1st Meeting After Value Clarification

Dear Trendsetters,

Was a great first meeting after our value clarification session on 24 Oct 2017

At the outset thank you to all these amazing people for making it and also for your enthusiastic participation : 

Chandar, Pradeep, Vinod, Ram, Salar, Hari, Elango, Sunil, Mr.Mehta, Girish, Lawrence and also to our guest Tushar. 

The session started with our president Lawrence playing the role of Program Quality Leader (which is to replace the TMOD in our club); he started off by reminding us about the mission which we have all created for our club which is:

To help each other to become effective communicators, leaders, trainers coaches and mentors.

He also reminded us that the way to get to accomplish mission was by committing to continually demonstrate these values:

Values: Punctuality; Receiving Feedback; Giving Feedback; Sharing and Contributing; Regular Attendance; Active Participation; Quality Content

He further went on to explain the novelty we have introduced in our club - "the evaluation sheet" - this will help each member of the audience offer an objective feedback to the speaker by measuring the speach against its stated purpose (Specific and General) as submitted in the below form to the VP Education before the speech. I firmly believe that if we refine and continue this critical practice it will help us not only in Toastmasters but importantly  outside toastamsters - it can be the single determinant of a valuable and impactful speech. 

As with all initiatives there were a couple of teething troubles which Lawrence attempted to address by giving examples after each speech of how the specific and general purposes could have been improved. I believe members are better aware of the requirements now. In any case I'd request members to read Project 3 of CC (I have taken the key learnings from P3  and have appended it below this writeup so you can familiarize yourslef with the concept). I look forward to run a quiz in the Trendsetters group in order to ensure you have indeed learnt (P 3) how to define the purpose/objectives. 

Following this Sunil, Sajan (myslef) and Mr.Mehta gave our prepared speeches (in this order); The themes were that of storytelling, entrepreneurship and poetry.

I belive this is a rich and interesting combination of speech themes. The concept from Sunil "that there always exists a positive and parallell line of thinking in every situation and our destiny depends on having faith, seeing and following this positive parallel thought line" was beautifully illustrated by his sotries. 

And Mr.Mehtas recitation of the poem titled "You start dying slowly" - By Pablo Neruda was delivered with confidence and an unusualy strong passion.

As for my workshop on Business Model Canvas, please see if you can share in the comments section as to what you remember of value (after one day of  the session) as this can be a reliable testimoney of if and how this was beneficial to you. 

I felt the approach taken by the evaluators  Elango, Girish and Salar (respectively for Sunil, me and Mr.Mehta) were of distinctly different styles - Elangos seemed to focus on being tactful and thorough, while Girish seemed to focus on critical analysis and recommendations. And  Salar's evaluation  (for Mr.Mehtas poety recitation) seemed to reflect balance, wisdom and experience. These are my personal observations. Thank you all for your wonderful evaluations.

The session ended with Lawrence concluding with a reminder of our commitment to our mission and values.

The following memebrs have confirmed their speech for next session:

Girish

Ram

Sunil

Mr.Mehta

Thank you gentlemen and I look forward to have your filled in Speech Purpose sheets sent to me at the earliest. Please be sure to read the below and do brace ready for a quiz :)

The next session would be on the 28th of Nov.

Warm Regards,

Saaj

92839447

Specific and General Purpose

Introduction:

Every speech must have a general and a specific purpose. A general purpose is to inform, to persuade, to entertain or to inspire. A specific purpose is what you want the audience to do after listening to your speech. Once you have established your general and specific purposes, you'll find it easy to organize your speech. You'll also have more confidence, which makes you more convincing, enthusiastic and sincere. Of course, the better organized the speech is, the more likely it is to achieve your purpose.

As you plan a speech, you must be absolutely clear about what you want the audience to do or know at the end of your talk. Your speech must have a purpose. Once you know your purpose, all other decisions relating to the speech - what information to include, organization and delivery - are easy to make, since you will measure them against their helpfulness in achieving your purpose.

There are two types of purposes: general and specific.

General Purpose:  A general purpose is the broad intent of your speech. Most speeches fall into one of four general purposes:

1.       To inform. You present a speech to inform when you want your audience to learn about a new subject, develop a new skill or learn more about a subject they already know something about. Lectures, briefings and demon­strations are all informative talks.

2.       To persuade. A persuasive speech strives to change the audi­ence's attitudes or behaviors, or

3.       to convince the audience to accept or approve your point of view. Sales presentations and campaign speeches are examples of persua­sive speeches.

