Systems Overload

Online Toastmasters- Boldly Going Where Nobody Has Gone Before!

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 02 May 2016 10:03:00 +0000

Yesterday, History was made at Toastmasters and another step was taken for mankind as well. Yesterday was the Charter Party Meeting for the Firebird Collective, one of Toastmasters first totally online chartered clubs.

Toastmasters International has been a non-profit global educational organization focused on the development of communication and leadership skills for over 90 years now. It has been largely known in the United States and has been growing more and more outside of the U.S. for a number of years with more than 14,000 clubs worldwide and more than 300,000 members. Toastmasters started a strategic initiative a few years ago to rework their entire educational program, something that they’ve called the Revitalized Education Program (more commonly known as REP). The program has recognized that the needs of its members and future members have changed and the educational program needs to reflect these changes. Traditionally, Toastmaster members have met at brick and mortar clubs tied to a single geographical location (face to face). The Toastmasters Board of Directors cleared the way for online clubs with what they referred to as Phase 1 and Phase 2 clubs and then in February of this year they decided to allow online clubs to charter or to become full-fledged Toastmaster clubs. The Firebird Collective was “officially” chartered on March 29, 2016, the second totally online Toastmaster club. Yesterday was charter celebration of a chartering process one that until February 2016 was only allowed to the traditional bricks and mortar club, now club definition has evolved to allow for online clubs!

There are a lot of Toastmasters who have been working on bringing the bricks and mortar functionality of traditional clubs into the online world, some have been working on this for ten years and longer, so to these people, this is quite an achievement. Manhal Shukayr gave a speech during yesterday’s meeting telling us a little bit about the history of online Toastmaster clubs. He told us of how an interest in bringing together various groups of elderly people together to form Toastmaster clubs led him to test various tools to bring these people together. Within Firebirds, we know that people whose mobility is limited, still want to be a part of the Toastmasters experience and online clubs allows them to take an active part without leaving their homes and having to go through whatever ordeal they might need to go through to get to a traditional bricks and mortar club that might be quite far away and not at all a practical solution for them any longer. It boggles the mind when you think of how this could be very helpful for people with all kinds of disabilities! As Manhal’s speech wasn’t a long keynote address, the audience really only got a taste of the history, but enough of a sense to appreciate that something monument had happened and that we were now all a part of it.

We were all treated to a speech by Jim Kokocki, the current Toastmasters International President. Mr. Kokocki told us how he has been using his monthly column in the Toastmaster Magazine to get a few messages out. One of his messages is that there are three things needed for leadership to grow: knowledge, a place to practice, and feedback, this is all something that Toastmasters has traditionally done very well with. He said that the actual product of Toastmasters is a changed person and that the meeting (physical and now online) is the delivery mechanism. Mr. Kokocki told us of a covered wooden bridge that was abandoned, then turned into a tourist center, that again feel into disuse because people were now using Google Maps and no longer needed to stop at such Tourist centers. We should all keep open minds, so that we don’t become some antiquated building that history has left behind. He was very optimistic about the role that online clubs can take to bring in new members to help keep Toastmasters relevant to the world we live in today as well as the world of tomorrow.

Another theme I noticed that was touched on a few times yesterday was that the online nature allows for a truly multi-cultural experience. When the Firebird Collective chartered, it was with 28 members from 11 different countries. How many people really get the chance to meet and socialize with people from that many different countries at one time, in one location, and never need to leave your home to do it? Firebirds has members from: Mexico, U.A.E., New Zeeland, Australia, England, the Philippines, England, Germany, Canada, and the U.S. as well as guests from all over the world. Kim Hahn, the Vice President of Membership at Firebirds, said during her speech yesterday that online has taken what had traditionally been a local experience (attending a Toastmasters meeting) and turned it into a global experience. She also said that we no longer needed to be geographically isolated.

With Smart-phones, Tablets, and all kinds of other devices, younger people are expecting that companies and organizations have an online presence. Toastmasters now have the opportunity to develop and present themselves in an online world. With online clubs you can work on the same skills that you would at a traditional bricks and mortar club, but you can also develop the skills you’ll need to succeed in a truly global world. If you have a company or organization with a global reach, imagine how this experience could help you and your employees/associates/customers? This is a brave new world with a lot of possibilities.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a big Star Trek fan and in March the Firebird Collective held a Star Trek themed meeting. Much of the technology shown in Star Trek and science fiction has become reality (think about cell phones and tablets) and even an online Toastmaster club meeting might not have seemed possible even two years ago, now it is. Remember, Toastmasters produced changed people, this can be at physical brick and mortar clubs, it can now be in online clubs, and who really knows what future technology might bring us.

Darryl

If you’re interested in learning more about Online Toastmaster clubs, feel free to check out the OnlineToastmaster Facebook Group. The Firebirds Collective Facebook Page can be found here. I did an episode about online clubs for the Toastmaster Podcast Europe where we discuss what a normal meeting is like and other questions that you might find interesting that you can check out here. I interviewed Toastmasters International President, Jim Kokcocki which you’ll find here.

Photo credit: The picture above was taken by Elise Lonsdale, capturing a snapshot of the meeting with a view of her desktop during the meeting.

Raise Your Voice- Blog Action Day 2015

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 16 Oct 2015 08:19:00 +0000

Today is Blog Action Day (BAD) and this year’s theme is “Raise Your Voice”. Today thousands of bloggers and different organizations from around the world will be writing about it for the 8th annual Blog Action Day on October 16, 2015. Every year Blog Action Day raises awareness about a specific theme and it is always a chance to be a part of something bigger than ourselves to feel that you can make a difference in the world around you. This year’s theme of “Raise Your Voice” really resonates with me on a variety of levels, all of which I will describe.

I’ve been taking part in Blog Action Day since the first one back in 2007 and I’m happy to continue my involvement. Every year the theme’s build upon with has come before and this year’s theme seems especially so, I’d even say that it is at the core of making changes in our world. In order to make changes someone first needs to speak up to “Raise Their Voice”. We live in a world of instant results and instant gratification, and where most people won’t chase after the big dreams. There is a lot of apathy everywhere and the overall feeling that you see is that “one person can’t make a difference”, “you can’t fight city hall”, “we’ve always done it this way”, “it will never work”, and the list of excuses we tell our selves seems to grow larger. But change has to start somewhere. I’m reminded of a story that I’ve heard several times in my life.

There were four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. There was an important job to be done and Everybody was sure that Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that, because it was Everybody’s job. Everybody thought that Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized Everybody wouldn’t do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody could have done.

(note: you can find the story was summarized here). What escapes most of us a lot of the time is that we’re all “somebody” and sometimes we need to be the one to raise our voice when other are afraid or seem unwilling. That first voice gets momentum going and once momentum is going it is a whole lot easier to get others to join in on a movement and when the momentum is going fast enough, people will question what took so long and how come it didn’t start sooner. While momentum is no guarantee of success, if that first person doesn’t raise their voice, there is no inertia. In physics I was taught that a body at rest tends to stay at rest while a body in motion tends to stay in motion.

I’ve been very active in Toastmasters the last few years and one of the things that has stuck with me from Toastmasters is that we all have a voice. In the beginning many of us are afraid to use it before a crowd. Many of us spend a lot of time trying to find our voice. What is it we have to say? What is our message? Toastmasters provides a laboratory where you can practice using your voice, you can make mistakes, and people will support you. We’re all human and everybody makes mistakes, don’t let the stop you from raising your voice. If you’d like to practice using your voice you’re welcome to visit any Toastmaster club, but I hope that you’ll take the chance to practice using your voice and to find your voice.

Sometimes our world today seems overly complex and overwhelming but when we’re in need of inspiration it can be found everywhere. We’re blessed to be able to see thousands of motivating videos by inspiring people on YouTube. We can find words of wisdom on Facebook and Twitter. Sometimes you need to tune out all the noise but it is there for you to find.

Our world is full of people who are unable (or initially unwilling) to raise their voice, but human history if full of unlikely people who raised their voices and eventually others joined. If you look at Gandhi and Rosa Parks, who would have thought that these two could ever have accomplished what they did. I encourage you to be Somebody! Have a look at the Blog Action Day website, look around the web to see what people are doing for Blog Action Day 2015, you can also look for #BAD2015, #Bad15, #BlogAction15, #RaiseYourVoice, #FreeToWrite, #JustABlogger, and Blog Action Day as hashtags and keywords. Be Somebody and “Raise Your Voice”!

The Future is not yet written, Let's build it together!

Darryl

Photo Credits: "Gandhi Graffiti San Francisco" is from here. "Rosa Parks Booking" is from here.

95 Reasons to Remember

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 08:37:00 +0000

November 14-16 was the first ever District Conference for one of the newest Districts in Toastmasters. More than 300 people were registered for the event in Frankfurt, Germany with quite a few people deciding to show up at the last minute. The attendees, participants, and all the people putting on the conference found at least “95 Reasons to be There” and then some. District 95 history was made with a whole lot of firsts, lots of memories, and plenty of good times, here some impressions that I had from the event.

I’ve been to a few district conferences now and while it won’t be too much longer until I can count the number I’ve been to on more than one hand, I always find them fun, memorable, and I always walk away learning lots of things (often about myself). This conference will be memorable for me for a number of reasons including my helping out at the registration desk, having a role in running one of the contests, great speeches, friends, and a great weekend.

During the Opening Ceremony, Norbert Poppe gave the audience a kind of Frankfurt for beginners kick-off; D95 Governor, Kees Broos, told us about a popular expression he learned when he was living in New Zeeland “Sweet as” (which was referred to quite often during the weekend); and International Director, Khaled Matlagaitusome, told us about how some district governors will say that their districts are saturated and that there isn’t any more room for growth (with Los Angeles having 3 districts alone compared to the 11 countries currently comprising D95). Our part of the Toastmasters world is indeed growing quite a bit.

Saturday brought us the District Council Meeting where there was a lot of time spent talking about growth of the district with applications for admission to join D95 coming from the Baltic States, Slovakia, and the Ukraine. After some lively discussion about all the national applications, the District Council Meeting approved all applications to join. We were informed that Toastmasters International’s guidelines are based on a country joining with at least 4 clubs forming an area. Since the Baltic States were looking to join as an area between the three countries, their application would ultimately need to be approved by Toastmasters Headquarters. The Ukraine’s application discussion didn’t take on the political discussion that you might have assumed it would but it is a little tricky because they will likely need to form two areas due to the current number of existing clubs and they will need to do a lot of work to get the currently existing clubs up to the necessary club strength. Slovakia has actually been working on joining a European district since 1999, but they already have been working quite a bit with the Czech Republic and Austria, so their admission appeared to be the most straight forward during this DCM. Kees mentioned that he wanted to revise the Strategic Advisory Board via committees and he mentioned the creation of some committees and their leaders. We were informed that Dananjaya Hettiarachchi (2014 World Champion of Public Speaking) will be the keynote speaker at the 2015 D95 Spring Conference. Prague’s bid to host the 2015 D95 Fall Conference was accepted and the 2016 D95 Spring Conference will be hosted in Romania. On a personal note, I was mentioned during the PRO (Public Relations Officer) report for the Toastmasters Europe Podcast. Provided that all of the applications for acceptance of new countries within D95 meet with all the necessary approval, this will be a pretty big expansion of D95 and signals that further reorganization won’t be too much further down the road.

There were great Humorous Speech and Table Topics (Improvisational Speaking) Contests held in English and German. Former D59 District Governor, Morag Mathieson, had the honor of being the first-ever contest master in D59 with the English Table Topics. Contestants were to incorporate the quote “Living dangerously is the only way to live” into their Table Topic speeches. It should be noted that Goethe came from the Frankfurt area. Alexander Lang got the house rocking as the German Humorous contest master. Toni Lämmel referred to the 2014 World Champion of Public Speaking winner Dananjaya Hettiarachchi, saying that he something in them, what do you see that others don’t? Ivan Aksenov reminded the audience we shouldn’t break the rules, in a true Ivan fashion. You can read the list of winner here. Congratulations to all the winners and participants. The creativity of our fellow Toastmasters never ceases to amaze me!

