Dinosaur Toastmasters

04/01/2023

Apart from the weekly meetings, twice a year Toastmasters runs contests. I've started participating in them because writing a contest speech is wildly different than a typical meeting speech.

Our division is hosting their contest TODAY (Saturday) for the international speech and the evaluation segments. I'm competing in the international speech contest with a 5-7 minute MBA inspired speech on the VRIO framework - since practicing it at the club I've added in a rap about Louis Vuitton and Grey Poupon...should be fun!

If you're interested in listening to some high-calibre speeches - most of them will be inspirational speeches - it's being streamed live to the District 42 you tube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/user/District42TM

It starts at 1:30 pm and they do not make a recording of it. They will do the evaluation contest first, and then the international speech contest.
I'm speaker #6 out of 8 contestants so I'll be later in the program: I'm guessing maybe 2:15 or 2:30?
If you're washing dishes or puttering at home, you can tune in.
Happy Saturday!
September

District 42 encompasses Toastmasters Clubs from Southern Alberta and Southern Saskatchewan in Canada. Toastmasters is a world leader in communication and lea...

03/16/2023

I spent last week in Edmonton with my supply chain management class for my MBA (ugh, in my last year finally!). I've been in Toastmasters for two years now, and observing my peers reminded me how much Toastmasters has sharpened my communication skills.

I observed several of the deadly sins of public speaking:
-the use of filler words like ums, ahs, so, and.
-complete lack of awareness of time: people would go on and on instead of making their point and yielding the floor to other people
-people not preparing what they wanted to say, which resulted in stumbling through their message, contradicting or repeating themselves, missing key points, and sounding incoherent. I was genuinely dismayed by some of the group presentations.
-people distracting themselves by going on unrelated tangents.
-people cutting each other off - that one drove me crazy.
-people having side conversations that distracted others.

My feedback to the PhD's who ran the group was to open the session with some public speaking etiquette reminders around these different behaviors!

What I found most helpful to avoid these behaviors was writing notes for myself so that when I asked a question or had a comment, I could refer to my notes and do it quickly and concisely.

The truth is that you might be the smartest person in the room, but if your communication skills are ineffective, it doesn't matter. My biggest takeaway from two years in Toastmasters is that we need BOTH great content AND great delivery. One without the other fails.

Happy Thursday!
September

12/21/2022

Dinos is on a Christmas break - we will resume on Thursday, Jan 5/23. If one of your new year's resolutions is to improve in public speaking, we invite you to stop in for a meeting! The worst that can happen is you have some fun, listen to two great speeches, and decide to join!

Happy holidays!
September

09/29/2022

Hey all. I like setting monthly goals, and one of my Optimal October goals is no social media. I’m sure you’ll all miss me terribly... If you’re thinking about Toastmasters, we meet in person every Thursday night at 6:30 pm in the SPEC boardroom. You’re welcome to join us for any of our meetings as our guest to check it out. The front door is unlocked from 6:15-6:28. Come tonight to hear my humorous speech that I’m entering in the semi-annual Toastmasters contest! It’s on divorce, online dating, and finding love in my 30’s.

If you decide later that you’d like to join, the fee is $60 every six months and that pays the Toastmaster International dues, plus a one time fee of $30 at the beginning to pay for your materials. It’s a great investment in personal and professional growth - I am a far more organized and confident speaker and leader because of it. I’ve been a member for two years and have a second membership in a zoom only club because I enjoy it so much.

You’re welcome anytime! Working professional? Great. Retired? Awesome. Anything in between? You’re welcome too. As long as you didn’t vote NDP, we’ll have you. That was a joke. Kind of.

I’ll be back on Facebook in November (unless I can’t break my social media habit lol!)

Thanks for reading along,
September

09/23/2022

Well folks, I posted all 90 Toastmaster Tips so perhaps today I'll just give you a general life tip.

If you're sad, eat ice cream.
If you're happy, eat ice cream.
If you're hot, eat ice cream.
If you're bored, ice cream again.
If it's your birthday, still ice cream.

If I lived in Sunnylea next to Lori's Cornerstore, I would go there every single day.
You're welcome. But also, join Toastmasters.
September

09/23/2022

We had our Thursday night meeting last night and I'm here to talk about speeches again. Ideally, we have two 5-7 minute speeches in each of our 60 minute meetings, which means each member would give a speech a month. Some people are happy to do speeches more often while some members are a bit quieter. This week, Amanda and I delivered our speeches. We are both in Level 5 (the last level) in our pathways and we are both procrastinating the more challenging projects required by level 5. So....we both did for fun speeches where we got to choose our topics and the purpose was to practice writing and delivering a for fun speech.

