Toastmasters Virtual Meetings are a Competitive Advantage

In the last year, we hear, among Toastmasters, and people considering joining a Toastmasters club, that they hesitate to renew, or join the club, because meetings are online.  Some clubs are apologetic about this, and appeal to loyalty, altruism, or an appeal to emotion to get members involved.  This is ineffective.  That is now how people function.  We appeal to self-interest. 

We have to be cognisant, first and foremost, that the post-pandemic world has fundamentally changed the way we conduct business, the way we interact with each other, the way we connect.  Meetings are conducted across borders virtually, and that requires specific skills we may not feel necessary in a physical meeting.  There is a greater sense of intimacy in that distance when we are speaking on video.  The audience has an opportunity to see much of our facial expressions up close, and that affects how they react to the message. 

Toastmasters, as a programme, is effective in granting members constant opportunities to refine their presentation, their speeches, their interactions across the medium of virtual meetings.  It affords access to a diverse audience to familiarise ourselves with the intricacies of communication across cultural boundaries.  Those are benefits and advantages that cannot be understated in a post-pandemic economy.  It is a competitive advantage we cannot afford to disregard.