While it is unusual to have non-Toastmasters as Keynote speakers, we had such a speaker with John Lewis on Saturday afternoon. John told us about using “Humour as a Management Weapon”, telling us a few personal stories. John was a perfect example of why it is good to diversify your experiences, providing some good insights to the attendees.

The announcement of the contest winners, people achieving the DTM (Distinguished Toastmaster) Award and other recognitions were a few of the highlights of the Gala Dinner. There were quite a few well-dressed Toastmasters dancing the night away. Me and my two left feet stay off the dance floor, partaking in some lively conversation instead. With all of the contests and workshops being the focus of most of the conference, the Gala Dinner provided a good chance to catch up with some friends I don’t see that often and the opportunity to make some new friends.

The conference was blessed with some wonderful workshops, including one given by Toastmasters International Director, Khaled Matlagaitusome. My own schedule didn’t allow me to attend very many of the workshops but I was pleased to get several interviews for the podcast. I was able to interview former D59 District Governor and current Regional Advisor for Region 11, Morag Mathieson, where she told me about some of the changes being planned for the Educational Program. I have a few interviews in the queue to release before I’ll be releasing these interviews, but I plan to release these in the coming weeks.

I had a conversation with a local Toastmasters that I know and she pointed out how the nature of the district has changed, which really struck me. When we were part of D59 (until July 2014) we were part of Continental Europe and now you can see the emergence of Eastern Europe with the success of some of the contestants and with the decisions being made to add the Baltic States, Slovakia, and the Ukraine. With several of the countries that have joined the district in the past few years, there is a younger demographic and the overall demographics are changing. You can also notice the wonder and excitement of our new Toastmasters. You could see how excited the delegations from the different countries that applied to become part of D95 were, when they were accepted. History was being made for this countries and it is an exciting time (especially to see excitement and potential through the eyes of our new members and the feeling of renewal that they bring the longer-term members) to be in our district.

I’d like to say a big thank you and congratulations to everyone that helped to organize and pull off this wonderful conference! I now know what it feels like to host a district conference and although I didn’t play nearly the big role that many people did, I feel the pride in having hosted a district conference in "my own backyard". I’m excited for the cities that will be hosting the upcoming conferences. I’d also like to say that if your area gets to hold such a conference that you should do what you can to help out, you won’t be disappointed.

I’ve really enjoyed these past few days and I look forward to seeing everyone in the coming months. To the Toastmasters out there that haven’t had the chance to experience the Toastmasters world outside of their club, I encourage you to give it a try, you’ll learn a lot and make some great friends along the way. See you next time, Happy Toastmastering!

Note: All of the pictures are from here. I took several pictures but many have red-eye that I’d like to remove before posting. Upper left picture is the English Humorous Contest winners, upper right picture is of the German Table Topics winners with the contest master, lower left picture is of the German Humorous Contest winners with the contest masters, and the lower right picture is with the contest master, the winners, and D59 Lt. Governor of Education and Training, Tuire Vuolasvirta.

The 11th Annual International Project Management Day Is Here.

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 07 Nov 2014 05:35:00 +0000

Did you attend or are you planning on attending the 2014 IIL International Project Management Day? This is the 11th annual event hosted by IIL.It is a great opportunity for Project Managers from around the world to get together virtually, network and learn. Yesterday was the opening day with live presentations, recorded presentations, and more, but the event is open through November 21st.

I received and email from E. Laverne Johnson (IIL Founder, President and CEO) yesterday where it was stated that their have been more than 75,000 registrants! This event provides some great opportunities to network with other Project Managers from around the world. In fact, there is a "Networking Lounge" and an "Exhibition Hall", providing the opportunity to network and learn about this year's event sponsors.

If you're a PM and you have one or more certifications from PMI then chances are that you're always looking for PDUs (Professional Development Units) towards your recertification. Between the Keynotes (live yesterday and now replay available) and the recorded sessions, you have a chance to earn up to 12 PDUs. These are available through November 21st. You will probably want to check out the "How to Claim PDUs" and download "2014_Video_Presentation_Tracker" to record what sessions you've attended.

There are several sessions available to view. I watched Dr. Harald Kerzner's "Changing Times: Growth of Project Management 2.0". I also noticed a Sustainability thread running through a few of of the presentations, with IIL opening up a Sustainability unit. Greg Balestero, Nathalie Udo, and Jennifer Tharp and presentations dealing with Sustainability. Greg and Nathalie wrote a book together about Sustainability and are very much involved in ILL's new Sustainability unit. Greg made the point that Sustainability was just about "tree huggers" anymore that successful companies that are forward thinking are beginning to see the importance, not only for the environment but that in the coming years it will become imperative for businesses to focus on sustainability to survive and thrive. Jennifer Tharp mentioned some recent disasters and how these were all projects at one time and we now need to plan many of these things into our projects and that as a PM you do have more influence in this area than you might think. You don't have to worry, not all of the presentations are focused on Sustainability, there is a wide range of interesting subject worth checking out.

I attended the International Project Management Day last year for the first time, so I already had experience with an international virtual conference. I'm also interested in connecting with fellow Project Managers out there, feel free to connect with me in the various Social Spaces. You can find my various profiles here. I'd would appreciate something indicating some kind of context when you connect with me (or anyone else). So why not indicate that you attended the conference?

Many of the presentations are available for download in the "PowerPoint Slides" area that you can find by clicking on the "DIRECTORY" in the upper left-hand corner of the website, where they can be downloaded (this will vary depending upon which web browser you use). You'll also want to check out the documents in the "Briefcase" . This allows you to review the material provided later on.

I hope that you'll take advantage of this excellent opportunity to get up to 12 PDUs. You have two weeks, so that gives you a lot of opportunity to view the material available. Thank you to the IIL and the sponsors for organizing this event!

The Future is not yet written, Let's build it together!

Darryl

A Fall Day in Freiburg

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 26 Oct 2014 08:01:00 +0000

October has had a lot of celebration because of 90th Anniversary of Toastmasters on October 22nd. This added a little something special to yesterday's District 95 Division F Fall Contest in lovely Freiburg, Germany. Toastmasters every where are holding division contests in preparation for all of the district conferences that are coming up. This was the last step for Division F (South West Germany) on the way to our district conference in November. Much like the autumn colors outside, there was a lot of color in all the contestants talent and delivery. There was also an excitement in the air as contestants participated in Humorous Speech Contests in German and English and Table Topics (improvisational speaking).

I was really impressed with the very enthusiastic group of Toastmasters in Freiburg who were our hosts. The club had it first meeting in with 4 people back in September 2013 and as of yesterday they have more than 20 members. It is quite an accomplishment to think that a little more than a year ago the club was only the idea of one person and he was able to spread his enthusiasm and excitement to get the club started and with so good support they charted and now were holding a division contest! They're a German speaking club and they told us that they're planning on starting and English speaking club, you just know that they will do this. Hats off to this Toastmaster club!

We were privileged to hear former District 95 Area Governor and now Regional Advisor to Region 11, Morag Mathieson tell us about her Toastmasters adventure. Morag told us about her travels as a Regional Advisor and about a woman she recently met in South Africa who was too scared to speak at her own club and who recently did her Ice Breaker and is now motivated to continue on the path to being a Competent Communicator. She also told us that in our own challenges that we needed three types of people. First, we need Catalysts who inspire us to get started. Second, we need Champions who are there with us along the way, who can advise us in how we can deal with the obstacles that will pop up along the way and can advise and coach us as needed. Lastly, we need Cheerleaders, people who encourage us to keep going when we need a little spirit lifting.

Personally, I was very excited about yesterday's event, because I was actually competing in a division contest for my first time and in two different events. This is not something that I really thought would happen when I gave my Ice Breaker a few years ago. I'm pleased with the opportunity that I've had to develop myself in my public speaking abilities, this is something that is unique to Toastmasters and I can't tell you how much this has meant to me. One of the things that I really enjoy about an event like yesterday is to see the level of talent that was competing and looking at what I can learn from everyone and I will learn.

Within the two Table Topics contests (in German and in English) there were two good questions asked. In the English Table Topics contest we were asked what we would do with one extra hour in a 25 hour day. In the German Table Topics contest, they were told that Santa (or the Weihnachtsman) wasn't coming, what would they do. As a contestant I only heard two of the English answers (one being my own). In Table Topics you only have a short period of time to formulate your response and depending upon the question and the circumstances at the time, you might be able to put together a brilliant response, but more often than not we come away thinking that I could have said this and I should have said that, but that is human nature and it teaches us how to think our our feet. I liked the German question and the responses because I like the diversity of ways that people celebrate that holiday, knowing that it is celebrated differently from country to country and even region to region within the same country. I can tell you now, that when we do get that extra hour in our days, I'll be ready.

I needed to leave the contest yesterday before the winners were announced. I've just seen that Ben Parsons won the English Table Topics and Kailey Peng won the English Humorous Speech Contest. Norman Gräter won the German Table Topics and German Humorous Speech Contest. Congratulations to them and all the other participants. I'm curious to find out how the other contestants finished. The Division F Contest seemed like a great way to end all the celebrations related to the 90th Anniversary of Toastmasters that have been happening this month.

To all the Toastmasters who are considering coming to Frankfurt for the first ever District 95 Conference November 14th to 16th, I do hope that you'll decide to attend (the website is here). I was told yesterday that they're expecting around 300 Toastmasters from around Europe. For anyone who is curious to check it out, why not visit an area club (you can search for clubs here) and maybe you can even check out contests and all the wonderful workshops in your first ever district conference, and if you're ever in Wiesbaden, I'd love to have you visit my club.

Blog Action Day 2014: Inequality

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 15 Oct 2014 17:12:00 +0000

This year’s Blog Action Day (BAD) theme is “Inequality” and thousands of bloggers and different organizations from around the world will be writing about it for the 7^th annual Blog Action Day on October 16, 2014. Every year Blog Action Day raises awareness about a specific theme and it is always a learning experience for me and all of the participants. This year is no different.

I’ve been taking part in Blog Action Day since the first one back in 2007 and I’m happy to continue this tradition. I read about the theme that was selected a few months ago and I was thinking about it when I recently gave a speech about the famous Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. “I have a dream” speech. I briefly thought about recording myself doing a version of that speech and making it part of my efforts for this year’s theme, but I decided to put that on the back burner for the moment so that I can do an article that is still timely and relevant.

What got me originally thinking about Dr. King’s famous speech was driving in my car one day with my family I heard part of this speech through our car’s speakers, but I was quickly surprised to hear that the speech had been put to dance music and was now a popular pop song in Germany (maybe other parts of Europe for that matter, but I can’t say at this moment). While I was listening to the song, I was thinking how cool is this that a big message from the 60’s was being picked up and taken by a new generation. I don’t know what will happen with this song and what the impact will be but the possibilities are endless, when you consider the inspirational and motivation aspects and what effect that they can have on people and incorporating this into a popular song has that much more possibility to spread the message. One point of my speech was the torch of Dr. King and his message in the 60’s being picked up by another generation and made a new.

In his famous speech delivered at the Lincoln Memorial in August 1963 (now more that 51 years ago), Dr. King says “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.“ Doesn’t this speak to parents everywhere, we all want a better world for our children? Dr. King’s speech hits on civil rights, discrimination, and inequality. I think that if were giving the speech on Blog Action Day (October 16, 2014) he would probably mention the following things as well.

People are often treated unfairly because they’re older or younger
People are chastised because of who they love
Society today is a lot more polarized with people not willing to listen to other people with different beliefs
Religious toleration is at an all-time low
People are unwilling to consider new information that might conflict with their personal dogma
College education (and education in general) has become so expensive that it becomes more and more out of reach
Women and African Americans tend to earn a lot less for the same work as white males
Money has long be a divider, but today we’re living in the time of the 1%. Add to this the statistic that the world’s richest 85 people own as much as 3.5 billion people of the world’s poorest people was a big topic of conversation at Davos earlier this year (Richard Fuentes mentions this here)
He might even have a few other things to add

Duncan Green, Senior Strategic Advisor at Oxfam wrote an interesting article about inequality. He tells about a few years ago when he was promoting a book of his “From Poverty to Power” in the U.S. and he had to replace “redistribution” with “rebalancing”, because it had become so politically loaded in the U.S. Unfortunately, this is not the only word that has had its former meaning hijacked only to put images in people’s minds that will almost stop any positive discussion and turn it into a heated political discussion where many people will immediately tune you out. Sadly, there are many topics that we can hardly have a sane conversation about any more.

