Welcome back to Long-Distance
Worklife, where we help you lead, work and thrive in remote and hybrid teams.
I'm Marisa Eikenberry, a fellow remote worker.
And joining me is my co-host and remote work expert, Wayne Turmel.
That would be me. Hi.
How are you? I'm great.
How are you?
I'm great.
It feels like a million years since we have recorded one of these.
So this could be fun.
Or it could be a car wreck.
This is the joy of recording live, right?
Yeah.
I was going to say, I mean, for those that are now scared,
if you're first time listeners, do not shut this off,
but that being said,
today we're actually going to talk about acceptable meeting behaviors.
So we actually got this survey sent to us by our boss, Kevin.
And so it's a 2023 YouGov survey that was done of
just different, acceptable or unacceptable leading behaviors.
And they start off with just behaviors in general.
And then we actually go into generational stuff.
But now just to clarify,
for the mere mortals out there who can't read our minds,
YouGov is
essentially this is a survey, internal survey of U.S.
federal workers in all the branches,
all the divisions, all the stuff right.
Now, lots and lots of people.
Context. Yeah, exactly.
And one of the first things that they did talk about,
which we've talked about before, you know, we mentioned remote work, is that
while we would like to think that this is a majority of the population,
the majority of the population is not remote working.
But they talked about 32% of Americans participate
in virtual meetings for work and 37% for like personal calls.
So so that's where we're going with this.
But Wayne, were there any that kind of stuck out to you from this first,
you know, acceptable, not acceptable, graphic.
And for those of you that are watching, I'm going to have this up on the screen.
Yeah, I think if we look at the general numbers,
we're not getting generational or granular on this, just in general.
Certain things make sense, right?
Having a TV on in the background,
smoking, although that's interesting.
Okay.
So why is it interesting to you?
Well, it says a whole lot more about
where society is gone than where the meetings have gone.
Because if we think about why
smoking was banned in the workplace,
second hand smoke
being rude and blowing smoke in somebody's face,
all of that good stuff.
A lot of people take remote meetings in the privacy
of their own home or a hotel room, wherever they happen to be.
And secondhand smoke is not an issue.
You cannot catch secondhand smoke.
Right through.
Zoom. That is true.
So I think that says more about the fact
that people just don't want anybody smoking at all.
Whether or not it's rude on a meeting.
Now, some of that is I come from the generation
where I can remember people smoking in meetings.
Yeah, See that? I can't remember.
I was old enough to still remember smoking in restaurants
and there being a section for both.
And of course, I live in Las Vegas where you can still do that.
All right.
Well,
and then for our audio listeners, so for smoking,
they said, you know, 75% of those surveyed said it's not acceptable in any meeting,
while 12% said it's acceptable in informal meetings.
And five said it's, 5% said it's acceptable in any meeting.
Yeah.
One of the interesting things I found about this report
is that there is an increasing,
especially among people
under older than dirt.
There is an increasing gap between what it's
okay to do in an informal meeting, you know teammates a teammate
than in a formal meeting where you're doing a sales presentation
or you have a customer on the line or whatever that works out to.
I think that is interesting.
yeah, for sure.
And where you find that a lot is,
is it okay to have a child or a pet in your lap?
Right.
And interestingly, more people find it acceptable
to have a pet in your lap than a kid in your lap,
which in a strange way makes sense.
It really does.
But, you know, I can remember
when remote work started to catch on.
If you wanted to know whether or not somebody worked remotely on a regular
basis or not, you'd be on a conference call and a dog would bark.
And the people who worked
remotely would say, say hi to Bailey for me.
And the people who didn't work remotely were like,
Is that a dog?
Like they'd never heard a dog before?
Right.
And so I think that gap between
formal and informal, if I'm just talking to you,
you know, I don't care.
Right, Right, Exactly.
Like Max Barks. And it's fine.
Yeah.
Max barks Or he jumps in my lap
and I hold him up and go say hi to Auntie Marisa.
Right, right. Right.
Yeah.
My husband drops in behind me, and I'm just like, my God, Go away.
And I'm going, Hi, Parker.
