The most scariest time of the year
Meeting season…*shudder!*…
January through mid April is meeting season – the time of year when we bring our entire sales force together for a
series of conferences. The meetings are part recognition for the past year, part motivational and part butt kicking so they are all on the same page going into the new year. My company is large enough that each distribution channel will have it’s own meeting, and some meetings are reserved only for the super elite sales force.
So anyway, as you can see it’s
all very complicated and my department’s job is to help pull these meetings together. The meeting planners – bless their weary souls – handle all the logistics of the what, where and when. The editors – myself included – write scripts, PowerPoints, articles, bios, meeting booklets and pretty much handle any and all written materials.
Meeting season, in a word, is
heinous! I feel it sneaking up on me like the monster that stands behind you in a dark room and breathes down the back of your neck…and not in a good way.
BLOG READER: Surely, meeting season can’t be that bad.
DMG: I’m tellin’ ya – it really really is that bad…and don’t call me Shirley.
Once bitten, twice shy
Let’s review. This year will be my third meeting season. Last year a
friend and co-worker died during meeting season,
Grief is like a hangover. Now, I’m not blaming his death on meeting season itself but his passing certainly didn’t help change my opinion.
The year before was my first meeting season. It was stressful for all the obvious reasons – first time writing for a VP. Oh, and then there was the little added bonus of MY HAIR FALLING OUT! No joke. My
immune system went wacko and thought my hair was an invading foreign body. It’s something the doctors call alopecia areata or as I affectionately call it, “…the weird thing that made my hair fall out and nobody knew why...”
Thankfully, it never got to the point where other people noticed (the
crying jags were a different story) and yes my hair did grow back. I haven’t had any trouble since (knock on wood). Maybe it was the stress. Maybe it would have happened whether it was meeting season or not. I don’t know - but the point is it happened during meeting season.
It could be worse – it could be rainingI have come to expect nothing but the absolute worst possible scenario when it comes to this time of year. And even
if no one dies or my hair doesn’t fall out again there is always the general stress and how some people can be when they are stressed out.
Everyone deals with stress in their own way.
I make jokes or when things get really bad I knuckle under and hide in my cube until the work load lightens up. I also go out of my way to be extra super nice and appreciative of other people when I’m stressed simply because I can’t stand it when people take their bad mood out on me.
Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for other people in our department. They get stressed, they get busy, tempers grow short and you would think by the way they act (
Drama Queens and Departmental Divas) they are the only stressed out, busy people on the whole floor.
…sigh…
I feel like a prize fighter lacing up my gloves. Even if I win the bout, I know I’m still going to take a beating. So I'm writing this post - part therapy, part venting - thinking if I name my fears and write them down then maybe it won't be as scary as I think it's going to be.
A taste of paradise
