The nonprofit best known for public speaking has benefited more than 4 million people through improved communication and leadership skills that bolster personal and professional growth

RANCHO SANTA MARGARITA, CALIF., Oct. 22, 2009 – Eighty-five years ago today, Dr. Ralph C. Smedley held the first official Toastmasters meeting in the basement of a YMCA in Santa Ana, Calif. Not even Dr. Smedley could have envisioned the history he was making on that day. The organization that started as a small group of people dedicated to teaching after-dinner speeches to young men has evolved into a worldwide leader in communication and leadership development. Since that first meeting in 1924, more than 4 million people have benefited from the Toastmasters experience.

“Toastmasters’ long-term success and growth is a tribute to Dr. Smedley’s vision,” says Toastmasters International President Gary A. Schmidt. “He understood that communication isn’t optional and leadership isn’t always innate, but both can be learned through doing.” Today, Toastmasters’ 250,000-plus active members participate in over 12,500 clubs spanning 106 countries. From Dubai to New Zealand, Saskatchewan to Connecticut, each day thousands of Toastmasters participate in meetings to learn and practice valuable communication and leadership skills in a supportive environment.

Michael Avedissian of Reading, Pennsylvania, is one of the organization’s longest-term members. He moved from Germany to the United States in 1954 and joined Toastmasters the following year. He credits the Reading Toastmasters Club with saving his engineering career and his new life in America by helping him learn and practice English. “Toastmasters gave me the ability to deliver the reports and presentations that were required for my career.”

Many organizations stall or even crumble during difficult economic times. Toastmasters has withstood the test of time and has even grown 5% annually since 2005 because it offers practical skills that are critical for success in today’s competitive environment.

Ann Maxfield of Austin, Minn., recently was able to begin a new career as an e-learning coordinator at Hormel Foods. With her Toastmasters training, she aced the interviews. “People in management know about Toastmasters and look to it as valuable training for the skills and experiences they require in employees,” she says.

The Toastmasters program also helps political and business leaders prepare for the demands of their positions. Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle is one of many with political aspirations who found help in Toastmasters. “It is the best and least expensive personal improvement class you can go to,” says Lingle.

Clubs around the world will celebrate the anniversary with special meetings. Locally, Peninsula Toastmasters Club, which meets at The Tafelberg Tavern, on the last Thursday of the month at 5.30pm will offer special presentations. The general public is invited to visit a meeting and learn more about what Toastmasters has to offer. Contact Vanessa Clark at 082 335 1117 for more information.

CAPE TOWN, 7 October 2009: Peninsula Toastmasters Club, a Cape Town-based branch of the international speaking and leadership organisation, is pleased to announce it will be hosting a Knowledge Café, in conjunction with David Gurteen, leading knowledge management specialist.

A Knowledge Café is an effective way of opening up conversations and discussions that lead to information sharing.  It can be used within teams or communities to question assumptions, to help facilitate learning from others and gain a deeper collective understanding of a subject – through conversation.

David is the founder of the Gurteen Knowledge Community – a global learning network of over 16,000 people in 154 countries. He has over 30 years’ experience working in high technology industries and today, he works as an independent knowledge management consultant, facilitator and speaker, helping people to innovate and to work more effectively together.

The Knowledge Café will be followed by a Toastmaster’s Speakathon. A Speakathon is a special Toastmaster’s meeting that only involves speeches and evaluations. It is a great way to get a taste of the public speaking skills and experience you can gain from Toastmasters, and also to enjoy a series of presentations from speakers ranging from beginner to professional.

Details of the Knowledge Café & Speakathon:

Date: Tuesday, 13th October 2009
Place: Tafelberg Tavern, Roodehek Terrace, Gardens
Time: 6 for 6.30 pm
Cost: R40 (snacks provided, cash bar available)

Tickets are limited. Please contact Ana Garcia, Peninsula Club President to reserve your place: anataggy@yahoo.co.uk or telephone: 076 393 3552.

ABOUT TOASTMASTERS & PENINSULA TOASTMASTERS CLUB

Toastmasters International is a non-profit educational organisation that teaches public speaking and leadership skills through a worldwide network of clubs. The organisation currently has 250,000 members in 12,000 clubs in 106 countries. Since its founding 85 years ago in October 1924, the organisation has helped more than four million men and women give presentations with poise and confidence.

For information about local Toastmasters clubs, please visit www.toastmasters.org.

For more information about Peninsula Toastmasters Club, please visit: www.peninsulatoastmasters.info

ABOUT DAVID GURTEEN

For more information visit: www.gurteen.com

Issued by:         Twokats Communications
On behalf of:   Peninsula Toastmasters Club
Contact:           Vanessa Clark, 082 335 1117

Instead of a regular meeting review, how about watching the meeting in action?