Right.
Say hi to Uncle Ray.
So I think some of those are really interesting
where you start to see some gaps.
Is. Is it okay to eat?
Right? Right. Is it okay to drink?
There is a percentage of humans and I'm looking for it.
And I'm wondering who these evil people are. 3%.
No, it's not 3%.
It's.
I'm looking for
drinking and nonalcoholic drinks.
Yeah.
So 17% say it's not acceptable in any medium.
53% say it's acceptable in any meeting.
And 22 say only informal meetings.
Yeah.
The Geneva Convention says people are allowed hydration.
Right.
Like I remember looking at this would be like,
I don't think I have ever been bothered by somebody taking a drink ever.
I can understand not wanting to be on a meeting
and it's not a happy hour and like, they're clearly drinking a beer.
Like, that's a problem.
I get that.
But like, I have a soda with me
all the time and I drink it in meetings all the time.
And I never thought about it being a problem until I saw that.
Well, until we hold the intervention.
Well, you know,
it could be worse.
So, you know, if we look at it, it's
not really surprising what people think is acceptable and unacceptable.
I suppose.
It gets interesting around
formal and informal meetings.
Right.
And I have been on informal meetings.
And again, everything is context, right?
Right. I belong to a writer's group.
We used to regularly have cocktails during our meetings.
Yeah.
If we're talking about it, work.
I have had meetings with people overseas
who, you know, are taking the meeting out of the kindness of their heart.
But it's after dinner
and they have a glass of wine or a beer with them as we're having it.
And it doesn't bother me. Right.
First of all, they're the customer.
What am I going to say? Okay.
But also, it's an informal discussion.
And I want
I want a heightened level of informality
because I think you communicate better that way.
Right. Yeah.
I mean, I've been on some, you know, virtual happy hour stuff with sorority
sorority meetings or webinars or whatever.
And it's just like, yeah, like it's 9:00.
If I have a cocktail, it's fine.
If they have a cocktail, it's fine.
Now, one of the ones which is very personal to me because and
people who regularly view this don't know this,
but I wear hats a lot.
I thought about you when I saw the.
Different types of hats,
but you'll notice that nobody on this
podcast has ever seen me wearing a hat because I differentiate
between work Wayne and Wayne in the rest of my life.
However, the one time I do wear a hat on a work call
is because I live on the West Coast.
My day starts way earlier than everybody else's.
And if somebody's not necessarily a client,
but if somebody on our team or somebody like that
calls a meeting for 9:00 Eastern
time, there is a pretty good chance
I am not going to be showered and presentable.
Right.
And so I can throw on a shirt that's not a big deal,
but all off and put on a baseball cap just so I don't look like Albert Einstein.
Well, I thought it was interesting, too, when I was seeing that, because, you know,
we had a team member
that she wore hats frequently and that was just part of her style.
That was just how she was.
And I was never bothered by it.
When I would see out, it was usually a wow, like that.
That's cool hat.
I hadn't seen or wear that one before or something like that.
So I definitely found it interesting
it being on this because it is an issue.
Most people who wear hats do it as a cheap attempt at branding and difference.
Yeah, it's just myself included. Right.
So that
particular person that was part of her wacky.
Yeah, That was her.
Laid back style and it was great.
One of the things that is important,
if you're going to do that, though, and baseball caps are a problem for this,
is they affect the lighting over your eyes and very often
make it hard for people to see your eyes.
And that can be a problem.
Right. And I can totally see that right.
Now where things get ugly
as we look at that
is generationally. Yes.
What people find acceptable and what they don't.
I used to think I was pretty cool.
And and I do
differentiate between formal and informal meetings.
Right.
And since extremely formal has never been my style.
I'm fairly relaxed
about some things, sometimes more than I should be.
And I am a child of my generation.
Right. Okay, So give us an example.
I'm 62 years old, right?
I'm looking at where there's a huge difference
in what's acceptable and what's unacceptable.
You know, walking around the room
during the meeting.
Right.
There is no reason not to do that.
