'My six-word outburst on work call left me humiliated – I thought I was on mute' – The Mirror
A man was left horrified when he made an outrageous outburst during a work meeting when he thought he was on mute – and now he’s worried his colleagues will tell his boss
Getting caught doing something you shouldn't on a work call is everyone's worst nightmare.
For those of us who started working from home during lockdown, sitting down for a shift in our pyjamas and taking impromptu tea breaks has become the new normal. Being comfortable while you work is never a bad thing, but it does mean that when the time comes to hop into a team meeting via video call, you can sometimes make mistakes you wouldn't normally make, as you forget that your colleagues can actually see you.
That's exactly what happened to one man who recently admitted he made the cardinal sin of work calls and forgot he wasn't on mute. The anonymous man was left humiliated when he vented his frustrations with a colleague out loud thinking that no one could hear him – only for the people on the call to fall silent.
In a post on Reddit, the man said he was in a meeting when a colleague began messaging him "on the side" asking when he was free for a one-on-one meeting. After getting frustrated with his colleague's incessant questions, he angrily stated that he wished the other person would "check his f***ing calendar" – before realising he wasn't muted.
He wrote: "Someone was messaging me on the side asking if I could meet at certain times (my very limited free time is on my calendar). I yell in pure frustration, 'Jesus Christ, check my f***ing calendar!'. The meeting got really quiet and I realised what happened. I just gave a little sheepish 'My bad, thought I was muted' and went silent. The person I was yelling about messaged me on the side and apologised, which made me feel even worse.
"I apologised and said it was very unprofessional. I tried to explain how I am really stressed with deadlines (I am) and was venting but I still feel like a total a**, which is accurate. This was a smaller group of decent people so I don't think anyone will complain to my boss or anything like that, I just get to live with my embarrassing f**k up."
Commenters on the post sympathised with the man's embarrassing moment, but many of them told him to always act like he's not on mute when on a work call to avoid these issues in the future.
One person said: "I treat Zoom meetings like firearms, always loaded – as long as the meeting is on, I'm not muted, even if I am. The camera can see me, even if it's off," while another added: "Some times you need to scream into the void to maintain your sanity. You just have to make sure the void is actually empty."
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