LEWISHAM SPEAKERS 18TH JULY, AN OLYMPIC EVENING.

What great evening we had.  Manoj was in great form.  Indeed he had dressed appropriately for his theme for the evening which was the Olympics.   The evening started off to a fine start by our Sergeant of Arms, Richard who also doubled up as our table topic evaluator for the evening.  He gave people a 2 minute warning, which helped get the meeting started on the dot. 

He then handed over to me, your president, who had the audacity to turn up in full riding gear.  What’s that about, I heard you wonder!!  Well I hope I proved a point that if your president can turn up to a fairly formal meeting set in a church on a Wednesday evening, pretending to Princess Anne, dressed in a riding out fit then it’s fairly good indication that we needn’t take ourselves too seriously and that we are in a safe environment when it comes to pushing ourselves outside our comfort zone.   If your president has licence to do it, then so do you!!

Phillip cantered us through the Warm Up swiftly, giving us good instructions on how we should respond. 

Vivienne was on the ball throughout the meeting with the timing.  Ringing that bell firmly when people went over time.  She was firm, fair and authorative.   I was staggered, Vivienne, Richard and Manoj worked together, as a great team making sure the meeting stayed on time. Which it did.  We finished spot on 9.30 pm.

Flavia one of our recently completed competent communicators, certainly showed her versatility, jumping in at short notice to be both the AH Counter, and Grammarian.   She spoke clearly, and  articulately, with great poise, and stage posture.  Always a pleasure to listen to Flavia.

What a cracking speech by Beverley, facing her Fears in life!  As Lucas pointed out she could have fooled us!  What fear?  She was competent, composed, and didn’t even use notes.  She made great use of Metaphors I thought.   Those people with the candle snuffer had better watch out!!  as this ladies  going places, and she won’t find any of those people in our club.   A great speech, well done Beverley for winning best speaker of the evening.

Chris was up next, again his use of self-deprecation humour is just so comical, its accompanied by such great body language, and eye contact too, which brings out the humour so well, and you just can't help but warm to him.  He thought PE lessons were a form of child abuse, tee hee!!  He is certainly looking forward to the Olympics and the fact it does serve a greater purpose for global unification, and improving our global relationships as a nation.   Unfortunately we won’t be watching Chris in the 100m final, but he did assure us that he will have a beer in one hand and watching it from his arm chair.

Serena gave a speech titled “Being Practical” I enjoyed this speech.  As usual Serena spoke to us with a lovely smile, a nice, pace, with plenty of pauses, so we could follow her story from start to finish.  I enjoyed her description of Lewisham, and she reminded me of the many things that I like too.  The birds singing, the beauty of the foxes that we see, the squirrels on the fences.  Who needs the country, when we have it on our door?  It all rung true for me.  Being practical was certainly the right move for Serena, and I identified with much of what she said.

Zhanna gave us an Educational speech, which is great because it all means we can learn something.   She gave us practical tips on how we can conclude our speech.   I thought she had good posture, and body language, using her hands meaningfully to make points.   Excellent sign posting too.  We knew what she was going to talk about, and then broke it down for us.  Our conclusions should summarise the main points, have impact, and should not take up any more than 5 to 10% of speech time. 

Lucas, Rosie, and Steve all gave very competent evaluations.  Our topic master Marcella took to the stage with great gusto and stage presence and took us through the TT session.   Didn’t we have some crackers!  Gabriel, cool calm and collected, made such a great point, that the Olympians should be role models for children.  Andy, our master stage dodger of the evening or not as the case proved to be.  He was in his element when he finally went to the stage and gave his speech.  Maureen, the gold medal was her dream.  She was cool, calm and collected with her speaking.  Brandon exuded real warmth from the stage, which in part came from his Irish accent.  There was a real character on stage, and we warmed to him.   Well done to all our other TT contestants too.  Well done to Maureen and Andy who were joint winners of table topics.

Steve gave us a good general evaluation of the evening, making the point we had stayed on time.  He whizzed through all the role holders of the evening who had not been commented on, and gave them all fair, and informative feedback.

We all gave a warm welcome to Natasha our latest member to our club, and we look forward to supporting her on her journey of becoming a competent communicator and leader.

Other Business

We were reminded of two points:-                             

1.        If anybody wants to assist with London Trustmasters, who are a newly formed club.  They are looking for experienced role holders to help them get off the ground.  They meet every 2^st and 4^th Wednesday of the month.  They are located at Northern Trust, a short walk from Canary Wharf.  If you are interested let me know, and I’ll put you in contact.

2.        Our next Committee Meeting for Committee Members only is scheduled for the 25^th July 2012.

 Well that’s it folk until the 1^st August.   Looking forward to seeing you all then.

