Jo McClure built a career around communication – but her own ability to communicate began to break down eighteen months ago, when her hearing loss began.
The owner and director of JM Virtual Business Services first noticed she was having hearing issues while conducting business networking events with large audiences. Jo is on the Membership Committee of a large chapter of Business Networking International, and facilitates weekly members’ meetings.
“There’s at least a hundred people in the room,” she describes.
Jo says that the volume of people at the BNI meetings made the room sound like “all one voice”. “I couldn’t hear anything,” she adds.
When the meetings took place online, every second week, Jo noticed herself learning towards her computer’s speaking and continuously turning the volume up. She also noticed how much she relied on lip-reading when some participants didn’t have their camera turned on.
“On online meetings, I’d always have to put on a transcriber, so I could read what was happening,” she says.
Jo’s hearing loss didn’t just affect her business activities. She says her ex-partner began to have difficulties getting her attention at home, too.
“My ex was saying, ‘Did you hear me? Did you hear me?’. And it was like – am I purposely blocking him out and not listening, or did I really not hear him?”
The turning point
Jo originally got her hearing checked after reading some information about the coincidence of menopause and hearing loss.
“When you reach menopausal age, hearing can become challenging,” she explains. “So I thought I better go get my hearing checked.”
After undergoing a hearing test, Jo wasn’t referred to a hearing aid specialist right away. Instead, her audiologist told her to keep an eye on “two points of concern”, she says. But 12 months later, with her symptoms worsening, the entrepreneur decided to seek help. She booked an appointment where she was given hearing aids to trial for a week.
Jo says she noticed the difference immediately – and so did those around her.
“I remember standing in a crowded room next to one of my colleagues,” Jo says. “We weren’t facing each other, and they said something. And I turned around and said, ‘Yeah’. And they said, ‘that’s the first time you’ve ever done that. You always watch my lips’.”
Impact on business
Jo says the impact on her entrepreneurial activities has been “life changing”.
“I can hear without lip reading. I’m not as exhausted at the end of the day. Everything’s just easier. I didn’t realise how challenged I was.”
Another unexpected effect of the hearing aids was the passion for business that they reinvigorated.
“I’ve totally fallen in love with my business again, and it’s simply because I can hear better,” she says.
The business owner describes how her networking activities have flourished with the improvement of her hearing. She’s now advocating for more people to get their hearing checked, especially if they are currently undergoing menopause.
“I think there is a bit of a stigma around, I think just getting older,” she says. “I’m telling everyone I know how good it’s been for me. Even if they don’t think they need a hearing test, do one online with the earbuds in a quiet room. I actually did that to start with.”
This post was originally published on here
