Toastmasters conference!

If you believe Toastmasters is a lot of fun, especially in person, then you should consider attending a district conference! Not only is it fun, but it was educational and inspirational!

This year’s conference was held in Calgary, AB from Friday, April 28th to Sunday April 30th.

Friday evening kicked off with an inspirational evening featuring Sharon Hill, a noted American Toastmaster. She told us how saying yes, opened so many doors in her life! She may not have completely been ready, in fact, most of the time she was NOT ready, but she said yes anyways, and then figured it out. It reminded me of the 2008 Jim Carrey film, Yes man! However, Sharon did caution us with 3 rules, when it was ok to say no:

1. When the opportunity does not align with your values.
2. If the organization or organization’s representative gives off the wrong vibes.
3. If you take the opportunity, but find out the opportunity isn’t what you thought it was.
   

That evening, we honored the Immediate past international president with a white hat, an symbol of Calgary’s history and hospitality.

The district evaluation and international speech contests were played on Saturday, it was wonderful to see and hear from such talented speakers! These people beat out hundreds of others from their club, area and division, to compete!

There were several educational sessions, I was not able to attend them all. I will share the ones I did participate in: Find your funny bones, Networking and strategic planning for success.

The humor panel had 3 presenters, Katrina Aburrow, DTM, Nandini Venkatesan, DTM, and Laura Chambers, DTM. Each had a different take on how to be funny in your presentations, but each followed the Golden rules:

1. Exaggeration and Absurdity 
2. Gestures and Facial Expression 
3. Rule of Three 
4. Twists and Turns 
5. Use of Language 
6. Saving the Punchline for the End 

The Networking presentation was lead by two great speakers, Ahmad Jabbir and Richard Lee-Thai. They suggested that in order to get the most out of networking events, you need to be authentic, really connect with the other party, instead of only thinking about what is in it for me. Because there can be many people at the event, you may have to do something unexpected to stand out, so that you are memorable. The example Ahmad gave, was an elaborate way of impressing his now boss, during an online interview.

An easy way to think about connecting with others, is whenever you think about someone, thank them. At the session, Richard phoned up his friend and thanked him live! It was really neat to see him talk the talk AND walk the walk; thank you’s can be powerful!

The Immediate past international president, Richard E. Peck gave a 45 minute presentation on SOARing to success, a tool to help you reach your goals. SOARS stands for Strengths, Opportunities, Aspirations, Results and Strategy. However, Richard suggested that we first start with Aspirations, to figure out what your goals are first. Then think about what your current strengths are, what do you do well? After that, think about what sort of opportunities are available in your situation. Now this is the key, connecting your strengths with your opportunities… you can either connect them directly, or, if you have opportunities you are not able to connect, that means that you need to DEVELOP a strength, in order to take advantage of the opportunity.

For example, if my aspiration was to develop my Toastmasters club into a growing and thriving club, and I had the following:

Strengths:

• Dedicated members
• Experienced members

Opportunities:

• Growth in in person members
• Growth in different locations
• Too few members signing up for roles

For my current club, the first two strengths and opportunies match up, however, the third one, there isn’t a match. Thus, we need to develop a strength to match it to the opportunity of members signing up for roles.

People often say, life is about the journey, not the destination, this may be a good philosophy to live by, however, for some goals, you need to think about the destination in order to achieve it! When thinking about results, be specific and realistic. It is good to have aspirational goals, but if it is not likely you are going to achieve them, then you aren’t going to try very hard to make it happen.

In the above example, my results are:

• 5 new members by the end of the year
• A prepared speech each meeting
• Each member completes at least 1 Pathways speech level a year.

Finally, think about strategies to put your plan into motion! Strategies are not the individual steps; those are tactics. Rather, strategies are the high level plan of what is needed to implement the plan. In the above example, a strategy might be to have the executive work with each member to plan their year and check in regularly to ensure they are following their plan.

Another important part of the conference was the district council meeting. It is a business meeting to discuss and vote upon important matters. This time around, there were 2 important matters I recalled: realignment of clubs to different areas and divisions, and passing the financial statements. Unfortunately, many clubs struggled over the pandemic and they shutdown… on the flip side, there were several enterprising members that started new clubs, because they recognized a new for better communication and leadership skills in their neighbourhood and workplaces. In order to balance the gain and loss of clubs, a committee had to redistribute them into various areas and divisions. Financials are very important, each Toastmaster pays dues and we want to ensure the money is well spent.

This district conference was the first since the pandemic; I believe everyone really savoured being back in person. It is a different experience when you have a more direct connection to your presenters, be it at an educational session, contest or a business meeting. I highly encourage you all to attend a conference, training session and meeting in person, and you too, can get even more out of your Toastmasters journey!