I flew in to give a product demo to some higher-ups in the company. What was supposed to be a simple demo between me, my manager, and the program manager morphed into a major event. Other program managers were invited, then the vice president, and then the president -- all for what I hoped would be a low-key, informal demo. For a relatively green employee, this was a daunting assignment -- to sit in a conference room with ALL your superiors to showcase the product that you've been working on for the past few months. To make it slightly more awkward, it's even a product in which I only reluctantly involved myself initially.
So, here I am, in this darkened conference room cast in gray hues by the projector lamp, giving a spiel to all these people, many of whom are twice my age and twice my experience. Everything seems to be going well as a get started, but about 5 minutes in, I look over and see the President, head on his chest, eyes closed. My heart totally skips a beat, and I stumble a little, but soldier on. Everyone else seems pretty interested, with a lot of questions, and even the president asks a few in his moments of alertness, but every once in a while I notice out of the corner of my eye that he seems to have dozed off again.
When it's all over, everyone seems really pleased and surprised that the product has turned out so well and so far under budget. It's actually quite a coup, but I still have mixed feelings because of my narcoleptic supreme leader. My concerns are assuaged, however, when I run into my manager a few hours later, and he explains that, in fact, the Prez falls asleep in nearly every meeting and product demo they do. My sigh of relief was probably audible when I heard that.
I can handle a over-tired company president. At least he's not Ron Burgundy.
Stay classy, San Diego.
Do you know how cool you are for having a picture of Ron Burgundy on your blog? It's pretty much incalculable...
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