Mr. Green mentions that inequality should not just be equated with income (or money) but views it as “the division of the world into haves and have nots is at its root about power” and the gap between those that have it and those that don’t. He also suggested that we need to be better telling the story of inequality and where the fight has been and is being won. You can think about the abolition of slavery and women getting the right to vote. When we claim to profess and embrace Democracy in much of the world, then we should stop ignoring inequality and so much of the world’s population.

When I think about "Inequality" today, I realize that it means so much more than ability to vote, be hired for a job, eat in a restaurant, or to sit wherever you like on the bus. I encourage you to have a look around the Blog Action Day website, to look around the web to see what people are doing for Blog Action Day 2014, you can also look for #BAD2014, #Bad14, BlogAction14, #inequality, and Blog Action Day as hashtags and keywords. There are some good ideas of how you can participate at the Blog Action Day website, which also links to conversations that they’ve had with some of the sponsors of this year’s event (like Oxfam, All Together Now, and Global Voices).

The Future is not yet written, Let's build it together!

Darryl

PMI Virtual Professional Development Symposium 2014

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 15 Sep 2014 06:41:00 +0000

If you're a Project Manager and a member of PMI (Project Management Institute) you might have received an email telling you about the PMI Information Systems "Virtual Professional Development Symposium 2014" which was held September 12, 2014. If you missed it, the sessions are available "On Demand" for the rest of the month. This is an excellent opportunity to get up to 6 PDUs (Professional Development Units) toward your recertification and there was some excellent information provided.

If you're not already registered for the event, you should be able to register for it here.

There are 6 sessions plus Opening Address (Welcome and Introduction from Marke A. Langley, President & CEO, PMI) and Closing Comments. The six sessions are:

Keynote Address: Secrets of the Thoroughbred Leader...Are You One?
Session 1: Strategies for Project Sponsorship
Session 2: The Two Human Factors that Drive or Oppose Change
Session 3: Understanding Opportunities, Challenges and Strategies to Build Your Career in Project Management
Session 4: How to Best Embrace Change as an IS Professional
Session 5: Identifying the strategic Value Drivers for Change, through value Stream mapping

I was able to watch the Opening, Keynote, and sessions 1, 3, and 4. I found all of them to be valuable. In the Keynote Dana Brownlee discusses how Project Managers as leaders tend to be Task or Relationship Focused, but it is the a third type, that she refers to as Thoroughbred leaders where we really want to be. Peter Taylor talked about the role of Project Sponsors and why it is so important for organizations to provide the proper training and support to Project Sponsors. Ricardo Vargas gave a really practical and inspiring session on developing your career as a Project Manager, he organized his presentation with practical recommendations for "Beginning My Career", "Career Transition", and "Expanding Horizons". Dr. Ginger Levin shared what she has learned about embracing change as an IS Professional, and she has been involved in some very interesting project in her long and storied career. I plan to check out the other two session before the On Demand period is over.

I attended the International Project Management Day last November for the first time, so I already had experience with an international virtual conference. There were some good possibilities to network while the event was live. There was a running chat during each session where people could make comments and ask questions. It was interesting to see where everybody was from. I hope that other PMI groups will get a chance to do something like this again. Everyone of the speakers from the sessions I've attended so far encouraged attendees to connect with them, which I've already done with some of the presenters. I'm also intetested in connecting with fellow Project Managers out there, feel free to connect with me in the various Social Spaces. You can find my various profiles here. I'd would appreciate something indicating some kind of context when you connect with me (or anyone else). So why not indicate that you attended the conference?

One thing that I really appreciate is that all of the presentations were made available for download in the "Resources" tab at the website. They can be saved to your "Briefcase" and downloaded from there (this will vary depending upon which web browser you use). This allows you to review the material provided later on.

I hope that you'll take advance of this excellent opportunity to get up to 6 PDUs. I also hope that you'll attend the 2014 International Project Management Day being held on November 6th and maybe we'l run into each other there. Thank you to the PMI Information Systems for organizing this event!

The Future is not yet written, Let's build it together!

Darryl

Darryl Heron's 2013-14 Presidential Farewell Speech for Toastmasters

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 03 Jul 2014 15:26:00 +0000

Changing of the Presidents (Darryl 2013-14 Club President & Patrizia 2014-15 Club President)

On June 25^th, Word Weavers, my Toastmaster club held out Induction Ceremony, where the 2013-14 Officers handed over the reins to the 2014-15 Officers. What follows is the speech that I wrote and delivered as I ended my term as club president.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Darryl’s 2013-14 Presidential Farewell Address

My fellow Word Weavers, we come here tonight to end an era and to start a new one. We come here to say thank you to the officers who served us proudly in the 2013-14 Toastmaster year and to welcome those that will be leading and serving us in the 2014-15 year.

I started my presidency with an inaugural address and I’m ending it with a farewell address. I’m a student of history (as well we all should be) Mark Twain has said that while history doesn’t repeat that it does sometimes rhyme and we should take the time to learn the lessons that we can from the past. There have been some famous farewell addresses through the years and we can indeed learn a lot from the giants of human history as well as the many unknown and unrecognizable people.

As many of you know, I lost my job in October, and through my self-discovery and job searching, I’ve been able to be the President of Word Weavers, even when a big part of my life was in chaos, this was certain and gave me dignity and the ability to lift my head and carry on with a purpose. Thank you, everyone for placing your trust in me and giving me this opportunity.

I’ve learned a lot this past year, as I have since joining Word Weavers and Toastmasters. I’d like to say thank you to all of the officers and of you, I can’t take credit for this past year, I’d like to share it with all of you. I’m happy that we have a beamer that the club can continue to use for years to come (even if we still need to work out the screen problem). I’m excited to have great flyers that we can use to promote the club. A great big thank you to Karin and her husband for all their work on this! I’m also proud that club is Select Distinguished for the 2013-14 Toastmaster year. While I wanted to be President’s Distinguished for the third year in a row, being Select Distinguished is the 2nd highest honor that we can achieve from Toastmasters and there are lots of clubs that don’t achieve this honor and it means that a lot of members achieved educational awards this year (like Carsten and his Competent Communicator, not to mention Ron and Regina both getting their DTMs this year). In fact, the club was recognized by the district for achieving the most educational awards in our division for the first 6 months of this Toastmaster year! In life, we sometimes we fall short of our goals, but if we didn’t have goals we would achieve very little. Now, Patrizia and the other officers won’t be pressured to 4 peat and will be able to determine what they want to achieve.

2013-14 Officers

I’d like to call up Patrizia to help me recognize all of the officers from the 2013-14 TM year.

Gabi,

Served as our Sargent at Arms for half the year before her non TM life called her away. In this time she led the search for a new meeting location that brought us here. For this I cannot fully express my gratitude.

Gilbert,

Thank you for taking over as Sergeant at Arms, it isn’t easy to take over a role that someone else has started or learning about the role half way into it.

Isabelle,

She has served as Secretary for two years. She has also done a lot of work with organizing and running our club contests for the past two years.

Martin,

The club depends on you and can count on you to fulfil the treasurer role. You submit everything in a timely fashion and were a key part of us being Select Distinguished this year.

Karin,

Karin really helped to take the officer goal of having new flyers and made it a reality.

Bryan,

You joined our club about this time last year and you’ve brought all your TM knowledge to the club. I’ve really appreciated being able to pick your brain for ideas this past year. You’ve inspired me to know that our club can achieve so much more and we can have fun while we do it.

Andrea,

Thank you for serving as our Immediate Past President. After serving a term as president, I realize how much work you put in when you were president, so thank you for that and for offering me your consul this past year.

Patrizia,

I really appreciate the enthusiasm that you brought to the officers group. I fondly remember when you and I were at the American Information Evening at the U.S. Consulate in Frankfurt. We talked quite a bit when you were president

Everyone, can I get a big hand for the 2013-14 Club officers! To all of you and to all of you, I thank you for helping to make this an unforgettable year.

George Schultz, the creator of Peanuts said, “Why can’t we get all the people together in the world that we really like and then just stay together? I guess that wouldn’t work. Someone would leave. Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say good-bye. I hate good-byes. I know what I need. I need more hellos”

Gilda Radner said, “I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next”

Dr. Seuss said, “Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”

I’d like all of the 2014-15 Officers to come up here. I hope that you’ll all support the officers and help them to achieve the goals that they will seek. I’d also like you all to seriously consider being an officer in the future, when you’re asked or you can even volunteer. It is an indescribably rewarding experience. We get out of Toastmasters what we put into it, so I challenge you all to put your hearts into it, you won’t be disappointed.

Helen Rowland said that, “A man never knows how to say goodbye; a woman never knows when to say it.”

That being said…Dale Evans said, “Some trails are happy ones,

Others are blue. It’s the way you ride the trail that counts…Happy Trails to you, until we meet again.“

Everyone, please welcome the 2014-15 President of Word Weavers, Patrizia!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I’ve been very honored to have been able to serve as the President of Word Weavers this past year. I would encourage others out there to think about being officers in your Toastmasters clubs and other organizations. The world is in need of good leaders, this is an excellent opportunity to practice and learn leadership.

Note: All of the quotes listed above were found at Quote Garden.

Picture credit: The picture above can be found at the Word Weaver Flickr group.

Challenging the Dragon- The Krakow Report

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 25 May 2014 04:33:00 +0000

Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending the District 59 2014 Spring Conference in Krakow, Poland. I know that it is a cliché but you really had to be there to really get the full experience, that being said I thought that I’d capture some of my experience while it is still fresh in my mind. This year’s conference had a little bit of everything.

2011 World Champion of Public Speaking Joch Elliot

It was amazing having the 2011 World Champion of Public Speaking, Joch Elliot at our conference. He gave a very dynamic Keynote speech, workshop, and even did a target speech. He took us on his 14 year journey to become the World Champion of Public Speaking. In his Sunday morning workshop, he dissected his winning speech and explained the Rhetoric devices he used, what an experience! He said a few things that stuck with me including, only one person takes home the trophy, but they will remember your message. He also told us of his dream to win three different districts and to finish first, second, and third, what a one-man show that would be.

The International Speech Contest was incredible. Division F was well represented by our own Rudy Morales and his Diamond Notes speech. It was nice to see Rudy make the finals. Rudy told me on Sunday that someone had told him that like Joch Elliot had said, he might not have won but everyone knows Rachel (the little girl that had taught him so much)! All the finalist speeches were memorable and the winner told us about a special marathon he participated in where he learned what it meant to be a winner. Olivia Schofield was on fire as the contest chair. Given the level of the speeches I saw at the district conference, I can only imagine how great they’ll be at the International Convention.

This was a very historic conference, as it was the last one for an integrated Continental Europe and the birth of District 95 (Northeast Europe). At the DCM (District Conference Meeting) on Saturday, We started out as D59, with officer elections and we later split into separate DCMs for D59 and D95, with D95 meeting for the first time. Everyone was very excited to see the banner for D95 unveiled. After being in Toastmasters for a few years, I know (or know of) more and more of the people playing their parts. Ron Joseph (from my own club) was elected as Division F Governor and another person I know from my club was elected as an area governor. Kees Broos, who I’d first got to know as a Division F Governor, was elected the first ever District Governor to D95. At the DCM we saw a presentation for the 2014 D95 Fall Conference being put on in Frankfurt. The organizing committee did a good job and people are looking forward to the first ever D95 Conference.

This year at the gala dinner, not only did we have the finals for the International Speech Contest but there were a lot of awards presented. Several of the past D59 Governors were recognized. There were twenty some DTMs (Distinguished Toastmaster, one of the highest awards that a Toastmaster can achieve) recognized including someone from my club.

I’ve heard that there is a lot of pageantry at the International Convention, but we had plenty of pageantry. There was a parade of all the flags represented in D59 from the back of the building up to the main stage and later on all the flags were hung from the ceiling, it was very impressive looking on the hanging flags from my table.

