It’s okay to feel big feelings about your End of Year Summary presentation. Big feelings are really normal when you spend so much time investigating stakeholder demographics. Can you name some of your big feelings so we can talk about them before you switch into presenter mode?

I know it can be really frustrating to be asked the same question over and over, but I’m circling back to touch base on our onboarding policies for the new hire. Do you have an answer for me or would you like me to come back at another time of your choosing?

Thank you for sharing with me that you’re a little nervous for your annual review! I know receiving feedback can sometimes be challenging, and I promise I’m going to do my best to see you as a whole human when we look at your Q4 KPIs—even though I think we both understand there are a lot of misses there. Do you want to name five things you can see before we get started?

I see that you care a lot about this Q1 report. It’s really normal to care about things you spend a lot of time on—it can also be a little scary. It’s okay if you feel like you never want to do another report again and that you wish you could walk into the Adriatic Sea and never return.

But you do have to give the report! So let’s take some deep breaths together before we start.

Does anyone know if that stapler that just flew across the room was maybe thrown across the room? Can we ideate together on why someone might throw a stapler?

I’ll go first: maybe the person who threw that stapler was feeling like they are not seen, heard, or are missing a sense of belonging that is hard to put into words. Mike, would you want to go next?

I’m feeling a little tired because Kyle continues to piggyback on everyone’s ideas with ideas that sound exactly the same. I’d love to take a minute to count to ten in my head before moving on with this cross-functional brainstorming session.

I have a gentle reminder that only toilet paper can go down the staff toilets. Trying to flush your quarterly eval down the toilet is a sign that we’re not making kind choices! We all make mistakes, but our actions have consequences. There’s water on the floor and now we’ll have to call our janitor, Sal, to clean up some yucky toilet water. Let’s take a minute to think about how that might make Sal feel, since it’s the fifth time this month.

I know we all asked Kyle nicely not to microwave haddock in the break room, but we can’t control other people’s choices. What we can do is take accountability when we throw other people’s lunches against the break room wall. If it’s helpful for anyone, when deep breaths don’t help me calm down, I like to take some outside time and walk around the block. Can I see a show of hands of people who might want to walk around the block right now?

I’m asking someone to make a really brave choice and let me know who took Mr. Toby, Janet’s office therapy dog. I really like Mr. Toby, too, but we need to take accountability for our excitement, which means doing our best not to kidnap our co-workers’ office therapy dogs. Mr. Toby needs to stay with Janet because that’s where he feels safe and it smells like he may have missed his potty time so we’ll need to start another round of “find the office therapy dog doo doo.”

I also wish Kyle would share his target numbers, but we can only control our own selves and we need to let Kyle make decisions that work best for him. We can’t know what’s happening in Kyle’s cubicle or brain all the time, even though he’s incredibly loud when he’s on the phone with his non-work friends, oversharing personal information about his potty and bedroom time.

Aaron, I understand you feel upset right now, but part of making decisions is experiencing consequences, and the consequence of you deciding to move forward with an unapproved Q3 plan is that you don’t get to work here anymore. Maybe you can take some deep breaths about this while you pack up your things.