Communicating Online

Coronavirus has introduced social distancing, sheltering in place, and remote working into our culture this spring.  And for many of us, this is impacting our normal communications.  A friend of mine recently lamented how much he preferred presenting to a live audience vs a zoom webinar.

I had a similar experience in February.  I needed to create short, online modules to support my collaboration/teaming services.  Each module had two videos about 2-4min in length.  When I went to record the videos, I froze.  Anxiety took over.  I was shocked.  The initial results were awful and I was dejected. 

With encouragement from a team member and my spouse, I kept at it.  I used my imagination to visualize the people on the other end of these modules.  I saw the human beings watching, and I sought a voice that would feel like a 1:1 conversation with each person.  A voice that was authentically me.  The videos got better, and the process become easier.  The result was good enough, and the modules are launched. 

This has also helped me in Zoom calls this spring.  Instead of talking to a screen, I’m looking at their video, talking to them and being animated with my body language and face.  And it has helped me on my phone calls too.  Even though we cannot see each other, I’m still animated with my body and face.  I was once told people can hear you smile through the phone.  I believe it. 

It was a reminder of how hard something is the first time.  Brene Brown refers to these as FFTs (F&@king first times).