Last weekend, my organization CREABA held a workshop on Communications. With this workshop we wanted to help participants become a confident speaker and capture the audience’s attention effectively. It was a joined project between me and my co-facilitator, who was a professional in Communication.
3 days before the workshop, I got a text from my co-facilitator:
😳😳😳😳
At this point, I had two options:
👋 Postpone the event to another date when we are more prepared and mentally ready (suggested by my co-facilitator).
🚀 Take a leap of faith and continue the workshop by myself.
The show must go on
It was a very very difficult decision, but in the end, I decided that “the show must go on”. In my email to my co-facilitator, I explained 3 reasons behind this decision:
🔹 For CREABA, we equally care for quality and quantity. Even if 1 person shows up, we will still deliver the workshop to the 1 person. We would like to deliver the workshop to serve our community.
🔹 We have already finalized the logistics with our partnering venue. We do not want to lose their trust and cooperation as they also involved a third party organization to help us with this event.
🔹 Earlier that week, we already sent out the reminder email of the event, so on our side, it had been officially confirmed about the organization of this workshop. However, we will make sure to transparently inform participants about the changes for this event.
I hit “Send”, and fell into despair. My intuition tells me this is the right thing to do, but how am I supposed to this by myself.
10 hours until Workshop Day. To conform or to Innovate?
I could have modified the outline we planned originally,
But to be honest, I was not 100% happy with it. The original content was missing an Oomph. A Wow factor.
So i thought,
Why not take a leap of faith.
“Why not see this as a chance for a complete do-over”
A silver lining when things don’t go as planned.
Sometimes when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into places.
So Friday (the day before D-day), I scrapped off all the slides I did, and came up with a new workshop content. Using the original workshop goal as the guiding light, I brainstormed how to help participants communicate their ideas confidently and in a compelling way.
I thought and thought and pondered about the situation I was in, how I was being put in the difficult position, but still need to deliver some appealing content the next day and deliver it confidently.
I need to think fast and have something smart to talk about in tomorrow’s event.
🤔🤔🤔
And then it all clicked 🫵
Content courtesy of Matt Abrahams’ “Think Faster Talk Smarter” book. Go give it a read :)
I’m gonna teach people just that — how to talk smart & feel confidently when you are put on the spot 🚀
With 10 hours left, I knew there was no time to be visually aesthetic. Focus on the MVP, regardless how scrappy it may be. The important part is how to deliver the content that helps participants achieve what they came to the workshop for.
Snippet of the updated slide deck I made in 10 hours.
Friday night, I laid out the presentation outline. Saturday morning, I added simple flair and basic designs to the deck. I still had a full 7-hour of quality sleep hehe. 💤
The results? I think it went well :)
We definitely had a smaller turnout, but I am glad we could communicate the changes transparently to participants.
What were my takeaways from this leap of faith
🙅🏻♀️ I wouldn’t do this so often (LOL).
It was great to push my creativity to the edge to create with a tight deadline. However, I would only recommend doing this if you can estimate your confidence in completing it. (since I have been doing workshops since 2019, I knew I could get it done)
🚦 Work ethics is important.
Yes, I could have postpone the event and save face for my organization, but it is important to keep our words and dedication to the participants who have signed up. As I mentioned above — even if one person shows up, I will deliver the workshop to the one person with no less than 101% enthusiasm.
🔑 Transparency is key.
Early communication with my co-facilitator helped iron out our differences, not put the blame on either party, and inform participants immediately so they can choose to how to handle the situation.
🤝 It is not a one-person effort.
Although I delivered the content by myself, the entire workshop couldn’t be a success without my teammates who welcomed the participants, the partnering team who helped with logistics; and most importantly — the participants. They showed up was open to the unexpected changes, just like me on the other end.
The feedback, speaks for us all.