Toastmasters Archives | Toastmasters 101

Area Director Visits

Get ready for your area director visits now.

Toastmasters International is a worldwide organization. We are seeing massive growth outside of the United States, where Toastmasters is based. Do you ever wonder how they manage over 300 thousand members and thousands of clubs? Do they know what’s happening in the clubs? How do they know what’s going on in the clubs – and where there are problems, how can they help?

In today’s episode, we’re talking about area director visits: what the area director is doing, what the visit looks like to the club, and what they can do for you.

Do you want to develop your leadership and public speaking skills? Then Toastmasters is for you. In one hour a week, we’ll teach you the skills and give you the opportunities to practice them. This is Toastmasters 101 and I’m your host, Kim Krajci.

Toastmasters Area Directors

If you’re a member of a Toastmasters club, you might not know how the Toastmasters International organization is run.

Toastmasters International is a big organization – 300 thousand plus members to help to achieve their goals means that there must be some levels of management inserted into the program.

For an organization that teaches leadership – this gives thousands of people the opportunity to build up their skills in a hands-on way, instead of just reading a book or taking a class. As a club officer or a district officer, you’re going to deal with the problems that leaders face – managing an on-going program that’s just updated its basic product and delivery system, personnel turnover, and confused new members who don’t know what’s going on.

That’s in a healthy club. But what if you’re in a club with issues? Continue reading “Area Director Visits”

Your Online Meeting Agenda: The Power Tool You Need

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What does your online meeting agenda look like to a guest of your club?

What? You don’t have one?

Can you imagine trying to cut down a tree with a power saw – without starting it up? Absolutely ludicrous idea, isn’t it? The power tool is designed to be used to solve a problem quickly and more easily than it would by hand.

Have you ever thought about your agenda as a power tool? That maybe it can do a lot more for you than you expect?

Some people think of an agenda just as a check list, nothing more.

What value does an agenda bring to a club? How does it improve the club member and the club guest experience?

Does it need to change for online meetings?

Today on the podcast, let’s chat about your agendas – in person and online meeting agendas. What yours looks like, what you may need to change up, and how to use it out to recruit your club guests to become members.

INTRO

Are you looking for an effective way to learn public speaking and leadership skills? We’ve got it at Toastmasters. In one hour a week, you can learn what you need to change the world. This is Toastmasters 101 podcast and I’m your host, Kim Krajci.

On-site meetings vs. online meeting agendas

A few years back, I tried an experiment with my lunchtime Toastmasters club. Instead of printing an agenda, we opted to use the Free Toast Host agenda online, but we copied the information onto a whiteboard in our meeting room.

Saving money, saving paper, saving time – we thought.

What we found was that we were missing a critical part of our marketing to guests when they walked through our doors.

The meeting agenda provides more than just “who’s the Toastmaster and who’s the Table Topics Leader” information to the people in attendance. Continue reading “Your Online Meeting Agenda: The Power Tool You Need”

Come Back to Toastmasters

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Peole leave Toastmasters clubs for many reasons. What reasons do we have for them to come back to Toastmasters?

In today’s podcast, we have interviewed past District 10 Governor Deonna More Taylor. She’s a 7.5 time DTM (Distinguished Toastmaster Award) with the next one just one project away from completion. Continue reading “Come Back to Toastmasters”

Toastmasters Triple Crown and Smedley Awards

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What are your goals this year in Toastmasters? Have you given that much thought? What if you decide to think big and go for a Triple Crown?

What’s a Triple Crown, you ask?

Today on Toastmasters 101, let’s discuss your work and what you can do to win three awards in this Toastmasters year.

Do your goals this year include learning how to speak in public? Are you interested in leadership? Then Toastmasters is for you. We teach public speaking and leadership skills. This is Toastmasters 101 podcast and I’m your host, Kim Krajci.

How many projects can you do in one year?

Continue reading “Toastmasters Triple Crown and Smedley Awards”

Overcome Fear of Public Speaking with Toastmasters

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What’s your biggest challenge in public speaking? Is it overcoming your fear of public speaking?

Do you struggle to tell your stories? Does the stage fright scare you off? Are filler words filling up your speeches? Maybe you’re lost with no idea what to give a speech about?

At one point or another, we all face these challenges in public speaking. Right now is your opportunity to make some decisions that will help you solve those problems later.

Welcome to the new year – the Toastmasters New Year – and all the promise that a new year has.

Intro

Do you want to overcome your fear of public speaking? Then Toastmasters can help you. Our proven plan can teach you the skills and techniques of public speaking so you can share your message with the world. This is Toastmasters 101 and I’m your host, Kim Krajci.

Getting lost in the plan

Have you ever started a project and watch it go wrong? You’re stuck at a place with no idea what to do next or how to finish it?

Maybe you’re lost on a trip. Maybe you’ve got just enough experience to get yourself in a pickle. Or maybe you just need a better plan.

