Magnificent greetings!
An extraordinary afternoon meeting for Anchorvale
CC Toastmasters Club as we gathered for our remarkable 90th Chapter
Meeting with a special guest, motivational speaker, Kevin Cottam! Kevin’s presentation
on “Your Body Talks” is not only entertaining, it literally engaged all of our
senses.
Walking around in anger, sadness, happiness….. and imagining ourselves
like a tree staying rooted to the ground, members participated in the workshop
with lots of fun, laughter and learnings.
Next, our club president, Zulhafni, took on an unusual session explaining
the roles and responsibilities of Executive Committee (EXCO) members of our
club. He opened the invitation for nominees and volunteers to take up the
fulfilling challenge of EXCO roles for the next term. Zulhafni took the time to
share about the roles, responsibilities and REWARDS of each EXCO position.
Provided below is a summary of the EXCO Positions:
- President - the Club president sets the tone and direction for the Club and has both the macro and micro view of the progress and development of the Club. By tradition and as part of succession planning, Anchorvale TMC usually elects the next Club President from the Vice-Presidents of Education as the latter provides the President with key experience in preparation for the President role.
- Vice-President (Education) ("VPE") - Has an intimate knowledge and oversight of the members' educational progress and goals. The VPE also works closely with other Clubs, forming a network to rely on for appointment-holders and speech slots
- Vice-President (Membership) ("VPM") - Promote the Club, initiating new guests, recruit new members, assist with Club renewal
- Vice-President (Public Relations) ("VPPR") - Club Web-master, recording videos and taking photographs of the Club meetings. The VPPR also manages the Club Facebook page and has the creative space to design the Club's branding
- Secretary - Maintaining of Club records, managing Club files, taking of Meeting Minutes. We are also considering adding the role of liaison as part of the scope of secretarial duties.
- Treasurer - Club’s accountant – will hold the bank account and process claims, keep detailed records of Club transactions and funds. There is no need to be fantastic at mathematics or statistics but should be meticulous and thorough
- Sergeant-at-Arms ("SAA") - Has oversight over the Club supplies, stores and property and alos handles the logistical aspects of the Club. The SAA also coordinates the planning of the Club meetings (e.g. food purchase) and briefs the SAA of the meeting.
Before
Zulhafni ended the session, came the “AHA” moment when our club mentor Jenny Au
mentioned to the club members the decision to buy all eight of Kevin’s books
“AHA” by both our club mentors (Jenny herself and Richard Tay) to be given to
the incoming EXCO members. Added incentive, cheers!
Our VPE, Salma also took on another unusual session by giving
pointers on how to complete the Competent Leadership manual. She urged all those
present not to neglect the Leadership Track in our Toastmasters journey, an
important part of the whole Toastmasters experience as it focuses on key areas
of improvement such as our listening, thinking and leadership skills; aspects
that are absolutely crucial in other areas of our personal and professional
lives. She gave examples of how non EXCO members like Sridhar, Alice, Vinay,
Owen and Karthik did projects in the manual by exhibiting their competency in
organizing our club contests, as encouragement to members to come forward for
such opportunities in the future.
Salma ended by making a passionate call to
all members to continuously pursue roles like project / language / general
evaluations, toastmaster of the day, timer, ah counter and other roles. Members
are also most welcome to suggest other events and volunteer themselves as organizers.
We started our prepared
speech segment with a reminder from Saravanan that looking forward propels us
to act instead of staying put on the past. Owen showed us the five commandments
of alienating friends as an anti example to what not to do with his newly
acquired body language skills from Kevin. Followed by Kevin himself, the blend
of old and modern Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, was read to everyone on a
comfortable circle seating arrangement.
Hareesh, Chye Bei’an, our
gracious visitor from Money Mastery Toastmasters and Zulhafni’s evaluation of them
proved to be great take aways not just for the speakers but for the members as
well.
The already unique Chapter
Meeting did not stop churning out surprises. Table Topic Master Chee Sian
invited us all to attempt assuming the position of people in the pictures shown,
who showed passion and competency in what they do through their body language.
From an extreme photographer, high rise building window cleaner, skilled fork
lifter, brave safari game keeper who mingled with a lion, barbeque welder,
multiple servings bartender, mountain top ironing to traffic police perching
themselves on top of traffic lights…..members had a challenging time taking on
different extreme work roles.
Special kudos should be given to Sridhar who did
not do an “over the counter” Ah Counter report. Sridhar gave useful suggestions
on how to avoid pause fillers, and paid attention to the most commonly repeated
ones, instead of the usual reading out of the number of pause fillers used by
each speaker. A very useful approach.
Drumroll…..
and the awards go to……….
Best Prepared Speech: Owen
Roma, TM
Best Table Topics Speaker:
Sindu, TM
Looking
forward to seeing all of you on 25th June 2016, our 91st Chapter
Meeting at Anchorvale CC 3rd Floor Conference Room from 2pm to 5pm. It will be a special occasion as it will be our AGM, EXCO Installation and Anchorvale Awards Bonanza!! It promises to be a feast as we end the term.
Written by: Wee Chee Sian CC,CL
