The Good, the Detailed and the Ugly

I have had a strangish task on my table the last few weeks and I finally got around to completing it today to "rave reviews" - which was essentially a lot of laughter. The task was to create a demo for a delivery that sales people could use as a model to learn from - except the learning experience would be to not do what I did. Essentially, there will be three remote delivery demos done using the same script by three different people, where one is good, one dives too deep into details and then mine, where the logistics are poorly delivered. The logistics of the demo are the use of highlight tools, zooming, desktop setup, application windows and the like.

I thought it was going to be really easy to deliver a bad demo, but it was quite hard, because I have so much practice delivering this kind of thing, that the physical actions are almost automatic. Breaking that routine and injecting "worst practices" was difficult, plus the script I was reading from was not written in "my" language, meaning the flow was awkward to wrap my mouth around.

My supervisor reviewed once I was ready and by three minutes into the 11 minute delivery, she messaged on how painful it is to watch.

PERFECT!

Normally of course, I don't want my delivery to make people cringe and feel uncomfortable, nor do I want them to be asking in their head, "what the hell was that for?" in regard to what I display, but the intention of this was to do just that. And, it is funny how little things matter, where for example when I moved to a browser, I had a couple of tabs that I didn't click on, but they had titles like "Job Search" and "Weird growth on shoulder" and while tiny on the screen, they stand out to anyone paying attention.

But, I also made sure that it was hard in places to pay attention, by explaining what didn't need to be explained, and highlighting and demoing what was obvious, just a little longer than required. Then, moved the mouse around randomly whilst speaking, hovering over things I wasn't talking about, finishing with a desktop full of random files to close out.

It was a masterclass in poor demoing technique and was a lot of fun to do, considering it was something that I also really didn't want to do, as I have so many other things on my plate currently. But, it was necessary and needed to be done fairly quickly and while I am terrible at polished, I am okay at minimal viable products.

However, I really hope that it is sufficiently bad enough that people will understand that it is meant to be a parody of a demo, as I have seen all of these things happen from professional people delivering to customers, and they seem oblivious to the effect it has. If they don't realize that it is purposefully bad, 50% of my company are going to think I am terrible at my job - which is about 50% more than those who currently think it.

But, for me personally, it was a nice "break" in daily routine from what I have been working on and I do think that it will make a memorable impact on the audiences that will see it. I was chosen on purpose for this bad version though, because as an Enablement manager, it is my role to do what it takes to get the job done and in this case, it means looking a bit like an idiot. I don't mind looking the fool, but hey, I don't have overly lofty career aspirations anyway.

Having said that though, at least at the company I work for, it is relatively relaxed and what is more important than saving face, is getting the job done and those who are able to laugh at themselves a bit and can survive being the butt of the joke, tend to do well enough. Is that the same everywhere, or is it cultural?

I guess at least for me, I don't have all of my identity tied to the jobs I do, which means even if people do think I am not professional enough, it isn't going to make me go home and cry into the pillow. I don't think many people think that anyway, but still, it is good to have an understanding of what our personal guidelines and limits are, and how we react under negative reactions to what we do. So many people seem to take criticism personally and react in kind - which in my opinion, is not a good look.

How we react to others reactions matter, but if we do not reflect on why they have those reactions to us in the first place, we can easily become blind to how poor our own processes may be. If we are doing things but not know why, we should probably not be doing them until we do. This is easier said than done, when what we do is reinforced by muscle memory and a lack of honest feedback.

Which is why we have to seek it out for ourselves.

This presentation I did is going to be consumed and torn apart by 300 people who have been asked to critique it - Even though I know "this isn't me" - it doesn't mean that it is going to be easy to take.