What is happening in Division K?
Division K, fondly called Special K, kicked off the Toastmaster year with their TLI in July with the theme Reflect, Reset and Recharge. This theme has informed all our activities so far.
In terms of reflections, we started with our membership strength. We analyzed the data over a two year period and reflected on all the possible missed opportunities to increase our membership strength.
A quicK Glance
- 372 members across 24 clubs
- 120 Club Officers
- 58 Pathway awards
As a result of this reflective exercise, we decided to do a member survey with the aim of finding out about our members’ experiences. The survey covered areas, such as
- First Impressions;
- Membership Orientation;
- Fellowship, Variety and Communication;
- Club Meeting Planning and organizing Membership Building; and
- Recognition and Member satisfaction.
Watch this space for the outcome of the survey.
Leadership was another aspect of our reflective exercise and we established that there was a need to encourage our members to embrace the leadership opportunities at Toastmasters. In addition to the presentation on leadership by Sam Warner at the TLI in July, we will be hosting a panel discussion on leadership at the Division K contest on Saturday, 20th November. Come and listen to Andy Hammond, Gina Rocque-Drayton and Dennise Holliman as they share their leadership journeys.
We also have a range of opportunities available to help members develop their leadership skills, so speak to your Area Director to find out more.
Rotary and Toastmasters Alliance
Pamela, Gina and Rose attended the Rotary and Toastmasters teams meet-up on 22 October. It was jointly facilitated by Filcom International Toastmasters in Qatar, International Orators Toastmasters Club, Luton Someries and Rotary Club of Ikate, Nigeria. This was a great opportunity to explore the many benefits collaboration with Rotary can offer to create a positive community impact.
We would encourage you to make contact with your local Rotary club and explore how you can work together. As a starting point, you could invite them to your club meeting or even arrange a joint club meeting. No time to stand and stare, let’s embrace this opportunity.
Comment from K3
London Toastmasters is now live on Easyspeak – thanks to Adrian Lane who helped carry out the technical work. We are very grateful for his support! Commendation to the club’s VPE, Thana Yoganathan, for leading the project and getting all members on board.
We are proud to welcome the successful transition to hybrid meetings in our two clubs – Central London Toastmasters and London Public Speakers.
- Central London Toastmasters are early adopters of the hybrid format and have been holding these meetings in Holborn since summer. Both guests and members love the energy generated in the physical room. The post-meeting conversation flows for quite a while over a drink or two.
- London Public Speakers are back at their old venue right next to London Bridge station. The club is offering a choice to its members who want to meet in the flesh and those who can’t make it to Central London, especially those who would need to catch a flight to the meeting.
Both clubs are attracting new members in record numbers since the start of this Toastmaster year: a whopping 7 members for London Public Speakers, and a solid 6 for Central London Toastmasters. We are confident this trend will continue throughout the year.
Question for K12
How do you persuade members who are zoom-fatigued to volunteer for roles in an Area Contest?
– Gina Rocque Drayton, K12 Area Director, shares her recipe.
Leadership is about using creative ways to persuade people to take action. The ability to persuade others has always been a top leadership and communication skill. It’s a great choice to use creative means to deliver your key message so that it comes across in a fresh dynamic way and makes your audience want to pay attention, listen and respond to the call to action. A leader has to find that emotional hook to make the speech memorable and to make the audience responsive. Therefore, I used cake as my emotional hook.
As Area Director I needed to convey a key message to ask my Area K12 for volunteers for the Area Contest. I used my passion for baking cakes to craft a video. I crafted my speech using a perfect cake as a metaphor to demonstrate how baking the perfect cake is like organizing an Area Contest. When you are passionate about something you can use passion to fuel the fire behind your power of persuasion.
In the video I created, I went on to talk about the essential ingredients that go into baking the perfect cake – from getting the right recipe, mixing all the ingredients together to baking the cake at the correct temperature. The outcome is a delicious, delectable, delightful cake baked with lots of love. In the same way as organizing a successful Area contest, the essential ingredients you need are people to help you fill the roles to run a successful Area contest. The power of persuasion I used in crafting my speech and the imagery of the perfect cake I baked had a successful outcome in achieving the message. The feedback I received was positive and achieved the intended outcome.
Fellow Toastmasters, I would encourage you all to explore creative approaches when crafting your message. Trust me – it works!
Comment from K13
Area K13 is planning a combined Special Christmas meeting in December. This will be a great opportunity to recharge, network with other Toastmasters, and gain renewed vigour.
Speech Contests
It’s contest season. Well done to all our members for supporting this annual event!
We had a spirited contest in both Humorous and Table Topics contests, and the winners will move on to the Division Contest on Saturday, 20th November.
