I totally get it. If you say something, then you become the problem...and everyone's going to hear about it. I don't think you can say anything and still be the nice one. Tolerance is key to being successful....that's been my experience.

The senior person in the group should have a private word with this person. Not in front of the whole group. Reminds me of the president of the company my husband worked for many years ago, In a private, all-male setting, he would scratch private parts, not knowing he was doing it. Someone had to pull him aside and point it out. Never did it again, far as we know.

Wow. Have things changed since I was in the workforce. There would be no eating oatmeal in a meeting at work, and you ARE working, even if it's from home. I could see once in a while it happening in a jam, but every day? I would privately talk/email the person. Make it about eating while in meeting, not the eating with your mouth full, to solve the problem.

Thanks everyone. I swear I'm not normally a crabby wench. LOL. However there is something just so gross to me, watching someone share their half eaten food for everyone's visual delight. Ha.

Deeinohio - that story actually helped me a bit. The sounds of coffee being slurped, or a hard candy rattling around in someone's mouth don't bother me. But you politely reminded me that we all have our quirks.

Sushipup - would you believe my very first boss in my very first real job out of college not only used to scratch from the outside - he would reach down his underpants and shift it around!!! The first time he did it I couldn't believe what I was seeing. My longer term colleagues regaled me with stories of all the various times he inappropriately decided to shift his bits. LOL. I truly think that he had no clue he was doing it - and there again is another bad habit someone really should have stopped him from doing at some point during his long career.

Now I'm wondering what I do that annoys everyone else around me...

Oooh - Bunny for the win. Bless you kind soul!!!!

I love that idea, thank you!!

"...stick a small post-it note over him" LOL That's hilarious!

Hilarious and effective, I love it. That's the power of this group, I figured someone would come through with a better idea for me. :)

Ugh I am so sorry you're having to deal with that. It would drive me crazy to start my work day seeing someone chew with their mouth open every single day. Gross. I don't know that there is a polite way to tell someone to knock it off. A grown up should know to chew with their mouth closed, but I've definitely seen a few in my lifetime that somehow never learned that lesson.

One other option might be to somehow institute a camera off if eating during meeting policy. To be honest, that's what nearly everyone at my company does. If for some reason one has to eat during a meeting, the polite thing is to keep your camera off and your mic muted. It shouldn't be a regular thing, but it happens occasionally around lunch time at my work because we have people in different time zones, and often people get scheduled back to back mid-day leaving the poor person with no time for lunch. Not sure what meeting technology you're using, but maybe you could keep a sticky note at home to strategically place over the eater's face during the morning meeting. No one has to know.

On the subjects of male executive scratching, my current CEO had a tendancy to adjust his bits in front of the entire company (back when we used to have in person meetings). He does not use his hands, but it was very obvious what he was doing and he would do it nearly every company meeting, sometimes multiple times. He's probably still doing it today, we just can't see it over video conference.

Oh boy - I love Bunny's solution!

I was thinking that if this person doesn't have the presence of mind to realize it's rude to eat on camera during a work meeting (or really during any video call), it's no surprise they don't seem to realize it's rude to laugh with a mouthful of food in front of people too - clearly lacking awareness of good etiquette.

A rule for everyone might be a solution, but if this is the only person eating during the meeting, they might notice.

At least they're not taking the camera into bathroom too...

Seeing oatmeal in someone’s mouth would make me dry heave.

Love Bunny’s suggestion.

Now I’m wondering if my wine slurping on camera gets a Post-It.

Aren't there basic rules for these sorts of meetings? The basic's...must wear clothes, must not eat during, must be informed...

My hair stylist, that I love, has a small separate closed space in a large building where many different stylists & beauty experts rent. I had a color touch-up the other day and while the color was processing my stylist ate her lunch loudly and with her mouth open the whole time. It nearly drove me mad. I was trying to read my book as a distraction but couldn't concentrate. At one point I plugged my ears with my fingers. I said nothing as she's pregnant and just got to the point where she can eat food without being sick. It was really loud and I hope this isn't going to happen for the next five months. If so, I think I'll take my book and wait in the hall while she eats to give her some privacy.

Bunny has the best solution by a mile. My solution would involve some very passive aggressive remark like, 'Oh Bob - I see you're having blueberries with your oatmeal this morning - how nice of you to share the in process view with us' which would explain my lack of corporate success.

Funny what people will do on Zoom. I'm guessing this person would not bring a bowl of oatmeal to a conference room meeting.

I, too, am out of the zoom meeting loop but back in the day we used web cams to connect off campus participants to some meetings. It was understood that one behaved exactly as if you were in the meeting in person. No eating, no checking your emails, doing your nails, etc. This does not seem too much to ask of participants.

But if all else fails, I like Bunny's solution. Can you mute just one person, too?

