Toastmasters truly is a place where you can develop certain skills which you would never be able to develop even if you attended the most exclusive seminaries.
No expensive 2 day public speaking workshop is going to help you as much as a Toastmaster membership will. And no, you won’t learn how to make the perfect breakfast toast.
I’m not paid by Toastmasters International to write this. This is my personal opinion after I’ve reviewed the whole Toastmaster curriculum, program, membership events. I’ve even read many of the specific booklets created by Toastmasters International. I’ve come to this conclusion by comparing it to many other offers on the market.
I can truly state that Toastmasters is an truly benefical investment and a astounding way to help you succeed personally and professionaly.
At the end of this article I’ve also updated my personal critique after being a member for more than 1 year. (March 2019)
Personally, I’ve avoided going to any self development/public
speaking/entrepreneurial club for years due to the fact that I viewed it
as a waste of time since most people there where actually there to take
and not give back. Or it was some kind of pure theoretical story about
how you can change if you only think about it.
Change can only come from action.
I had been searching for a while for a group of people who where on to
developing their leadership and communication skills. I want to develop
my communication skills even more so that I can offer the best advice to
my customers who seek software development and consulting.
I wanted something that was a "no nonsense" approach to leadership and
public speaking . A more business-like environment where there is no
theoretical bullshit but you actually get to practice every time, all
the time and become better and better.
To make it clear. I had prior public speaking experience since
highschool. We gave presentations all the time so I had a basic
knowledge of how you should do certain things. I had broken the ice of
public speaking during highschool when I can tell you that I really was
nervous all the time. I would speak so fast that probably most wouldn’t
get my message.
Due to the fact that I had practiced it before it became easier for me
to stand in front of a small crowd in Toastmasters. But standing in
front and presenting something versus delivering an extraordinary speech
are different things. If I can still improve, so can you!
If I am to compare the quality of other places to the high quality that
Toastmasters adheres we first need to take into account the fact that
each Toastmaster club is different in a unique way.
Although each Toastmaster Club follows a predefined agenda it has small
differences and this is a good thing.
Most of the people who sell specific trainings, courses, seminaries
still need to learn how to actually provide people with benefits instead
of continuously selling hopes and dreams. Toastmasters is different in
this aspect that it doesn’t try to sell you anything except the fact
that you will reap true benefits by continuously improving.
If you where to compare the money you would actually spend on
trainings,courses, seminaries and books throughout the years it will be
a cheaper investment to just go to Toastmasters each week AND prepare
for your roles. Dilligently start writing a speech and perform it every
3 to 6 weeks so you build up your muscles. For the leadership part it’s
pretty easy, all you need to do is get involved in the meetings
organisation.
The self development industry has created many charlatans and hustlers
selling miraculous solutions to every problem including public speaking,
communication, inter personal relationships etc.
Most of them are so effective they charge for $3000 for a 1 or to 2 day
seminar excluding other costs like transport, accomodation and food.
I am writing a book called "The Credible Eccentric" on some of this
topics. You can subscribe to get a sneak
preview at ElixirOfTruth.com.
Continuous professional development
Everything that happens during Toastmasters, all activities, no matter
how small they may seem help all the members in developing their
communicaton and leadership skills.
It’s sad that most don’t understand this and are actually reluctant to
participate or do something extra. For example, presenting your role is
a great way to prepare a 30 second customized speech.
Or just to improvise based on the topic of the meeting.
Organization, Timing and Agenda
I’ve attended my first Toastmasters meeting in Januari 2018. The only
reason why I wanted to go is that I was testing the waters to see if I
could find a group of business likeminded people.
It instantly drew my atention of how organized everything was.
Everything started on time and was kept in track in a timely fashion.
There was an actual agenda of what was to happen and when it was to
happen.
Let’s be serious and honest here for a moment. Not even the most
effective corporations follow a specific agenda and try to focus on what
they’re doing. Most meetings in a company are useless time hogs. If
they’d plan everything in advance they would also benefit from meeting
with a plan at hand.
Just by attending toastmasters you can instantly inconsciously feel the
breeze of benefits that are thrown at you at each step.
Timing is important and everything is timed in Toastmasters. You have a
minimum time to speak and a maximum amount of time to which you get 30
seconds to wrap everything up. If you don’t wrap things up then you are
'disqualified'.
Being disqualified often means different things in different clubs. You
will mostly see the red card waved and people will start to applaud as
if you had the best speech in the world.
This indicates that you’ve gone over your time and the meeting should
proceed further. So please take a seat and learn to look at the signs
the next time.
Learning to present effectively
Even the speech timing has been devised in a way that makes it extremely
logic. You have to keep a speech in around 5 to 7 minutes. This is not
to long and not to short.
Being able to present your ideas means that you need to be able to do
this in a certain predefined timeframe. I think 5 to 7 minutes is a
extraordinary choice of time since historically people could keep
attention at around 10 minutes before it would drop. Nowadays attention
is even lower in younger generations but 5 to 7 minutes is still a sweet
spot.
