Report on BISC meeting, from Carole Manship
What a great evening! For one thing we had a full house. Our usual attendance is around 12, give or take a few people either way, but last night we had 22. Lots of guests and lots of merriment.
Our presenter was Ana, who truly is the epitome of the Birmingham International Speakers Club. It was a delight to have her as our host for the evening and she started it off with a real warm welcome to everyone. The theme for the evening was resolutions and Ana kicked off the evening with an anecdote about her newly acquired husband and his already failed resolution to go to the gym more often.
Our speakers for the night were Waseem, Chris, Kirsty, Susan and Mercedes. One feature of our evenings tends to be the spin that our speakers give to the evening’s theme but last night everyone stuck to the idea of New Year’s resolutions but each with their unique take, from Waseem’s hatred of resolutions to Kirsty’s research about where the concept originated and all the advice from Chris, Susan and Mercedes about how we might be able to stick to our resolutions. As ever, there was some good entertainment alongside learning and thought stimulation.
Rob and Josie provided excellent feedback – balancing all the positive aspects of each individual’s delivery and content with at least one recommendation about what they could do better next time.
A new feature of the evenings is a regular slot to update club members with news and announcements. As President, I used the time to announce the various competitions that are coming up, especially the speech contest on 8 February and that the winner would go on to compete in the Council competition on 25 February and I have asked members to keep that date clear so that they would be available to compete or support the winner. Announcements were also made of the new buddy system to help induct new members and it was a delight to be able to present our newest member, Susan, with her badge and Powertalk pin.
The second half of the evening was a workshop run by Allan, a very experienced and long standing member, who gave us a presentation on how to structure an award winning speech – and then gave us the opportunity to put it into practice. Everyone in the room had a chance to participate, learn and have fun. It’s quite a challenge to write a powerful beginning and ending of a speech in 5 minutes within a group setting.
When the formalities of the evening were over, it seemed no one wanted to go home. Many stayed on to carry on conversations, get to know each other better and one or two guests actually joined on the night. What a way to end the evening!
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