We’ve all been in situations where we’ve been nervous before a presentation. In fact, speaking in front of others is often times peoples’ biggest fear. It’s a natural fear, but often one that can impede our progress in client presentations, speeches or overall daily communication.
However, help is out there. Toastmasters International (TI) (www.toastmasters.org) is an international organization is a worldwide nonprofit educational organization for the purpose of helping its members improve their communication, public speaking and leadership skills. TI’s mission is to cultivate self-confidence and growth in its members. To date, TI boasts over 10,500 clubs and more than 200,000 members in approximately 90 countries. Since Toastmasters began, more than four million men and women have benefited from the organization’s communication and leadership programs.
How Toastmasters’ Works
A Toastmasters club is a “learn-by-doing” workshop. A typical club has 20 to 40 members, who meet weekly or biweekly to learn and practice public speaking skills.
Toastmasters use its Competent Communicator (CC) and Competent Leadership (CL) manuals to guide members through the coursework. The CC manual includes 10 speech projects, each building upon the other in skills and difficulty. When giving a speech at Toastmasters meetings, a member is expected to speak within a certain time limit, usually five to seven minutes. At the end, other members will evaluate the speeches, aiming to encourage him or her to improve their speaking and listening skills.
Using the CL manual, the member works through ten leadership projects, working on leadership skills such as giving feedback, critical thinking and team building. Similar to the CL program, members who complete all ten projects in the CL manual receive a Competent Leader (CL) award.
After achieving their CC or CL designations, the Toastmaster then can proceed to more advanced projects.
A Typical Toastmasters Meeting Each meeting has a structured format, with various members participating in the different roles in the meetings. The meeting is run by a Toastmaster of the Day (TMOD or TME for Toastmaster of the Evening).
There are three basic parts to the Toastmasters meeting: the prepared speeches, table topics, and evaluations. In the prepared speaking portion of the meeting, two, three, or sometimes even four Toastmasters will give a prepared presentation, which are usually designed to meet the requirements of one of the projects in the communication manuals. “Table topics” is an speaking exercise where the speaker responds to a topic that is not known beforehand.
The evaluation session is where feedback is provided, not just to the speakers, but to all members. The evaluation session is headed by a General Evaluator, who calls on individual speech evaluators to give a 2- to 3-minute evaluation of an earlier presentation. After the evaluators have finished giving their evaluations, the General Evaluator calls for the helper reports, consisting of feedback given by specific individuals on topics as grammar and timing.
It’s important to remember that when you’re joining a Toastmaster’s club, all members have the same ultimate goal: to improve your presentation and leadership skills. That can be a comforting thought when you’re starting out on this journey. To find a Toastmasters club near you, visit: http://www.toastmasters.org/find/default.asp.
Related posts:
0 Responses to “Developing a Presenting Prowess: Toastmasters 101”