Andrea Tantillo, DTM
Communications and Leadership
Toastmasters International
I joined Toastmasters in February 2016 as a way to improve my communications skills. Since joining, I've had the opportunity to speak in front of various clubs and groups, at my office, and at a region-wide symposium.
I am a member of Timmons Talkers Toastmasters and Vice President of Public Relations for Spaced Out Toastmasters. I've had the chance to take on some leadership roles at both the club, area, and district levels.
AND, I've won a handful of speech contests in the humorous, tall tales, and international categories.
Resources and Videos
Creating an Impact
In January 2021, I led a panel discussion among members of Spaced Out Toastmasters, an advanced club in the NASA area of Houston, Texas. We discussed ways to create impact in presentations in both virtual and in-person environments. In May 2021, I followed up on this panel and hosted an Online Leadership Elective to share the tips and get additional strategies from other Toastmasters in District 56 in Houston.
Because I want more Toastmasters to have access to this information, I created a free book to share. This book, as both a PDF and an online flipbook, is a complilation of the strategies and tips from January and May. It is not meant to be a comprehensive guide but instead a place to start when thinking about creating impact in your own presentations.
Tips for Hosting a Hybrid Meeting
When thinking about a hybrid meeting, there are four things that need to happen for it to be successful:
- The people online need to see and hear the people in the room
- The people in the room need to see an hear the people online
- The people online need to see and hear each other
- The people in the room need to see and hear each other
The last two are easy, just show up or log in. But the first two require planning and equipment. Spaced Out Toastmasters put together a one-page guide for our meetings (we meet an area restaurant each month and must bring all of our own equipment). Toastmasters District 56 offers some helpful resources for planning a hybrid meeting, and Rotary International District 5950 offers a brief demo video for setting up with minimal equipment.
New Member and Visitor Kits Aggregate List
This is a list Toastmasters International materials and District/Club-generated documents that can be used in your Visitor/New Member packets for your club. This list is the result of my High Performance Leadership Project to develop a scalable new member kit for use by club Vice-Presidents of Membership. This project relies on feedback from my guidance committee (a club charter member, a VPM, and a new member), individual interviews of club members, and responses to a survey posted on Toastmaster International’s Member Facebook Page (responses represent 14 districts in 5 countries).
The chart is organized into three sections-Materials that can be included in your core new membership packets, materials that can be included in your core visitor packets, and optional materials that can be added to visitor OR new member. (Many of clubs indicated that components were often used interchangeably across packets or in lieu of one of the packets [according to survey results, more clubs provide visitor packets than new member packets].) The list is a combination of Toastmasters International Resources and samples of club-generate materials.
These items can be printed and distributed during meetings or emailed as an electronic follow up. If you have any questions or would like to add information to this compilation, please contact me.