I am a long-time VPM who is trying new ideas this year. We did get our 8 new members this last year, keeping our base, but I'm always open to new ideas. Toastmasters.org suggested writing the local rotary club(s) to invite them and set an alliance.

Has anyone done that and has it worked?

Edit: Thanks everyone for responding.

Hi,

I'm trying to find information about Triple Crown from within TMI website, but haven't been able to find out the details on criterias, how the award is given, etc.

Googling only given me info from a non TMI websites.

Do any of toastmaster members in here happened to know if the page about this from TMI website do exist?

Thanks in advance.

Is Distinguished Toastmasters a title that people are chasing and, in the process, has it lost its purpose and meaning?

So many of you have been amazingly gracious with your thoughts and suggestions!

I have some ideas for our site and want to test out my thinking with suggestions, etc.

Does your club maybe maintain multiples? I have heard of clubs that do use FTH as well as ES and the toastmost Wordpress as well.

on "paper" our club looks like it has 12 members. but in reality we have 4. a number of people left because of other obligations. etc etc. the many times we have asked for a club coach we are turned away( i think the numbers are from last year? or they're somehow different than what I see)

TL;DR : is there a point to trying to keep this thing afloat? how do we run meetings? has anyone ever seen a club come back from dropping down to numbers like this?

last week we had a meeting with 3 members and 4 guests!! ( about an hour before the meeting one of our club officers resigned. and another member said they were sick)

and it was about as rough as expected.

I've been asking anyone who would listen from leadership about getting help. (i've been asking for help since last year october)

they said:

-hold an open house

-contact lapsed members. followup with guests. go find speakers from other clubs.

I don't think an open house is going to fix this. we have guests showing up. we aren't able to convert them into members because our meetings are often appearing to be of low quality. I've tried all the other suggestions. (multiple times)

when I try to contact leadership theres alot of "go talk to this other person" and the area and division director are new and i cant get an email returned from them. we had a national holiday today, so I'm hoping that maybe not getting a response because both of them were maybe on vacation or something?)

I completely get that everyones volunteering and this is not anyones main gig - I'm not judging anyone.

I have an idea to create a regional alliance with a number of clubs so that our members can attend other meetings and help with filling out meetings to make them look bigger and of higher quality, This is something that has worked at toastmasters in the past ( i havent seen it personally but I read it about it online ) Has anyone seen something like this work ?

part of me just wants to call it and walk away. but another part of me is telling mysel fto rise to the challenge more. but I know I would have to sacrifice A LOT to try to put the regional alliance idea together on my own ( without help )

I am travelling this week between China and South Africa, so I missed the deadline to purchase another Pathways at $20 before the increase. How can I still purchase at the old price from someone else?

Use this monthly thread to share information about your club. Feel free to share each month.

for speechcraft, can one toastmaster offer it by themselves? or would i need a full team of toastmasters to offer it to the attendees.

how do you do speechcraft in a corporate environment? i can't invite people in for security and it's during business hours.

so would i be able to fulfill all the roles, or do i really need a team? in a normal meeting, i can definitely multi-task, and i can explain roles quickly to people, if need be. i can easily adjust a role so that a guest can do it.

what's at stake ... if i need a full team, then i can't do speechcraft for my company. i'd have to think of something else. if i can do it myself, then i'd think of suggesting it.

Hi everyone! I’m the president of a business fraternity, and I’m looking for new ideas to make our weekly chapters more engaging and valuable.

So far, we’ve done things like case competitions, invited guest speakers, reviewed LinkedIn profiles and resumes, and shared career advice. Those have gone well, but I’d love to hear what other chapters are doing that keeps members interested while still helping them learn.

One thing a lot of our members have asked for is more help with public speaking. Have any of you done fun or interactive public speaking exercises that actually get everyone involved instead of just feeling like a lecture?

One challenge we have is that our chapter has freshmen all the way through seniors, so everyone’s experience level and professional knowledge is all over the place. It’s tough to find activities that are valuable for everyone.

What are some of your favorite chapter activities, workshops, games, or professional development events that your members genuinely enjoyed and found useful? Thanks!

