Tag Archive for 'evaluation'

Next CAT Meeting – November 26th

Published
by
Emily Minor, CAT VPE
on 24 November, 2009
in upcoming meetings
. 1 Comment

Theme:  Giving Critical Evaluations

TME – Spike Gu, ACB & CL

Summiting Session – Emily Minor, CC & ALS, on “Critical Left Brain/Right Brain Evaluations.”

Table Topics – Jenny Ni, CC & CL

Speakers:

  • Carlo Wolff, ACB & ALB – The Emperor’s New Suit from the Storytelling manual
  • Susan Zhou, DTM – Lead and Learn for Resolving Conflict from the Professional Speakers manual

We’ll have a guest General Evaluator, Gabor Holch, the president of Leadership TMC!  Rebecca Hong, DTM and District 85 Governor, and Joyce Hu, CC & CL, will be our individual evaluators.

We’ll be meeting at the Carpark, our super-secret underground lair.  Admission is just 30 RMB for members of other TM clubs, and 40 RMB for non-TM members.  We hope to see you there!

Speakers:  Remember to bring an SD card to the meeting so we can record your speech or training, and you can take the recording home with you that night!

Shanghai Education Day

Published
by
Dan Smith, DTM
on 31 August, 2009
in events
. 0 Comments

In a little over three hours on Sunday afternoon, more than 100 Shanghai Toastmasters were treated to a valuable Education Day. We were led most eloquently by David Yang CC (Microsoft No. 1) and Jackie Zhao CC (Lighthouse), our hosts who provided engaging interactions through the afternoon while linking the various sessions.

You will find videos from parts of the session here.

Continue reading ‘Shanghai Education Day’

The trouble with suggestions

Published
by
Dan Smith, DTM
on 30 June, 2009
in article
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I’ve been hearing so much of the word “suggestions”. One very senior General Evaluator last week used the word at least every minute during their evaluation.

  • “If I could make a suggestion…”
  • “One suggestion that I would have…”
  • “Now onto some suggestions…”

A well-used signpost becomes a distraction for the audience and a crutch for the speaker.

Let’s stop wasting time talking about it and instead use that time to give relevant, targeted, and useful suggestions.

As an evaluator, emphasise what the speaker did well that audience can learn from, and areas that the speaker could improve that would also help the audience.

Leave your personal comments for a private conversation with the speaker and perhaps in the written evaluation.

General Evaluation at Shanghai No. 1

Published
by
Dan Smith, DTM
on 1 April, 2009
in Speech and evaluation
. 0 Comments


Last Monday night our VPE was the GE at Shanghai No. 1 at their 499th meeting. It was a longer evaluation than is often possible and you can see it here or below but some of the key points are below:

  • Utilization: Use whatever happens to get across your message.
  • Frame the message and prepare the audience.
  • Say less; communicate more.
  • Take your time. When you do, speak with a purpose.
  • Share the emotional component of the message, not just the content. Communicate feeling AND information. They’ll remember the feeling long after they forget your information and will forget your information immediately if they don’t like the feeling they get around you.
  • Everytime we stand up, we’re looking to expand our skills. There are no small roles, only short ones. When you have a short role, it’s a concentrated experience to use in refining your skills.
  • Set the frame – when you speak, identify the criteria for success or at least the guidelines that you are working towards.
  • There are no excuses – don’t make them for yourself or give them to other people. Just give your best. Always.
  • When things go wrong, strive to make the problem invisible. Make it look as though it was part of the plan.
  • Give your audience the gift of your message. They are VIPs (Very Important People) so if you don’t have a point to saying something yet, think of one.
  • Great evaluators highlight examples of great things that we can learn from, highlight ways that we can improve and presents the combination of the two for the benefit of the audience. Speak of “the speaker” to the audience rather than speaking to the speaker. Give your personal evaluation for the speaker later.
  • Have a great introduction. Introductions set the stage for the audience and help them get more from the presentation. The easiest way is to write one yourself.

Some thoughts on how to be a great evaluator

Published
by
Dan Smith, DTM
on 30 December, 2008
in evaluation
. 2 Comments

Be careful of asking audiences questions. Especially ambiguous question. The audience won’t always give you the answer you’re looking for and sometimes will give answers that are deliberately difficult.

Don’t ask the audience if they liked it. Or anything else for that matter. Certainly don’t ask for another round of applause. In fact, in 2-3 minutes don’t ask the audience anything unless the manual specifically requires it as you have just enough time to do what you need to do but not enough time to waste grandstanding. Even then, the manual probably should be changed in my opinion…

Too many evaluators use their evaluation as a chance to grab the limelight. Instead, focus on the speaker and let the quality of your evaluation draw to you the attention that you deserve.

Skip restating the speech. We’ve already heard it once – if we slept through it the first time, we might well sleep through your evaluation of it too!

Focus. Say what’s most important first. Be specific. Have only a few points – maybe three strengths and three points for improvement. Use your critical thinking to identify what’s most important and leave the rest to the written evaluation. Your audience won’t remember a long list anyway.

Make no apologies. When you give points for improvement, you are doing a service to the speaker and the audience – there’s no need for apologies or comments like “there’s always room for improvement…”

To me, there are just three parts to being an evaluator:

  1. Highlight (strenghts)
  2. Helpout (show areas for improvement)
  3. Handover (to the Toastmaster or General Evaluator – that means you shut up and sit down)

Being a good evaluator is not that complicated really…

One more thing: Speak in the third person.

Speak to the audience, not to the speaker – address your comments as “Mension had a strong, commanding voice and a dynamic, entertaining presence” (which Mension, the Immediate Past President of Lighthouse Toastmasters does of course!) rather than making it into a public conversation with the speaker.

Once you’ve delivered your evaluation you can give personal comments to the speaker, but save them until later. The oral evaluation is a speech in its own right – a speech should be delivered in the third person.

(Check Evaluate to Motivate for the formal Toastmasters training of course but really you just have to think about how strange it is to say “you” in a speech when you’re just talking to the speaker, you could probably work it out yourself.)