Sunset

Senior AE

What mistake / slip up have you made during a call or meeting that has caused extreme awkwardness?

Question is in the title.

Mine is where I was wrapping up a demo with a female client, did not realize I was still sharing my screen as I googled her name and continued to browse her LinkedIn, even clicked into her picture. The embarrassment when I realized was horrific. Have never made the mistake since.

Lets hear yours..

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38 comments

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Lumbergh

Politicker

Sr Account Exec

Slacked "what a fucking moron" to my SE after a prospect asked a really dumb question when my SE had his slack on "autopop" in the top right corner while screensharing with them live on the call.

Deal did not move forward.

Sunset

Politicker

Senior AE

I learned to turn off pop ups within my first week. Never know what could pop up next, leaving them on is playing with fire 😂

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

This is why you communicate only via text. And turn off screen notifications when presenting. Damn. 🤦‍♀️

BCD

Politicker

BDR

oh noooo!

SaaSguy

Tycoon

Account Executive

ha, i've done something similar slacked my colleague on the zoom who was sharing his screen "this guy is useless". Dude either did't notice or ignored it.

cw95

Politicker

Sales Development Lead

shiiitttt that is bad!

Rallier

Politicker

SDR Manager and Consultant

Not a bad one, but I was sharing my screen and forgot. Pulled up my notes and one of my notes was.

"is Cleveland Browns fan...yikes"

He thought it was hilarious

Sunset

Politicker

Senior AE

I'm sure he is immune to pain and used to disappointment. Great way to break the ice though haha

funcoupons

WR Officer

👑

Mines not as bad as yours but last week I pronounced a guys name as Wang instead of Wayne.

Sunset

Politicker

Senior AE

Hahaha brilliant. Made me laugh! I'm sure everyone has been called a wrong name at some point.

Annonny

Big Shot

Account Executive

I'm crying at yours!!....I left a voice mail by accident saying crazy motherf***er. To one of my coworkers...lol

CoorsKing

WR Officer

Retired King of the Coors Knights

Kept referring to them as the wrong account the whole call. Somehow they didn't notice or just didn't care.

I have butchered names more times than I can count, and definitely done the "share the wrong screen and show notes" goof as well.

Zoom meetings are fun.

SalesGal

Politicker

Account Executive

Oh I did that too ! Kept calling them the wrong company name and the name I was using was actually their competitor's company name...oops !

saaskicker

Celebrated Contributor

Enterprise AE

Had two different accounts join the same Zoom meeting last week by accident.

Two completely different industries, one produced content around guns the other produces kids content. Didn’t realize until about 5 minutes in and was like uh oh. Turns out the two prospects knew each other. Wild turn of events.

JuicyKlay

Celebrated Contributor

Called someone a she when they identified as a they. #awkward

funcoupons

WR Officer

👑

Awkward, but honestly how would you know?

Reminds me of the time I was a waitress, and had a new table in my section. I walked up to them without getting a good look at their faces but both people were of slight build with long hair. My introduction: "Hi ladies, welcome to (restaurant.) One was a guy. He definitely heard what I said.

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

😬😳

Yikes....

desperado

Politicker

Head of Sales

When I was an SDR my AE had her slack up on another screen. The opp was pretty far along, it was like the 3rd negotiation call. She was slacking me talking shit about how cheap this guy is and how ugly he is (pasted Linkedin profile pic in slack as if I can't see it myself).