How often don’t we see long presentations that go on for almost an hour
while everything could have been presented in just 7 minutes in a manner
that it would have made people laugh and actually be interested.
Sometimes you can’t really present what you want in 5 to 7 minutes and
that’s ok. You can talk about those ideas in another speech. Or you
could keep a longer educational moment if everyone agrees.
Toastmasters has such booklets and presentations which can be used in
conjuction with Powerpoint. Of course, when people go to keep longer
presentations and when using powerpoint it’s important to learn the rule
of putting almost NO text on your slides. I haven’t found a guide on
making great powerpoint presentatinons within TOastmaster yes.
I think this is something extra since most presentations are to be of
the storytelling type. I however recommend everyone to go through
Presentation Zen.
Feedback and encouragement
During a meeting members and guests are encouraged all the time to go on
and speak. Everyone is presented for their position and we all applaud
eachother.
The applauding also happens whenever you have finished your role and
speech.
The continuous feedback during the meetings is what makes everything worthwile. Feedback leads to improvements. Those improvements happen when people know they may speak up and also when they know they are listened to. Feedback also needs to be applied for it to work.
I can certainly say that prior to toastmasters I didn’t really know how
to give feedback. Especially feedback based on a speech someone has
given.
After each speech all members give feedback to eachother. During my
first 2 to 3 months I didn’t know what to write. Toastmasters has some
tools to help with this, and in pathways even a small training on how to
give feedback. I read the 'effective evaluator' 10 page booklet but I
was awaiting a 300 page book explaining everything into details.
To be honest, practice makes perfect. You can only learn if you
practice.. And the practice you gain while giving writing and presenting
the speech evaluations in Toastmasters are invaluable.
Speech Evaluation
Then I had the chance to give a personal speech evaluation to other
members. This first happened at the club contest.
This
was also the moment I gave my first speech.
Speech Evaluation can seem pretty simple. You watch someone perform a
speech. You write down your feedback including the positive, the
negative and what can be improved.
Simple, right?
Well not so fast.. You have to look at everything including structure,
body language, eye contact, tonality etc. This can prove to be
overwhelming.
Big deal, You write everything down. Now what?
Well you need to structure it and keep a 2 to 3 minute presentation.
However if you focus on 3 to 5 keypoints then you have more than enough
to talk about.
Toastmaster international actually has a contest on keeping speech
evaluations. I’ve found their sandwich way of doing everything is
allright.
The General Evaluator
The general evaluator is not a military general who is also an evaluator but mainly someone who views the meeting from a 360 angle and gives his feedback on how everything went. Was everyone on time? Was the agenda followed? Guidelines for the meeting. Additional feedback for certain activities.
Round Table Feedback
If there is no general evaluator then there is a round table feedback session when everyone can give their input on how things went.
Guest Feedback
Guests are also asked for their feedback. This is extremely important. My view is that they’re often overwhelmed by everything that is happening and have a positive thing to say.
Constant feedback
If you have a speech you also get feedback slips from other members,
they’re usually very specific since the time to write the feedback is
limited.
As a toastmaster or tabletopics master you also get feedback.
As you see, feedback IS an integral part of the Toastmaster Experience.
Feedback is a first class citizen. You will be learning on how to
effectively give feedback aswell on how to receive it.
Giving feedback is an art and it can only be created by continuously
providing it. After some time it’s going to become a habit and you will
start writing feedback for every person who keeps a presentation or does
a project outside of Toastmasters. Of course, when you have 2 different
roles in a smaller club it might be difficult to fill in the feedback
slip.
The Various Roles Explained briefly
There are multiple roles in each meeting and each role HELPS every
toastmaster member develop their skills in attention, public speaking
and presenting.
Because with each role you actually have to do some talking and
presenting. This is an opportunity to go beyond the basic roles outlined
in the manuals.
Whenever you are presenting your role you can roleplay or give something
of an extra.
These roles also provide you with the opportunity to enhance your focus and attention skills. Just "doing" them will help, but doing them and researching will boost your abilities.
Ah Counter
The first role would be the Ah counter. Pretty simple. Just count the
"ahs" and other filler words used during the whole meeting. Use a
certain device like a piano to attract attention to the speakers. The
sound is not made during prepared speeches. At the end of the meeting
the "ah counter" reports his findings and provides feedback on how to
improve.a
I’ve seen people improve tremendously by just attracting their attention
all the time.
Camera Master/ Video Master
Not really a full fledged role, it’s the person that registers certain parts of the meeting like the speeches, feedbacks and provides them to the members.
Grammarian
The grammarian choses the word of the day based on the Toastmaster
theme. (S)he is responsible with reviewing proper usage of the language
used in the club.
The Grammarian also gives a report at the end o the meeting.
Motivational Words
Motivational words is a function that differs from club to club. It’s a mini speech of 2 to 3 minutes to help keep people motivated. Usually it’s based on the theme of the meeting. This mini speech is usefull to train new members in public speaking. It can be given to new members before they go on to give their Ice breaker.
Posture Monitor
The Posture monitor looks at the body posture of all speakers during the
meeting. He has a certain device which he uses to attract attention
whenever someone is using a bad posture or a distracting gesture. Again
this does not happen during the prepared speech.