Maija and Dirk at the Gala Dinner

There was even a little romance. After the Finals of the International Speech Contest were rapping up, we were told that there was surprise. Dirk Löffelbein, took the stage and after hearing him talk for a couple of minutes I knew that he was going to propose! He walked from the stage to the table that girlfriend was sitting at and got to one knee to ask her to marry him. She was quite surprised and started to say what a great guy he was and then I heard her say “however” and I about choked. However is not a word that you want to hear when you propose. Maija Kadlecova did eventually say yes, but everyone (especially Dirk) was hanging on her every word. What a memorable proposal! I wish the couple all the best, and now all future district conferences will have an additional place in their hearts.

One of the reasons that I like going to the district conference is that it usually gives me a chance to do some interviews for the Toastmasters Podcast Europe and this conference gave me the chance to do a few interviews that will be turned into episodes in the coming weeks. I had the pleasure to interview Joch Elliot. He is the second World Champion of Public Speaking that I’ve been able to interview and the 3^rd for the podcast. I interviewed a team from Romania that are largely responsible for Romania’s success in being able to join D95 (officially accepted into D95 on Saturday). They told me about the Romanian story and had advice for other countries looking to join Toastmasters. I’m not going to divulge all of my interviews but please stay tuned and find out.

I took a lot of pictures that I’m still sorting through at the moment. I’ll be posting them as I get the chance at my club’s Flickr group. I took several pictures of banners which I’ll post the Our Toastmaster Banners group pinboard as I get the chance. You can read more about the pinboard here.

There were some wonderful workshop scheduled. Florian Mück as the contest chair for the English Evaluation Contest had a Hogwart’s theme to the contest I heard mentioned during the awards ceremony at the Gala dinner, it sounded like it must have been interesting

With so much going on during the conference, I didn’t have much time to see Krakow, during the conference, fortunately, I did get to do a little sight-seeing in Krakow, but I’ll write about that in a another time.

I really enjoyed the conference and would like to thank the organizers and everyone responsible for making it a success. I believe that if you only ever go to your club’s meetings that you’re missing out on a key Toastmasters experience. District conferences (and other inter club events) are a great place to meet with other Toastmasters. I won’t be able to make it to the International Conference being held in Kuala Lumpur August 20-23 but I’m sure that if you get the chance to go it should be quite memorable. I’m looking forward to the conference in Frankfurt, I hope to see you there.

Photo Credit: The picture of Maija and Dirk was shared on Facebook. The other pictures shown were taken by me and appear in by club's Flickr Group.

Rhetorik Wiesbaden And Word Weavers Are Holding An Open House

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 15:44:00 +0000

Rhetorik of Wiesbaden and Word Weavers- Toastmasters of Wiesbaden are holding an Open House on April 30th and you're cordially invited. The purpose of the evening is it introduce Toastmasters to people interested in finding out more about it in Wiesbaden. This is a first for the Wiesbaden Area as the Open House will be bilingual (conducted in German and English).

Toastmasters International is a non-profit educational organization focusing on the development of members' communication and leadership skills. Toastmasters started in 1924 and has grown to over 290,000 members and 14,000 clubs around the world. This year is Toastmasters 90th Anniversary and it is expected that it will surpass 300,000 members globally. At Toastmasters International, the club and its members are the focus. Clubs around the world meet in a variety of locations and times. At most club meetings there are prepared speeches, impromptu (speaking off the cuff), as well as evaluations of the speeches and various other aspects of the evening. Toastmaster members start working on a series of speech projects within the Competent Communication manual (often referred to as the basic manual) that focus on different things like organizing your speech, vocal variety, body language, using visual aids, and so on. In survey after survey it is revealed that most people are terrified of public speaking. Toastmasters gives members a chance to work on their public speaking in a safe and friendly environment. After completing the Competent Communication manual, members can start doing other specialty manuals with a wide variety of projects available.

Toastmasters also runs two different sets of speech contests. The International Speech Contest is held yearly in the Spring and the finals are held at the Toastmasters International Convention, it is really something to make it to this level of competition, as you can imagine. I highly recommend that you do a search on YouTube to see some of these contest winners. In the Fall, there is a Humorous Speech Contest, but this ends at the District level, so there is not a global final for this contest. In addition to the International Speech Contest and the Humorous Speech Contest, there are also contests for Speech Evaluations as Table Topics (impromptu speaking). There will be a District Conference 59 (Continental Europe) in Krakow, Poland on May 16-18, and the winners from there will get to compete in the International Conference being held in Kuala Lumpur August 20-23.

Rhetorik of Wiesbaden and Word Weavers- Toastmasters of Wiesbaden are holding this Open House together, so you'll get the chance to get a taste of a meeting of both clubs at the same time. Since it is being held in German and in English, you can experience Toastmasters in both languages. Rhetorik of Wiesbaden conducts their meetings in German, while Word Weavers conducts their meetings in English. Word Weavers has had several members that wanted a chance to use and improve their English and Rhetorik members see this as an excellent opportunity to train their rhetoric skills. At both clubs you'll find a supportive environment where you can work on developing your communication skills. In the few years I've been a member of Toastmasters, I've been amazed to see the personal growth of members as they go from speech to speech. You can see the confidence building and the skills developing and I never get tired of this aspect.

Toastmaster meetings are a good place to meet and network with new people outside of your work. I really enjoy meeting all the people at Toastmaster events, the people are always interesting and friendly. Since there are so many different speech projects that members can do, you get to learn about a lot of things at a typical meeting and really no two meetings are the same because of this.

The Open House is being held at:

SEIBERT/MEDIA (5th floor)
Kirchgasse 6/LuisenForum
65185 Wiesbaden

Members from both clubs will be available for questions at 7:00 PM and the meeting will start at 7:30 PM

You can get more information at:
Xing:

Rhetorik Wiesbaden: Website Facebook: http://www.twitter.com/TMWiesbaden

Word Weavers- Toastmasters of Wiesbaden: Website:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WordWeaversToastmastersWiesbaden
email: wordweaverswiesbaden@googlemail.com

I've had the pleasure of serving as the President of Word Weavers for the 2013-14 Toastmaster year and I'm very excited about this unique event and hope that you'll take this opportunity to meet members from Word Weavers and Rhetorik. I'm looking forward to meeting you at the Open House, it should be a lot of fun!

The 2014 Division F Spring Contest Was Incredible

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 06 Apr 2014 06:00:00 +0000

The Toastmasters 2014 Spring Contest Season is open now and running nearly at full speed. Most clubs and areas have had the contests and now the divisions are determining who they’ll send to the District competitions. April 5^th was the District 59 Division F Contest and it was incredible.

Division F (Southeast Germany) is made up of five areas and they were all represented at the contest. There were people from Frankfurt, Wiesbaden, Darmstadt, Stuttgart, Karlsruhe, all assembled in Mannheim for the contest. I mentioned in my article about the F3/F4 Area Spring Contest, that I really like the cultural diversity of living in Europe. We had contests in French, German, and English yesterday.

Division F Governor- Regina Kroemer kicked off the contest by mentioning that winners of the contest would be eligible to compete in the District 59 Spring Conference in Krakow (May 16-18, 2014) and the winners from the district would be eligible to compete at the Toastmasters International Convention being held in August in Kuala Lumpar. She also mentioned that Division F would become part of the new District 95 but that we’d still be Division F, where we “Focus and have Fun”. District 59 Public Relations Officer- Ruxandra Balboa-Pöysti delivered and opening greeting via video. While there is nothing like being there in person, it was nice that we were still able to have a district office be part of our contest. Ruxandra was also the French Target Speaker.

While there is always wonderful things going on at Toastmasters and the different clubs, the two contest seasons really give Toastmasters a chance to shine and to show all the skills that they’ve developed. It is also an opportunity to learn a lot from some great speakers. In addition to the messaged that mentioned in the F3/F4 Area Contest (since some the winners there advanced to the Division F Contest) here are 3 new messages that I picked up:

· You need to have special talents or tools to help others and save lives

· What if we could turn our weaknesses into our strengths

· Teachers are all around us (often in unusual people), are you learning the lessons their offering

I was really excited to see Rudy Morales put all his Toastmasters years to work in his speech. In fact I first met Rudy at the Division F Spring Contest in 2012, when he evaluated the target speech that I gave that day. Another aspect of Toastmasters that I really love is watching people grow and develop. You see time and again that people will start out wanting to improve their public speaking and not only do they become better speakers but they also become leaders and better people.

Until you’ve taken part in a contest or watched one, you don’t know all the work that goes into running a contest. There needs to be the contest chair for all the contests, which can be challenging with contests being held in three different languages. There is also a large number of judges needed (including tie breakers) and this can be challenging due to all the languages represented in the contests being held. The timers play a very important role, watching the time of each speech and evaluation and recording the final time. A lot of contestants are disqualified because they go over the time limits. There are various other roles as well, but at whatever contest, people are needed in order that a contest can be held. Even if you don’t participate as a contestant, you’re help would be welcome at most any contest and the contests are usually a lot of fun, so it is time well spent.

After two contest weekends, I’m getting excited about the District 59 Spring Conference in Krakow. If you can find the time to attend, I’m sure that you’ll have a blast. Since District 95 will be starting after the conference, this will be the last chance to meet so many Toastmasters from all over Continental Europe. I hope to see you there.

Note: The picture above was taken at the contest before it officially opened and gives you an idea of all the hustle and bustle it is in my club's Flickr group. You can see more pictures from the contest there if you're interested.

The 2014 F3/F4 Spring Contest Was Amazing

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 31 Mar 2014 10:20:00 +0000

The Toastmasters 2014 Spring Contest Season is open now and running nearly at full speed. Most clubs have had the contests and the area contests are under way. March 29th we had the District 59 Area F3/F4 Contest and what a day it was.

If you’re a Toastmaster and haven’t been to any of the contests outside of your club, well you’re really missing out. If you haven’t been to one in a while, it is time to check them out again. Areas F3 and F4 decided to run joint contest so that less people are needed to run the contests and this has been a wonderful idea, one that I would recommend to other areas that might be struggling to get the enough support staff on boar. It has also meant that people can see more great speeches and evaluations, than if the contests were limited to just one area. The impact is just that much more impressive.

One of the reasons that I love living in Europe is the cultural diversity. On Saturday there were contests held in French and German, in addition to English. One of the contestants participated in 6 different contests (English, French, and German), for those of us with command of one language this is quite a feat! There was another contestant that did all of the English and French contests, and a few contestants did English and German contests. At the area contest level, the quality of speeches is a notch above what you’d expect from the club contests, but there really wasn’t a bad speech in the bunch.

I like the Evaluation Contests because you get to hear a great target speech and then see what advice the contestants have for the target speaker that would make their speech that much better. The English target speech was called “Why Men Don’t Listen And Women Can’t Read Maps”, so as you might expect it was about relationships, a topic that most of us can relate to. The German Target Speaker was not a Toastmaster, so while his speech might not have conformed to the expectations of the audience, the speech was about something that everyone could relate to and that was trying make sense of the things that we have to do in our lives today and applying the idea of doing one third less things to be one third better. For most of us our “To Do” list is getting too big and complicated, it would make sense for us to have a “To Not Do” list. Even with the speaker not being a Toastmaster, the contestants were still able to apply Toastmaster style evaluations, showing where the speech was strong, where the speech could be improved, and summarizing their recommendations.

It was nearly impossible to have attended the contest on Saturday and not be awed, inspired, and changed for the better. There were so many great themes and messages and I thought that I’d share a few of them.

Trust is at an all time low in our society- and why should people trust us
There are a lot of ordinary people doing wonderful things, being modern day heroes- don’t we all want be heroes like this and doesn’t the world need more people being modern heroes
Legendary UCLA Basketball coach John Wooden would rather have outstanding teams than teams with outstanding players that don’t perform well as a team
Do we deal inspiration or are we users of inspiration
What do we want to accomplish in our lives (especially for those of us that are already parents)
We are enough- we need to transport this message to our kids so they live it
We’re too quick to judge ourselves and declare ourselves failures, in the long run many of these failures really aren’t failures but a way of changing our direction
We shouldn’t play with our smart phones when we should be present. Pay attention to the people you’re with, when you’re with them
Music is a mood changer and can really inspire you
Communication makes the world go round, we need to speak the same language to each other and make sure we have the same understanding of the words used (don’t assume)

On a personal note, at my club contest I was talked into competing in the English Evaluation Contest for the first time, so I’m honored that I placed 3rd in the F3 competition. I’ve entered various speech competitions in the past, but this was the first time that I tried the speech evaluation contest, so now I’ll be watching the evaluation contests with a different perspective.

