Horsham Speakers Club

In every one of the club’s meetings, there are a number of roles that volunteers take. Many of these are speaking roles in themselves.

Here is a brief explanation of each of them:

Chairman

The chairman for the evening is responsible for ensuring that the meeting runs smoothly. He would be handed the agenda for the evening, and it is up to him how he presents them including in which order.

Speakers

Speaking is the main reason for attending the club!

You can book a slot to give a prepared speech, which lasts approximately 6 – 8 minutes. The ASC provides a manual, which guides the speaker through their education to become an effective and confident speaker.

There are 10 speeches to be prepared and delivered before moving on to advanced assignments. You will be able to confidently give speeches in public long before you finish the programme.

Speech Evaluator

Speech Evaluators give constructive help to speakers. Offering of helpful advice on how to overcome faults, together with encouragement for the future is provide by evaluators.

The evaluator makes comments on the good points as well as the bad, explaining why he found each aspect significant.

Don’t be afraid to give your first evaluation. In giving an evaluation, you are simply telling the speaker how the speech came across to you, the listener.

Tips to consider:

• The first requirement of an evaluator is to listen. Practise listening and assess a speech in terms of how the speaker delivers his or her message.
• Did you receive the message clearly?
• Was it interesting and easy to follow?
• Avoid listing all the faults in a catalogue. Apart from being depressing, it is unlikely that the speaker will be able to take them all in. Try instead to highlight the two or three fundamental points that the speaker can concentrate on.
• It is always helpful to illustrate a point by giving an example from the speech. The example reinforces the message, and puts it into context more appropriately.
• Always follow your comments with a suggestion of how the delivery can be improved.
• If you cannot think of a constructive way of helping, then there is little point in drawing attention to the fault.
• The desire to avoid hurting a speaker’s feelings is commendable, but often not helpful! However, be tactful. Speakers would not speak in the club if they didn’t seek to improve their faults. So, you must do your part with honesty and integrity!
• Before concluding, give a clear message as to whether the speaker has successfully completed the assignment or not. If the speaker has not reached the required standard, they should be asked to repeat the assignment.

Topics Chairman

The role of the Topics Chairman is to provide a comfortable but stimulating atmosphere in which members can develop their impromptu speaking.

The topics session has a twofold purpose:

• To develop the confidence and skills of impromptu speaking.
• To provide a speaking opportunity for those that have not already got a speaking part elsewhere in the evening.

It is most important that the Topics Chairman matches the topics to the speaker’s ability: the more experienced speakers should be stretched to keep their skills sharpened.

• Each topic should be on a subject with which the members can reasonably be expected to be familiar and phrased so that its implications can be readily understood.

Topics Evaluator

The role of topics evaluator is similar to that of the speech evaluator. The difference is that the topic evaluator gives only a short feedback.

General Evaluator

The role of the General Evaluator is an extremely important one to the club. It is designed to ensure that the Club’s standards are maintained.

This role is only assigned to members who have considerable experience and proven ability as an evaluator.

As a General Evaluator, you have the last word: you have the right and indeed the duty to disagree with judgements where appropriate, particularly when the balance of prior evaluations needs adjustments.

Because of these rights, the General Evaluator possesses an authority, which must be carefully applied.

The General Evaluation should be seen as a summary of the meeting, highlighting the strong points and pointing out the weaknesses of why the meeting was a success or failure. The General Evaluator gives feedback on the Chairman, Evaluators, and Timekeeper and how the evening went.

Tips:

• A prime task of the General Evaluator is to advise and train the evening evaluators. Novice evaluators need special attention, to help them develop their analytical techniques whilst ensuring that the original speaker has been adequately assisted.
• Consider the timing of the meeting. Did it start on time? Did each part finish as planned. Was the interval properly controlled? Did the evaluators spend too long or too short a time on their tasks? Timing should include the balance amongst the main ingredients of the evening.
• Has the latest meeting taken account of the criticisms made last time?
• Has the Chairman taken notice of any remarks made about the Chairman of the previous meeting?
• If you are a guest at another Club, your views on how events are managed elsewhere may be of interest to the Club.
• Don’t re-evaluate the speeches. Your task is to comment on the evaluation or rectify faults, not to repeat the process!
• Don’t misuse the privilege of having the last word. It is your responsibly to ensure your standard of speaking and conduct don’t need evaluation!

Timekeeper

The role of the Timekeeper is to provide timing signals to the various participants. And to report the timing performance of the prepared speakers, topics speakers and evaluators.