Page 18 - Voices Decemper 2015
P. 18

SUCCESSFUL CLUB

      Making Toastmasters Part of the Company Culture

                   by Matthew Clarke, President, Toastmasters of the Universe

Toastmasters of the Universe serves employees                    mindset of being a better leader or not, you
of Connective DX, a digital experience agency                    leave one. Mostly we promote a safe environ-
in Northwest Portland. The club has paid off for                 ment to grow, learn, collaborate, create and
the company, as its president describes here.                    share with each other.
                                                                 	
We regularly see the benefits of a closed club                   Another twist for us is that we do not favor
because we are a small company with a fairly                     PowerPoints or digital presentations in general.
high percentage of Toastmasters.  Just a few days                This might seem odd as we are a digital agency,
                                                                 but for us Toastmasters is a way to go beyond
                                      ago we had a company       that. I like to remind people that your fancy
                                      meeting that sums          deck might get lost. Your cloud might be down.
                                      it up nicely. There        Heck, the power could go out. Mastering the
                                      were three presenta-       essence of your presentation and being able to
                                      tions on three sepa-       motivate people with nothing more than your
                                      rate work projects.        mind, your body and your voice is what’s impor-
                                      The last group, all        tant. Funny animated GIFs and fancy transitions
                                      Toastmasters, abso-        might get some oohs and aahs, but they are
                                      lutely nailed i t . T h e  supporting, not core, elements.
                                      o t h e r two presenta-    	
                                      tions weren’t even         We stress a fun and safe place to explore and
                                      close. These were          communicate. We value and take the quality
                                      not highly coordi-         of our feedback quite seriously, especially
                                      nated and rehearsed        when someone is
                                      presentations, so the      presenting company
Toastmasters excelled. They didn’t need much                     work. The entire
time. Their presentation was on point, it flowed,                feedback loop is
it had the audience captured, and no one in the                  something we are
crowd, Toastmaster or not, would disagree that                   trying to export from
they were head and shoulders above the others.                   Toastmasters into our
                                                                 conference rooms
Our club is closed to the public. We receive                     and interpersonal
requests throughout the year, and it’s hard to                   communications by
turn them down, but it suits us best. We always                  listening, being posi-
encourage our speakers to tie in their work                      tive, and providing
when applicable. Because of this we hear a nice                  constructive and
mixture of professional and personal experi-                     actionable sugges-
ences. We learn about each other and learn to                    tions for improvement.
trust each other while honing our leadership
skills.                                                          We love it when other folks in the company
                                                                 remark that they hear us clapping and cheering
I like to say the leadership part of Toastmaster                 in our meetings. When someone stands up to
is really a byproduct. 		                                        speak, we clap. When they are done, we clap. If
                                                                 they get up but don’t say anything (as in Table
It’s a bonus. Whether you come in with the

18 Volume 2 Issue 5 - DECEMBER 2015
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