A couple of weeks ago I was innocently getting some pages off the printer when I heard Jamison say “I’ll do it if Bofenkamp does it with me.”
Me: “What? Huh? Will there be alcohol?”
CG explained that they were asking Jamison to host an event during our Regional Kickoff meeting that some of our vendors were kind enough to sponsor. Attendees would be 150 marketing folks from Home Office and the Regions (all across the US.) Jamison was smart enough to realize that it would be painful to just have one person standing up there and as he tells it he was trying to think of who he could have do it with him when he saw me at the printer (tragically located next to his cube.) I’m not sure if besides being convenient he chose me because we do tend to turn in to Beavis and Butthead or because someone secretly messaged him to say I’m completely powerless against peer pressure or he just has a personal vendetta against me.
Now what we signed on for was to stand up in front of everyone and introduce a few folks during the course of two hours. We did not sign up for a five minute introduction and three more five minute installments where we were to ‘kill time’ in addition to introducing four lip sync groups, three judges and six presenters over the course of two hours.
Regional Marketing has gotten about 30 new employees in the last year so someone decided to haze them (believe it or not, it wasn’t me.) They were split in to four groups of 7-9 people each based on geography except for the group of fresh-out-of-college kids. They actually did a really good job considering how hard it is to practice when your teammates are two states away. The judges were three vendors who, without any pre-warning other than to treat their responsibilities like American Idol judges totally bought in to their Simon Cowell (female but she brought a British accent and bitchiness), Randy Jackson (dawg) and Paula Abdul (that was a nice dance, I’m hungry) roles which they weren’t aware of until we introduced them that way.
Jamison and I also decided to introduce the six presenters with the names of singers (the awards they were giving out are called GRMMYs, I don’t remember why.) So we had Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga, Beyoncé and Jay Z (EVERYONE wanted to be Beyoncé) and Elton John and Kiki Dee (Don’t Go Breaking My Heart.) We did clear it with them first – the guy playing Elton OWNED it, sashaying down the aisle with a martini. They all totally bought in to their roles and it was hysterical.
Fortunately I had been talking to my doctor who FINALLY had a magic pill for me (I’m constantly asking her for one.) Turns out there is a pill for stage fright – Propranolol. I had to laugh because I was chowing down on pizza and enjoying my beverage 30 minutes prior and Jamison, who had talked me in to this and been pumping me up for days couldn’t eat OR drink a thing!
The feedback afterwards has been very positive although when people tell you that you almost crossed the line but didn’t, you have to wonder if you really did. However, people did seem to be genuinely laughing, and not just politely. That said, we did bad impressions of co-workers, worse jokes and a Top 10 list comparing Regional Marketing to the Entertainment Industry (it was the GRRMYs, after all) and referenced both the Graduate (Mrs. Robinson) and Deliverance so maybe we did cross that line a tiny bit but we had a disclaimer.
And our badges still worked the next day so I guess it’s all good…
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