I think that the posture monitor should be more of a body language
analyzer looking at small details of how body language affects the
speecth.
Since body language is complex the posture monitor has a predefined set
of things to look after. Members are encouraged to study other body
language moves and postures which can be used.
He gives a report at the end of the meeting.
Sergeant at Arms
This person is responsible to maintain Club equipment in working order
and check after every meeting to ensure adequate supplies are available
.
Collecting voting slips, ensuring that the meeting starts on time. He’s
also the person who should greet members and guests and arange them to
sit with members.
Smaller clubs have this role integrated with other roles.
Table Topic - Impromptu speeches
Table Topics, probably the most loved portion of any meeting. This is
when the Table Topics master creates questions around the meeting
theme.
Members that don’t have other roles and guests are invited to give an
impromptu speech which can last between 1 and 2:30 minutes based on the
question asked.
To qualify you must be in time and use the word of the day explained by
the grammarian.
The best table topic impromptu speech is voted upon and the winner takes
a prize home.
Vote Counter
The vote counter just counts the votes of the table topicss and only
votes if there is a draw. He then announces the winner.
I find that the vote counter should be mixed with the Table Topic role.
If there are 20 members at a meeting then it’s better to have this role
sepparate.
Timer
The timer must time all the speeches and most of the meeting to ensure everything goes on schedule.
Toastmaster
The toastmaster role is the ultimate role. This person is responsible with presenting the whole meeting and introducing everyone during the meeting.
Club Officer
There are 7 club officer roles. These are leadership roles which will
help each member focus on a certain skillset and ability.
These roles are:
President
Vice President Education
Vice President Membership
Vice President Public Relations
Secretary
Treasurer
Sergeant at Arms
I won’t explain what each of them needs to do since more details can be
found on this page.
https://www.toastmasters.org/leadership-central/club-officer-tools/club-officer-roles
The Club Leadership Handbook which explains these officer roles can be
downloaded here
https://www.toastmasters.org/leadership-central/club-officer-tools/~/media/E51A693193F749AE91FD79F6DB839534.ashx
Each role is quite complex but one thing is certain that all club
officers need to meet at least once a month and dicuss certain
activities.
Picking up a club office role provides you with the opportunity to go to
2 bootcamps a year organized by the division. You will get training for
your role and get to meet other people.
Critiques and my personal feedback on Toastmasters
Maybe one of the weaker points or critiques of Toastmasters Clubs is
that most members themselves are learning and growing with the club.
Everything is based on volunteering so all the people in all the roles
are volunteering their time and energy. This is something that must be
taken into account and always kept in mind.
No one is paid to do anything so the Officers are motivated by certain
intristic abilities and the fact that they truly want to help people.
Once a member has grown to a certain level, (s)he most often changes their mindset and experiences other priorities in life. Members then quit and pursue other activities. Or they just aren’t active anymore.
What I hate the most
What I hate the most is when people are extremely motivated to do speeches and become better. They claim they’ll put hours per week into preparing and making a speech in 2 weeks. Yet after a few months they haven’t even done their ice breaker or 6 months passed and they haven’t reached level 1 of pathways. Most members I’ve encountered have claimed that they "simply can’t make the time". I find this a very weak excuse. If you want to become better and you know it helps you then you will prioritize what is important. if you can’t prioritize what is important then you’re just lying to yourself and to others. This is called hypocrisy.
I’ve explained on numerous accounts that with just 15-20 minutes per day put aside to work on a speech you will have 7+ hours per month. Which is enough to keep one speech per month! Taking this to the extreme you can easily do a great speech every 6 weeks.
Think about it, don’t you have at least 15 minutes a day to invest in yourself for something that will benefit you for the rest of your life?
Most often experienced members just quit without properly giving back to
the community.
I find this regretful since the people who have learned the most are
needed the most to coach and mentor the newcomers. I truly feel that for
each 1 year when you learned and reaped the benefits of Toastmasters you
should give back 1 year of your experience, knowledge and time to
toastmasters by helping other members.
So if you’ve spent 3 years learning then think about giving back 3 years
to the community. If you just take without giving then you haven’t
really learned anything from the toastmaster experience.
The quality of the meetings may differ from club to club due to these
reasons. This however shouldn’t keep you from joining Toastmasters.
Keep in mind that Toastmasters isn’t a place where you will learn
everything and become an expert overnight. It’s rather the place where
you will go to for years on end to get incremental results to success.
One other thing that bugs me is that Club Officers don’t really invest in themselves and the club. I know that adult life is difficult yet taking a responsibility means doing your job properly untill the end.
Conclusion
If developing your public speaking skills, enhancing your feedback giving and receiving skills or becoming a leader is important to you then you should consider joining a Toastmasters club. If you DO commit and join please be realistic and set aside at least 3 hours per week.
You can find even more than Ive summarized here on the official
https://toastmasters.org website. I encourage you to search for a club
near you and go there as a guest a few times.
If you can’t find a club near you then think about STARTING ONE.