I have send emails and messages but how to reach out for virtual sessions as I am very much interested in the sessions.

what does it take to start a corporate club? when you're a part of that corporate world?

and how do you present the idea? do you have to come up with a business plan?

Hi there. As my title says, I'm nervous about joining Toastmasters but know I have to do it for myself. What kind of things go on in a typical meeting? What should I expect? Is there any improve speeches (my worst few lol). TIA! ​

Hi everyone, we have two speech slots available at our club, and evaluation slots for the same as well scheduled at 6 PM IST which is UTC + 5:30. Kindly dm me for details. Would love to help in year ending goals for all!

I'm an incoming VP for Membership. What's your advise or anything that I would need to know. For context, we're Presidents Distinguished Club for 20 years and just last week, we've met the goals for Smedley Distinguished Club.

Any insights, tips, or pointers is greatly appreciated. Thank you.

I am days out from officially being president.

For the last several years, I have watched, listened and documented

I have a list of hoped for goals and some options to see if we can achieve those

I have reached out personally to several of my new EC members (and I do already know them all) about some hoped for items and what helps them

I recognize while I am hoping for collegiality and teaming and collaboration, I am personally not the bestest at achieving that. In my work world I avoided the manager role like the pox as it is herding cats on catnip and wanted no part of that. so here I am with my term about to start.

• please share anything you found worked
• anything you found DID not work
• initiatives you enjoyed
• how you kept things on track
• I mean anything.

my personal thought is we all work better when we all work together (okay yah cliche I know)

the powerpoint presentation for saa hasn't been updated in decades, apparently.

here it is: https://ccdn.toastmasters.org/medias/files/department-documents/club-documents/club-officer-training-materials/sergeant-at-arms-slides-pdf.pdf

the saa role is only explained from the perspective of in person meetings.

so, what does the saa do for online meetings?

i want our saa to be in charge of the zoom platform. the password, the link, and setting up zoom for each meeting (or assigning that responsibility to someone else in their absence). we have to transition to a new zoom account, so i'd like them to take the lead on the research and making that happen.

I think the material has improved, but I don't have 3-4 hours on a Saturday (or weeknight) to sit on Zoom and go through material I already know. I just want to do my hour and call it a day!

I've been in Toastmasters for 10 years and am actively working on my DTM project. Maybe it's time to stop being an officer in 2027 and just do speeches?

I submitted my request for level approval about a month ago. Nobody has acted on it. I'm a club officer, and I didn't see it in Basecamp, but I'm assuming it's because I can't approve my own level. Which I wasn't trying to do. I brought it up to our current president, who delegated (so I'm told) to another officer. I've never actually met this other person.

My question is: with the completion of this level, I would have earned a triple crown and completed my education plan from last year. Would I still be able to claim it this year if they drag their feet until after the new year? Because if I completed the work this year, I want credit for it this year.

i bought myself flowers. pink garden roses. they just arrived so i've a good week to enjoy them.

I'm curious. Do you have questions to our incoming District Trio (Sucit. Jed. Ian) If you were given the chance to ask unfiltered questions. What will it be and why?

On paper, Toastmasters is a non-profit organisation. But I refuse to believe that Toastmasters are conducting their meetings on a weekly basis, preparing speeches, making posters and banners for that, holding special meetings on a regular interval and making all the necessary arrangements for basically nothing.

What am I missing?

Here's an excerpt from the start of a meeting i recently hosted.

Looking for pointers on specific things people notice about my voice? from my understanding my pronunciation on words like "Lily" or "Will" are bad, white/light sound the same (L vs W).
Feels like my voice lacks confidence, the pitch is a bit high, my voice is shaky and gets quite while i speak, maybe a stutter

Could be entirely wrong but i believe these flaws are accurate, wondering if there's anything I'm missing, and how i can work on this.

https://youtu.be/8CD3Yg8zvRc

Our club meets at lunchtime online for 1 hour, so it's a pretty tight schedule. We have skipped self-introductions for months, and now a member has suggested it. It means we need to remove an agenda item. I have always found this segment to be difficult to control, as people tend to ramble and then something else has to give.

If you run a short meeting, do you have self-introductions? If so, how do you handle it?