On April 5th, the Division F Contest is being held in Mannheim, Germany. Not only the winners from F3 and F4 will be there, but areas F1, F2, and F5 will be competing there as well. Contestants will be competing in French, German, and English contests. Given the level of competition at the F3/F4, I’m excited to think about the quality of the speeches and evaluations that I’ll see in Mannheim. Considering all the great messages I picked up on March 29th, I can’t even imagine what messages I’ll take away. This is a rare opportunity to see some of the best speakers in Southeast Germany. I challenge you to attend and not leave a changed person. If at all possible, the division contests are worth checking out and I hope to see you in Mannheim.

Note: The picture above is of some of my fellow club members and me taken at the F3/F4 Area Contest. I've posted several pictures from the contest at our club's Flickr group.

My High Performance Leadership Project

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 28 Mar 2014 07:23:00 +0000

Since joining Toastmasters International in June 2011, I've wanted to become a DTM (Distinguished Toastmaster) and part of the Leadership Track to take you there includes doing a HPL (High Performance Leadership) Project. After a lot of thought I decided what I wanted to do and put my guidance committee together and I gave the introduction speech for my HPL project at Word Weavers on 26 March. The guidelines for the HPL introduction speech indicate that you should share your vision and mission with the club. The speech is kind of a kick-off of your project within your club. In my case I also wanted to encourage the members of my club to join me on the project, so that they will take an active part in my project. During the project phase I will put a team together and we’ll determine the details of what will be done during the project as well as the timing of the project activities. I’ll have further meetings with my Guidance Committee where I’ll review the project planning, status and how things are going. At the end of the project I will give a speech with a lessons learned about the project. What follows is based on the text of the speech I delivered. I’ve left in some detail that I had to cut for time purposes from the speech I delivered.

MY HIGH PERFORMANCE LEADERSHIP (HPL) PROJECT INTRODUCTION SPEECH- "OUT OF THE STONE AGE"

Introduction

Fellow Word Weavers, Mr/Madame Toastmaster, honored guests. At a meeting in January, Norbert said something that really stuck in my mind and that was that he didn’t like the way things were today and would like to be able to turn back the clock 20 to 30 years. While, people fondly look back at the good old days, I know that I’m guilty of this, I’m here to propose something different today. I’d like to bring Word Weavers out of the Stone Age and into the Digital Age.

About the HPL

“As populations increase and cultures and people become increasingly diverse, more issues – and more problems -- face us than ever before… Many of the critical issues and problems today are the kind government is least equipped to handle… This is why the world needs strong, competent leaders now more than ever before. Progress can only happen when someone assumes a leadership role – when someone decides there is a problem, a need or an injustice, and takes action to solve the problem, fulfill the need or correct the injustice.“ (this statement comes out of the HPL manual)

Toastmasters has recognized the need to develop leaders and the HPL (High Performance Leadership) project is a product of this recognition. Gandi, Martin Luther King Jr, and Mother Teresa are all unconventional leaders who were able to accomplish great things without the traditional political authority that we’re used to seeing in historical leaders. What we’re going to do won’t be spoken of in the same breathe as these great figures but it is something that will help Word Weavers to grow and to prepare for the future.

Vision & Mission Statement

Vision:

To bring Word Weavers from the Stone Age into the Digital Age.

Mission:

Word Weavers, Toastmasters of Wiesbaden, will become commonly known throughout the Wiesbaden/Mainz area to adult residents of all ages. Potential visitors will be able to find us relatively easily within popular search engines and social media sites. We’ll expand the Digital Footprint of Word Weavers.

People Google everything today, so Word Weavers needs to be found on Google. Google changes their search formula all the time. In fact there are people that are paid tons of money to try to figure it out. But I’ve noticed that there is more and more of a focus on social media in their rankings. If you Google someone you’ll like find a Facebook entry and a LinkedIn entry and other social media sites in the top returns.

Body

You have probably all heard that Facebook has over 1 billion users and if it were a country it would be the 3^rd largest in the world. It is easy to get lost in statistics and forget about all the people. Boiled done, Social Media is people sharing things socially, with family, friends, colleagues, and so on. I’d like to share 3 stories with about Social Media with you now.

You might have heard about the Pink Tutu project. In order to cheer up his wife who was being treated for cancer, Bob Carey, started taking pictures of himself running around in a pink tutu. The video of their story on YouTube has over 2 million views and Deutsch Telekom has been promoting their story. Bob Carey not only cheered up his wife and the other women that were being treated for cancer with her, but his story has raised cancer awareness and tells us how Social Media can spread the word and connect with people all over the world.

Facebook was doing lookback videos earlier this year. They showed when users joined, popular pictures and status updates made by the user and many of them were very touching. John Berlin, desperately wanted to see the video for his son that had recently died. He launched a campaign to do this and I found it on Facebook via a radio station that I listened to back in Detroit. This campaign got the attention of Facebook and he got to see the lookback video for his son. John Berlin showed us that it is possible to get a company to listen to us and he was able to tap into the feelings of parents and non-parents who would want to be able to do the same thing if we lost a child.

Some of you will remember that I did a speech about the presentation site SlideShare, there were maybe twentysome people there when I gave it. I also did a workshop for business English teachers in Frankfurt with twentysome people present. I put both presentations on SlideShare and both presentations have been viewed by more than 1000 people. I love the idea that I can give a speech or presentation one time, that it can be viewed by people all over the world that weren’t there when I gave it. We all want our speeches to be heard and to make an impact. Since setting up my profile on SlideShare, over 26,000 people have viewed my presentations. With Social Media you can put something online or share something where a lot of people look at it in a short period of time or that people can look at over a long period of time after it was initially posted or shared, the best outcome is of course to have a good combination of both.

What we’ll do during the project

·        Update our website to attract more visitors and keep them coming back
·        Establish profiles on popular social media sites
·        Post regular updates where we have profiles

Each and every one of you is doing amazing things. When I look around and I see the growth that all of you have made from speech to speech, this same possibility for growth can and should be our gift to the world. We don’t want Word Weavers and Toastmasters to be a secret. Toastmasters is re-engineering their educational program to better meet the needs of members and potential members. They’re working to make sure that Toastmasters stays relevant and we can do this via this project And we can let the world know about some of the great things that are happening. This is not just my HPL, it is really an HPL for the club.

Conclusion:

Hillary Clinton once said that it takes a village to raise a child, well, Word Weavers is like our own child, it takes everyone to be a successful club.

Join me in our HPL, there is room for everyone!

You’ll learn how Social Media can help Word Weavers to grow and thrive
You’ll have fun
You’ll be a part of a great team
And,You don’t need to know anything about Social Media to start.

I’ll be talking to all of you about what role you will play.

Together we can bring Word Weavers out of the Stone Age and into the Digital Age.

The Word Weavers website can be found at:

http://word-weavers.de/

Our Facebook Page is at:

https://www.facebook.com/WordWeaversToastmastersWiesbaden

We have a Flickr group at:

https://www.flickr.com/groups/word-weavers_toastmasters_wiesbaden/

Feel free to follow along as my HPL project unfolds. I will share a lot of my experience and I hope that other clubs can benefit from my experiences.

Note: I created the graphic above based on using the quote from the HPL Manual. I believe it is a very powerful statement.

Spectacular Speaking is Transformational

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 18 Mar 2014 10:12:00 +0000

Have you ever been part of a Transformational event? This is the best way that I can describe #SpecSpeak2014 in Warsaw, Poland last week! Six amazing speakers from six different countries came together to share the tools of their craft, and what an unbelievable impact they had on the participants. The effect was Spectacular, to say the least.

John Zimmer shared the importance of speech preparation (including knowing what your message is and analyzing your audience) and gave us good useful tips for making use of presentation tools (i.e. PowerPoint, Keynote). Peter Zinn showed us how powerful stories are and why we should be using them to connect with our audiences. Although people want the logic, they really want this to come via stories. Florian Mueck demonstrated how a good speech structure should look (and I don't think that any of the attendees will forget about the tailpipe anytime soon!). Tobias Rodrigues told us how to be persuasive via Logos (logic), Pathos (credibility of the speaker) and Ethos (emotion). Olivia Schofield demonstrated the importance of breathing, entrance onto the stage, and so many of the things that have made her an engaging speaker. Jerzy Zientkowski was the Master of Ceremony, weaving all the different speakers and segments together via his sense of humor. Jerzy reminds me a lot of a the comedian Yakov Smirnoff, so not only did we learn a lot but we laughed a lot and had a lot of fun.

What really stands out, for me, was the transformations that I saw in everyone. There was a woman that had been talked into attending by a friend, but she really had no idea what was going to happen, AND she was promised that she wouldn't have to speak! She did give a speech on the 2nd day, and what a speech it was. She told us about how she wasn't really happy in her career and a life changing event. She had such a warmth and sincerity that everyone in the audience connected with her. This woman did an impromptu exercise where she was an orchestra conductor leading the audience, who were all playing imaginary instruments. You should have seen the look on her face, she was just beaming with excitement and joy as she was up there conducting. One of the guys is a programmer who is introverted (as many of think that programmers are) he experimented with movement as he told us three stories of his life and the lessons he learned from each one. I was astounded by the camera women, who took us on an incredible journey of a documentary that she did while she was in Japan. Two of the speakers really incorporated the presentation tips we were shown on the first day to liven up some business presentations that would normally bored the audience to death. All of the participants incorporated some of what they learned into amazing results. I'm really curious to see how all of the participants incorporate what they've learned into their lives.

Another thing that really stands out, for me, was the authenticity of all the participants. There were several Polish people (as you might expect, since we were in Poland) and a Russian women. For most of them, English was definitely not their mother tongue. I've discovered in the time that I've lived in Germany (and in Europe), that many people will use this as a crutch to hold them back or apologize that their English is not that great. To me, this only makes them more sincere and it makes me want to hear them all that much more. We should not let anyone's language "not being perfect" stop us from communicating, we can often get someone's message, even when it isn't perfectly formulated. This is all something that we need to keep in mind in when we're dealing with different people from around Europe and around the world. There were so many great people that attended the event, this along is enough to attend the next event.

I do have a disclaimer to make. Olivia talked to me in January about becoming involved in promoting the event via Social Media and I did know a few of the speakers up front, but I was just as excited about attending the event (if not more) than any the other participants. I'm now looking forward to seeing how I'll make use of what I've learned and what effect it will have on me. I can't recommend attending a Spectacular Speaking event enough. We all need to be better communicators, for our own reasons. Some of us want to be better public speakers; others could stand to be able to give presentations to their teams, bosses, clients, and so on. Why be an ordinary speaker, when you can be a Spectacular Speaker! Stay tuned for the next Spectacular Speaking event.

You Might Like to Know....

Florian Mueck wrote about some of the more memorable phrases here.
Olivia has quite a few events in the next few weeks.
John's blog can be found here.
Florian's website is here.
The website of Tobias Rodrigues can be found here.
Jerzy Zientkowski can be found at the Speakerslair.
Peter Zinn can be followed on Twitter @PeterZinn
I interviewed a few of the Spectacular Speakers and will be posting the interviews at the Toastmasters Podcast Europe.

Spectacular Speaking: Last Day for January Pricing!

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 31 Jan 2014 08:11:00 +0000

Today is the last day to get the early-bird discount for the Spectacular Speaking event in Warsaw. This is quite an opportunity that should not be missed!

In my time as a Toastmaster, I've found that the number one fear of people, repeatedly confirmed by survey after survey, is the fear of public speaking. What this fear really means is not that people will somehow be mortally wounded by a podium or microphone, but that they're afraid that they'll be publicly embarrassed. Then this fear goes off the irrational deep-end and peoples' subconscious comes up with all kinds of reasons why you'll fail and all kinds of consequences of how this will doom you forever. Toastmasters can really help people to overcome this fear and to use the nervousness that they feel prior to speaking, to their advantage.

