A Group Photo At The End Of The Webinar
Welcome back!
Let's continue my reflective journal, another 5 life lessons I learned from organising and hosting my first ever public webinar Reimagine Your Career.
6. Trust – myself and others
Trust myself
It was not easy. I was nervous before the webinar like most people. This was my FIRST public webinar. Also, I had pressure on myself – I didn’t want to let the team down. So how did I manage in the end? Two easy tricks.
Trick 1: Self-talk
I found having positive conversations with myself through the verbal and written form was very useful. Writing things down really helped me to get a clearer picture of the current state, and these were some conversations I had with myself below:
“What do I feel right now?”
“Scared, nervous, and excited.”
“Why do I feel scared and nervous?”
“I am just worried what if we had some technical issues? Or someone might post inappropriate messages in the chat? Or I didn’t do a good job?”
The conversations continued.
“Can I do anything to control these?”
“No. “
“So is there anything that I can control?”
“My energy level and preparation.”
“How’s my preparation?”
“Good. I have been doing this for a month, and I know my guests pretty well.”
Trick 2: Think of my past, present and future timeline
Past: A lot of things that I have been through, I noticed they had a similar pattern: I always felt nervous and worried beforehand. And it usually turned out to be okay in the end, such as the recent webinars I hosted for my workplace. Thus, this webinar should be the same.
Present: I have been doing different webinars and radio shows for a while, so I am experienced. Also, I believe everything happens for a reason. The universe must think I am the most suitable person for this webinar. 😊
Future: Imagine, if this is me 10 years later, looking back, what would I feel? Probably nothing. What a small tiny event over these 10 years. Right. So I just need to be authentic, enjoy the moment and have fun.
Trust others
Initially, when I was told that I was going to work with D closely during the webinar （She needed to pass me questions from audiences and remind me so I can keep on track of time）, I was a bit worried. Because I didn’t know her very well, and we’ve never worked together before. Thanks to S for telling me:
“Only when you trust D fully can you focus on your hosting part well.”
It proved to be so true. I was talking to myself right before the webinar: D would do an amazing job. She did. She was so professional and reliable. She even gave me positive feedback along the way which really warmed my heart. Thanks!
That also reminds me of the foundation for delegation: trust. Only when we trust our subordinates while delegating tasks can we then maximise the value of the team. That is, we focus on our own tasks while they will try hard to live up to our trust.
7. The power of passion
Organising this webinar reaffirmed my passion and even impressed me by its strong power.
What did I feel when I was organising this webinar?
Excited!
I still remember when I was reading speakers’ background stories and the articles they wrote, I was so drawn into them that I couldn’t even stop reading. Later on, when I met guests via Zoom before the webinar, I got so energised after every single chat. I found we had a lot in common, the self-discovery journey and the desire to grow and serve our community.
One night after I finished my day job, I noticed one promotional article wasn’t quite matched with the theme of this webinar. So I decided to revise it. When I finally completed it, I realised it was midnight already. However, even though I felt so tired that I just wanted to jump into bed straight away, my mood was still joyful with a sense of achievement. And that was all I wanted.
I can hear your internal monologue right now.
“Sadly, I’ve never experienced those feelings.”
Or
“I don’t know what my passion is.”
Or
“I don’t think I have any passion.”
That’s totally fine and common. In fact, I’ve only discovered mine around 1.5 years ago. Be positive about it. We have a whole life to figure it out. Meanwhile, I have some easy and practical tools for you too.
Start to ask yourself some questions, be mindful, reflect and keep a record of your exciting moments. Some questions might be:
Is there anything that makes me lose track of time?
Is there anything that I am willing to do even if I don’t get paid?
What things did I love to do as a kid? (ask your parents for help if needed)
I believe, when you begin to follow your curiosity and connect these dots, you will eventually find the key to the puzzle of your world. Sounds pretty fun, hey?
8. Delegation
In the past, I always thought since I wasn’t a manager, I had to do every task on my own. Now I know I was wrong. We do have so many resources around us if we pay attention.
As the main organiser for this webinar, I was required to do almost everything (e.g., communicating with the guests, and preparing for the question list, promotional writeups and posters). As time passed by, I realised there was no way for me to complete them all.
It then forced me to think of seeking extra help (delegation). Is there anyone else who can do some work for me and is good at doing that? My student S instantly popped into my mind. As a result, he did it so well and so fast. (Thanks)
Imagine, if it was me, it would have taken me so much time to complete it, because I had never done that before and it wasn’t my strength either. That taught me two things:
Our time is limited. Focus on our strengths. By doing this, we are helping the whole universe. We will be more efficient, creative, and productive — we will be happier and more successful.
Also, don’t be afraid to ask for help, which is one of the benefits of working in a team. Knowing everyone’s strength and delegate tasks to them accordingly becomes so essential.
9. Preparation (two important but usually easily neglected areas)
Good change
I am not a very organised person, as you know, but I made some changes this time. I wrote down a detailed webinar schedule (even has each speaker’s starting time and finishing time for their parts despite knowing I would get the reminders from my team too) and a potential question list. Magically, this gave me more inner peace. Also, great preparation enabled me to multi-task while hosting the webinar, as I already knew every guests’ stories well after studying them intensively.
One thing for me to work on
My estimated completion time for each task was always shorter than the actual time spent. (What an optimistic person I am.) This time was not an exception, unfortunately. I didn’t leave any time for unforeseeable interruptions. Therefore, I got stressed right before the webinar.
Initially, I was planning that time block for my introduction. However, I got caught up by the question asked from the team: “who will read out guests’ bio?” In the end, I had to juggle, a busy girl madly checking some correct pronunciations from the bios.
So, next time, I really need to budget cushion time (extra time for some unforeseeable tasks) while planning.
10. The right attitude towards the past
Asking team members who had organised webinars before didn’t come to my mind until the very last minute. Why? Two reasons, I guess. First, self-pride. I thought I could handle it. The second would be the fear of being judged:
“what would they think when hearing my questions? Would they laugh at me how come I didn’t even know this basic information?”
Luckily, other thoughts won over these negative perspectives. They were:
Apart from this self-pride and potential worry, is there anything else I would lose by doing it? No. What about anything I might win if I asked for help? The outcome of this webinar. I am so glad that I did ask.
By asking H, I got a better idea of what a webinar schedule should look like and how many potential questions I should prepare for each speaker. Besides, I got inspired to think of the colour code idea for our speakers, we all wearing something in blue. And I even came up with a special meaning of this colour matched with the webinar theme.
Talking to S taught me something new regarding the logistic and mindset area. For example, we need to have a waiting room before the webinar starts and a mentality of expecting the worst and hoping for the best.
I’ve never thought of some bad scenarios, such as what if one person said something rude during the webinar. Preparing for these situations helped me know the importance of keeping calm as a host. Luckily, the webinar went very smoothly in the end. But I still believe I should always have this mindset, so I will panic less if anything extreme happens.
These are all the things I reflected and learned from the webinar. Please leave a comment below:
Which tip do you find the most helpful for you?