On the twelfth day of Christmas

by

‘On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love……’ OK, OK: I will save you the Christmas songs, but I did warn you in my video message of last month that I do love a bit of Christmas and at the time of writing I am but days away from getting my Christmas cushions out of the cupboard and my finger hovering over my Christmas play list on Spotify.

Contests

We have now seen the conclusion of our Division level contests throughout the District and so we now the finalists who will compete to become District champions at our conference in May next year. I want to take this opportunity to thank all those members who played an important part in the success of all the contests from the club, area, and Division level. Special thanks are due to the Division Directors who worked collaboratively together to ensure the best possible events. They certainly showcased some high standard of speakers – well done everyone.

Club Officer Training

The next round of club officer training has started so committee members will soon start to see the district calendar fill up with lots of opportunity to be trained. Remember that not only does training offer a fantastic chance to be supported and learn in your role, attendance of 4 or more offices contributes to a point in the distinguished club program if this is the second time clubs have sent four officers along.

Don’t forget that the 7×7 incentive is still very much active! If 7 officers (must be a minimum of 6 individuals) attend for the first time the club receives a set of Toastmasters club officer pins. If clubs have already done this in the first round, then they will be eligible to claim £60 for their clubs.

Between the 13th and 24th November, we ran our second round of Corporate Club officer training where no less than 104 officers qualified for their credit. I would like to thank all those that played a part in either providing training or for offering their services as Zoom masters.

2024 conference

I know our Conference Director, Amy Jones DTM is very keen to provide an update for you, so instead I will just refer to the event by thanking Amy and her team for all the amazing efforts so far.

Educational Awards

Many congratulations to those members who have worked to achieve more than 400 educational awards since the start of this year. We look forward to sharing with you more information about the changes to the Pathways LMS system when it becomes available in the new year.

I hope that you all get to enjoy some rest over the Christmas period, and may I wish you a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Steve Vear
Program Quality Director 2023-24

 

Stroll (Back) To Smedley 2023-2024

by

In December 2022 we created a predictive model of where clubs would finish in the Distinguished Club Programme in June 2023. This became “Stroll to Smedley”, emphasising that steady progress throughout the year is preferable to a last minute dash. The model proved right to within 1 DCP point for 65% of clubs, 43% exceeded their prediction and 29% fell short. However, as a District, the overall improvement enabled us to achieve Smedley Distinguished status for distinguished clubs. Well done and thanks to everyone who took part in the “stroll” and got us over the line.

We’re repeating the stroll this year, starting a month earlier, and the table below shows our first prediction. We have seven months in which to pick up our strolling pace and do better! The principle is simple: every club is compared to its DCP position on the same date the year before and is either the same, ahead, or behind. If the trend is maintained, the club will attain the same DCP outcome, do better or poorer accordingly. Each of the ten DCP metrics is tracked, although it is the club membership strength that confers or denies eligibility. This is a team sport! 

In the table below, clubs that are in the left column are currently on target to improve on last year, and those in bold may become distinguished this year with a modest increase in strolling pace. Clubs that are in the right column are currently expected to fall short of their attainment last year, and those in italics would be advised to pick up their pace to retain their distinguished club status.

You’re invited to join us for the stroll. Please help us make our prediction turn out to be unduly pessimistic! We can do this!

Update: 11th January

Now we have passed from December to January, a perfect “stroll” would involve having at least 2 Level 1s, 2 Level 2s, 1 Level 3, 1 Level 4/5/DTM and four new members. If you haven’t planned your Open House event yet or geared up for our “Talk Up Toastmasters” campaign, now would be  a great time to start it. It’s also a great time to start your membership renewals campaign if you’d like to win our “20+80 Challenge“. Keep your membership building going to be able to win our “Net Growth 8” incentive. Why not look at our incentives page to remind yourself what’s on offer?

[table “” not found /]


[table “” not found /]


[table “” not found /]


Slicing the Cake

by

Insights from the October renewals

Thanks to the work done by the District Leadership Team (DLT) to improve our communications and send you, our fellow members, information that is relevant to you, we have gained some new insights on members’ Pathways journeys when they leave Toastmasters. It also allows us to connect better with each member rather than sending out a mass email to everyone. Just as with a cake to eat a whole cake is probably too much yet everyone would like a slice that satisfies their needs at the time.

Of the 1,265 members who left District 91 at the end of September, 871 of them had enrolled in Pathways, however, more than 1,000 members left without gaining a single Pathways award. This shows that members are not engaging with Pathways even though they have signed up. I would encourage new members to start their Pathways journey soon after they join a club. Experience has shown that members who enrol and are active in Pathways are the members who gain most from their membership. Whilst seeing other members speak or give an evaluation can be helpful, the best way to get better at anything, public speaking, cricket, home baking etc. is to take part in a safe club meeting environment. Think of your club as a training ground before you go “onto the pitch” giving a speech or presentation at work or at a friend’s wedding.