Spectacular Speaking holds workshops where people can learn from incredible speakers and get the chance to put those tips into action. If you're already a good speaker, attending a Spectacular Speaking event can super charge your public speaking and presentation abilities. You'll learn about how to structure a solid presentation, how to develop and deliver a compelling story, how to use the stage effectively, how to craft convincing arguments and influential strategies, how to find your unique voice, and more. Imagine being able to use these things when you're speaking in front of clients, your boss, your team, and in so many situations this will help you to succeed.

I've only been a Toastmaster since June 2011, but I've already gotten so much out of the it. I've met some truly wonderful and remarkable people, including 3 of the speakers that will be at the Warsaw event. I watched Florian host one of the International Speech Competition contests at the District 59 Spring Conference and was really impressed with the presence he had and I've heard a few Toastmasters talk about what a good speaker he is. I had heard about Olivia Schofield's experience in the Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking finals and how she had dazzled the crowd there, I was excited to be able to meet her and to actually be able to talk to her at the District 59 Spring Conference. I've had the privilege of taking part in a workshop that John Zimmer did at the District 59 Fall Conference and I got to see him win the International Speech Contest at District 59 Spring Conference. Some of my Toastmaster friends had told me that John was a great speaker, but I was blown away when I saw him. I've heard great things about the other 3 speakers, but I'm looking forward to seeing all of them in action in Warsaw on March 14th and 15th.

Another thing that I find exciting about the Spectacular Speaking event in Warsaw, is the value. America has had conferences like this for a long time in places like Las Vegas or Los Angeles, but here in Europe we have the chance to learn from these 6 Spectacular Speakers and we don't have to travel all the way to America do it, we only need to get to Warsaw! I've heard a past winner of the Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking tell the audience how he commands a five figure speaking fee when he does corporate events. The normal, non-discounted price to attend a Spectacular Speaking event is not anywhere near that expensive!

If you act today (January 31, 2014) you can still take advantage of the January Early-bird pricing. This means that you'll be able to take 15% off the already reasonably priced event costs. Be sure to check out the Spectacular Speaking website for more details. I'm looking forward to the Spectacular Speaking event in Warsaw, I hope that I'll see you there.

Darryl

P.s. You can like Spectacular Speaking on Facebook, follow in LinkedIn, and follow on Twitter.

Spectacular Speaking: Warsaw 2014

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 17 Jan 2014 14:09:00 +0000

You may be surprised that public speaking continually shows up as the number one fear of people when they're surveyed, yes, even more than snakes or death. Maybe you don't have a fear of public speaking but want to bring your speaking and presentation skills to the next level, then, we have the event for you. Spectacular Speaking is holding a two day event in Warsaw, Poland on March 14th and 15th.

Olivia Schofield won the coveted prize of top woman speaker at The World Championship of Public Speaking, founded Spectacular Speaking. She will be joined by John Zimmer, who is a 5 time European Champion of Public Speaking; Florian Mueck, charismatic speaker extraordinarie, delivering keynote speeches and moderating events in English, Spanish, and German; Peter Zinn, who did 7 years of improvisational theater before turning to public speaking, he uses storytelling to get complex messages across; Tobias Rodriguez, who is a communication and conflict resolution specialist; and Jerzy Zientokowski, the founder of Speakers Lair, offering training and workshops in Poland. These six dynamic speakers will work with you to bring your public speaking into the stratosphere.

You will come away with concrete tips on:

The proper way to prepare a speech or presentation
The structure of a solid presentation
Techniques for crafting and delivering a compelling story
Designing an engaging slide presentation
Using the stage effectively
Finding your unique voice
Creating convincing arguments and influential strategies
And more!

On the first day you'll learn the triggers for successful public speaking, getting tips from the experts. On the second day you'll get to put the theory into practice.

This is a rare opportunity to learn public speaking tips from the best and to actually get to use them. Get more details at the Spectacular Speaking website. I hope to see you in Warsaw on March 14th and 15th.

Blog Action Day 2013

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 13 Oct 2013 13:54:00 +0000

The Theme of Blog Action Day for 2013 it Human Rights. What a wonderful theme. In our day to day lives it is easy to develope a tunnel vision and over look a topic such as this. I've participated in Blog Action Day since the first one back in 2007 and I'm excited about participating again this year.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed". This comes from the American Declaration of Independence and many Americans and people around the world will be familar with the concept of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. As Americans this is the baseline for Human Rights, meaning this is the minimum of Human Rights that all of us can expect. As a people, the human race on our planet is failing on even this baseline of Human Rights, but we can also aspire to lift ourselves up and to improve our conditions!

What are Human Rights? The video does a nice job of explaining the idea of Human Rights "From the start of our lives there are certain things that our governments must do to help us reach out potential...These expectations and claims we have of our government are called human rights." These include (but aren't limited to):

Respect- avoid putting limits on what people can do
Protect- safeguard a person from abuse
Fullfill- to provide basic conditions to allow a person to achieve their potential

Different Views on Human Rights

As people we often tend to believe (and assume) that everyone else shares our beliefs and views and it is often inferred that when other people don't share our same beliefs and views that they're somehow weird or inferior to us. There are genuine differences in culture, religion, and other factors that lead to our differences in beliefs and views and wherever and whenever possible these should be respected. These differences can and often have led to difficulty in agreeing on what Human Rights are and should be.

We Can Agree

When we think about our children, our grandkids, our brothers, our sisters, and children growing up in all parts of the world, most of us can agree that we want the best for them and the conditions that they grow under will be nurturing and supportive for their development. everyoneerent Because someone doesn't share our same belief and view on religion, this should not be held against them.

Not Us Verses Them

Human Rights are not a Right or Left thing. They are not a Liberal or Conservative thing. They are not a this religion or that religion thing or even a religion thing. Human Rights are something that all of us have because we're human.

What Can I Do

The Blog Action Day Team has assembled a great playlist on YouTube highlighting some of the issues related to Human Rights. I'm sure you'll find something there that peaks your interest and something that you can promote. I highly recommend reading The Universal Declaration of Human Rights from the UN. Bog Action Day has set up a profile on Pinterest. I've set up a board for Blog Action Day and Blog Action Day 2013 (feel free to repin and create your own boards). They're on Twitter, Facebook,Tumblr, Google+, and YouTube. You can look at the video below and participate in this year's activities. Remeber that Blog Action Day is on October 16, 2013 this year.

I want to see a better world for my daughters, for all the children of the world. I want to see a world where they're limited only by their own imagination, motivation, and desires. I want to see a world where we help each other to make our dreams come true and to reach out true potential.

Darryl

There Is No Glass Celing in Toastmasters

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 11 Oct 2013 15:11:00 +0000

What follows is the text of the speech that I wrote and delivered to Word Weavers (My Toastmaster Club) on August 21st in a special evening we held honoring 40 years of Women in Toastmasters....

There Is No Glass Ceiling in Toastmasters!

Madame Toastmaster, fellow members, dear guests, and especially all of our Word Weavers women

members. In August 1973 Toastmasters officially opened its doors for female membership and we’re

celebrating this tonight. With all of the problems that we have in the world today, I can wholeheartedly say that women in Toastmasters are a beacon of light to shine in the rest of our society. Within Toastmasters, women are powerful and there is no glass ceiling. Women are only limited by their own desires, wishes, and motivation.

40 years, that is great but why weren’t women allowed in sooner? As an organization Toastmasters has pioneered a lot of things but we’re also very much effected by the society and times that we live in. If you look at the role women played in the 20^th century, it probably isn’t too surprising that women weren’t allowed to be members until 1973. The women’s movement really started to become active in the 60s and in the 70s there was a movement behind the Equal Rights Amendment in the U.S. But Dr. Smedley and others supported the idea of women getting Toastmasters training and the Toastmistress organization was started. The first of these clubs was charted in San Francisco in 1938. The Lions. Kiwanis, and Rotary clubs all didn’t allow women to join until nearly 15 years after Toastmasters officially opened our doors!

When Helen Blanchard joined Toastmasters, it was not has Helen Blanchard but as Homer Blanchard, because women were not allowed to join at the time. When she initially got in contact with her local

Toastmasters club she was told that she could start a Toastmistress club if she wanted, but she couldn’t join Toastmasters. She spoke to the up and coming women she knew but none of them were interested in starting up a Toastmistress club. The person she had been in contact with talked to the club and they decided (un-unanimously) that the club was operating on government property so, they should accept women and they decided to help her join, this was in 1970. She became Toastmasters first official woman member, finally changing the "Homer" to Helen. Because Toastmasters wouldn’t accept only “H” in her initial membership application, her club actually used a Table Topics at one meeting to come up with the name "Homer".

Helen started her life growing up on a farm in a small town in Nebraska. Her first job was teaching 20+ kids in a one room schoolhouse, just as you might have seen on “Little House On the Prairie”. She was working at a U.S. Navy Research and Development Center in San Diego. Her job was to teach engineers how to collect and process the data from the testing they were conducting for the Nave and she felt uncomfortable having to make presentations to men that had far more technical training and education that she did, so she wanted what Toastmasters was offering. As one of the early women in Toastmasters she had so many firsts it is hard to mention them all but she was the first woman to become a DTM, she was one of the first women to become a District Governor, she was the first women to be elected as an International Director. She held leadership positions at the District and worked her way through the various leadership positions at Toastmasters, being elected as the first female president of Toastmasters International in the 1985-86 Toastmasters year. Helen did not really fit the image that a lot of us have about women in the women’s movement, she was someone who always demonstrated that a woman could do something not that she was "entitled" to anything, and she worked for all her accomplishments; as a Toastmaster, as a professional woman, as a wife, mother, and grandmother. She never intended to be a role model, but there are no doubt countless women that she has influenced to accept the challenges and break those barriers. Sadly she died on May 11, 2013. She wrote a book called “Breaking the Ice”, that I recently ready. I think that every Toastmaster should read this book. There is an article in the August Toastmaster Magazine about Helen.

Helen is one of 5 women that has served as president of Toastmasters International. 4 women have won the World Championship of Public Speaking. Evelyn Jane Burgay won in 1977, 4 years after women were officially allowed to become members. Why have so few women won the World Championship of Public Speaking? David Brooks (1990 World Champion of Public Speaking) made the observation a few years ago that he has found a ratio of 4 to 5 men competing at the club contest level. Put simply to see more women at the finish line, more need to be at the starting line.

Looking around our area and District 59, our club has had a lot of women officers (Bryan, Martin and I are the only men this year). Our Regina has been club president, area governor, and now division

governor. D59 has had Morag Mathieson and Barbara Hörger serve as our District Governor.

Leadership is one area that women are excelling in at Toastmasters.

As a parent, I often wonder about the future that my daughters will have. I can tell them that I’m proud of the progress that women have made in Toastmasters and I believe that within Toastmasters, there is no longer a glass ceiling that limits what they can do and who they can be. I further challenge all of you to encourage more women to join us. It might take the world around us a while to get there, but as Toastmasters, I believe that we will have the day where it doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a women, what your skin color is, what your religion is, or any other discriminating and limiting factor known to us today, but that we’ll be judged by who we are inside and our good deeds. Let’s celebrate 40 years of women in Toastmasters!

******************************************************************************

Photo Credits: The photo of Helen Blanchard is on her website. It was taken officer installation at the Naval R & D Toastmasters Club

My thanks to Merv Olsen of the South Redlands Toastmaster Club for inspiring me to organize a special evening honoring 40 years of Women in Toatmasters and for providing some of the information that I used in my speech. You might also want to read the profile written about Helen Blanchard by Julie Bawden Davis at Toastmasters.org.

2013 Frankfurt Auto Show

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 13 Sep 2013 13:29:00 +0000

2013 IAA- The Frankfurt Auto Show from Darryl Heron

The 2013 IAA (Frankfurt Auto Show) is open from September 14th to 22nd. I put together the above presentation and this article to give you my impressions and to help you decide if you'd like to go check it out and to help you see some of the changes in the Auto Industry in the past couple of years.

This is now the 5th IAA that I have been to, and prior to this I attended half a dozen of the NAIS (Detroit Auto Show), so I've been watching the evolution of cars and trucks for more than dozen years now.

