When running online means ‘running virtually’

When running online means ‘running virtually’

I hardly do any runs over the weekend.  I probably did none in the whole of 2020 – thank Corona for that.  The very corona that had almost 4,813 confirmed cases and 294 deaths on planet earth as at March 11 last year, but now* (March 13, 2021) has afflicted 119,703,834 and killed 2,653,534 globally.  However, I still did manage two weekend runs, being the Kilimanjaro marathon on March 1 and the First Lady marathon in Nairobi on March 8.  After that…. my weekend runs were done.  Corona restrictions, including curfews, masks, social distancing, lockdowns and quarantines ensured that there were no other weekend runs since then.

*worldometers data

It is now one year later, and life has changed so much until I do not expect any more surprises in terms of changes that come about.  One of the changes that has changed our way of life is this new way of conducting meetings, due to social distancing and restrictions on maximum number at venues.  Previously, we had halls full of people, listening and seeing each other on-their-faces so to speak…. and even sorting each other out, depending on the gravity of the subject matter.  That was last year.  That was then.  Now is now.  The new way of having group meetings is now called ‘virtual’ or ‘online’.  It has its bad and ugly.  It is only good if you are the convener, since you must convene anyway, and this may help you to meet some obligation.  Every other aspect of the meeting relies on the bad and ugly of the reality of online meetings.

I have had many of these online meetings since last year.  They ‘sounded’ strange when I started attending them.  They still do, literally, with sound quality usually being a real issue to contend with.  Internet connectivity and the medium of hosting the meeting plays a big role in this aspect of how the meeting shall ‘sound’.  Additionally, the same online meetings ‘look’ different.  Participants are expected to show the visual of themselves (and surroundings) and it does not take long to see why ‘looks’ can deceive.

How many times have you observed a participant, in full view of hundreds of participants, do ‘things’ on video display that you would not expect, appreciate or even condone in some cases?  From bringing person grooming sessions to our view, to making faces and gestures to the camera.  From dancing around to making the meeting to be a family event, even if it is not meant to be.  And by family event, I do mean family event – from the crying young ones and feeding of the same online, from having family agreements (and disagreements), to letting in the whole family into ‘our business’ in the full glare of the lens.

While the visuals would requires an online participant to be keen so that nothing passes their observing eye, sound on the other hand permeates the air whether you are looking at the screen or not.  The speakers soon start crackling as you start hearing things.  You shall hear all manner of stuff during online meetings.  “Keep your microphones muted” is usually the first rule to be thrown out of the window during online meetings.  I believe people like hearing their own voices to confirm that they can still speak.  And did I even mention the echo that goes on and on when a participant is having full volume on their loudspeakers while the mic is on?  Such participants feel nothing!  To them it is just another day online!  Of course, you are also ‘entitled’ to hear all manner of things during those video moments– just add sound to the above scenarios.

I finally had to run into one such online meeting over a weekend and I was not expecting any less, in terms on what I would expect to see and hear.  The meeting did not disappoint!  It has it all.  Unmuted microphones turned out to be the first culprit from start to end of meeting.  That enable me and others to hear everything going on at the different places of the participants.  This included children playing around and even some livestock making their noises.  The video did not disappoint either!  We saw people make their hair, apply lipstick and on some occasions even dress up.  Did I not tell you that there would be no disappointment?  I just like online meetings!

“Keep your microphone muted” was repeated and repeated but that helped, not.  Those who were keen to keep the mics on, did, those who followed the expected etiquette of keeping them off did.  Life continued as was expected, reminder or no reminder.  People behaving in their own ways without a care in the world.  I do like online meetings…. already!

Another aspect of online meetings that did not disappoint was attending the meeting ‘virtually’ – literally virtually, to mean having the meeting by ‘not being there’.  Isn’t that the meaning of ‘virtually’ anyway?  Being at a place where I could observe two or three other participants in their offices, I was able to observe them switch on their computers and join the meeting alright.  I then saw them leave their offices, never to be seen again, despite the audio of the ongoing meeting coming out of their offices.  They had joined the meeting ‘virtually’… by not being there ‘physically’.

But do not take my word for it.  How do you explain the absence of a participant when they are called upon to respond to an issue during a meeting, before the convener gives that customary ‘sorry, they are not there’, when for sure we can see that their online presence is live and active?  Does it not just mean that they are not there anyway?  And finally, voting online is a fallacy.  The voting tools favor the tech-savvy, being those who are ‘well-connected’ and those with ‘quick hands’.  That is the only way you can vote using online tools with a two-minute time limit.  Apart from that, how do you even restrict people to vote only ‘any two’ out of four, when you have no control over the number of times they can vote?

Finally, though I had already stated my finally above, but this is surely the final ‘finally’.  So, finally, online meetings expect participants to participate by text messages on a forum.  The participants are expected to raise questions that should then be answered by the conveners.  This is where the final rip-off occurs!  The biggest scam since corona is right there!  The organizers of such meetings usually select the issues they are comfortable responding to, and blatantly ignore all the rest of the ‘weighty’ issues, brushing them aside as ‘there are no more issues on the chat box’!  

As we celebrate this new normal of online meetings, let us just be prepared to run them ‘virtually’, if you know what I mean.

WWB, the coach, Nairobi, Kenya, March 13, 2021