I like doing speeches about the books I read. I have an annual SMART goal to read 10,000 pages of non-fiction. So far this year I have read 38 books and am within 200 pages of my goal. I don't say this to brag - it's a TON of work, and I guarantee that Amanda has read more books than I have this year! So, my speech was about The Gap and the Gain by Sullivan and Hardy. After coaching high-performing individuals who didn't see themselves as successful, they came up with the gap and the gain theory. We have our ideal selves, our actual selves, and then us at 20 years old (or some starting point). Imagine a yardstick - ideal on one end, 20 yr old on the other, and current us in the middle somewhere. Whether we focus on the gains we have achieved or the gap remaining has a huge impact on our self-esteem, the way we lead our teams, the way we parent. I gave an example of a place in my life where I am too gap focused and challenged my group to be proud of their gains and let that fuel them to keep closing the gap.

Amanda delivered an excellent speech about imposter syndrome, including a fantastic story about Neil Armstrong - yes, that guy who went to the moon - feeling like an imposter. She explained imposter syndrome, shared an example from her own life, and gave us specific tips on how to beat it. I love listening to her speeches and our speeches ended up being really complimentary. She was able to work in references to my speech, as well as comments about several of our Toastmasters which is a great example of audience awareness.

We've both given so many speeches that we've learned the formula of a good speech, and it's always fun to write a speech about something we want to talk about instead of a pathway project on mentoring or leadership styles etc. I highly recommend for fun speeches!

It's Friday! Have a great weekend!
September

09/22/2022

Day 90 of 90 Toastmaster Tips
Keep a journal. When you get ideas for speech topics, jot them down in a journal so you have them to refer to when you’re tapped for ideas and need inspiration.

I had hoped that tip #90 would go out with a bang. This one is kind of lame so I'm going to write my own Tip 90.

90: Get all your friends to join Toastmasters so you have an excuse to hang out every week. Don't be afraid to do it in an obnoxious way, like giving them a membership as their birthday gift - surprise!!! Ha ha, I NEED TO DO THAT TO MY SISTER WHO KEEPS REFUSING TO JOIN ME. BECKY, I AM COMING FOR YOU.

Thanks very much for following along (maybe it's just been my dad, who knows).
Have a great day,
September

09/21/2022

Day 89 of 90 Toastmaster Tips
Use people’s names. People love to be addressed by their name in conversation. To help you remember someone’s name, be sure to say it back to them to verify you have it right, and try to use it several times to make it stick.

Beyonce wrote a song about this - Say My Name - so it must be true.

Are you sad that we're almost at the end of the Toastmaster Tips? Me too. I like adding my two cents and having this one way conversation with Facebook.

Have a great day and definitely go for lunch at Niko's. We are lucky to have delicious sushi in this town!
September

09/20/2022

Day 88 of 90 Toastmaster Tips
Take jokes for a test drive. If you want to include a joke in your speech, write several options and test them out with your family, co-workers or club members to see how they are received.

I prefer subtle, dry humor myself, but that's not for everyone.

My dad says he likes reading my daily tips so hi dad! I love you! Thank you for teaching me to do it right the first time, to give back to my community, and to use my fat head. If I could have picked my father, I would have chosen you x 1,000. Any time someone says, "is your dad Bill Plumer?" I am proud to say yes. I won't tell my sisters that I'm your favorite child.
Love September
PS Ask mom to make some buns!

09/19/2022

Day 87 of 90 Toastmaster Tips
Don’t get lost in translation. If you deliver a speech in your second (or even third) language, use humor, metaphor and analogy sparingly, as these don’t always translate well into other languages.

And don't forget to avoid idioms. There may be more than one way to skin a cat (literally the grossest saying ever) but that doesn't mean you should ever use that phrase!

Happy Monday!
September

09/19/2022

We listened to two really lovely speeches on Thursday evening.

Amanda shared "I don't feel connected", which was a for fun speech to practice writing and delivering a speech. She explained what connection is, how we do it, and what we can do to improve at it. I was her evaluator and had my hands full recording all the great speaking techniques she used. Her two speaking superpowers is the use of relevant quotes (two from Brene Brown in this speech as well as a reference to Proverbs) and providing strong roadmaps at the beginning and ending of her speeches to tell you where she's going and then remind you where she's been in her speech. She gave me a lot of food for thought on the power of connection and blew my mind with a magnet prop that was basically a magic trick.

Donna shared "Look! I can cook" to complete her last level 2 project to give a speech on mentoring. She brought a cookbook her mother gave her as a child and delighted me with stories about cooking her way through it as a young child. Her mother's inscription in the front of the book was precious, and I laughed about one of the tips in the book: You can't buy new fingers so be careful with knives. Donna is a master of wordplay and pacing: my face hurt from smiling so hard.

I'm working on my speech for this week's meeting about a book I just read called The Gap and the Gain that left a real impact on me - book #37 for this year. I'm 398 pages away from hitting my 10,000 pages of non fiction reading goal for 2022. Crazy.

Have a great evening and remember to eat some of that Halloween candy. Why else would stores be selling it this early?
September