Last night I went along to join the Cape Communicators Toastmaster’s Club’s monthly meeting. They have a crafty tactic whereby if you are a guest and want a speaking slot, you are required to bring along an evaluator.

Tim Wagner, from Peninsula, was presenting the first of his advanced speeches and invited me along to see what the club is all about. This is a club with a bit of a difference as it’s for speakers working on one of the Toastmasters advanced programmes. Typically these speeches are longer than the average 5 – 7 minutes, and it can be difficult for busier clubs (such as Peninsula) to always accommodate the longer slots and still give all their members a chance to present regularly. Most of Cape Communicator’s members seem to belong to more than one club. They stay a member of their home club and then join Cape Communicators as well to rack up those advanced speaking credits.

The types of presentations you can see include keynotes, brainstorming sessions, after dinner talks and motivational speeches. I also found the evaluations to be more extensive than what I am used to. It’s definitely a good place to go as an observer to see some great speakers and evaluators in action.

I was asked to evaluate Craig Strachan’s high performance leadership presentation on his goals for the district this year in his role as division governer. Craig has some pretty bullish goals in place – so watch this space.

On the one hand it was pretty daunting for me as a CC5 (this means I am half way to achieving my competent communicator status) to be evaluating THE most senior toastmaster in southern Africa, and such an advanced speaker in general. Fortunately the club was so welcoming, and the environment so relaxed, I only really thought of this later (gulp!). I hope I gave Craig some useful feedback on his superb speech and I earned a credit towards my competent leadership track (thanks Sarah Rossouw).

Tim did extremely well presenting his keynote address. The jump from 7 minutes to 20 minutes must be quite a task.

If you have just completed your CC or are interested in finding out more about the advanced course – do yourself a favour and go along to one of the Cape Communicators Toastmasters Club meetings. They meet on the third Monday of the month in Pinelands. Contact Francois Rossouw, the vice president of education (VPE) to attend as an observer or get on the programme.

PS – mention this blog post and see if you can get a free glass of wine out of Francois!

I stumbled across this recent blog post from Mike Stopforth, a leading social media chap in South Africa, on his top tips for improving your presentation skills.

Having seen Mike present on more that one occasion – I’d recommend having a read.

Enjoy!

What is a Speakathon? I hear you ask. A Speakathon is a special Toastmaster’s meeting that only involves speeches and evaluations. It’s a great way for Toastmasters to get in additional speaking experience, and also credits towards their various speaking and leadership assignments. It’s also a great chance for members of different clubs in an area to get to know each other and participate in a meeting together.

The next Speakathon in Area D3 (Cape Town city area) is coming up:

Date: Tuesday, 13th October 2009
Place: Tafelberg Tavern (large hall) – you can get directions here
Time: 6 for 6.30 pm
Cost: R40 (snacks provided, cash bar available)

We will be providing the opportunity for 6 – 8 toastmasters and 6 – 8 evaluators to progress with their CC or AC programmes slots will be awarded on a first come, first served basis.

Please RSVP by 25th September to Ana Garcia with your CC or AC number and timing of your speech.

PLUS….

David Gurteen of Gurteen Knowledge will be running a Knowledge Café at the Speakathon.

David has over 30 years’ experience working in high technology industries. Today, he works as an independent knowledge management consultant, facilitator and speaker, helping people to innovate and to work more effectively together.

He is the founder of the Gurteen Knowledge Community – a global learning network of over 16,000 people in 154 countries. Community members receive his free monthly Knowledge Letter that is now in its 9th year.

David publishes the Gurteen Knowledge Website – a resource website that contains book reviews, articles, people profiles, event calendars, inspirational quotations, an integral weblog and more on subjects that include knowledge management, learning, creativity and innovation.

He is a frequent speaker and facilitator and presents on various aspects of knowledge management and social learning. He is well known for his Gurteen Knowledge Cafés that he runs regularly in London and in other cities around the world. He also facilitates Knowledge Cafés and workshops for organizations and conference organizers.

David has run run 100s of knowledge cafes over the last few years all over the world and they are really great learning and networking events.

Everyone engages with the theme of the cafe and some tremendous insightful, energetic conversations take place.  Better still the cafe process is one that you can take back with you and use in your own organizations to help create a more open, innovative culture.

Usually Peninsula Toastmaster’s Club meets on the last Thursday of the month. But because in September this falls on a public holiday (heritage day, or national braai day – whichever you prefer ) we’ve decided to push the meeting out by a week and have it on Thursday, 1 October 2009 instead.

All the other details stay the same. Kick off is 5.45 pm. R40 covers your attedence and bar snacks. A cash bar is available. All guests are welcome.