OK, unless it is a meeting with donuts or something, one should not eat during a meeting or if one eats due to some emergency, it should be discrete. It seems to me the same professional behavior rules should apply for a virtual meeting. One should not engage in distracting behavior at work. But if you aren't his supervisor, then you really can't easily say anything. Like you said, since no one else is doing it, you'd think he'd notice. Having said that, I cannot sometimes believe the behavior I see "online" or virtually from some people. It's like they totally don't get how it comes across. I find it hard to believe they would do that in person . . . but it is a common phenomenon.

My husband is a prime example. He writes nasty things on FB and they offend and hurt people's feelings. I'm not talking about voicing his opinions, I'm talking about using vulgarity and insulting other people with name calling. It's odd because he doesn't talk like that in person. I talked to him about it, said I had noticed it and then reluctantly I said so had some of my friends who were mutal friends of ours. He said he didn't care. Subsequently, I unfriended him and so have many of my friends, they have told me this privately. So anyway, not sure you would be successful in an attempt to fix this by talking to him anyway.

Manners aren't trivial, an argument I have repeatedly with my husband. I use this example to point out that lack of manners is a common problem both in the workplace and in families. Many of my teacher colleagues who have been in the business 30+ years have noticed the multiplication of rude behavior. One colleague said, "Sure, this kind of behavior was around when we were young too, but not on the scale it is now . . . " But in adults, attempting to discuss manners with an un-mannered person is rarely productive, they don't even get the concept of having to modulate one's behavior out of consideration for another person . . .

End of rant.

You all crack me up. Thank you for understanding how annoying this is.

I was hanging in there when they were "just" eating during the meetings - but today watching them guffaw, mouth wide open, with oatmeal sloshing around in there about pushed me over the edge.

My second thought was holy Hannah, you're about to choke to death on screen because you're laughing so hard you're going to suck oatmeal down your windpipe!!

It's fascinating how we do not know how to handle rude. We allow them to be rude but we freeze at the idea of being assertive and calling them out. I polite email saying just as you did to us, no one else is, we expect professional behavior on all meets....no eating....you don't even have to mention the way they eat.

Eating while on Zoom looks especially awful. Somehow your mouth gets magnified. i guess most people lean slightly forward to eat, making it worse. I watched a Zoom meeting of the local Planning Commission on tv. One guy’s wife walks into the meeting, hands him his dinner and he proceeds to shovel it in his mouth. . I could see the other members who were participating trying to stifle their laughs, he looked so ridiculous.

I like the post it note idea. Brilliant

Oh my, I laughed out loud about the scratching stories.

I agree Dedtired - Bunny's post it note solution is brilliant. I'm so glad I asked for ideas from this group.

I understand it's a stupid problem, but whatever - now my stupid problem is solved, and I'm pretty happy. :)

Having said that about rudeness, I will say that as folks age, sometimes they have various mouth problems that one would never think of, that affect their ability to eat and they don't even realize how it looks since it was not a previous problems. Such things as dry mouth, losing important teeth, jaw issues, etc. I know my Dad is a way more obvious eater than ever before, and I am starting to have sinus drainage issues that make it harder for me to get through a meal without having to blow my nose or clear mucus out of my throat, which would require going to another room. But heck, one can step away from the camera or mute one's picture too, and still participate in the meeting.

Maybe that person doesn't know this. But honestly, I have never been so desperate to eat that I had to eat during a Zoom meeting. I have drunk coffee or some other beverage on occasion. I also once had to go look for something in the office so just muted myself during my rummage so it wouldn't be distracting to others in the meeting. Anyway, maybe just send out a memo with some type of link to "Zoom meeting etiquette" for everyone, because some of this may be learning the Zoom tech.

I once felt SOOOOOOO bad because a friend invited me to his master's thesis defense, (virtual attendance through Zoom) and I typed a goofy crack about something he said, thinking it would not show up on his live feed, that he would read it afterwards. Well it showed up live and I was mortified. I apologized but it still haunts me. I actually ran meetings using pre-Zoom technology so I am hardly a tech rube. The tech did not show the feed as live, in fact I thought it said it was not live, but anyway, I learned just to not go there anyway, at any point . . . I am now super cautious virtually . . .

I eat during Zoom meetings often, just not with my camera or mic on. If I have to have my camera on or expect to be talking a lot, I don't eat. But I work with teams across the country, and meeting often get scheduled at times that are not particularly convenient for me. And I take thyroid medication and have to wait an hour to eat after taking my pill, so breakfast often spills into my work day.

