What makes a club great?

In this module we’re going to look at the factors that make a huge difference to creating a quality club. We’re going to explore what makes a club great. Hopefully you’ve had an opportunity to experience vibrant meetings where people are learning, growing and enjoying spending time together.

Why do Toastmasters clubs exist, what is our mission? All Toastmasters clubs around the world have the same club mission. It is we provide a supportive and positive learning experience in which members are empowered to develop communication and leadership skills resulting in greater self-confidence and personal growth.

What does this mean? All members of the club are responsible for creating that supportive and positive experience, but committee members in particular have taken on a duty to create that environment by working together. Let’s explore a bit more what makes for that great experience.

Members have a great experience when they know what they want to learn and know how to learn it, where there’s been a discussion about their personal and professional goals and they understand how the Toastmasters programme can help them, where they feel supported by their fellow club members and club officers who are working together to provide that positive supportive environment.

Members benefit when they receive thoughtful, insightful feedback and evaluation that helps them improve in the future and where they are recognised for their achievements, whether it is a Table Topic, an icebreaker or a Distinguished Toastmaster award. All of these achievements are worthy of recognition and celebration. And finally, we all want to contribute to something.

We all want to be part of something greater than ourselves. If our members feel like they are contributing to the success of the club, that will create even more engagement. Now, before we continue with learning how to create this positive, supportive environment, it’s worth remembering a wonderful phrase from Dr Ralph Smedley, the founder of Toastmasters International.

He said, “we learn best in moments of enjoyment”. We have a wonderful education programme in Toastmasters and that structure really helps people achieve their goals. But let’s remember we also need fun, enjoyment and fellowship together.

 

The Distinguished Club Program

The Distinguished Club Programme is a critical part of leading your club. It recognises the clubs that provide that positive and supportive environment that leads to member success. The Distinguished Club Programme is used by clubs all around the world as a source of inspiration and pride.

It was actually born in District 71. Ted Corcoran of Fingal Toastmasters Club was the first international president from Europe. He led the development of the programme as a way of helping clubs to focus on the factors that make a difference.

You can see the achievements for your club by looking at the Toastmasters International Dashboards. You can find them online at dashboards.toastmasters.org. Here we can see the status of a very successful club within our district. On the left hand side you can see that there are 10 goals within the Distinguished Club Programme.

Six of these goals are focused on educational achievement of members. This makes sense, we are an educational organisation, these are the things that we want to promote and recognise. You achieve different goals when your members achieve different levels within the Pathways Education Programme.

Two of the goals are for membership growth. We know that for clubs to be sustainable we need new members to join every year. There are various reasons why some members might not renew their membership.

For example, they might have joined for a specific reason and feel like they have already achieved that goal. By bringing new members into our clubs we gain fresh perspectives and we help more people. Club officer training is an essential part of the programme and well done to you for participating.

By learning how to do your role effectively, you and your fellow club officers will find it much easier to create the club environment that you and your members want. It is also a very important investment in your own learning and growth. Finally, all organisations have administrative requirements.

There are things we all need to do to ensure that our club can keep running. There are two requirements for the administration goal and both requirements need to be met. Your club needs to complete the membership renewals on time.

This means ensuring your member payments are received by Toastmasters World Headquarters by 30 September and 31 March. You also need to submit the list for your incoming officers after the elections. Your club officer election should be held in early May and you should submit it as soon as the elections are complete.

The deadline is 30 June. On the top right of the screen we can see a summary of the number of goals achieved and how this corresponds to each of the levels of recognition in the Distinguished Club Programme. Achieving 5 goals makes your club a Distinguished Club.

7 goals means a Select Distinguished Club. Achieving 9 goals and having 20 or more members means yours is a President’s Distinguished Club. And starting in the 2025-26 programme year there will be an additional level of recognition.

This is for those exceptional clubs that achieve all 10 goals and have at least 25 members. They will be called SMEDLY Distinguished. To achieve any level of recognition under the Distinguished Club Programme there are some essential requirements.

Your club needs to have at least 20 members or a net growth of 3 members based on the number of members you had at the start of the programme year. So if your club starts the year with 15 members you can qualify under the Distinguished Club Programme if you have 18 members at the end of the programme year. There are additional requirements for the higher levels of recognition.

And in addition to this your club success plan, which you will shortly learn about, has to be submitted by 30 September.