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My son is beyond the age where I need to worry about him interrupting a Zoom call but I do recall the day when he was a toddler, and I hung up on a potential client because the kid was about to do a swan dive off the brick barbecue onto the concrete. Let’s just say that little ones have and will always find a way to interrupt our work from home.
But during the pandemic, Zoom is frequently necessary to keep teams on track and clients satisfied. We all want to be professional, but how do you avoid family interruptions and what do you do if your kid does show up to your Zoom meeting?
Plan ahead for your calls and talk to your kids beforehand
Find a space — or create one — to have some privacy during your call
Set up a work zone. While not everyone has the space to have a home office, create an area that is just for work. This might be a corner of the dining room table or a desk in the corner of your livingroom. Give your kids a tour of the space and make it clear that this is mommy's place to be uninterrupted. This will curb some of the interruptions, but don't stop there.
Have a conversation about calls
When we’re home, it’s natural for kids (especially younger ones) to want all of our attention and they will do what they can to get it. Long before you start a Zoom meeting, explain to your kids that you have work-time that requires you to be on calls. Remind them about what work does for the family: it pays for the house, it buys them food, and affords them nice toys and without work those things are at risk.
Depending on the age of your children, they might just get it. After all, my teenager is less likely to interrupt my Zoom calls than I am to interrupt his. With younger kids, you’ll have to back the conversation up with a plan.
Find ways to keep your kids busy during your meeting
Before you get on the Zoom call, remind your kids about the conversation you had about work-time and your need to get through the call. Make sure to provide them with enough to do independently while you are on the call. Consider having a snack prepared and let them know that you’ll look at all their progress as soon as you are done with the call.
Some parents have resorted to leaving a note on the door. In fact, creative mom Jennifer Walden had her two children help her with the door signage. “What I did was had my girls help me make a little door hanger out of construction paper and poster board," she told Mom.com. "One side is green and says Come On In, the other is red and says Text Me First. When I'm going into a Zoom meeting, I flip it to the red side. That way they know to text me before coming in.”
This is a great way to engage your kids in the solution and talk about why it’s necessary. It helps to set the ground rules for Zoom meetings and when and why they can interrupt you.
Things happen! Keep your cool if you do get interrupted
If you feel ashamed and embarrassed, you’ll increase your child’s anxiousness and stress level. A quick and direct apology may apply if you had to refocus your attention momentarily, but don’t repeatedly apologize for your child interrupting a Zoom call. Before the pandemic in 2017, we all fell in love with the Kelly family as dad, Robert, was doing a live interview on television from his home office when his toddlers bolted in. Kelly was noted saying, “Our children were 9 months and 4 years old, respectively, at the time. I cannot imagine trying to coordinate anything this complicated with children of that age. Sorry, it was just a legitimate family blooper.”
Mr. Kelly was super cool through the entire escapade which lasted what must have seemed like an eternity until his wife wrangled the kids. He continued his interview with the undertone of, "Nothing to see here. Just a dad and his kids getting it done." And that is what we should aspire for in terms of our attitude when kids do interrupt us.
Interruptions are bound to happen, so it couldn't hurt to have a pre-emptive talk with your supervisor. "If you're expected to do professional work from home, stay in touch with your boss about how and when you expect to get things done," Dr. Laura Markham advised on Psychology Today. "Your boss knows that you and everyone else now has kids to deal with and will give you some slack, especially if you answer communications in a timely way and set reasonable expectations about when you will get to things that are asked of you."
Let’s face it, we all know there is some unwritten zoom meeting etiquette. But superseding that is the knowledge that we are all facing work-from-home, school-from-home scenarios in unprecedented ways. Address your child if necessary and then continue on with your meeting.
And if your child insists on sitting on your lap, well, that just might be the winning edge you need for your meeting. That moment when I hung up on a potential client left me embarrassed to call him back. I was shocked when he laughed and said, “You have your priorities set right,” and awarded me the gig. You’re a mom with a wonderful family — embrace that even when working.
