From Growth to Gratitude: A Heartfelt Thank You

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End-of-Year Reflections from Your Club Growth Director 

My dear Toastmasters,

As the Toastmasters year draws to a close, I find myself filled with deep gratitude for each one of you – our members, club officers, area and division directors, the club growth team, the district leadership team, my mentors, and the many Toastmaster well-wishers who had my back, especially in moments when I doubted myself.

This year has been a tremendous learning experience. While I began the year with ambitious goals, I quickly realised the value of going back to basics, understanding why our members are proud of their clubs and how we can truly support them to grow. Sometimes, that also meant having the courage to let go of clubs that no longer served their members. As they say, growth isn’t always linear, but it is always meaningful.

We tried many new campaigns and ideas:
📍 Job Fairs to raise awareness
🚇 The Ditch the Nerves Tube campaign
🎤 Ditch the Nerves Live interview skills workshops
🏢 Our first-ever Corporate Summit, setting the tone for years to come
🎁 Innovative incentives to reward and encourage

Some landed beautifully. Some taught us valuable lessons. But through it all, we moved forward anchored in the Toastmasters core values : Integrity, in our decision-making; Respect, for every member’s journey; Service, in supporting one another; and Excellence, in everything we aimed to deliver.

To all of you who contributed your time, energy, ideas and heart: thank you.

As I transition into the Program Quality Director role, I hope we’re leaving the district stronger, wiser, and more connected – ready for the next wave of growth under the incoming Club Growth Director.

Wishing you all the very best as you finish the year strong, take pride in the incredible clubs you’ve built and continue empowering more voices.

And if you haven’t yet filled in the feedback survey, please do so – your voice matters:
🔗 https://forms.gle/xCbPMhEQ29w5SgZp8

With heartfelt thanks and deep respect,

Seema Menon
Club Growth Director, District 91
2024–2025

 

Last Minute Achievements for 24-25 Program Year

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Dear Toastmasters

Time truly flies when you’re having fun!

As we approach the end of the Toastmaster’s year, please take note of this important reminder from Toastmasters International:

“Last-Minute Club Achievements?

All achievements (which include new or reinstated members, and award submissions) for the program year must be received no later than 11:59:59 p.m. Mountain Daylight Time (MDT)/Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) -6 on June 30.

Submissions received on or after July 1, 12 a.m. Mountain Daylight Time (MDT)/Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) -6 will be applied to the 2025–2026 Program Year.

Additional details, including how to submit documents to World Headquarters, are outlined in the Distinguished Club Program Manual”.

This is also a perfect moment to say thank you. It has been a fantastic year, and I’m truly grateful for all that we’ve achieved together. Your dedication and teamwork have been invaluable.

Let’s keep the momentum going; let’s finish strong right through to 30th June, and I look forward to seeing you in the next program year.

With gratitude,

Debbie Williams
Program Quality Director 2024-2025
District 91

 

Lessons from a District Director

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As the title of one of my favourite TV series, Star Trek: The Next Generation tells us, all goods things must come to an end, and as I write my final newsletter article as your District Director and as I reflected in the Council pack, I can look back on the program year with immense pride for what we have achieved within district leadership and across our wonderful clubs.

I won’t repeat the large number of thanks that are laid out in the council pack or what I said in my farewell speech, instead I wanted to leave you with some of my own lessons that I have picked up during my time in Toastmasters and latterly as a senior district leader.

  • To Club Members – always remember what you joined for in the first place, and before you agree to take on any extra responsibility make sure that you have a plan to achieve what you set out. However, if someone asks you to pick up a task or role within the club, before you say no or I don’t have the time – please don’t answer straight away, pause, do your research and make the right decision once you have all the information you need. If you do say yes, I doubt very much you will regret it.
  • To Club Leaders – I know that the amount of Toastmasters resources can seem vast and overwhelming. You should absolutely take advice from previous officers of your club and indeed from officers outside your own club, but there is no substitute for first-hand knowledge. Make sure you at least read the club leadership handbook, and the club constitution, this will give you an important platform for what is to come. Make sure you know who your area director is and use them, they are there for you! Remember, you and your team are enabling people to come through your club doors and for some it really will be a life changing experience. Oh, and – please see my advice above, this applies to you too.
  • To District Leaders – First hand knowledge is my advice for you too, but I am afraid you have a little more to gather than most. Have a read of the District Administrative bylaws (yes, all of them) and make sure you keep referring back to the District Leadership Handbook, the timeline in there will be your ultimate go-to. Make sure you are specifically clear about the rules regarding your role and the involvement with clubs. You will be challenged on this point for different reasons time and time again. And you especially need to read my comments about personal goals in my first point above. You didn’t join Toastmasters to be a district leader – make sure you are getting the value from your toastmaster membership too, balance is key.
  • To Madam District Director Elect – What we achieved this program year in creating Team 24/25, in creating an ethos that we have become famous for, will (I hope) give you the platform you need to go on and achieve the things that I have been unable to. I have done the repair work – and now you need to build that skyscraper! Carry on being you – and remember, as you have already discovered even when the sun is nearly rising and the milkman is out on his rounds, I am always there for you, and I look forward to serving you to the best of my ability. Above all else though – please enjoy it. And remember, it’s only Toastmasters 😉

