And We Made Fire

By that Friday, the week of the event had come and 150 participants had signed up in total. This was a huge 200% jump from the original number of 50 participants. The website I had created, coupled with the article that came out in the New Paper as well at the advertisements in SGRainbow and the Straits Times boosted our reach and sparked a great amount of interest.

On that day itself, the turn up was heartwarming. I was put in charge of managing the audio booth, as well as media monitoring for the numerous media portals that I had created (Twitter, Facebook, and thepowerfulself.com). I provided constant updates for our Twitter page, so as to keep  energy levels up and to continually build awareness. Short quotes from the speakers as well as updates on highlights and our activities would make the workshop even more interesting.

My two other colleagues were placed in charge of catering and keeping to the event plan. Volunteers tied up trivial loose ends where the main four of us (the organiser, my two colleagues and I) handled the larger management and tasks for the actual event. The volunteers also mingled and created rapport with the audience.

The entire audience, including the volunteers and myself, were well entertained and fed, with the humourous speakers and the fact that these speakers were contributing their services for free, as volunteers. On a normal rate, these speakers would have been extremely costly, at least a few hundred per hour for each speaker. Furthermore, they spoke for a total of two days, and thus we saved a lot of money. Also, the catering was rather tasty and provided a good assortment of dishes for the price.

Sadly, there was one last glitch before this project came to a close. The week after the workshop were exams, and the organiser, assured us that she would prepare the post-press release and have it ready to be sent out by mid week that week, in order to keep the news of our workshop fresh. However, by the end of the week, there was a communication breakdown and we realised that nothing had been sent out. This both worried me and made me feel like an opportunity had been wasted, as it would have been a great opportunity to showcase the response and effectiveness of our workshop – with quotes from the participants themselves. It would have been a good promoter for the next workshop, which would surely come about in the near future.

Nonetheless, we had done better than expected; everything went smoothly and without hiccups during the workshop itself. Everybody had contributed in their own way, and overall the workshop was a success. I was proud of my team; we had managed to pull off such a large-scale workshop for our level of experience, and perfectly on our first try though our schedules were increasingly hectic as the event approached. It was all in all a valuable and priceless experience; to have a taste of singlehandedly managing as a team, what a true event was like in reality.

Charlene Xiao
15352547
Curtin Singapore