I'm when I'm in the conference room,
I very often because my joints ache and stuff and I have
the attention span of an Irish setter, so I have to burn off energy.
So I'll stand and move to the back of the room. Right.
Stand against the back wall or something while the meeting is going on.
I tend not to do that on virtual meetings,
but I think that's largely a function
of my camera setup.
Right.
I'm on camera most of the time.
If it's a telephone call, I'll walk down.
There are there are ruts in our carpet from where
I pace and walk during a comp during a telephone call.
Right.
But generally
speaking, I'm a little more particularly
if it's a camera meeting, I'm a little more traditional.
Like now.
I'll sit there like a good boy and do it.
Yeah, I do it too.
And I have been on meetings
or even streams that I watch where like, people have gotten up.
And I think for me the issue is less that they've gotten up.
It's that their mic is set up for that.
And so now they're talking, I can't hear you.
You know what's worse?
I just realized when I want to throttle the person.
Okay.
Not that I would.
Because you're virtual, so you're.
Actually laying hands on another human being is wrong.
It's okay to want to just don't do it
that way.
But the big one for
me and it's because I never do this, is I,
I don't do face time or meetings,
especially work meetings on my phone.
When I'm having a conversation, a webcam conversation
with they're on their phone and they're walking,
and it's like
being on the deck of the Titanic.
Like, it's super distracting.
Well, not only that, but, like, okay, I'm.
Somebody gets motion sick, really easy.
And still, I literally cannot watch people do that.
Like, I know it's a thing.
And we've we've had people on our own team that have done that occasionally.
And I'm just like, I literally have to hide your camera
because otherwise I'm a puke all over the.
Yeah.
I am surprised that that wasn't mentioned in this list.
Yeah.
I mean, it was I don't know, you know,
the problem with surveys is
they people answer the question that you ask.
Right. Right.
Nobody says, by the way.
Yeah. This drives me crazy, too.
I think the biggest one
and this is true of the workplace in general, which gets
generational conflict is what you're wearing on your call.
Right.
Yeah. So.
So is it okay to wear your pajamas, you know?
Do you wear what you sleep in on a zoom meeting?
And, you know, I sleep naked, so the answer is no.
Thank you.
Welcome to another edition of too much information.
Like, unplug my headphones about.
Do not need to know. But.
But it drives me crazy.
My daughter wears pajamas.
24 seven.
She goes to the grocery store in a onesie.
No. It drives me insane.
Well, she's about a year younger than me. Yes.
Okay.
See, I was also the weird person, and I will confess, I'm weird
that I wouldn't go to college classes in pajamas,
and I felt like it was very respectful or disrespectful When.
Why would somebody.
Go to college classes in pajamas?
Why would you leave your dorm room?
We had 8 a.m.
classes and I was like the only one in jeans.
I Yeah.
But now you're an old soul. That is true.
So, you know, I can appreciate that.
That's. That's why I adore you.
But it's not.
But, Jim, is there, like, an obvious example?
Correct.
Right. Right.
But what do you wear on a call?
And again, context matters.
Right. Right.
If I'm working from home and because I'm always working from home
and you have a question and we have to get on a zoom or
whatever, call real quick.
If I'm in my gym shorts, you know, if I'm not dressed
100% professionally, it doesn't matter because it's you and me.
It's going to be a five minute conversation and we're out. Yep.
If I'm in front of a customer, a.
Totally different ballgame.
You know, from the hips up,
I need to be dressed like an adult.
Right.
I have worn a shirt, tie and cargo shorts.
I have done that more than once.
That's okay.
The customer doesn't see it. Yeah.
I mean, I've occasionally done that where I've had yoga pants and, like,
something really nice or there when it's really cold in my office.
I have one of those like, Snuggie blanket
things that, I mean, like I it's, it's Navy blue.
I put on it.
I look like Cookie Monster.
Like it's a thing, but it's super warm.
But you better believe if I'm sitting here and working with it on
and you or Kevin or somebody else is like, Hey, we have a meeting real quick.
It's Hey, can you give me a second?
And I will remove that because I do have standards.
Yeah.