I too love the post-it note idea but I would probably put a favourite picture in front of the person's face.. something cheerful or flower or something like that. Maybe then you can think of the person more positively even while they are eating grossly in front of you.🙄

The concepts of manners and professionalism have unfortunately not been instilled in everyone these days. I am frequently surprised by just how unprofessional my coworkers can be. As for behavior on zoom, it really varies. There are lot of things that people are doing these days on video calls that I would not think they would ever do in the office. Though to be honest, I have seen people bring meals into conference rooms for meetings when I was in the office. Uncommon, but it does happen. Long before the pandemic, I was working in an office where we had a few remote employees, including one in Florida. We were having a department meeting and had the remote people on camera projected on a huge screen at the front of the room. Not as a grid but whoever was talking was full screen. For some reason, the man from Florida decided to join the meeting without a shirt. Everyone in the conference room was struggling to maintain composure as we saw his n.i.p.p.l.e.s up there front and center on this huge projector screen. It was incredibly awkward and unprofessional and most of us weren't sure whether to say something or not. I mention Florida because it was summer and I imagine it was really hot and muggy and he happened to be undressed for comfort that day.

Oh my Pricklypearcactus! You would have to have some very large post-it notes to cover that!

LOL, pricklypearcactus. The mind sometimes boggles, doesn't it?

We had a very young woman join us for what was just a brief job. One of my colleagues called her and she answered a video call just wrapped in a towel with sopping wet hair! She said she'd just gotten out of the shower. Um, ok - but it's work time so why were you in the shower, and oh, maybe don't answer a video call if you're not wearing clothes!

We had another video morning meeting when one of our colleague's wife appeared in the background also just wrapped in a towel. He yelled, "I'm on a call!" and slammed the laptop closed.

Slightly OT, but I love that Snickers commercial where the guy shows up on the patio, where his wife and actual guests have gathered, in a nice shirt and his underwear saying "Oh, I thought it was going to be virtual . . . " Such times we live in . . .

I'm beginning to think that everyone who has a video call must have something behind them that blocks other people and sometimes something on their own screen that blocks most of them.. from the upper clothed torso up sounds perfect to me. Plus that all important background screen...

I know it seems to be a learning curve but it seems to take a long time as each person develops conscious awareness of different things at different times. Sigh..

When this whole thing started I was on a virtual meeting (about how to apply for unemployment) with a bunch of people outside my department and one guy got up, went and got an ear of corn and ate it with the camera about six inches from his face. It alreadly bugs me when people's faces are not far from the screen and not centered in the camera. Picky I know. But the meeting was also mid morning, not any meal time.

I was at another mandatory CE course, one that no one is interested in taking, it's a state requirement, and people had to be own their own computer with their cameras on, and would have to check in at time points to verify that they were indeed taking the course. It was obvious that some people were at work and not paying one bit of attention, but one guy in particular was shown in his office, in the hallway, on the side walk, in his car driving, walking into his house and he was asleep by the end of the presentation. The presentation was only an hour and 15 minutes.

I work with someone who was at a zoom where a woman picked up whatever device she was using, she had her mic on which was not necessary. She carried it into the bathroom, used the toilet, loudly, and at some points during all this continued to interject comments (which were unneccessary, it was a presentation, not a discussion) as if nothing was going on at all.

I don’t know how someone makes it 4 or 5 decades on this earth with no one telling them to please chew with their mouth closed.

I think about this all the time. It's also a major pet peeve of mine. I shared an office with my boss and she smacked her food so loud, almost like she was trying to do it on purpose. The hilarious part is that she's otherwise extremely polished. (Immaculately dressed every day in Barney's clothing. Well groomed manners in every other sense.) Her adult children have that habit as well and it's kind of hilarious to see such beautiful rich people smack their food like animals. (oh and also? she flossed her teeth at her desk. BARF.)

Anyway, she was my boss and I was too afraid to complain. For YOU however, can you ask HR to deal with it? The message could go to your co-worker as an anonymous complaint, and a good HR person will know how to deal with it tactfully.

It's possible that she spent the first decade and a half being told to chew with her mouth closed, and then when she was not around a family member correcting her about it any longer, she was around people who chose to ignore it for the next 4 decades. I work with someone who chews with his mouth open to the extent that our shared office looks like the ground underneath the bird feeder when he is done eating. Everyone knows it, but other than a generic note to "please keep the desk area clean" which he now does, more or less, nobody is ever going to say anything. On the rare occasions that we have a department dinner I just try to seat myself as far away as possible. And, there are a few people who I will Never go out to eat with voluntarily because of their table manners.

oh and also? she flossed her teeth at her desk. BARF

I think I would die if this happened next to me. If I didn't die, I would certainly vomit.

There was a man at the same office as shirtless video conference man who would clip his toenails in his cubicle every week. I was so thankful to be several cubicles away and I was still disgusted by it.

I really wish I would have thought about putting up n.i.p.p.l.e covering sticky notes for Florida man. I could have just grabbed one for each and quick stuck them up on the screen quietly without him being the wiser. Everyone would have been rolling with laughter and appreciation.

