Getting overwhelmed with negativity won’t solve any problems

The Singapore Week of Innovation and TeCHnology (SWITCH) just wrapped up. The cool thing about the event is it follows a “plug and play” model.

This is fairly unique because it involves different companies from Southeast Asia coming together to form a picture.

Organised by National Research Foundation Singapore (NRF) and Enterprise Singapore (ESG), along with 3 event Organisers, SWITCH had a total of 47 Partners and 17 Events.

I was heavily involved in the event

My name is Shernice Lum Xue Qi and I was one of the e27 employees most directly in charge of running SWITCH. I am also very young, I am 22 years old and will be completing my degree in 1 year’s time.

This was an immense responsibility for me and it was both an amazing challenge and an excellent learning experience.

Here is what I learned:

Immediately after Echelon Asia Summit 2018 which ended at late June, I was on-boarded to SWITCH 2018 (about 2 months before the project).

In the beginning it was overwhelming because IT’S A GIGANTIC PROJECT. And, if I am being perfectly honest, I thought it might be difficult to meet the government’s expectations. -.-

That being said, I was definitely excited as running / helping out with events has always been my passion.

As the project got going, my biggest challenge was managing the communications from all nine partners at the same time. I had to navigate different expectations and requests coming from various angles. I overcame these hurdles by being more OCD about writing down every single request on a common platform where answers can be easily found.

Which brings up the partners. I was new to this and my partners were patient with me, allowing me to grow and learn along the way.
This leads to my by “hindsight is 20-20 wish”. I wish spent more time with all the SWITCH Partners. Now that the dust is settled, I think I could have better understood each and every single one of the pain points, so that I could help make their event even more successful.

However, I am just one woman so maybe that is a bit ridiculous.

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On a positive note, I love how all of the startups are so eager to thrive and grow. They are trying their best to let the world know about their product and idea, trying their best to be the next big thing.

Even if a lot of them don’t succeed, the energy and support of the community is palpable, which is important to help people stay motivated as they pursue what is a tough business.

During the experience, I have learnt that, no matter how difficult something becomes, we should always deal with it with positivity.
For example, if you get scolded by someone, treat it as a way to improve. If your communications fail, treat it as a wake up call. Always deal with things positively 😀 😀 😀 😀 .

Becoming negative makes problems spiral, it becomes harder to approach an issue with the calmness and clarity necessary to actually solve it. If you are able to take criticism seriously, but also allow it to roll-off your back, it will go a long way towards improving your ability to climb mountains.

Also Read: Healthtech startup Holmusk raises US$9.75M pre-Series A by Heritas Venture Fund

Finally, I just want to say that I loved the entire production of the event. It looked freaking amaze-balls. Everything was done up very professionally.

Would I do it again? I think so.

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The post I am 22-years old and was a leader at SWITCH 2018, here is what I learned appeared first on e27.