And finally – for any leader current or future within our organisation and beyond, here are my top leadership lessons for you to reflect upon:

  1. Don’t try and boil the ocean – you can’t achieve everything even if you want to. Be focussed, be determined but don’t burn out!
  2. Be you and always you – leaders need to flex and change but you can do that without changing who you are and being sure never to leave your core values, or the core values of our organisation behind
  3. No leader is an island – ask for help. However, remember that at the end the day – you can skill make the decision. Advice, opinion and support does not remove your responsibility.
  4. If you are not enjoying what you doing , or it is effecting your wellbeing to the point where there is no longer a balance – you need to pause and decide whether you need to be brave and think of yourself first.

I hope to see as many of you as possible at the Hall of Fame in London on Saturday 5th July. Spaces ARE limited – please book now, it is free to attend!

Toastmasters International may not be a lifesaving organisation – but it is a life changing one.

Thank you for making me proud to be your District Director.

Yours in service

Steve Vear MBE DTM
District Director 2024-2025

 

What’s it like to be a Division Director?

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The following is a transcript of Olgas’ conversation:

How do you feel about your time as division director?

I feel excited, it was a challenging year, a lot of difficult decisions to be made, a lot of challenges to raise to, but I think I learned quite a lot.

I had an opportunity to visit a lot of clubs and one of my goals was to visit all of them, I’m almost there. [I am] understanding them better, learning what they are doing, and how we can help.

I was also given a privilege to set a vision for the whole division and deliver to that vision and as I said raising 2 challenges: Division C is 60% corporate clubs and I do enjoy a good challenge, and that’s how I feel about my division director role this year.

What is your next challenge?

I am pleased to have a successor so we will be handing things over pretty soon and, my goal will be to support him and the vision going forward, and my next challenge is to achieve my DTM.

 

Running an Open House

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On Tuesday 8th April, London Victorian hosted a highly successful open-house meeting attended by 75 members and guests.

Headline Results

Total attendance:                        75
Guests attending:                        49
New members signed-up:        11
Marketing spend:                        £120
Videos produced:                        6
Views on LinkedIn:                    ~2,600

How did we do it?

Here are the key lessons learnt from this event that every Club can replicate, alongside ideas on how to do better still.

Make it a Paid Ticketed Event

London Victorians previously organised an open-house in March 2024 attended by around 35 people. While this was a successful event that led to some new members signing-up, one data point made me think; out of 41 people registered to attend only 10 had turned-up.

This time, we decided to charge anyone wishing to attend £5 to ensure buy-in and commitment from attendees. Another positive effect of this decision was to focus minds around creating a professional value-adding event which attendees would enjoy.

A Big Event Needs a Big Team

Our VP of Membership Nick Roberts spearheaded organizing this open-house meeting with support from myself and our VP of Public of Relations Sam Yates. Other members of the leadership team additionally help on more specific tasks like agenda management. We knew early on that more members would need to be involved as well, especially on the day to support delivering an amazing event.

With this in mind, meeting agenda was filled-in early on with excellent speakers, evaluators and a fabulous Toastmaster of the meeting to create a show on the day. Another team of member also looked at guest hospitality, signing-in, registering and mingling with guests in the evening.

In total almost 20 members played a part in making this event successful. It was truly driven by the whole Club.

Set Goals Upfront and Plan Accordingly

Initial discussions regarding the event’s format began 7 weeks before its scheduled date. Nick and myself agreed on all key parameters 6 weeks beforehand, with Nick emphasizing that value was a key proposition for attendees:

  1. The event’s theme would be public speaking essentials and tips, aiming it at attendees looking to improve their skills in a professional yet friendly atmosphere.
  2. A short interactive 15 min workshop ‘The 5Ws of Public Speaking’ kicked-off the event after intros from the President and Toastmaster.
  3. The agenda then followed best-practice written when I was Club Growth Director, with audience-led interactive evaluations of the speakers facilitated by the Toastmaster amongst other things.
  4. Space for ~20 Table Topics using question which attendees pre-answered beforehand while registering – ‘Tell us something unique, interesting or fun about you’ to be answered in one minute max. The Table Topics Master selected the most interesting answers for this segment and there were loads.
  5. A Testimonial from a member sharing her journey to wrap-up the event and encourage people to join.
  6. Networking over pizza after the event.