The guy hops on zoom, AE opens up the screen, shares the SLACK SCREEN ONLY. His pic is right there. AE tried to drag another window over it but that didn't work, then tried to stop the screen share but it was too late. Prospect just hopped off the call and we never heard from him again. Lol

annonsales

Opinionated

Sales Development Representative

damn, that's savage

cw95

Politicker

Sales Development Lead

This is the worst one I have read.

marketingsucks

Member

Major Accounts

3 hours of back to back meetings, went to use the restroom mid-call with phone in back pocket...somehow magically phone came off mute...you can use your imagination as to what the call attendees heard. Lesson learned, add breaks in between calls.

cw95

Politicker

Sales Development Lead

hahaha, brilliant. The silent killer.

sneakysnek

Politicker

KCSM

Assumed the co-owners were married... apparently, that's how to offend a set of siblings

HoldemCaulfield

Politicker

Sales Training & Enablement

not totally the same but reminds me of The Office episode where Andy and Pam have to go out and do cold calls to clients and try to use her baby as theirs in some meetings, others not.

paddy

WR Officer

Director of Business Development

I’m perfect. Never made a mistake.

SaaSsy

Politicker

A newbie colleague asked what forms of payment we accept and someone answered throwing BTC in as a joke. She didn’t get it and immediately fwd to the prospect 🤣
Thought it was hysterical and signed the next day!

Bandos

Politicker

Seller Man

This wasn't a slip up I made, but I witnessed the "incident." For reference, this was during a Teams meeting in the military. It was essentially 100+ people on a conference call - some junior enlisted guy changed his username to that of the commanding officer and then screen shared his pornhub browser... It was a pretty chill sitch

alyshahzi

Celebrated Contributor

Sales Development Representative

He's savage wtf... hahaha

WenWest15

Valued Contributor

Principal Business Development Manager

"K! Talk soon, love you" at the end of a voicemail... mortification, but Client thought it was hilarious, and somewhat endearing.

exec

Acclaimed Answer

Account Executive

LOVE to gamble - especially during work. It's definitely been awkward to have online bookie tabs open or the classic scoreboard... have even accidentally shared a live baseball day game once or twice.

also didn't realize until recently people can see the reflection in my glasses over zoom... so probably plenty of people seeing

Unicorn.Hunter

Politicker

Enterprise Account Executive

referred to Chuck as Chucky because that's what my SE and I called him internally.. he did not like that

matty

Good Citizen

Sales Manager

Not a call/meeting but an email from my first SDR gig. Small little consultancy company submitted a demo request, and I replied to the lead opposed to my intention of forwarding on my thoughts to the AE I was supporting "they look like a complete waste of your time." Anyways, the lead ended up forwarding that note to both of the Co-Founders with an irate message.

The Co-Founders did not care as they were still spending that acquisition money, Head of Marketing was pissed, but already had another gig lined up and gave notice a day later... to the Head of Marketing who was the interim manager while we were scheduled to chat about what I did.

Aaronlovessales

Opinionated

Financial advisor

Wrong name is always a classic

HoldemCaulfield

Politicker

Sales Training & Enablement

sent a prospect a message on Linkedin about a time to take a call. when we had the call, I said, "we'll be in Charlotte soon --- trying to get the 'we'll be in your neighborhood meeting' (though we weren't). He said, "____, I'm in Cleveland."

Stopped talking to me after that. Good thing we didn't already book flights to Charlotte (or Cleveland).

eatthefrog

Politicker

Sales Development Representative

Asking the GK to speak to a someone at a firm who is clearly deceased...

Kinonez

Celebrated Contributor

War Room Enthusiast

Thought I was mutted and said something in spanish to a friend and the AE had to mute me while the prospect answerd the question in spanish thinking it was for him

cw95

Politicker

Sales Development Lead

The classic every fucking day - Hey how you doing? 'Yeah, I'm well how about you?' Yeah I'm good how you doing?'. What?

cw95

Politicker

Sales Development Lead

I did have a meeting, internally, where I had to share my screen and I didn't realise LinkedIn was on the screen.

I was chatting to my mate on it and said to him 'Mate, work is so fucking boring'.

My team plus two new teammates saw that message as it was popped up and open.

They saw the funny side as I said 'i was having a bad day'. But Jesus, my stomach dropped.

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Sunset

What mistake / slip up have you made during a call or meeting that has caused extreme awkwardness?

38 comments

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