4.       To entertain. An entertaining speech strives to amuse or provide enjoyment for the audience. Humorous speeches are the most obvious kind of entertaining speech. However, any speech may be entertaining without being laugh-out-loud funny simply by including anecdotes, such as a speech about some unusual experiences you had while on a business trip.

5.       To inspire. Inspirational speeches ask people to achieve noble goals or ideals or reach their highest potential. They draw on emotions and sentiment. A commencement speech is a typical example of a speech intended to inspire.

Perhaps you've heard a speech that seemed to have two purposes - for example, an informative speech that also was entertaining because the speaker told some funny stories. Using humor doesn't mean the speech had two general purposes. The speech's purpose was to inform, but the speaker used humor to help convey his message. Although it's possible for a speech to have two general purposes, it's not recom­mended. Your speaking time is limited, making it difficult to effectively achieve two purposes. Also, your audience can be overwhelmed and confused when presented with too much information.

Specific Purpose: Suppose you are planning to give an informative speech about remodeling a home. This is a very broad purpose, and you would have difficulty adequately addressing the subject in a five- to seven-minute speech or even a 30-minute speech. Narrowing the general purpose into a more clearly defined specific purpose will make the presentation more practical and manageable for you, as well as more beneficial for the audience.

The specific purpose is a one-sentence statement about what you hope to accomplish in your speech. It should meet three criteria. The statement should be:

1. Worded from the audience's viewpoint. What do you want the audience to be able to do after listening to your speech?

2. Specific. The wording is precise.

3. Attainable. The specific purpose should be realistic and possible to achieve.

Write the statement from the audience's view­point. Instead of saying your purpose is "to inform the audience about remodeling a home," you could say, `After hearing my presentation, the audience will be able to identify the five steps in hiring a competent contractor." In a persuasive speech, your specific purpose could be, "After hearing my speech, the town council will approve the proposal to build an art center."

Be sure to keep the specific purpose reasonable. "After hearing my speech, the audience will be able to repair a bicycle" is not a realistic statement. This is better: "After hearing my speech, the audience will be able to do two simple maintenance tasks that will keep their bicycles safe "

Keep the specific purpose clear and concise. Write it down, paying careful attention to the verbs you use. If you are giving an informative speech, the specific purpose statement could include verbs such as compare, identify, name, prepare, analyze and list, while a statement for a persuasive speech could include verbs such as buy, contribute, join, offer and vote. Avoid using words like know, under­stand, recognize and be aware - they're vague and not readily measurable. The statement should be worded so that, after your speech, you could actually test the audience to see if you achieved your specific purpose.

Once you have written your specific speech purpose, you can decide the main points you want to make, the facts and ideas that best sup­port the main points, and the most appropriate speech outline to follow. Occasionally you may be tempted to digress. Be careful to include only the main points and supporting facts and ideas that directly contribute to your specific speech purpose.

As you write the speech, make its purpose clear to the audience. The audience wants to know what you are going to talk about, so the beginning of your speech should tell them this succinctly. The body of your speech should provide the information you promised; the conclusion should reiterate what you've told them. By the time you conclude the speech, the audience should be able to state in one simple sentence the specific purpose of your talk.

The value of Purpose:

Knowing your specific purpose and being able to effectively organize your speech to achieve that purpose provide a big benefit for you as a speaker: increased confidence. When you are clear about what you want to accomplish with the speech and the method by which you will accom­plish it, you feel better and more confident about yourself and your speech.

You may have discovered, too, that when you are interested in your topic and have strong feel­ings about it, it is easier to prepare and present the speech. Why? Because you are enthusiastic about the subject, believe in what you have to say and believe your audience will be interested in it, too. This makes you more convincing and sincere. When you are confident, enthusiastic, sincere and convincing, you have more credibility. As a result, the audience pays attention to you and is willing to consider your viewpoint.

When you speak on a subject that interests you and/or evokes strong feelings, you'll experience yet another benefit: You'll become so involved with your talk that you will forget your nervousness.

When you have a sub­ject that excites you, a clear purpose and well-orga­nized material, and you have rehearsed the speech so much that you are comfortable with it, you no longer have reason to be nervous.

Therefore you could do the following for each speech:

·       Select the speech topic or idea and determine its general and specific purposes.

·       Organize the speech in a manner that best achieves those purposes,

·       Ensure that your speech’s beginning, body and conclusion reinforce the purposes.

·       Fill the  general/specific purpose sheets and send it to the VPE