In a related issue. To help build a picture worldwide across Toastmasters International, long standing Aylesbury Speakers member Selina Griffin is conducting research that is trying to build a predictive model looking at using Pathways data to find Toastmasters that appear at risk of leaving so we gain a better understanding of why members leave. This is part of her PhD research with the Open University. She is working with Dr John Lurquin a member of staff at Toastmasters HQ. All information will be anonymised, and John will be selecting potential interviewees. 

Thanks Toastmasters Campaign – goes real!

You have hopefully seen the Thanks Toastmasters campaign ads in past couple of years, which clubs can download and use for their own publicity. In this month’s newsletter we have another real-life example of Thanks Toastmasters, a video from Remko Timmermans, a member of Didcot Speakers on how Toastmasters has helped him in his career in rocket science. Last month’s newsletter article on how Toastmasters has helped Tom Bailey become a Barrister, was the most read article. Nikita is looking for further examples of current or past members who are willing to make a short video or draft a short article explaining how Toastmasters has helped them achieve their career or life goals. If you know of anyone then please ask them to contact Nikita. The articles will be shared in the D91 Website, newsletter, and other social media channels.

Happy Anniversary – Campaign

A benefit of introducing the new CRM programme is that we can now more easily find members who have a membership anniversary. In the last few weeks with the help of the D91 Public Relations Manage, Nikita Parks, we have sent out congratulatory emails to members who are celebrating their 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th or even their 10th or 30th membership anniversary. It is a way for the DLT to thank members for their continued membership and support of Toastmasters International and D91 and their local club.

New Administration Manager

Unfortunately, Aayushi Jain DTM has had to step-down as our District Administration Manager. However, I am delighted to announce that Janet Alkema DTM has agreed to become our new Administration Manager with Immediate effect. Janet is a very experienced Toastmaster and has been a Division Director twice, the first time for Division A in 2019-20 and last year as Division D Director. I am sure you join me in wishing Janet all the best in her new role.

Diane Richardson
District Director 2023-24

Recognising Excellence in 2022 – 2023

by

On 30th July this year, we hosted your District’s Hall of Fame over a social event on London’s Southbank. The full list of those individuals and clubs recognised at this event can be found here.

For several years, we’ve recognised individual clubs with the ‘Club Excellence’ award; a recognition that goes beyond the dashboards. Clubs are recognised for some of the more intangible elements that show success aside from membership and training numbers. Examples here are contributions of members beyond the club such as in leadership positions, conducting wider Toastmasters education programs and the overall ‘feeling’ someone gets if they visit such a club.

Why not visit one of the clubs listed and discover the magic?

We also recognise clubs who have suffered a little but bounced back over the course of a Toastmasters program year with the Phoenix Award.

Due to the nature of our organisation, we celebrate milestones and length of service largely through education achievements. For example, to become a Distinguished Toastmaster (DTM), individuals must complete several projects and leadership service over a period which make it quite a milestone when achieved. I know this year’s team have a renewed emphasis on length of member service and anniversaries.

Reflecting on my own Toastmasters career journey, I got stuck in very early on simply due to a combination of my own curiosity and others opening doors for me. As a result, I wanted to pay this forward by recognising new members who had dived straight in and added value outside of their club in their first 12-18 months of membership.

After the May elections, many individuals start to wind down. This year, we felt compelled to recognise a District Officer who kicked it up a gear in the final stretch with the District Mission Award. This year, to the best of my knowledge, was the first time District 91 issued the Communication and Leadership Award. This award recognises someone who has made significant impact in a community under these categories and need not be a Toastmasters member.
Spreading the footprint of what we do is a collective responsibility. Two members were handpicked by our Public Relations Manager for their consistency of effort. A key function or mission of the district is to ‘build new clubs’ and as we stepped out of the pandemic 6 new clubs (all corporate!) were recognised with the Pioneer Award. This is testament to the fact that companies see the value of our program for their employees.

Every now and then we get asked if there are criteria for the main awards i.e., Toastmaster of the Year, Division Director of the Year and Area Director of the Year. The simple answer is – yes! There are checklists that act as a guide for these and often it is quite clear at some point in the year who the recipient will be. In some cases, the deciding factor may be because of something an individual has contributed (often quietly) to the cause or overall mission.

In my deliverance speech at the May Hall of Fame, I referred to the fact that I searched high and low for the checklist for the District Director’s Award. This one is understandably quite subjective, and you can find out why here.

I didn’t get off Scot free, though. There’s a certain type of speech known as a roast in which the subject matter is often someone leaving a role. When it became clear that this was about to happen, I was incredibly nervous however couldn’t help but choke up at the affection that came through not one but four roasts! One was delivered by immediate past District Public Relations Manager, Chris Arning and can be watched back here.

I once again thank the 2022-2023 District Leadership Team for their service, commitment, secret scheming to put this on, and for their friendship – a lovely byproduct of working intensively in a team for 12-15 months.

As ever, thank to event photographer Chris Bovell from Blaqpix for capturing special moments. You can view the photos here Password: Limin

Rupa Datta
Immediate Past District Director 2023-24