Who has the funnest display at the IAA? This would be Mini, in my opinion. The have a two level display. The second level has a bid slide that you can ride (and I did see a few people riding it!) There is a big television screen where you can paint a Mini in all the colors of the rainbow, anyway pattern that you want, WII style. On the second level there is a driving simulation as well as a trampoline where you can look at the people below as you jump. By the way, did I mention that there are also lots of Minis there as well?

One of the spokeswoman at Rolls Royce informed me that the The Alpine Trial Centenary Collection is celebrating 100 years of the Alpine Trial. This edition of the Ghost is in the same color as the Ghosts that did the trails 100 years ago. It is also interesting to note that the world famous Rolls Royce emblem on the Wraith is made of Swarovski crystal.

Smart had its "fourjoy" concept featured prominently in its exhibit. There were a few electric Smarts and some interesting customizations. A lot can be done to make a Smart unique and stand out from others and Brabus has become very good at this.

I got to the BMW exhibit as they started their press conference and I wasn't able to get a good view of the press conference so I decided to look at their exhibit while everyone else was busy with the press conference. I could still see new BMW i8 was still hidden, waiting to be unveiled to the world. They had a few "BMW i3"s, one of their electric vehicles on display. I also noticed the "BMW C Evolution" motorcycle on display.

Porsche is celebrating the 50th anniversary of the 911. They also world premiered the 918 Spyder. I saw a Panamera S E-Hybrid plugged in.

Over at Opel, I saw a few the new "Adam"s on display. The is a cute little car with a lot of color combinations and possibilities for further customization. Their Monza concept was on display as well as the revamped Insignia.

VW had a whole lot of "up!", moving the "up!" model that they introduced in the 2011 show into new models like the "e -up!", the "groove- up!", and "cross -up!". I really enjoyed the model city that they displayed to highlight some of their "blue" (or low emissions) offerings.

It seemed to me that Renault premiered more concept and new vehicles than most of the other manufacturers and you should definitely check out their display. It was also nice to see that their Twizy (which I first saw at the 2011 IAA) has made it into production and I have even seen one parked at a local shopping center.

When I was going through the Toyota exhibit I was struck by a sign that they had posted, announcing that they had sold over 5 million hybrids. I was reminded of the Kevin Costner movie "Field of Dreams", where his character is told "if you build it, they will come", as he builds a baseball diamond in a corn field. Toyota has shown that there is a market for hybrids.

I was really impressed with the Evos concept from Ford at the 2011 IAA and this time Ford had a Social Media team working at the IAA. The Social Media Evangelist in me is curious to see what the results of Ford's social media will be. The team even sent me a tweet while I was there.

Over the last few IAAs I have really seen the development of hybrids take off. Almost every manufacturer is offering (or planning to offer) something other than gas or diesel powered vehicles. I noticed that some of the car companies are even getting into hybrid racing. There is still a lot of work to be done here before a hybrid can be seriously considered by your average consumer but it is encouraging to see the progress and some of the exciting vehicles being offered.

I planned to take a lot of pictures and after changing batteries in my camera a couple of times, my camera just died on me. I thought that maybe my memory was full, so I deleted some pictures, but I still couldn't take more pictures. I then started taking pictures with my iPad, over 600 of them in fact.

It almost goes without saying but I really enjoyed myself. There are so many things that I didn't touch upon, so why not go check it out.

Darryl

I've posted several pictures on Flickr already and will post more in the coming days (look for more albums). I started a pinboard on Pinterest that I will be populating as well. You can also check out my past posts about the IAA (2011 and 2009).

Darryl Heron's 2013-14 Presidential Inaugural Speech for Toastmasters

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 11 Jul 2013 14:38:00 +0000

What follows is the text of the speech that I wrote and delivered to Word Weavers (My Toastmaster Club) on July 3rd....

My Inaugural Address for Word Weavers for the 2013-14 Toastmasters Year

Good Evening, Madame Toastmaster, fellow members, and dear guests. America has a long standing tradition where the President of the United States gives an Inaugural Address that lets the nation and the world know what he is thinking about and what he would like to tackle in this time in office. This speech gives the people something to aspire to and sets the tone for that administration. There have also been some very famous Inaugural Addresses over the past 200+ years. I would like to bring this tradition to our club. While my scope is not nearly as lofty or Earth shattering, I would like to take a few moments this evening.

Thank you to everyone who has voted for the officers that will be leading Word Weavers in the 2013-14 Toastmaster year. It is quite an honor and show of trust that you have put into electing us. We all plan and hope to serve you to the best of our abilities.

JFK famously challenged Americans to not ask what their country could do for them but redirected them to think about what they could do for their country. For me I would challenge you to think about how Toastmasters can help you grow and reach your goals and how you can help our club to grow. Our relationship with Toastmasters is a two-way street. Personally, I have gotten so much from Word Weavers and Toastmasters that I could not even begin to repay this if I lived a thousand years and a thousand lives. Do you have a mentor? Are you a mentor? You can give so much to the club and Toastmasters by being a mentor and being mentored? If you're a more experienced member you can share your experiences and your knowledge with newer members and you should also seek out mentors for yourself who can challenge you and help you to develop further.

FDR said in his inaugural address to a world that was in the middle of the Great Depression that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. As Toastmasters, many of us have worked on this fear of public speaking that affects so many people and many of us have taken great strides to become better speakers and some of us even stand on the edge of greatness. I challenge you to take the risks, try different types of speeches, try out different skills, take on new roles. The club will support you! Remember that when asked how it felt to fail 1,000 times in his attempt to create the light bulb, that Edison reportedly said he did not fail, I just found 10,000 ways that didn't work. While I hope that none of us has to do anything 10,000 ways that don't work, just imagine how great it will work when we finally get there!

I challenge each and everyone of you to think about what you want to accomplish in the next 12 months personally, within Toastmasters (as a Word Weaver), and as a club. Set some goals. 12 months will pass regardless of if you do anything or not, but wouldn't it be great to accomplish something in that time. Maybe you can become a Competent Communicator, an Advance Communicator, maybe you can complete one of the advanced manuals, maybe you can work on developing some new communication or leadership skills, maybe you can be a mentor. Think about what you'd like to accomplish and how the officers can help you or what you'd like to see the club do or develop, and let me or the other officers know.

The other officers and I have met and started planning for the year, but at this stage I would like to make you the following pledge to our members, potential and future members:

1. I will listen. I might not always have the answer, but I will try to find it and if my search is completed and I still don't know the answer, I will tell you.

2. I will help you. The other officers and myself want to see you succeed and we'll do what we can to help you do so. If there is nothing that we can do (other than listen) I will tell you.

3. We are open and your feedback is welcome. The other officers and myself want to make Word Weavers the best that it can be, so let us know what we can do to make coming to our meetings and being a member a more meaningful and rewarding experience. We won't be able to implement every idea but we will consider everything. Crazy ideas are welcome.

4. I'll keep the channels of communication open. I plan to keep the club posted on what the officers are doing. This will mean that sometimes I will have announcements and that occasionally members of the officers group will have announcements and reports.

5. I'll make mistakes. I can promise you that me and the other officers will make mistakes, but we will do our best to limit the impact and to take ownership of them. Whenever possible I like to learn from my mistakes and that I'm better for having made the mistake. As a Project Manager I'm very big on Lessons Learnt.

6. It will be fun. We will have fun this next year.

One last thing, as Steve Jobs used to say. When we met on June 5th I said that I wanted to develop a slogan for the coming Toastmaster year. I believe that having a slogan or motto can be a unifying experience and can help us to focus on what we want to accomplish. In my high school every senior class had their own motto, so my suggestion for our motto for the 2013-14 TM year is "A year of growth and creating new memories". Another suggestion out of the Officers Meeting was W5 (Winning With Word Weavers Wiesbaden). Let the other officers and myself know what slogans you like. We're half way through our 10th Anniversary, so while we have had a lot of accomplishments and good memories in the past we're looking towards the future and all of the new and wonderful memories we're going to have. Madame Toastmaster, fellow members, lets make this a wonderful year!

Note: Being a history fan, I had lot of fun writing my Inaugural Address. Why think about doing this in other Toastmaster clubs, roles, and even outside of Toastmasters.

I'm Pleased to Announce...

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 01 Jun 2013 14:12:00 +0000

I'm pleased to announce that Word Weavers, my Toastmasters club, has elected me to serve as President for the 2013-2014 Toastmaster year. This is a great honor for me and I look forward to serving my club members.

From the Toastmasters about page " Toastmasters International is a non-profit educational organization that teaches public speaking and leadership skills through a worldwide network of meeting locations. " But there is so much more to Toastmasters than public speaking! They were founded in 1924. Wikipedia reports that Toastmasters has over 260,000 members in 113 countries, served through its over 12,800 member clubs. Toastmasters is not as well known in Europe as it is in America, but this is changing as can been seen with the phenomenal growth Toastmasters has seen in Europe. District 59 (Continental Europe) will be splitting into two districts in the 2014-15 Toastmaster year and even Toastmasters in the UK, will be splitting into 2 districts in the near future as well.

I joined Word Weavers in the summer of 2011, so I'm coming upon my 2nd anniversary this summer. They made me feel right at home and I was hooked (in a good way I must say). I had heard about Toastmasters when I lived in the U.S. but I never got around to checking out a club. After passing my PMP in April, 2011 I was ready to check out Toastmasters. The 2nd meeting that I attended at Word Weavers was a BBQ (we had another one on May 15th). One of the things that I really love about Word Weavers (and all of the other Toastmaster clubs I have visited as well) is the variety of interesting and caring people that you'll encounter at meetings and events. It is also a supportive environment where you can try out different communications methods and get constructive feedback.

For the 2012-2013 Toastmaster year I have been the Vice President of Public Relations. The club website was moved from its previous provider to a site being hosted on EasySpeak, the current president and I spent quite a bit of time setting up the current website and I've been serving as the webmaster and will continue to do this in the near future. I've really enjoyed being a part of the activities that we've had this year in addition to our regular meetings. In January our club celebrated their 10th Anniversary and we've made it a club goal this year to celebrate this often. We celebrated in January, at our BBQ, and we'll be having a special meeting at an old Greek style amphitheater near the Neroberg, which is a water-powered train that goes up/down a mountain in Wiesbaden. The train itself is celebrating 125 years in 2013.

In 2012 I started up the Toastmasters Podcast Europe along with some other Toastmasters that I've met via LinkedIn. In March I released the 1st Anniversary episode. I'm looking to expand the podcast team near future and I hope to be able to create a team that is spread throughout Europe (including the U.K) so that we can keep Toastmasters in Europe together even after we split into more and more districts. For the podcast I've interviewed a lot of interesting Toastmasters at the D59 2012 Fall Conference in Bonn, Germany as well as the D59 2013 Spring Conference in Antwerp, Belgium and at other events that I've attended.

I will be getting in contact with the other newly elected club officers shortly and we'll do our preliminary planning for the year as well attend the first of two officers training sessions being held in July. I'm also going to make sure that I get the input from our members as to what they what to accomplish this year and what direction they see the club going. I want to do my best to serve the club and to get as much out of the experience as I can, so I should be a pretty exciting year. I really can't say enough good things about Toastmasters and I believe that is almost impossible to give back as much as I have received from Toastmasters.

If you're ever in the Wiesbaden, Germany area on the 1st, 3rd, or 5th Wednesday of the month, then we'd be happy for you to stop by, be sure to check out the website for more details. You can also find a club near you at the Toastmasters International Website. I hope that you'll check out a Toastmasters club soon. For all other officers (both newly elected as well as experienced officers, and all other Toastmasters), lets make the 2013-14 Toastmaster year an exciting one full of growth and lots of wonderful memories with your fellow Toastmasters and guests!

Photo credit: The Toastmasters Log is property of Toastmasters International.

My Impressions fom the Toastmasters District 59 2013 Spring Conference in Antwerp

noreply@blogger.com (Systems Overload) — Thu, 23 May 2013 17:41:00 +0000

I was one of nearly 400 Toastmasters that converged on Antwerp, Belgium May 10th through 12th for the District 59 2013 Spring Conference. While everything is still fresh in my mind I thought that I'd write about some of my experiences and impressions.