Kind regards all Katy

LEWISHAM SPEAKERS 4TH JULY A NEW CLUB YEAR

Well, what a great start to the toastmaster year that we had! Richard in his usual buzzing style opened the meeting on time. He was an efficient Sargent at Arms as well has General Evaluator too. Crikey, he was holding no prisoners this evening when he undertook his role of General Evaluator.

Steve Roberts, was ready and primed. I liked his question which he asked his troops for coming to the evening. He had clearly prepared for his role in advance for being toastmaster. He too was holding no prisoners, the theme of the evening was time, and by Jove he spoke with conviction, and authority.

Arnaud took us through the warm up with a nice simple, easy to understand question. He did discharge his role admirally, making sure we stayed on time.

Liz our timer for the evening was quick and efficient throughout the evening. I ‘m looking forward to her first ice breaker soon.

Great to see Marcella back, and have her back in our fold. She took her feedback from Richard well, and went on to remind us of the entire role of the “ah” counter.

Rosie gave a good account of the role of the grammarian.

Dee gave us her speech on “Failure was the best thing that happen to her”. Dee had great stage presence, and really delivered her speech with energy, passion, and conviction. How did she achieve this; good body language, and eye contact throughout, and good use of the stage too. Yes, if we want to get on in life we really do have to set ourselves goals that is for sure. No pain, no gain! A nice well organised speech which conveyed a very simple message. Well done to Dee for winning best speaker of the evening.

Rosie I thought carried out a very thorough evaluation. She drew to our attention, how enthusiastic Dee’s speech had been delivered.

Lucas gave us a very informed speech on how we can undertake more impressive PowerPoint presentations. His speech was well organised and researched well, with good use of visual aids. Again Chris was organized and composed in his evaluation of Lucas, and gave some very constructive feedback for Lucas.

Zhanna, again delivered us an intriguing and very poignant speech about the love she has for her mother. She had me hooked from start to finish, and I loved her humour.

Serena with her usual smiling stage presence gave a very clear and well-structured evaluation. She was clear calm, and composed. The pace was nice and slow, with pauses at the relevant points, so we could truly listen and engage with her. Well done to Serena for best evaluator.

Well done to Phillip who cantered us through the table topics, and our guests certainly performed beyond expectation. John agreeing that charging people for wastage for food not eaten in a restaurant was not a bad idea. It might make us think a little more, and only take what we need in life. Hey we could apply the process to other areas of life too even!!! heating, water (the list could be endless.) Suffice to say John gave us a very full answer to the question.

I’m looking forward to listening to Jo’s comments when he runs the commentary as he follows the Olympic torch through Lewisham. I’m sure there will be a lot of people on the streets watching the Olympic torch too. Again another very informative and competent response to a table topic question.

Anthony charmed us with his cool relaxed stage presence. Whilst he couldn’t remember his exam grades it was no great shakes to him, and he would feel quite comfortable telling people what they were (if only he could remember them!!).

Maureen gave us an exceptional response about friendship cakes, as she has matured she has become far more laid back about what a friend should be like, and she described to us how all her friends are different, and have different niches in her life.

Stephen another competent table topic responded, again another smooth operator on the stage, cool, composed and collected.

All these table topics were evaluated by Manoj, who delivered his evaluations competently and confidently. He had a real energy on stage, and a really clear voice.

Then there were the awards too. Well done to both Flavia and Manoj who have now both completed their Competent Communicator manuals, and well done to Zhanna for completing her Competent Leadership manual. They have all shown dedication and commitment, and they are a fine examples to all our club members of how we should set ourselves goals, and be disciplined enough so as to achieve them. They are a reminder to each individual member that we should be setting ourselves goals as outlined by the Toastmaster Programme, and be working diligently through our own manuals, so as maximise and focus our own personal development growth from the Toastmaster Programme.

Today (6th July) both Flavia, Julie, Richard, Stephen, and I undertook our demonstration meeting at Northern Trust (A club which Lewisham Speakers is sponsoring for 6 months) until they can become a fully-fledged independent new toastmaster club. It was a great experience for all of us. Part of our role of sponsoring this club will be helping them fill their roles, and show them the ropes so they can get fully off the ground, and they have indicated they may need help filling some of the roles initially (like prepared speeches, and evaluators, toastmasters etc.) so if any member would like to help out in this regard please do let me know. They plan to meet every Wednesday (2nd and last Wednesday of the month) after work, exact time to be confirmed. Northern Trust are based literally just outside Canary Wharf Tube Station.

Other diary notes:-
Note to all Committee Members that 16th July is our Officer Training Day. Taking place at: City Criers, Citigroup Centre, Canada Square Canary Wharf, London E14 5LB. Commencing 7.00pm. If you haven’t already please could you confirm your attendance or otherwise by return email to me.

Finally well done to Manoj for doing such a well organised job of organising our first meeting under the new Committee.

Looking forward to seeing you all on the 18th July for our next TM meeting!!
Kind regards all
Katy