Drop me a line at pro [AT] peninsulatoastmasters.info for more information. Or add your details to the mailing list by filling out the form on the right hand side of the page.

Come join us a for a fun-filled, relaxed evening, where we learn better presentation and leadership skills in a supportive, knowledgeable environment.

Gerda delivers her winning speech

Toastmasters welcomed guests, potential members. I say potential for you could smell their interest in the reason for visiting the club.

Solveig McCormick shared how chose the Peninsula club specifically because of the good reputation it has. At the end of the evening, asking for her review she said “…From the second I walked into the room…I have not been received as warmly as tonight for so long it moved me very deeply…”.

To Karen du Preez it seemed, it sounded like wonderful memories of high school toastmasters gave her a calling to rekindle the interest, as well as to support a member participating in one of the great events of the year…the humour competition.

No I’m not done, we had a few guests, Hans Pleysier heard about the club this morning and was so impressed he spontaneously decided to check out the club tonight …I’d love to hear what he thought about it, guess we’ll see if he returns.

Humour Contest 2009

There were competitors.

1. Kirsten
2. Tim
3. Vanessa
4. Gerda
5. Tom

Kirsten had an inspiring presentation on tips on how to discover and let out the Speakerman inside of every man. Very useful, practical hilarious tips on how to set Speakerman into action.

Tim, such a wonderful start …”The highest reason for most divorces….is marriage…”. A sweet humour, affectionate stories on marriage and his wife.

Vanessa, I wonder if it was intentional or whether I’m thinking too much on the theme of the presentation, I found it raised questions on challenging stereotypical minds on the new Mzansi, classifications of people into boxes filled with presumptions, how silly and ridiculous these assumptions can be.

Gerda with, a modern version of little red riding hood. I cannot even begin to paint the picture of the story and the events. Just some of the highlights “Red rode her Vuka scooter…surviving the mean Scorpion Choppy traffic officer in his blue uniform…vomit in the tumbledryer…to the woodchopper who whipped out his AK47. The most fragmented fairytale ever that flowed better than the alphabet.

It was interesting how humour was presented in such diverse styles; light hearted, sweet, hilarious, wit, thought-provoking, silly, and mostly filled with the kind of entertainment that leaves the smile on your face throughout.

The Club is growing with with new fresh blood; Ana inducted five new members

1. Vanessa Clark
2. Mapaseka Vryman
3. Kirsten Pearson
4. Puleng Molahlehi
5. Thomas Bowman

Ana (far left) with the new Peninsula Club members: Tom, Kirsten, Mapaseka, Puleng and Vanessa

The newlings pledged their commitment to participate and engage in the activities of the club and the current member welcomed and promised to continue their dedication as well as provide support to the freshers and each other.

Vision for the Year

Ana encouraged the members to view the participation in the club as more than just protocol and structure, to study and learn to enter a process of healing and transformation. To learn and understand how one’s energy affects others, ultimately to find one’s voice in others.  To become a beacon of light.

Table topics

Thomas shared a story on not giving up. No matter what, just don’t stop. Including when you are on your ski lessons and you realize you missed the instructions on how to slow down and stop because you were busy eyeing a beautiful lady across a distance. Once you have slid down the slope…

‘Products that are what they are not’

Kirsten Pearson, improvised on the Aerosol: it smells like whatever you want it to smell like

Trevor Poyo, nachos for a special price.

Craig Strachan, the peppermint anti-terrorist device will save you from a hijack.

Tim as Fines Master had nil fault to pick on, instead he thanked Gerda van der Merwe for her excellent organizing and coordination skills demonstrated on the evening.

Well done to

Gerda  for winning the Humour contest,

Thomas for attaining second place,

Tim for third place.

Craig for the animated imagination on the table-topics.

- For more photos of the event, visit our Facebook page here.
- Thanks to Mapaseka Vryman for the meeting review.

Apparently some of the members of Peninsula Toastmasters do. Our next meeting, on Thursday 27 August 2009, at 5.45 pm, will be the annual club-level humour contest.

To get you in the mood: check out Craig Strachan’s award-winning presentation from last year’s humour hopabout here. (This is a slightly different contest, but you get the idea!)

For our speakers, here are some top tips from the master himself.

Our contestants are:

Kirsten Pearson, Gerda van der Merwe, Thomas Bowman, Tim Wagner and Vanessa Clark (gulp! that’s me!). Good luck!

If you would like to join the meeting as a guest, please email pro@peninsulatoastmasters.info.

Here is a link to Ana Garcia’s inspiring presentation: “Unlocking your creativity” which she delivered to a number of clubs in Cape Town recently.  This is certainly food for thought for how Toastmasters Clubs can grow and thrive, but also applies to so many other aspects of our lives.

Enjoy – you can read the speech here.