Speaking and Listening: Toastmasters Experience

 This past week, I gave a presentation at one of my Toastmasters clubs about this very blog!  This was to fulfill the requirements for the Toastmasters Pathways project, "Write a Compelling Blog."  Toastmasters projects are everywhere!  They are in our daily experiences turning into speeches, our leadership at work and our volunteering becoming projects, and our blogs or podcasts getting us credit in the educational program of Pathways! One part of the blogging project that I really loved was the chance to get feedback on this blog itself, as well as my own self-reflection on this blog.  Two take-aways that I want to follow up on from this experience are: 1) I want to promote this blog more on social media - maybe that's why you are reading this post! 2) I want to try to create more variety in the format of my posts. For additional variety of posts, I'd love any ideas you have to offer!  I'm thinking maybe I can do a written interview with another Toastmast...

Yesterday at District leader training, I led a well-received session on feedback and appreciation.  I encouraged those present to look for ways to provide appropriate feedback and show appreciation for others in their lives.  When it was done, I felt good about the message I had conveyed, and then realized I could benefit from reflecting on this message myself! While I do show appreciation to others at times, I can always do more.  Beyond a quick message to tell someone thank-you, I can talk them up around their peers or boss - if that is something they would appreciate.  And how can I know if they would want that more public praise?  Probably simply by asking, "Is it okay if I tell your boss about how you just helped me?"  Or in the case of Toastmasters, "Is it okay if I share what you did with the club?" Even if the appreciation stays private, I can find ways to make it more meaningful.  My workplace has a "Quick Thanks" system that I have used befor...

 In any organization, I believe it is important to engage new members.  These could be volunteers at a charity organization, employees in the workplace, or members of a collaborative group like Toastmasters.  How do we engage new members? In the case of two of my Toastmasters clubs, I believe a key is to encourage their passion and participation.  One new member of a club just gave their first speech and did an excellent job!  Their speech evaluator did a great job pointing this out while also offering the new member suggestions of how they could grow through their involvement in Toastmasters.  I think (and hope!) that this will encourage this new member to be active in the Toastmasters program and keep giving presentations for our group! Another new member in a club showed interest in a side project the club is deciding to take on.  I was thrilled to see their interest in this even before becoming an "official" member and want to encourage them to par...

 Yesterday, I completed an exercise where I presented a hypothetical project proposal to my Toastmasters club and challenged them to come up with ways the project could go wrong - hindrances, obstacles, roadblocks.  I did this to complete a requirement for my Toastmasters "Persuasive Influence" path.  While the focus of the presentation was to give me practice preparing for disruptions to a plan, my evaluator shared a very interesting insight.  She suggested that when presenting the plan itself, I may want to focus on what could go right  before getting to the discussion of what could go wrong. I love this suggestion, because it forces me to look beyond the immediate objective of what I was doing (coming up with contingency plans) and consider the bigger picture.  Yes, it is important to assess risks for a project and come up in advance with ways to deal with those risks.  But in the broader scope of things, we can discourage our team if we only focus ...

When I work on a Toastmasters project, take a meeting role, give a presentation, or answer a table topic, I am focusing on my own personal development within Toastmasters.  And yet, Toastmasters is not just about my own learning and development, but helping others develop their skills.  One common example of facilitating the development of others is serving as a speech evaluation - giving feedback to help others improve their presentations.  Another less common example of facilitation within Toastmasters is leading a Speechcraft class. Speechcraft is a course any Toastmasters member can facilitate that guides students through specific modules to help them get a good start on improving their communication and presentation skills.  There are educational sessions and the students practice their skills by giving presentations. In preparation to lead a Speechcraft course myself, I recently I took a "Professional Facilitation Skills" course in my workplace.  Though th...

The Toastmasters Pathways project I am working on now is "Understanding Your Communication Style."  It's a project I've done before, but it is always interesting to revisit as it challenges me to think about how I prefer to communicate. What I found most interesting this time through is that word I was thinking of to describe my communication style ("direct") is one of the options the project presents, but it is not the one I scored highest in.  Though my scores were all pretty close to one another, my highest score was in "initiating."  As it had been a while since I read the descriptions of these different styles as Toastmasters defines them, my initial reaction was to be a bit surprised.  However, when I read the descriptions of the different styles, I had to agree that "initiating" fit me best.  I found nearly every aspect of the description of "initiating" relatable, whereas the descriptions of the other styles were more ...

 This is a story of three Toastmasters clubs and how they are doing at meeting preparation... Club #1 Has roles filled in advance of each meeting.  They do this by taking time at the end of each week's meeting to discuss who will fill the roles for the next week's meeting.  It takes some time, but people both get to choose their roles and  all roles are filled in advance.  Sometimes additional planning beyond that "end of meeting" assignment time is needed.  For example, if a member can't attend one week but will there the next week, they need to pick their role further in advance.  However, most club members attend nearly every meeting, so the process works well overall with occasional adjustments needed when other obligations and situations arise. Club #2 Has roles filled in advance of each meeting.  This club uses rotating role assignments to accomplish this.  For example, I might be a speaker one week, then Toastmaster, then timer, then t...