The Point

Toastmasters means business

The business world is full of opportunities. Very often chances come unexpected. Scenario one: A big project is in trouble. A new team leader is needed to manage the turnaround. This is a very visible position. Scenario two: The company established a new relationship with a client. They are looking for the trusted advisor who can successfully manage the relationship. Scenario 3: The VP of your division was hired away by the competition. The search for a successor has started. The company is looking both internally as well as externally.

We are interested to grow, perhaps make more money and make a difference. The question is, what do we do to systematically prepare for these situations? Will we have the skills to deal with the new challenges? In the sports world careers are shorter. We can see how players come to the game. There are only few like LeBron James who were drafted from high school into the NBA becoming the leader of the team over night. Mostly, somebody simply gets a chance. One player is injured, another player fills in and proofs himself. Now, what have these athletes done prior to getting their chance? Well, they have practiced. They played their game at anytime they could. They conditioned themselves in the off season. They thought through how this moment would look like, going on the field for the first time as a professional.

In the business world a lot of things are required from corporate athletes. We have to know our stuff. Engineers need to be technically competent. Sales people need to know their products, customers and markets. People in finance need to know their numbers, all applicable accounting and tax rules. Researchers need to know their science. Our educational system is designed to develop knowledge based skills. But, in order to be effective we need to connect with other people. We communicate facts, key concepts, perhaps strategies. Anyone who has ever been in a situation that is similar to one of the three scenarios, knows that the most important thing is not necessarily the domain expertise. The most important thing is to relate to people. It is about to reach out effectively, to listen and to be heard. Toastmasters is the ideal training camp for corporate athletes. Here are five examples how its educational program helps you to get ready.

1. Overcoming the fear of public speaking: Initially, this is the most important reason, why people join Toastmasters. For most people going through the Competent Communicator manual – a collection of ten (10) speech projects – is more than sufficient to achieve this goal.

2. Special speech projects: There is a slew of advanced manuals representing interesting challenges for an aspiring speaker. There are a wide range of speaking projects: a crisis situation, a dinner speech, a toast, a roast or a humorous speech. Nothing is more intimidating than the idea to have to be funny. The manuals help the speaker to prepare for the project. Based on very specific criteria - called speech objectives - the speaker receives constructive feedback in a meeting taking his game to the next level.

3. Impromptu speaking: Most of our day to day speaking situations are impromptu. We have to learn how to think quick on our feet. One way to train are “Table Topics”. As part of every meeting the Table Topics Masters has prepared a number of questions. She picks randomly someone from the audience. The selected person speaks for one to two minutes. And yes, this can be sometimes a long time. I met a number of people who said that Table Topics helped them most to become a more confident speaker above and beyond anything else they did in Toastmasters.

4. Listening: Business leaders need to be good listeners. It’s about understanding different view points and learning to detect those little nuances. This give us the ability to effectively understand, analyze and deal with the situation at hand. One of the great opportunities to train this skill is to give evaluations to other speakers. Evaluators are identified ahead of time in a Toastmaster meeting. They listen to a speech and then prepare a two to three minute response that equally encourages the speaker as it provides valuable suggestions for improvement.

5. Leadership: In Toastmasters we strongly believe that leadership skills can be learned. There are plenty of situations for our members to practice their leadership skills. It can be as simple as to practice how to run a meeting. From there we provide leadership opportunities to run a club, an area, a division or beyond. Just to give you an idea of the complexity: A Toastmaster division can have easily five hundred members. A district may have many thousands of members. So, Toastmasters can provide a training ground that easily matches the complexity of a VP level position in the corporate world.

Regardless, if you are interested to improve your speaking skills or your leadership skills. Regardless, if you are interested to become a professional speaker or just simply become more comfortable speaking in front of a crowd. The first step for all of us is the same. Visit a local club and participate in a meeting, perhaps answer a table topics question. Things will take its course from there.