The goal was to attract ~80 people and fill all the seats in the meeting room. Paid marketing was part of the project plan, alongside creating a series of short 1min marketing videos to entice people.

For reference, the agenda of the event can be found on easy-Speak and the registration page on Eventbrite.

Do a Big Marketing Push

Like most Clubs, London Victorians mostly markets itself passively with a website, Facebook page, LinkedIn page and Google Business profile. On this occasion a more active use of all of these channels would be needed.

Content Creation – Nick, Sam and myself work together to create professional looking content to share across all marketing channels. Using the best photos at our disposal, we created an A4 poster, a square image for social media and 6 videos featuring our members encouraging people to attend. We used Canva to edit these materials and iPhones to shoot the videos in our venue.

Internal Promotion – Nick spoke about the event to Club members during every meeting in March and sent multiple WhatsApp messages in our group with the event poster included. Several members took on the challenge of inviting friends and colleagues to attend, and word of mouth likely brought in more registrations as well. Leveraging our membership also led to one of our members Josh agreeing to sponsor some tasty kombucha from his business to drink on the day too.

Eventbrite Marketing – Eventbrite promotes events to users according to their own interests, the possibility also exists to advertise directly on the platform to attract more views and registration. Our event page was continuously updated throughout the pre-event period to make it more attractive, eventually culminating in using features such as video headers and embedded agendas. We finally ran £30 of paid advertising ran on Eventbrite in March targeted at people living in London.

LinkedIn Posts – Nick took the lead in sharing posts about the event in his profile and the Club’s profile with members encouraged to reshare them. We additionally leveraged the videos we created into a campaign of 5 paid ads which was viewed ~2,600 times and brough in close to 100 visitors to our Eventbrite page. Not a bad spend of £60 and our Click-through-Rate of ~3,6% would be the envy of many marketeers.

Facebook Posts – We posted once or twice per week reminding people to attend the event, sharing images and the videos we created. A short-paid marketing campaign using an image also gathered ~8,000 impressions and led to a spike in traffic to our Eventbrite page.

Past Guests & Newsletter – The event was promoted to all of our past members and guests via our newsletter, which led to a few familiar faces coming back to the Club and enabled us to reconnect with some old members as well.

Business Networks – Nick took the initiative to reach out to the Victoria Business Improvement District and other similar networks in the area. Through grit and a few phone calls with the right people, he was able to get our event added to one of their websites and a promotional newsletter going to businesses in this part of London.

The effectiveness of these campaigns helped fill on the room on the day and the week beforehand as well which saw a record 17 guests attending.

Make it a Show on the Day

Executing this event properly was crucial and all meeting functionaries alongside the hospitality team were brief beforehand regarding their task. Our Toastmaster for this meeting Lucy also took care in ensuring that all contingencies were planned for so that nothing was left to chance.

In the end everything went smoothly and QR codes were spread around the room encouraging attendees to join the Club. Pizzas arrived on time and everyone had something to eat.

How did we do?

Out of 59 guests who registered to attend, 49 turned-up, vindicating the Club’s decision to charge for attendance. What’s more we now have a whooping 10 new members who signed-up after attending the event, no doubt prompted by a special offer to waive the £30 joining fee to attendees. Ticket charges covered all marketing costs, and some of the pizza. So, by all accounts this was an amazingly successful event made possible by a great team!

I personally learnt or relearnt a lot from helping its organisation and I know the same is true for Nick and Sam.

The Club will likely organize another open-house next spring in 2026, and here is what we will aim to do even better next time:

  1. Plan ahead even more – In hindsight locking everything 8 or even 10 weeks in advance would have enabled us to have a solid few weeks to shoot more marketing videos and create more content.
  2. Read the fine-print regarding videos – Our marketing videos were successful but could have had far more power, if we had been able to use them on Facebook. For some reasons Facebook rejected them for advertising purposes, and we lacked the time to research this further and make any claim. YouTube also only accepted our videos as shorts once the background music was removed, despite it being copyright free.
  3. Have a bigger team – We needed a 4th person in the organising team, especially to support with marketing and there was a time in late March were we all found ourselves stretched doing everything. Another team member could have helped with getting more content out.

By Florian Bay DTM – Past District 91 Director