This was my second District 59 Conference. For those of you who don't know District 59 represents Toastmasters of several countries in Continental Europe. I have some really great memories from my first District 59 Conference (held in Bonn, Germany in November 2012), so I was ready to build from those memories and excited to be at my first district conference where some of the winners go on to represent the district at the International Convention (being held this year in Cincinnati). I've attended several contests now and it is quite an experience to see how the level of speeches grows from the club contests, to the area contests, to the division contests, and on to the district competitions, I can only imagine how great it is to experience the speeches at the International Conference! For me there are so many reasons that I was happy to be in this gathering of Toastmasters from all over Europe. The conference began so full of promise for me and I couldn't wait for things to get rolling.

Before the conference I was really looking forward to meeting Ed Tate. He is the 2000 World Champion of Public Speaking, and the first World Champion of Public Speaking that I have been able to meet personally. I attended an extra workshop that he did Friday morning where he showed the attendees how we can create stories for our speeches. I really liked the bully stories that he told us, this really helped set the stage for us to create out own stories. Ed Tate also gave the Keynote speech on Saturday and did a workshop on Sunday. I had the pleasure of interviewing him for the Toastmasters Podcast Europe (I will be posting this in the coming weeks). Ed Tate's website can be found here. I also met and interviewed Olivia Schofield, she was the winner of the District 59 International Speech contest in 2011 and went all the way to the finals in Las Vegas. Her website can be found here.

There were several workshops on a wide variety of topics. Besides the ones put on by Ed Tate, I was able to attend workshops given by Jack Vincent and Robert Cockburn. Jack Vincent's workshop was on networking. Robert Cockburn talked about the unexpected successes he has experienced at a Toastmaster of 29 years. I would have loved to see more of the workshops but I really enjoyed what I was able to attend. I was able to interview Robert Cockburn, so look for this to be part of a future podcast episode. Unfortunately, for those of us in D59, he'll be moving to Australia soon, but this should be quite a benefit for Toastmasters in Australia.

I was given the opportunity to watch Democracy in action at the District Council Meeting. The DCM was interesting because of what happened when a reorganization plan was presented for voting by the DCM and what happened after that as well as the officer elections in this transitional year before D59 becomes two districts. There was a proposal to reorganize some of the clubs within the areas and divisions within the district for the coming Toastmaster year. There was a little bit of controversy as a last minute amendment was proposed that would have changed the areas in Switzerland. Without getting into the details, the disagreement was about if there would be some German only speaking areas in Switzerland. Since German and French are two common languages spoken in Switzerland, you can understand why deciding to put clubs into areas that were organized around a single language could be a problem (especially when you think about who would be able to compete in what contest language and all the ramifications associated with this). The end result was that the amendment failed and Switzerland was to be reorganized as originally proposed. The district also held elections for the next Toastmaster year. As the district is getting ready to be split into two districts in July 2014, so after all of the voting was done there was one set of district officers (minus the District Governor) for the would be Northeast division and one set for the would be Southwest division. Division and Area Governors were also voted on. Since candidates could be nominated from the floor, there were a few people that were nominated from the floor.

The Budapest Conference team had a few people in Antwerp and they did a presentation about the District 59 2013 Fall Conference and had a table to start accepting early bird registration for the conference. The them for the Budapest Conference is Laugh and Learn. There were proposals from Krakow and Paris for the D59 2014 Spring Conference. The Krakow bid won. Hans Peterson led the Budapest team in their efforts, he also was one of the Toastmasters Podcast Europe team that started the podcast with me (I'm hoping that he'll have more time for the podcast after the Budapest Conference is over). I interview Hans and I did a wrap-up interview with the Antwerp team. I plan to put both of these interviews in the next episode. I also would like to say job well done to the Antwerp team!

Budapest is the location for the D59 2013 Fall Conference

In the past year my home club adopted EasySpeak for use in meeting planning and to host our website, so it was nice to see that Malcolm Warden, the father of EasySpeak was in Antwerp along with Bill Monsour (who I interviewed in Episode 8 in Bonn). I did an interview with Malcolm Warden that will be posted in an upcoming episode. In the interview he told me about the development of EasySpeak as well as some features that are on the horizon.

I was really looking forward to all of the speeches and the evaluations and I wasn't disappointed. I was able to attend one of the Evaluations semi finals in English as well as the finals. This was quite an experience, because I know that most Toastmasters want good feedback and it was a real pleasure to see how the feedback was delivered and to see what I might be able to use in the future when giving my own feedback. I've heard different Toastmasters say that an evaluation is a speech and many of the contestants showed how this can really be the case! Like most of the attendees, I was not disappointed by speeches, there were so many memorable and touching speeches. I was touched and impressed with the speech that Kaylie Peng gave and won with at the Division F contest about the love that she felt for her baby brother. I had the previlage of seeing Raquel Belo give her speech in the semi finals and again in the finals. I will always remember her saying "Get up, Believe, Walk Again". Christine Roos made us feel better about getting older in her speech. I attended the workshop that John Zimmer did in Bonn about writing a contest winning speech, so I was looking forward to seeing John Zimmer do his speech and he didn't disappoint us. I was fortunate enough to interview Kailey Peng, Raquel Belo, and John Zimmer.

District 59 will be splitting into two districts in July 2014. For me this is bittersweet, because I like the idea of Continental Europe in D59 but I realize that give the growth of Toastmasters in Europe, maintaining one district forever would be unruly to manage, so I see the need for the district to become two (and as time goes by there will be more and more districts). This is one of the things that I talked to Robert Cockburn about in our interview. Our current Lieutenant Governor of Education, João de Mendonça, will be our District Governor in this transition year (I talked to him about the transition year and other topics in an interview as well).

Like most everyone else, I was looking forward to see winners of all the contests in the awards ceremony. It was really nice to see that João de Mendonça, Morag Mathieson and her husband all received their DTMs (Distinguished Toastmaster)awards. The contest results are posted here. I'd like to say congratulations to all the winners and participants of the contests. The International Speech Contest and Evaluation Contests were also held in German and French, currently these contests end with the District Conference. It was nice to see the John Zimmer will be representing D59 in Cincinnati in the International Speech Contest. He wrote a nice blog post about his experience. His blog is really good, with all kinds of good public speaking material.

The winners of the International Speech Contest in English

I really enjoyed the conference in Antwerp. I can't recommend attending a district conference enough, especially while District 59 is still Continental Europe! I had the opportunity to interview lots of interesting people, so you can look forward to a few episodes from all the interviews that I did. The Fall contest season should be exciting and there should be another memorable conference in Budapest. I hope to meet you there.

Photo Credits:
The Antwerp Bear comes from the Friday day by day photo album of Roland Pauwels
The Budapest picture is a Tumblr (note it is also used on the D59 2013 Fall Conference website).
The winners of the International Speech Contest in English comes from Susanne Kischnick's photo album

Darryl

Ps. If you'd like to see some of the pictures from the conference in Antwerp you might find the following links useful...

Susanne Kischnick's photo album

Roland Pauwels created day by day photo albums for Friday, Saturday, Saturday the Party, and Sunday.

Pictures posted via Twitter are on Sharypic.

Now Accepting Applications...

noreply@blogger.com (Systems Overload) — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 12:36:00 +0000

Now Accepting Applications... from Darryl Heron

   I'm pleased to announce that I'm now accepting applications from forward thinking Companies and Organizations to employ my services and experience...

     My company has decided to close down the location that 1,100+ employees are tied to (including myself). I've worked 16 years for my company, holding several differnt jobs, for several different clients, working on several different projects. My company was acquired by another company a few years ago and now it seems that my location and the people tied to it are no longer needed.

     I don't wish to dwell on this decission, but see this as an opportunity to change my lfe for the better. Have a look at my application for forwrd thinking companies and organizations as well as my alternative resume below.

This is not my resume! from Darryl Heron

If you're a foward thinking company or organization that wants to change the world (or you know some that do), get in contact with me (details are in the application and/or the alternative resume). Contact me ASAP. Lets Change the World!

Darryl Heron

P.s. Be sure to include "Change the World" in the subject line of any email you send me. There are 1,099 other people that are also looking for an opportunity to make a contribution. Let me know what your needs are and we should be able to work something out!

Are You Going to Bonn?

noreply@blogger.com (Systems Overload) — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 04:53:00 +0000

The Toastmasters Distrct 59 Fall Conference is Bonn, Germany is about to begin. The conference officially kicks off tomorrow but there will be some activities tonight for people arriving today. For many people in attendance the highlight will be watching Humorous speech contest and Table Topics (impromptu speeches) performed in English, French, and German. Toastmaster members have participated in club contests, area contests, and divsion contests in order to be able to compete in this Fall's contests. The contests are be no means all that is going on in Bonn this weekend, there will be a series of workshops, various leadership meetings, a lots of fellowship between Toastmasters old and new from accross Continental Europe (go here for a overview of all the activites).

I joined Toastmasters in June, 2011 and this is the first time that I will attend the District 59 Conference, so I'm pretty excited about it. As the District is growing rapidly it will be one a few opportunities to experience a conference for all of Continental Europe, in the future Distrct 59 will be split into more and more districts, so I'm excited about attending this truly international event.

The speaking ability of all the contestants will be top notch. The Humorous speeches should be very entertaining, I've certainly enjoyed the speeches that I've herd at my club, our area, and our division. Impromtu speaking (speaking off the cutt as it is sometimes called) is an area that chalenges many of us. The contestants in Bonn have mastered this and I'm curious to find out what the topics will be.

I'm looking forward to meeting other Toastmasters from all over Europe. I hope to see you in Bonn.

Toastmasters’ Legacy of Learning Flourishes for 88 Years

noreply@blogger.com (Systems Overload) — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 04:25:00 +0000

Frankfurt, Germany, Oct. 26, 2012—“We learn in moments of enjoyment,” are the words of Dr. Ralph C. Smedley, who founded the first Toastmasters club at the YMCA in Santa Ana, Calif., 88 years ago today. Dr. Smedley, then-YMCA director, created the club in October 1924 for young men to practice their after-dinner speeches in a social environment. Today, nearly 300,000 men and women are improving their communication and leadership skills using the values and model that Dr. Smedley developed. In fact, there are more than 13,500 clubs in 116 countries throughout the world. Since the organization’s inception, more than four million people have found their voice and gained confidence through the proven Toastmasters program.

“Dr. Smedley laid the framework for the Toastmasters ‘learn-by-doing’ model,” says Daniel Rex, Executive Director of Toastmasters International. “The organization’s expansion in recent years is a tribute to the need for the timeless skills of effective communication and leadership. With 19 consecutive years of membership growth, our clubs continue to thrive globally.”

Longtime Toastmaster Morag Mathieson, says, "Toastmasters has benefited so many people over time because communication and leadership are universal skills that each individual needs. Better speaking skills are the most evident result of Toastmasters membership, but the leadership, listening and thinking skills associated with it are just as critical. " says Mathieson, the board leader of the organization in continental Europe and member of the Erlangen Toastmasters Club, Germany.

In Toastmasters, members meet weekly to learn and practice public speaking and leadership techniques. There is no instructor; instead, members evaluate each other’s presentations. Toastmasters clubs around the world will celebrate the anniversary with special meetings and events. The general public is invited to visit a meeting and learn more about the program’s benefits. To learn more about the Toastmasters club experience, view this video. You can join the ranks of famous Toastmasters who have benefited from the program, including Tom Monaghan, founder of Domino’s Pizza and many others.

View the Toastmasters timeline for a look at the organization’s history. Visit www.toastmasters.org to find a club near you.

About Toastmasters International
Toastmasters International is a nonprofit educational organization that teaches public speaking and leadership skills through a worldwide network of clubs. Founded in October 1924, the organization currently has more than 280,000 members in 13,500-plus clubs in 116 countries. Each week, Toastmasters helps more than a quarter million people of every ethnicity, education level and profession build their competence in communication so they can gain the confidence to lead others. For information about local Toastmasters clubs, please visit www.toastmasters.org or www.district59.org for the European district of Toastmasters. Follow Toastmasters International on Twitter @Toastmasters and @Toastmasters59.

Note: The Toastmasters logo is property of Toastmasters International.