Introductions
President Swarajit opened our last meeting of the year by reminding us about the importance of public speaking in different professions. As an example, he used an interview given by Richard Branson after the recent passing of Nelson Mandela. Branson’s speech was full of unnecessary filler words which detracted from his message – however, this is an area that the Toastmasters programme can help people improve through practice.
Swarajit then handed the meeting over to Jo, the Toastmaster for the evening. Jo’s theme was “What is the best or worst Christmas present you have received or given?”
Jo in action as Toastmaster for the meeting
Just like Santa Claus, Jo introduced her little helpers; Aislinn the meeting’s Timekeeper and Femi and Ayla as joint Harkmasters.
The meeting’s Timekeeper, Aislinn
Prepared speeches
Moving on to the prepared speeches, Marte with her Icebreaker speech entitled “My First Year in London” shared her experience of relocating from Amsterdam. Marte outlined 3 significant things she’d noticed during her time in London. Firstly, the expensive yet tiny and low quality housing; secondly the generally distant relationships people keep in the office until having a drink in the pub before opening up; and lastly the challenging transport in London as a cyclist, which is much more dangerous compared to Amsterdam.
In his No. 5 speech entitled “Clever Crows” Damien referred to Alfred Hitchcock’s movie The Birds before educating us on how crows are one of the most intelligent and adaptable birds to the human environment. They are found almost everywhere, from the centre of cities to moorlands and the seashore, as well as people’s gardens. They possess advanced qualities such as being problem solvers, facial recognition and planning ahead which includes storing food for rainy days.
Henry, with his No. 7 speech entitled “TV Addict”, informed us that people in the UK watch an average of 4 hours of TV a day. John Reith, who co-founded the BBC in 1922, started it with the intent to educate, inform and entertain. With over 300 hours of TV programs available there are TV documentaries, 24-hours news channels and programmes like Big Brother and The X Factor which achieve these aims. As a self-professed TV addict, Henry believed you can skim through 95% of junk to get the top 5% of good TV.
The final speaker Janet, with her 9th speech entitled “Don’t Take it Personally”, opened strongly by asking the audience if we could imagine working for a boss who despised us, no matter how hard we worked, but then said “don’t take it personally”. Janet’s message was to treat others as you would want to be treated yourself.
Evaluations
Moving onto the evaluations, the key tips from our evaluators are briefly outlined below:
- Paula in evaluating Marte, commended her on her confidence, great structured speech and timely punctuation. The recommendation given was to use less information in order to not run out of time.
- Rufina commended Damien on a great opening by using a relevant film, his passion about the topic and its simplicity. Her main recommendation was to use more gestures and facial expressions.
- Carrie commended Henry on a great choice of topic, interactive delivery and a wonderful use of humour. Her recommendation was to use more pauses in the jokes and to experiment by trying something slightly different from his normal style.
- Joe commended Janet on a very engaging speech full of passion and emotion in which she picked out people in the audience. However, he observed that the point of the speech seemed to drift after a while.
Table Topics
The table topics section (also known as impromptu speeches), hosted by Ahmed, were based on the theme of the evening and the festive season with an infusion of real life scenarios.
- Femi was asked, how would you convince Santa Claus to use a ‘Boris bike’ to deliver his presents this Christmas?
- Kessy discussed her least favourite Christmas movie.
- Agnes was asked, if you had a call from Santa what would you say to him?
- Peter pondered who he’d cast in the role of Grinch.
- Alex spoke about her most memorable Christmas celebration.
- Glen explained why Christmas reminded him of the state of the economy.
Rajeev, the Topics Evaluator, telling it like it is
Rajeev took on the mantle of evaluating the table topics and commended the speakers on their great smiles, use of personal language and humour.
Awards
Closing the meeting, Harkmasters Femi and Ayla (Janet’s daughter) tested the audience’s listening skills by posing questions based on what we’d heard during the meeting, rewarding correct answers with delicious chocolate treats.
Harkmasters Femi & Ayla giving out chocolate
Finally, Swarajit handed out the main awards for the evening.
- Best Prepared Speech: This went to Janet for her speech on dealing with a difficult boss.
- Best Evaluator: Carrie won the best evaluator award for her detailed analysis of Henry’s performance.
- Best Table Topic: Glen won best table topics speaker for his discussion of the economy at Christmas.
- Marte received an Icebreaker award for delivering her first speech.
- Damien, after delivering his 5th speech, received a half-competent communicator award.
- President’s Award: This went to Aislinn for her exemplary performance as Timekeeper.
As it was our last meeting of the year, we wound things down with a bit of extra food, drink and socialising at the end of the meeting.
Next meeting
Our first meeting of the New Year will be held on Monday, 13th January 2014 upstairs at The Clerk & Well pub, 156 Clerkenwell Road, EC1R 5DU.
Doors open at 6.30pm for a prompt 6.45pm start.
