6/2/20
Mission Statement: We the VA Voices are reflective of the Veterans we serve: Steadfast in our course of action; Courageous in the face of fear; and willing to make sacrifices for positive change.
I have not been to a specialty club like this one and was very interested to know we have them in Toastmasters, especially one who promotes veterans. Therefore it comes as no surprise to me that the club opens the meeting with the Pledge to the flag. Also during this "Invocation" time a member read an inspirational quote by Martin Luther King Jr.
This club is President’s Distinguished and currently has 20 members and I saw right off the bat some of the reasons why they are so successful. Before the meeting time, my husband got a call from the president, Hattie, to make sure we got the zoom link so we can join the club. Three other officers emailed him to thank us for contacting them and gave us a welcome to the meeting. Wow! That’s good customer contact. Steve felt very welcome. That’s something my home club might want to consider.
This club had so many positives. They started on time. Of course this should be a given, but surprisingly it is not with many other clubs. In fact members were in zoom at least 15 minutes beforehand and greeted us. (that’s when we logged on). There were 14 in attendance total. At the beginning of the meeting they asked us to write our name, email address and phone numbers in chat so they could follow up and contact us. Wow! Why didn’t I think of that? Great idea! How would you contact someone after they left the zoom meeting?
The Toastmaster made sure to tell the speaker to “pin” the timer so she could watch the time as she spoke. She explained to all the members how to “pin” a speaker. They had all the roles filled already before starting the meeting. This is the first meeting we have ever been to (besides my own) that has ever been that prepared. The timer seemed like a first timer in that role, she made mistakes showing the lights but then it got straightened out, I can only assume someone sent her a message in chat. Which I appreciated that. I have been to a few clubs where the timer did it incorrectly or forgot to even hold any cards up and it was never mentioned until the end of the meeting at the general evaluation.
They gave an award to someone at the end. They shared a screen the certificate. I love that! They announced club officer training at the end of the meeting and their District Director attended the meeting and shared a few words. This was a very well- run meeting, they were enthusiastic about toastmasters, we felt very welcome and I am probably going to steal some of their ideas.
By the way, Hattie and another member sent an email after the meeting thanking us for coming to the meeting. Two thumbs up for them!!
If I could give them a few small suggestions I would say, regarding elections…have it at the end instead of the middle meeting and also it could be shortened since no one was running opposed. Then any visitors could leave during elections and they also would have time for table topics. The other thing is after the meeting I looked for their Facebook page to put the group shot that we took of the club, but it is not active. Nothing had been posted since 2019. My club is very prominent on FB and I find it a very easy, cheap way to promote our club. However, maybe where she lives FB doesn’t help them as well in promoting their club. Either way, I really wanted to see some current pics of their club and I wanted to post the group shot but was not able to. That being said, they have a great website with nice engaging pictures. I even noticed on their website that a newsletter “will be coming soon”. Fantastic!
This is a great club! One of the best I have seen. Good job VA Voices! Keep up the good work.
No comments:
Post a Comment