Tuesday, June 23, 2015

June 16th 2015 Theme: Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway


“Fear is the mother of foresight”. ~~ Thomas Hardy


Welcome to the third meeting in June blog. Today, we had 3 guests attend our meeting.  
Sue was our toastmaster and offered empowerment and encouragement based on the book by Susan Jeffers called: Feel The Fear …And Do It Anyway 

She observed that fear is much less a psychological problem than an educational problem. It affects speakers and musicians. It is important to accept the fear within ourselves and move on anyway.

The GAT(e)  team was: Kathy  as Grammarian (Reminiscent), Jung as the Ah Counter, and Jean as the Timer.  

Jim was our first speaker today. He gave a talk from the Leadership Excellence Series. It was entitled “Developing A Mission Statement” and was delivered within 15 minutes.

His talk distinguished a vision statement from a mission statement. His objective was to clarify organizational jargon and transform these terms into a personal life mission whose goal is to realize the personal vision.

A vision is a non-specific statement of long term purpose.  Whereas, a mission is a broad statement that describes what daily activities occur to achieve the vision.

For a personal vision, the question, “what is your direction?” should suggest a one sentence epitaph on your tombstone. (How you want to be remembered.)

For a personal mission statement, write down successive versions and ask: Does this further my vision? Display your mission statement to keep it alive and visible and updatable.

Linda was his evaluator. Linda appreciated Jim’s introduction that was spoken by Sue to set the tone for the talk. She also liked the Star Trek metaphor and the readings Preston and Lynne gave for the Toastmaster vision and mission statements, respectively. She suggested that Jim give equal time (facially) to both sides of the audience despite equipment obstacles in the speaking area.

Our second speaker was Dave.  He offered his 4th Speech from the Competent Communicator’s Manual (Project #4 – How To Say It). His speech was called: “Why Do I Coach?” and was completed within 7 minutes.

Dave has 4 children and as part of their upbringing, coached Soccer, Basketball, Baseball and Lacrosse. He enumerated 10 reasons for his decision to coach:
• Enjoy being around youngsters, their banter, and special time in their lives
• Offer a positive influence on atheletes and teams
• Offset the scarcity of coaches
• Have and take the time to coach
• Feel and smell the field prior to a game
• Share the feeling of kids doing their hard working best
• Help them develop a positive work ethic
• Help them develop good sportsmanship and deemphasize Winning/Losing
• Meet and make friends with kids’ parents
• Become a better person by coaching

Dave was voted best speaker.

Barb was his evaluator. Barb felt that Dave’s speech used vivid images, precise words, and short sentences like “seeing a sea of kids with sticks”. The speech was well structured and the use  of notes worked well to give the 10 reasons why.

She recommended that Dave talk while standing still, vary the rhythm of the talk and leave the speaking area as he shakes hands with the toastmaster.

Our third speaker was Preston.  He did his 2nd Speech from the Competent Communicator’s Manual (Project #2 – Organize Your Speech). His speech was called: “What Is Paid Search?” and was completed within 7 minutes.

Preston explained what Paid Search or Pay Per Click means in the realm of search web sites like Google – which uses Adwords, Bing, and Yahoo.

He distinguishes the Search Market, which uses keywords. In this market, the advertiser bids on one or more key words and selects a bit amount. This is compared with the Display Market, which deals with pictorial ads and the advertiser bids “impressions” or the number of times an ad is shown. These pictorial ads show up in search engine results (ads, local lists, and organic links).
 
Naser was his evaluator. Naser complimented Preston about his insight in providing a new, informative view of Google search, where ads are ranked and advertisers are asked how much they want to pay Google to show their site.

Naser suggested that Preston offer a “takeaway” for this topic that the audience could use for themselves.

Naser was voted best evaluator.


 
Nicki, our newest member, was the Table Topics Master for today. Her topic was for a volunteer to describe a person, place or thing from childhood suggested by a written, starting letter picked from a basket.

Robert picked the letter M and launched into a memory of discovering m&m’s candy.

Alice
described a time when a boy offered gestures that he liked Alice while she, herself, was experiencing low self-esteem.

Alice was voted best table topics speaker.

Attendees were:  Linda, Jean, Jim, Lynne, Naser, Sue, Robert, Barb, Pauline, Julie, Kathy,  Anisha, Chizuko, David, Grace, Alice, Nicki, Sepidah, Preston, Jung, Diana as well as 3 guests: Andrew H., Srichand V, and Pratap B. Our active membership total remains at 26.

~~~~~ Respectfully Submitted by Robert, the Secretary [See, say then comment] ~~~~~

 

2 comments:

  1. So comprehensive, Robert! You do such an awesome job capturing the detail and the spirit of each meeting. It's a pleasure to read.

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  2. I wasn't able to attend last week, but Robert, your recap made me feel like I had been there!!

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