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Hi ala,
Every week I host Speaker Friend Fridays. Dozens of speakers from all over the world join to talk about speaking. I do an intro and basically ride herd on the conversation, so I wasn’t too worried when I woke up sick last week.
I started the call and minimized my talking role. Our agenda is 15 second introductions, discussion and Q&A, and then breakout rooms. I just needed to make it to the breakout room portion and I'd be home-free.
I was millimeters away from the breakout rooms...this close. Cough. Cough. I'm trying to name the rooms. Cough. Cough. Cough. Cough. I muted myself and turned off the camera while trying to type.
Cough. Cough. Cough. COUGHCOUGHCOUGHCOUGH.
Some people realized what was happening and someone spoke up. "I think Bobbie is coughing but the breakout rooms are open." And with a few well wishes, everyone disappeared. PHEW.
My husband took over and greeted everyone when they returned. Everyone finally got to meet the Bringer of Caffeine. (My husband graciously refreshes my coffee when I am trapped in back-to-back Zoom meetings.) He's also overheard me host more than 6 years of weekly Speaker Friend Friday events, so he knew the drill.
After the debacle at the morning event, I called in reinforcements from my team for the later calls. We managed to get through the day but I was mortified.
I’ve seen speakers fall off the stage. And fall both up and down the stairs getting to the stage. I’ve seen speakers stand stock still on stage, completely lost. I’ve seen speakers drop things. Important, fragile things. I saw one speaker drop the clicker and accidentally kick it off the stage into the audience. I’ve seen speakers faint. Computers freeze. Once the lights went out…and a very audible expletive came from the vicinity of the stage.
All kinds of things happen onstage and we’re still here to tell the tale and laugh about it later.
Bobbie and the entire Innovation Women team
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