Inaugural Address, AIA Toastmasters Club, 9th July 2020 — With Commentary

The following is the text of my inaugural speech, given as President of AIA Toastmasters Club, on the 9^th July 2020.  I was also, concurrently, Division Director, District 80 Division G.

Good Evening, Everybody,

Ms. Wong Sze Keed, our Chief Executive Officer; Mr. Colin Ly, our Head of Agency Distribution; our management team at AIA Corporate; past and present senior District officers; past and present District officers; my fellow Toastmasters; distinguished guests; eminent colleagues.  Lend me your ears.  Give me your hearts.  Grant me this opportunity to be your voice.

I stand here humbled.  I stand here exalted.  I stand here as one of you.  We stand here unbowed, unbroken, unshaken.  We have crossed a dark divide; we have navigated a great challenge; we stand here in a post-pandemic lockdown, a new world, a new challenge, a new normal.  We stand here triumphant.

I undertake this challenge, with my team, with our club, our District, our Company, knowing that we stand on the precipice of epic failure, or unprecedented greatness.  The lockdown affected production, morale, participation.  But we are still here.  It affected club renewals, attendance, survival.  But we are still here.  We faced an economic contraction, uncertain revenue, a health scare.  But we are still here.  And that is because we are a people who thrive in adversity, who walk in the footsteps of giants, and stand on the shoulders of the accomplished that came before us.  We are cognisant that we are a part of something greater than ourselves.

The senior Toastmasters of AIA, past presidents all, and I spent the last few weeks speaking to stakeholders at club level, at District level, and with our management team at AIA.  Ms. Wong, our Chief Executive Officer, kindly allowed us face time.  Mr. Ly, our Head of Agency Distribution, likewise.  We have a new Club Constitution, a written strategic plan, and a tactical plan to achieve great things this term, and to build the foundation for sustained greatness and continued success.

We are not just a corporate Toastmasters club.  We are AIA Toastmasters Club.  We are the best corporate club in District 80, in Region 13, and by the end of this term, we will be the best corporate club in the world.  We are AIA Toastmasters Club.  We set the standard, not follow it.  We deliver the best executive training and leadership programme, and we intend to share that with the rest of Division G and District 80, because greatness is only cemented when it is shared and passed on.

AIA Toastmasters is involved in corporate club charters in several Divisions, not just ours, because we are great together, as District 80.  AIA Toastmasters willingly share our knowledge as corporate trainers, as executive leaders, as sales specialists, with any club, because we want all clubs to grow and be strong.  This is a call to unity and growth.  We are strong together.

We are facing a new normal.  A new global economy.  A changed world.  We stand on the precipice of epic failure, or unprecedented greatness.  We can, as District 80, stand together and reach for that new standard, that unprecedented greatness, that culture of excellence.  I want you to believe as I do, because I believe in my team, I believe in our company, I believe in you.  We will succeed, and we will thrive.  Whatever we had, we will get back.  Our renewals, our number of clubs, our standards.  Now one step back.  Ever.  This is our vision of resilience.

Over to you, Toastmaster of the Day.

Commentary: Why the Timing Mattered More Than the Words

Five days after I gave this speech, the Ministry of Trade and Industry confirmed Singapore’s economy had contracted 12.6% year-on-year in the second quarter of 2020, its worst recession since independence.  I did not have that exact figure standing at the lectern.  I did not need it.  Everyone in that room already felt it, in cancelled renewals, in members who had stopped attending, in a company navigating the same contraction the entire country was living through.

“Epic failure, or unprecedented greatness” is not a hedge.  It was a deliberate refusal to let the room settle for a modest, defensible middle outcome.  A club leadership speech delivered during genuine economic contraction has exactly one job beyond logistics: convince people still worth convincing that showing up remains worth the effort when every external signal argues otherwise.

Getting genuine face time with our Chief Executive Officer and a Head of Agency Distribution, in the middle of a pandemic when every executive calendar had been stripped to the bone, was itself the proof of institutional buy-in the rest of the speech was asking the room to believe in.

The Philosophy Underneath It

Leadership during contraction is not about denying the numbers.  It is about refusing to let contracting numbers become a contracting ambition.  Every club that treated 2020 as a year to simply survive quietly did survive, diminished.  AIA Toastmasters treated it as the year to write a new constitution and a new strategic plan instead, because the only genuine hedge against a recession is building the infrastructure to outgrow it the moment the recession ends.

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Terence Nunis, DTM | Division Advisor, District 80 Division M | Club Advisor, AIA Toastmasters | Past President & Founder, Awesome Toastmasters