Page 15 - july 2019

FROM THE DESK

Learning Leadership Through

Courageous Evaluations

Cate Arnold, DTM

Program Quality Director

From serving in the District 7 Trio last year, comes the actual practice and doing. And then

I’ve learned several valuable leadership lessons. the toughest part, the evaluation.
Today let’s talk about performance evaluations For most of us, evaluations are the most
which can be broken down into three points: valuable, but the hardest part, the courageous
• Maximizing leadership skills by serving as part of any endeavor. Being willing to reflect and

leaders in our clubs and District get feedback from the people we worked with on
• Creating a plan for success what went well, what didn’t, and what we would
• Evaluating how it went do differently next time. Although Pathways
Evaluations take courage, concentration, and now includes a 360-degree evaluation as part

reflection. The leadership learning that comes of the High Performance Leadership project in
from them are huge. Level 5, there is no formal evaluation offered or
Imagine you worked on your speaking skills required of leaders.
by giving a speech where the only criteria was I hope you will do it anyway, that you will

to speak for 5 to 7 minutes. You get up, speak use the opportunity to learn the most you can
about whatever, and sit down. There is no from serving in leadership roles, recognizing the
formal evaluation. You aren’t going to learn role’s objectives, doing your best to execute them
nearly as quickly as you could without speech successfully, and gaining the self-confidence and

objectives and relevant feedback. You also don’t courage to ask for feedback.
get to practice one of the greatest skills you
can develop—learning to enjoy constructive
feedback.

Opportunities start with club officer roles and
move to higher levels through the Toastmasters
Leadership Pipeline. In each role, we start by
understanding the objectives of the position.

What are we trying to achieve for the club, area,
division, District? This is like looking at the
objectives of a speech. Then we plan it. What
are we going to try to do to achieve it? Then

VOICES! | JULY 2019 15