These are some really good stories.

I can't decide which is more gross - the flossing of one's teeth at their desk, or clipping one's toenails at their desk.

I can understand, on some level, being so clueless that you aren't aware you're eating with your mouth open. However I'm having a real hard time understanding on what planet someone thinks it is ok to take off their shoes and clip their toenails in an office setting...

Also, this - I work with someone who chews with his mouth open to the extent that our shared office looks like the ground underneath the bird feeder when he is done eating - made me actually giggle out loud. I'm so sorry you have to share office space with someone who has the table manners of a farm animal, but the description was hysterical.

In other news, suddenly I'm feeling much better about my little video conference problem. :)

And I used to be grossed out by the guy who clipped his fingernails. It was so noisy I could hear it all the way into my office two doors down. And another who chewed his fingernails. Flossing and clipping toenails has mine beat! As does chewing with one’s mouth open.

I'm glad you approve of the Post-it note solution. I was at my wit's end. The guy is a much loved member of our community but he's not really tracking stuff very well and I think turning pages endlessly is soothing to him. It drives me mad to see it out of the corner of my eye.

Muting others is only possible if you're the zoom boss, which I am. Once the greetings are out of the way, I mute this guy because his little dog barks incessantly.

Jinx, have you seen the suggestion to put your wine in a coffee cup, then blow on it occasionally so people will think you’re drinking coffee or tea?

Oly, I invented that!

😁😆

Just teasing. I use a Big Gulp cup and straw.

Well, with your cost effective wine solution, at least the Big Gulp wine sizing is only setting you back like 3 dollars. LOL!!!

(FYI - I plan to stop at Aldi's this weekend, will let you know how it goes!)

It's possible that she spent the first decade and a half being told to chew with her mouth closed...

My theory (for my ex boss) is that she spent the first 20 years of her life in a culture where smacking/slurping your food is actively encouraged. So when she became rich and successful in her adult years, she was like "eff it, I worked hard, I'll do what I please". She's kind of baller in that sense. An interesting combination of being brash and polished at the same time. Honestly I really do love her. She's not my boss anymore, now we're casual friends.

Oh, dear...wine with a straw...
Re: the original problem of eating on zoom meetings, I would email him and just tell him that he might not realize how it looks when eating so close to a camera and perhaps he'd want to wait until the meeting is over to eat, since it's so short.
I'm retired, so only do zoom for a few different events, one of which is my book group. The woman who sets up the meetings (because she has an account allowing longer meetings) has a home office with a chair that rotates/turns. She swings back and forth, side to side the WHOLE meeting. I am not one to get any kind of motion sickness, but by the end of our meetings I am dizzy. I don't know much about zoom, so am unsure if the 'host' can be reduced in size enough to cover with a sticky, but I'm going to try. Maybe I can cover the woman who insists on wiping/blowing her nose right into the camera, too, lol!

Not a food issue, but at our staff meetings, all professionals, one person sits on a couch? every week with a row of stuffed animals across the back!

Oh man! Thanks for all the laughs, people 😆

Cringeworthy is putting it mildly.

I also have eaten while on Zoom - with camera off. It was with family, and they were asking me to turn the camera on, and I refused until I was finished, and told them why. I am very conscious of how I am appearing on camera and do try to be as considerate as possible. It's very hard not to look at oneself, IMPE.

It's funny, but at the last work meeting on Zoom, I realized I was the only one who was showing any expression in response to what was being said, the others were rigidly staring intently at their screens.

I think a lot of people are just not that aware of how they are appear to others, and then there's the sad truth that not everyone has the advantage of knowing proper etiquette - business or otherwise. It's not something people are born knowing instinctively.

Oh, and over the past 2 years I bought a folding screen and a clothing rack with the idea either could be used as backgrounds on video conferencing. The clothing rack would have fabric draped over it.

Pal, LOL about the guy eating an ear of corn next to the camera. I won't go into details but sometimes while DH, who usually has very good manners, is eating an ear of corn I'd like to grab it out of his hand and throw it in the trash.

I have been on Zoom meetings with more than one group where someone is in bed. In one situation two people had similar headboards and we were private messaging joking that they were in the same bed.

Pal, you promised me you wouldn’t mention that incident. I didn’t realize my bed was showing! I thought I had the Barbie Conference Room green screen behind me.

Oly, that chair swinging thing is a no-way for me and the perfect candidate for a Post-it note.

Can you reduce the size of the host?

Oh, Jinx -- how I wish you lived next door! =)

She swings back and forth, side to side the WHOLE meeting.

My DB used to give financial commentary on shows like Bloomberg, Fox Business, etc. and his first appearance was memorable for many reasons but mostly becasue he kept swinging back and forth in his chair - going in and out of camera range. Cracked us up. He got much better but we do have this on tape...