And I think that goes to a larger conversation which is worth
having someday about formality or informality in the workplace.
Right.
I was working with 45 h.r.
People at a client yesterday,
and we were talking about
what are the things that they're dealing with and dress code
and a appropriate and inappropriate
clothing in the workplace
has bloomed as a problem.
Yeah, I've seen it in sorority meetings sometimes, too.
And i'm like this is supposed to be business wear,
and you have a denim skirt on.
Like, we would have set them home if it was
when I was in, but it was like, Well, we can't say that now.
Yeah, it's interesting.
I just go back to what somebody told me, just post-COVID
when people were coming back and she goes, They've gone feral.
Right.
Like there used to be because the workplace
was I mean, it was largely homogenous.
But even if it wasn't homogenous demographically,
there were just codes and the way things were done
and they were the way things have been done for 100 years.
And you had work clothes and you had plain clothes.
Right, Right.
It's like going to school.
I had school clothes and plain clothes. They weren't the same.
And when we worked from
home, the it wasn't just that you're home.
You can wear whatever the heck you want,
but the social pressure about what you wore went down.
So even now, men
who wear suits to the office rarely wear a tie.
Yeah, like they'll wear a jacket, button down shirt.
I mean, they'll look. They still look nice.
But they're not wearing, you know, the double Windsor at their throat.
And I think that
what that does and this gets back to the Spider-Man paradox, right?
With great power comes great responsibility is
just because you can dress a certain way
or act a certain way or get away with doing something
online that you can't or wouldn't
do in the office doesn't mean you should.
Right.
I mean, there's still a level of respect, both for yourself and for whomever
you're on the call with.
And, you know, yes, you are a grown person.
Yes. You can make your own choices.
You know, it's the whole thing about do you get dressed
in work, appropriate attire in the morning.
Right.
Even when nobody's going to see you. Right.
There is evidence psychologically that it affects how you think
and how you work in your level of professionalism.
And there are plenty of people who say, shut up, old man, my onesie is fine
and it doesn't affect the outcome of my
spreadsheet.
Right.
Like, I know some people that they feel like even when they're
working from home, I'm going to wear shoes because for them, like even just having,
you know, whatever they're wearing, having shoes is the thing that helps them
be productive. I am not one of those people.
I will admit I'm barefoot right now and have a blanket on my lap,
but I'm still appropriately dressed.
And so senior notes.
Send your notes to Wilma Flintstone here.
Right.
But like I would have been even without this podcast,
because that's just I'm just a.
From the house down.
It's the Wild West.
You could do whatever you want from the bellybutton up.
You better look like you're working.
A couple of things.
We are way past time and we have had an inordinate amount of fun, and
I think there are some important things to think about this right?
Where do the generational differences?
Right.
If I'm going to coach somebody about their appearance or their demeanor.
Am I doing it because it's a valid business reason?
Am I doing it because I am an old man?
Right? Right.
That is a conversation worth having
when it's you and I talking.
The level of formality is much lower than when I'm talking to a client.
And it should be right. Right.
If you are inappropriately informal
in a important business meeting.
Right. The VP is on the call.
Yeah.
Your AC DC T-shirt may not be the best choice,
but again, it's incumbent on us.
Yes, the rules are changing.
Yes, they are more flexible than they ever were.
And what is the minimum professional standard
in your industry, on your team, in your organization?
Absolutely.
And those are the things we need to think about.
Look at me wrapping all this up, trying real hard to sound like
we've had a professional discussion
instead of venting, which we've largely been discussed.
And that being said, if you would like to know how to be
more professional in your meetings and remote work, you can check out
our long distance leadership series at Kevin Ikenberry, dot
com slash LDL s.
Thank you for listening to the long work life
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And tell us.
Tell us your meeting. Yes. Are we right?
Are we wrong?
Am I a grungy, grumpy old man yelling at clouds, or do I have a point?
Am I just an old soul?
Don't know how to act at 32 inches your shoes.
Darn it.
I might slip.
Or sometimes
when my feet are cool,
thick you for joining us, everybody.
And as Wayne likes to say, don't let the weasels get you down.