I challenged each member of District 74, in the last Achieving Excellence Edition, to listen to their colleagues, friends and family members to hear what the pain points are in their lives and show them how the Toastmasters programme can help change that pain point into something more pleasurable.

How many of you took up the Challenge?

As of the 1^st of May there is now an additional incentive for each club, to take up this challenge as The Toastmasters International “Beat the Clock’ membership strategy starts. Any club adding 5 new, dual or reinstated members during the month of May and June, will get a ribbon from Toastmasters International and points for the Club Fitness Reward Programme.

Why would you want to add new members to your club?

• Ideally a club should have a minimum of 20 members to ensure that nobody needs to take on more than one role on the agenda.
• There is a diversity of speakers during the meeting, who will inspire, motivate and educate the audience.
• There is a depth to the evaluations which helps the members to grow as they get different input into their evaluations instead of having the same few people doing all the evaluation.

Guests join clubs that are learning while having FUN. In most Clubs there is not a membership challenge but an experience challenge. You need to ensure that your club conducts WOW events and not meetings. This will help convert those guests to members thus boosting your membership and the quality of your events.

I look forward to congratulating as many clubs as possible for achieving this incentive. Work together as a team so that every club passes on a legacy to the next team. Make sure that you hand over a club that is stronger than the club you were handed at the beginning of your year. That is true success