Public speaking challenges people down to the core of their being. Whether they’re afraid of being judged or afraid of making a fool of themselves, or concerned that they can’t effectively communicate their message – those go down into the center of who we are, who I am as a person. Fear might overcome almost every other emotion we feel – even love, passion, or pleasure.

So how does Toastmasters help your fear of public speaking?

Continue reading “Overcome Fear of Public Speaking with Toastmasters”

Toastmasters Area Director: Is this your future?

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Do you want to be a Toastmasters Area Director?

Our District 10 annual meeting is this Saturday morning. While we’re there, we’ll be electing our district leaders for the year – affectionately called the Trio – District Director, Program Quality Director, and Club Growth Director. Then the division directors are elected – in District 10, we have 5 divisions. But the most important member of the leadership team, the area directors, are not elected here. They are appointed by the District Director. Does that sound right to you? The most important members of the district executive committee are appointed?

INTRO

Are you interested in developing your leadership skills? Toastmasters is where leaders are made! We provide a fun and safe place for you to develop your public speaking and leadership skills at Toastmasters! This is Toastmasters 101 and I’m your host, Kim Krajci.

What is the role of the Area Director?

Continue reading “Toastmasters Area Director: Is this your future?”

Attend Your Toastmasters District Conference

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I find myself doing less and less in front of the computer right now. Maybe I don’t have the mental space? Maybe I’m too stressed? Whatever it is, I’m struggling with the idea of spending a day online for the upcoming Toastmasters District Conference.

Why should I?

Why should you?

INTRO

Are you interested in building your skills in public speaking and leadership? Then Toastmasters is for you. We teach both in a safe and fun environment where you’ll get immediate feedback to help you grow. This is Toastmasters 101 and I’m your host, Kim Krajci.

Toastmasters District Conference

Toastmasters International hasn’t reported the new membership numbers yet, but everyone expects that we’re down – just like everyone else int he world. But we also know that TI has done the work to help us get through this crisis – encouraging online meetings, permitting officer training to go online for credit, and moving the annual convention that was scheduled for Paris this year to a virtual conference – apparently at no charge.

But any conference, to me, is not so much about the speakers. Sorry, keynoters. #Sorrynotsorry. I can listen to your presentation later if it’s available. Frankly, any speaker needs to have unbelievable – and I mean that literally – unbelievable value to get me to sit down at a conference to listen to them. I find the breakout sessions have more value to me because I can choose. Continue reading “Attend Your Toastmasters District Conference”

Leadership in Adversity in Toastmasters

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What does leadership in adversity look like? What do leaders in adverse situations do?

This week was the most important religious holiday of my year. What’s normally a day of celebration and feasting with my extended church family was instead kept at home, in front of a screen.

No candles, no shouts, no procession.

But the following morning, we opted to create a physical event that met all of the existing regulations. We met outside. We socially distanced ourselves. Many of us wore masks and gloves.

For an hour, we were together.

Was it enough?

When we talk about 2020 and Toastmasters in the future, what are we going to say? Was it enough?

INTRO

Learning leadership skills takes us out of our comfort zones. Do you want to learn leadership skills in a safe environment without the risks of harming your career? Then Toastmasters is for you. Toastmasters is where leaders are made – we’ll introduce you to the foundations and give you the opportunities to grow your skills. This is Toastmasters 101 and I’m your host, Kim Krajci. Continue reading “Leadership in Adversity in Toastmasters”

Your High Performance Leadership Project in a Pandemic

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Today’s podcast is about your High Performance Leadership Project in a Pandemic – what to do when you are stuck.

TI Extends the Deadlines

Toastmasters International made a huge announcement last week right in the middle of my recording last week’s podcast. The big news? An extension has been made for those who are currently stuck due to the pandemic – the Advanced Leadership Silver award and the Distinguished Toastmaster Award in the classic education program have had their deadlines moved to 2021. Inside this extension is the Club Coach project – also extended into 2021.

What wasn’t extended was the deadline for the High Performance Leadership – which is part of the Advanced Leadership Silver award.

What’s a Toastmaster to do?

My suggestion? Pivot. Continue reading “Your High Performance Leadership Project in a Pandemic”

Mastering Online Meetings

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Mastering Online Meetings

Toastmasters are facing a lot of challenges right now. As we make the transition to mastering online meetings, we get to

Learn how to manage a meeting platform
Present projects with a remote audience
Plan out our path for us to achieve our goals.

Yeah, that’s not much, right?

What’s even more challenging is that your equipment is what you’ve got to work with. So how do you make that work?

Online Meetings

Good question. We can’t possibly address every single variant – this equipment, that platform. But what we can do is try to help you face your audience at the meeting with some confidence that you can do it.

So today, we’ll spend some time talking about how to learn your platform, presentation skills in the video format, and what your next project will teach you – a lot more than just what the Pathways instructions told you. Continue reading “Mastering Online Meetings”