Ask a Manager: Someone keeps farting in meetings

[minoanmiss]

I work in upper-middle management at a large business and entertainment events company and recently we got back to regular face-to-face client meetings. Over the last few weeks, we’ve been having some intense and lengthy meetings in our office with a potential local client, which could really take our company to the next level if it works out. However, a rather awkward problem has arisen.

During these meetings, which tend to last all afternoon, someone breaks wind, silently, usually more than once. The odor is, frankly, overwhelming, yet there is not much in the way of any clear reaction from anyone in the room. I have noticed some people very, very discreetly eye each other suspiciously. But it’s quite a formal and stiff atmosphere, with several very serious and no-nonsense senior executives present from both sides, so it appears if people are just doing their best to ignore this rude interruption. During one of the wind-breaking incidents, a junior member of staff sat with her elbow on the table and put her hand over her hand and mouth trying to make it look like she was just resting her head, while another junior member looked uncomfortable but kept her head down and stared at her notepad. On another occasion I noticed one of the clients frowning and looking out of the corner of their eye, but frankly I dare not catch anyone’s eye, so I always quickly avert my gaze to avoid any awkwardness or, god forbid, suspicion.


Everything at our company is business-like and relations are generally good. I know everyone reasonably well on our side, so I had assumed the culprit was from the would-be client’s team. But imagine my horror when, after the clients had left our last meeting leaving our team to continue the discussion among ourselves, the silent boardroom farter struck again! I was incredulous — there were three senior male executives in the room and two junior female members of staff who were not always present at other meetings. So I am fairly certain the culprit is a senior management figure at our firm.

I’m completely at a loss as to how to deal with this. I’m quite ambitious and have invested a lot of energy into making this project happen. So I can’t believe that a senior company member is behaving in such a rude manner and potentially jeopardizing it by acting so unprofessionally towards potential partners. The potential clients cannot have possibly failed to notice the smell, and I can only assume they are simply being polite and professional by ignoring it. However, I am just afraid that there are limits to anyone’s tolerance and that sooner rather than later they will decided one way or another to end their interest in working with us.

This is just such a strange problem. How on earth can voice my concerns to my superiors?

The good news is, you really don’t need to do anything about this.

These meetings include executives who are senior to you. If one of them is concerned and wants to figure out a way to address this, they can attempt to do so.

But there’s a pretty good chance that nothing that can be done.

I am amused by the idea of someone constantly farting in an important business meeting just because they’re rude or anti-social or don’t care about being professional, but it’s more likely that if it’s happening this often it’s because they can’t control it.


A number of medical conditions can cause that to happen with some frequency. It’s not a particularly pleasant thing to be around, but if someone is dealing with a medical condition, you just have to carry on. I realize that having it happen in client meetings is not great, but you can’t order someone to stop being gassy if they can’t help it. (If it’s really out of control, there might be a conversation about having them call into the meeting instead … but again, there are people senior to you in these meetings, so you can happily leave this to them to navigate. There are times when “above my pay grade” is a comforting mantra.)

Meanwhile, though, you could put an air purifier in the room and see if that helps.

Comments

[minoanmiss]

I suspect LW is an android.

Also, the comments are littered with nuggets of gold.

[purlewe]

this causes me such glee. like srsly.. these people are above you and also, people fart. So what the hell are you expecting people to do about it?

singing "let it goooooooo, let it gooooooo"

[shirou]

lol nuggets

let's hope not

[minoanmiss]

cackles

[cereta]

Bwah, seriously. I mean, okay, biased: I have IBS, and can sometimes be gassy (TMI, I know), but trust me when I say that no one farts in a small room filled with other people on purpose, unless they're a serious, serious...er, "asshole" is a bad term to use, here, right?

[bikergeek]

It was me! It was me!

[ioplokon]

aw, I really thought this one would have a twist like: "Someone Keeps Farting in Meetings... And It's ME!"

[melannen]

This seems like a great time to go to someone senior to you who has been in meetings and say "with all the new science about spread of illnesses, I'm concerned that our meeting rooms may have inadequate ventilation. Can we switch our client meetings to a larger room or one with better airflow while we work on improvements to ventilation?"

[eva_rosen]

That is excellent and only slightly snarky advise. Kudos to you :)

[jadelennox]

not to mention the science that lengthy meetings tend to increase the carbon dioxide ratio in the air and make everyone stupider, even covid aside.

But "covid aside" is a big aside. Like, the LW assuming that people fart intentionally is obviously the main story, but even if every person involved was known to be fully vaxed, I am honestly shocked that anyone is scheduling multi-hour, many-person meetings in conference rooms with limited airflow. What the hell are they thinking????

[melannen]

I mean, covid aside, even if your company/region has decided covid is over as far as they are willing to care the end, i feel you I am living that, one thing we have learned from covid is that poor ventilation is way more important to spreading ALL KINDS of illness than we realized. Giving your important client and top employees a bad cold is also bad!

...and it will fix the fart problem