Speak better, present better and make some friends along the way!

I went along to Toastmasters the other night to find out what it's all about, and to see whether the compliments and criticisms I had heard were true.  As a facilitator, presentation skills are an essential part of my business, in fact I help people improve theirs, therefore it is important I learn as much as I can too!  So here is my humble review of my first encounter with Toastmasters!

Over 270000 members and 13000 clubs in 116 countries

Firstly some background. Toastmasters are an international organisation that have been helping people with public speaking since 1924.  They have no instructor, and encourage a supportive environment whereby they evaluate each other's performance according to set criteria and members participate in a series of challenges in accordance with the 'Competent Communication Manual' and 'Competent Leadership Manual'. They are called Toastmasters because it is tradition to toast the speaker although one does not have to consume alcohol, and it is also important to applaud the speaker to encourage and show appreciation.

I have heard some criticisms that Toastmasters is 'formulaic'. I have to disagree. As a skilled evaluator, I did not feel the talks last night were formulaic at all, in fact I have to say the speakers who ranged from relatively new members to more experienced, were fantastic! No filler words, great body language, engaged with the audience and overall great talk!  I must say that the sources of the negative comments have a lot to learn from their Toastmaster peers.

The group I attended is the 4th Dimension at the Campus at Dimension Data Fourways - http://4thdimension.org.za/.  There are many groups in SA and each group is said to have its own 'vibe'. For some people, it may be important to spend some time finding the right group, I must say I think 4th Dimension are fantastic for me! I feel humbled and look forward to learning from all these wonderful and talented people.

What I appreciated is Toastmasters appoint a 'Grammarian' for the evening to comment on the usage of grammar.  Even if your written usage is excellent, often when one speaks things tend to fall apart so this is really useful! There is also the word of the day, something I really enjoy with my daily free subscription from dictionary.com, and Toastmasters use the same concept and encourage usage of the word of the day throughout the evening to reinforce its usage and ensure by the end of the evening everyone has incorporated it into their vocabulary.

I would certainly recommend Toastmasters to anyone who wants to improve their confidence, their presentations or even just network and make some friends.  I think there is great scope for self development here and it is affordable, fun and intelligent. I am very impressed with this well coordinated organization and look forward to becoming a Toastmaster in my own right too.  Why not pop along for a visit to a group near you, find your nearest club using this link http://reports.toastmasters.org/findaclub/.

For more info contact us on www.minutetakersclinic.co.za