This week’s meeting kicked off with a warm welcome from our President, Tina Joe. Our speaker for the One World Many Voices segment was absent this week. Tina Joe briefly introduced the Bias Flag and explained its purpose as a tool our club uses to encourage inclusive and mindful language throughout our meetings.
The meeting was then turned over to our Toastmaster of the Day, Gulnara, who briefly explained the purpose of Toastmasters and noted that we had one guest in attendance. Gulnara introduced the Word of the Day, Tenacious, defined as “Not giving up easily; continuing even when something is difficult.” She then led a quick round of introductions and guided us through an engaging, well-organized meeting.
We had two speakers this week. Toastmaster Diana delivered a speech from the Dynamic Leadership Pathway, Understanding Your Communication Style, titled “Miscommunication Can Be A Great Teacher.” She highlighted three mistakes that she has made in relation to communication styles and takeaways from each one. A few key quotes from this speech were: never waste anyone’s time, know what people expect from a meeting, know your audience, don’t run before you can walk, and figure out what you want to build before you start.
Our second speaker, Toastmaster Summer, presented a speech titled “Mi Casa Es Su Casa.” In this talk, Summer explained the importance of Home Exchange to her while also touching on how the process works by explaining the mechanics behind it. Through this process, they stay at real homes and embed themselves in the community. She went on to explain that they typically meet and befriend the people they are exchanging homes with.
Table Topics were led by Toastmaster Chang, who structured the questions to encourage use of the Word of the Day. Questions included: What is something you almost gave up on but are glad you didn’t? Are you better at starting something or finishing something? When you are stuck, do you keep trying on your own or ask for help? What everyday task tests your patience more than it should? Have you ever taken a shortcut that created more work?
Next, we moved into our Breakfast of Champions segment for those on the East Coast of the United States, also known as Lunch or Dinner of Champions depending on your location, which marks the evaluation and feedback portion of the meeting. Toastmaster Yuko led the evaluation team, highlighting the engaging Table Topics session and noting that both evaluators gave areas for improvement without sounding too critical.
Speaker evaluations were delivered by Toastmasters Tim and Danielle. Tim praised Diana for thoughtfully incorporating feedback from her previous speech, giving additional shoutouts for her great use of gestures, volume, speed, and clarity. No specific areas for improvement were noted, and Tim told Diana to keep doing exactly what she is doing. Danielle said that Summer’s speech was beautifully written and a great topic choice, with specific praise revolving around her use of gestures being intentional and adding to the speech.
Toastmasters Lisa and Adnan helped keep the meeting on track by serving as Timer and Grammarian, respectively, monitoring speech timing and tracking filler words throughout the meeting.
The meeting adjourned right at 7:59 AM EST, and we are already looking forward to next week’s meeting.
The next Sunrise Toastmasters meeting will be at 7 a.m. on September 4, EST. If you would like to join our meeting as a guest, contact us for the meeting link.
The roles for the next meeting are as follows:
Toastmaster: Kenny Eniola
One World, Many Voices: Syed Shah
Speaker 1: Robert Shepherd
Speaker 2: Chang Yu
Table Topics: Diana Calmic
General Evaluator: Lisa Garofola
Evaluator 1: Summer Murphy
Evaluator 2: Tim Murphy
Timer: Danielle Benzon
Grammarian: Tina Joe
