How do you grade? Jeff Bailey blogs about Toastmaster evaluations and the slippery slope they create. Since one of Toastmasters major missions is to get folks who are not comfortable speaking in public to cross the divide into the world of perhaps even enjoying it,...
As adults, we have a way of clouding what we ask for. Comments, implications, hints, and inuendo (of all types) seems to make us feel better than asking outright. Take a lesson from my kids — they ask, and ask, and ask. There is no doubt about what they...
As a follow-up to the previous post on things that shouldn’t be said, there are also things that should be said.I was a newlywed of less than a year when I had some great advice passed on to me from someone who quoted it as being passed to them from a wise sage...
I just finished up a boatload of notes and evaluations I took on some speakers that I observed a few weeks ago. Personal responsibilities, a hurricane, and The Hurricanes (!) delayed finishing up the write-up.While I suppose I was not surprised, it was difficult to...
I spent much of this weekend at the local No Fluff, Just Stuff conference watching (and critiquing, of course) folks speaking. Like most of us, these folk were not speakers first, but people with a passion who became speakers because others wanted to hear about their...
Today was Game 4 of the greatest sporting event on the planet — first-year Tee-ball. We’ve seen marked progress on the diamond, to the point where The Boy’s team actually made an out (one) and the kids actually run the bases in order and most of...
