It’s O’ dark thirty. My alarm clock explodes with noise. I set it loud so I do not hit the snooze button and role back to sleep. Then as the haze of the evenings slumber wears off I remember its Thursday morning. A smile roles onto my face and I get moving. My mind races and I can’t wait. Today, like every Thursday morning at 7:30 a.m. I meet my fellow Toastmaster’s at the Sil-Tehar Car Dealership in Broomfield, Colorado. Our group is known as the Ad-Liborators. I helped to Charter this group along with several other professional business people. This club is sponsored by the Broomfield Chamber of Commerce however it includes folks like me who are not members but, wanted to get better at what we do for a living. Listening and Talking.
It’s been said that people fear public speaking more than they fear death. I was never afraid of speaking in front of people, however I wanted to get better at it. I wanted to refine my skills and work on the nuances of speaking better and understand how to deliver my message clearly. The other reason for joining was to get enhance my listening skills. Not just hearing but, active listening. Too often we sales people spew information to a prospect when all they wanted to know is what time it was. Asking good, thought provoking questions, comes about by good listening.
Our morning meetings are pure magic. Our President, Nick is always dynamic, starting our meeting on time. He will make a few announcements pertaining to the Chamber of Commerce or let us know about an upcoming speech contest and we start. He introduces our Toastmaster for the day.
The Toastmaster runs the meeting and is responsible for picking a theme, introducing all the roles and speakers for the meeting. The Toastmaster introduces the Timer.
The Timer keeps track of the speech times usually 5 to 7 minutes long and holds up color cards to let the speaker know how close they are coming to the end of their allotted speech time.
Next, the Grammarian makes notes and reports back on who miss-uses the English language with such speech fillers as Um’s and Ah’s. The Grammarian also chooses a word of the day. This word is usually associated with the theme of the day and helps to expand every ones vocabulary.
Finally, the Joke Master starts off the meeting with a bit of humor. The Joke Master’s role relieves any tension in the room and leaves everyone with a smile on their face.
The Toastmaster then calls for the first speaker. We have a wide array of topics and speeches to listen to. We have new members just starting their first few speech’s to more experienced speakers who are amazing to hear. You never know what you will experience; however all the speeches are thought provoking, and interesting to listen to. As a beginning speaker your first speech is about yourself. A topic anyone can do. From here the basic speech book informs and gives pointers on speech structure and ideas, which are followed until you reach your tenth speech. At this point you have achieved your first milestone in Toastmaster’s. The Competent Toastmaster. Between each speech the Toastmaster will ask for comments to be written down and passed along to the speakers. These comments are another way to understand what worked and what did not.
Each of the three to four speakers are assigned an Evaluator who listens to the speech more critically. The Evaluator writes notes and comments for the Speaker relaying the good and poor aspects of the speaker’s presentation. Then after all the speakers are finished the General Evaluator will introduce the Evaluators who then give thoughtful comment to each speaker. Generally, the Evaluator will use a “sandwich technique” when giving comments. Simply this is some praise for some aspects of the speech. Some suggestions to improve areas that were not as fluid or that needs work and then finishing up with more positive comments. The Evaluators comments are timed and critiqued by the General Evaluator who gives their overall comments about the meeting.
The next portion of the meeting is the Table Topics. Table Topics is an opportunity for those that have no roles that day or that are not speaking a chance to extemporaneously speak for one to two minutes on any topic the Table Topic Master chooses. This exercise is a chance to think on your feet and work on your speaking skills. Depending on how the time is going there will be three or four Table Topic speakers.
At last we come to the calling of the vote for the Best Speaker, Best Evaluator and Best Table Topic participant. The names of the winners are called and ribbons are awarded.
This high energy one hour is often the catalyst for a productive day at work. It’s like a shot of Red Bull, Coffee and Adrenaline all in one. I urge anyone who wishes to enhance their speaking and listening skills to join their local Toastmasters Club. The cost is minimal and your presentation skills are guaranteed to be enhanced. Check for a club nearest you at http://www.toastmasters.org/
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