“I couldn’t possibly do what you do” "What do you mean?" I asked. “I couldn’t speak up and do presentations like you do.” This was a conversation with one of my team members when I asked if she was interested in applying for the job I was vacating. I had accepted new internal role and was looking for my replacement.

“Of course, you could” I said, adding “do you know how I got good at presenting?” “No” she said.

About 5 years ago I decided I wanted to improve my presentation skills. I saw that really good leaders are great presenters. I wanted to be good at preparing my presentation, developing the content and the stories and I wanted to be good at “speaking off the cuff”. It’s a key communication skill. How did I go about this?

I got really curious. I observed how great presenters and speakers did their thing. I asked how they got better at presenting. I read books on how to plan a presentation and the content. I learnt various ways to connect with a variety of people. I watched TED talks and I accepted any opportunity to be part of panel discussions and to speak independently on my own topics. I even contacted conference organises to see what opportunities are available for me to hone my craft.

It’s amazing when to start to put yourself out there, opportunities come to you. To date I have spoken at various human resource conferences, been invited to speak at company women’s development programs and events, run and facilitated leadership and sales development programs and more recently spoke on TV (BBC’s Business News Asia) for International Women’s Day). I have interviewed amazing people on stage and run my own events. Next month I’m moderating a panel for a diversity and inclusion conference for the insurance industry.

None of this happened by accident or by luck. I worked hard. I looked for opportunities. I grew my network and I created my own events, and along the way, learnt a lot.

So what happened when Covid-19 hit? I knew I had to get better at presenting online. Even though I have mainly worked for global companies throughout my career and am comfortable using and speaking to people on skype and teams and zoom, it wasn’t the only way to communicate with people up until recently. I also had to get better at using the technology for presenting online. So I created the Wine O’clock Series.

Every Thursday afternoon at 5.30pm SGT during the Singapore Circuit Breaker period (or lockdown, which honestly, like most people in Singapore, I didn’t think would ever end) I held a webinar on something I hoped would be interesting for people, would relate to what was happening during Covid-19 and would connect to my blog i-develop-me.

Why call it “The Wine O’clock Series”? Each day around 5.30pm after a long day of work, home schooling, constant interruptions from children and pets, worrying that I wouldn’t have a job in the future and the general up and down and grief I think we all experienced and continue to experience, my husband would come to the door of the room I was working in and kindly ask if I would like a cocktail or a wine. We had made it through another day, and we could celebrate. It was wine o’clock. That’s how you stay married right there.

To date I have run 14 The wine O’clock series events on topics including:

• Dealing with job insecurity, using recruitment companies to get a job and changing jobs during lockdown
• Building your community, whether face-to-face or online
• Personal and business branding
• Networking and future work skills, and
• Managing your health, finances and insurance

There were many lovely unintended consequences of running these sessions, beyond just improving my online presentation and facilitation skills.

• I have had the pleasure of working with many different guest speakers, some who built their network and contacts and achieved paid business from the exposure. Cool right?
• Organising a virtual wine tasting (which sold out!) and supporting a local business selling wine. I love wine.
• Getting better at skills for my current role
• Donating $300 to the Singapore Food Bank’s Feed the City Covid-19 relief drive while learning how the Facebook group Singapore Restaurant Rescue set about saving Singapore’s restaurants.
• Having the opportunity to co-create and co-run the digital conference Face Forward over 3 days to support women to emerge from Covid-19 and showcase some of the amazing female business owners in Singapore. I still can’t quite believe we organised and delivered a top-notch conference that people were willing to pay for, without any face-to-face contact.
• Learning to use Zoom, Eventbrite, Mailchimp and Canva.
• Have a purpose and a goal each week to run something and create a small community. Many people told me they met new people through the Wine O’clock Series.
• And finally, have something I could control and look forward to each week, when everything else felt like it was out of my control.

2020 will go down as one of the shitest years for a long time but at least I can look back and say I achieved something apart from learning how to make fresh pasta.

We may or may not see the same level of face-to-face events and conferences return and I think we will continue to use online mediums in a way we never did before. My experience developing and delivering The Wine O'clock Series has given me the skills, experience and confidence to keep moving forward.