My Photo
Name:
Location: St. Paul, Minnesota, United States

Mutual Voices Toastmasters Club meets weekly at Noon at Securian Center in downtown St. Paul. Securian Center is located at 400 Robert Street North. Please join us anytime as a guest!

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

August 17, Meeting Summary

On August 17, 2006, we hosted a joint meeting with Burlington Northern Toastmasters. The meeting was attended by four Burlington Northern (BN) members (Liz, Mary, Jack, & Bob), nine Mutual Voices Toastmasters (Laura B., Betsy, Marian, Mark, Laura G., Mike, Kathy, Dan, & Bill), and two Burlington Northern guests (Anjana and Kishori). Since there were many people in the room who did not know each other, our Toastmaster, Keri O, kicked off the meeting with introductions; everyone introduced themselves by sharing their name and job location. The theme of the day was “State Fair Food”, so duty holders were asked to share their favorite State Fair food during the meeting.

Our Wordmaster/Grammarian, Marian J, likes Sweet Martha Cookies. She chose “livestock” as the word of the day because she was intrigued that the definition of livestock depends on country and culture. In our culture, livestock is defined as, “Animals kept or raised for use or pleasure; esp: farm animals kept for use and profit.”

Mary S (BN), was the timer. She likes cheese curds and noted that she worked at Central Livestock before working at BN!

As Speaker #1, Betsy S, presented “A Girl’s Best Friend and More”. During her speech, Betsy shared information about diamonds, including the four Cs of gems, other uses, and other properties. The four Cs include: Carat, Clarity, Color, and Cut. Carat is a measure of the diamond’s size, where the mass of 1 carat = .007 of an ounce. Clarity defines the degree of internal defects (a.k.a., inclusions) in the diamond. Color defines whether or not the diamond is transparent. A perfect diamond is clear, however, chemical impurities or structural imperfections are usually present. Nitrogen causes diamonds to be white, more nitrogen makes them yellow (like the Tiffany Diamond; the fashion industry determines if the color increases or decreases the diamond’s value then!), boron makes them blue (like the Hope Diamond). Cut is determined by the quality of the workmanship when the diamond was cut, not the shape of the diamond (e.g., round, princess, radiant, emerald, pear, heart, marquise, or oval). Only 20% of diamonds are good enough to be gemstones; the other 80% don’t score well on the four Cs, so they are used for other purposes. Diamonds are used for other things due to their hardness, durability, semi-conductor properties, insulator properties, thermal conductor properties (they pull heat away, so are useful in making electronics smaller yet more powerful). (Time: 7:19 minutes)

Betsy’s favorite State Fair food is corn dogs, not pronto pups!

Speaker #2 was Bill S, presenting “Business Valuations”. (His favorite State Fair food is corn and cheese curds.) This speech is normally given to advisors. Business Valuations are done for business owners. He suggested engaging business owners by discussing their business valuations in order to capture their imagination and attention, gain their credibility, and create a plan based on their objectives. As an advisor, the benefits gained are insight into the client’s business which can lead to providing comprehensive services to the business owner. Bill did warn us to limit our liability though. For example, if clients use our business valuations for tax purposes, we might be liable, so we must limit our scope as advisors so that our valuations are not included on taxes. The techniques used for business valuations come from IRS code and the Financial Accounting Standards Board. First, a business’s net worth is determined, which may include houses, cars, record collections, etc. Then, a Capitalization of Earnings is done to determine the owner’s income stream. Bill ended by reminding us that Business Valuations are more of an art than a science. (Time: 8:13 minutes)

Table Topics Master, Liz M, likes pickles on a stick at the State Fair. She noted that for some people the food at the State Fair is the main attraction, for others, it’s something else. Then, she asked Kathy J to share what brings her to the fair. Kathy told us all about a trip to the State Fair where they saw the Brady Bunch perform. Tickets were so expensive that they went to the show, then left immediately. Her parents went to other Grand Stand shows as well. Kathy’s husband brought her to the Fair recently; she decided that the food is too many calories and there are too many people! (Time: 1:30 minutes)

Laura B was the second respondent. Liz told us that there are 72 foods on a stick at the Fair and asked Laura which ones should or should not be. Laura’s favorite State Fair food is a pronto pup, but she doesn’t like pickles! She recently had Key Lime Pie on a stick and thought that was a good idea—it was frozen and very good! She didn’t think spaghetti should be on a stick. Laura pictured the spaghetti mashed into a pasta ball and deep fried, with a stick shoved up it! Spaghetti should be eaten in a bowl or not at all! As long as the Fair has pronto pups, Laura’s happy. (Time: 1:14 minutes)

Liz suggested that with little ones, we should go on rides first, then have food. She’s heard horror stories of parents that have done it the other way and asked Laura G to share on of her horror stories of Fair rides and food. Laura didn’t have any horror stories to share of kids and food at the Fair since her kids are resilient and her husband hates the fair. However, she recalled an experience at Valleyfair where someone had eaten before going on the Looping Starship (the Viking boat ride)—not a good idea! The people on the other side of the ride got more than they bargained for as the ride swung back and forth! (Time: 1:17 minutes)

Evaluator #1 was Bob W. He likes mini donuts at the Fair. Bob liked Betsy’s supporting information and wrap up of her speech. He suggested that she leave the lecturn in the center of the room when using notes and that she color in her shapes on the board to add color to her speech. (Time: 2:18 minutes)

Evaluator #2 was Mike C. He likes sundaes at the Fair. Mike commended Bill on his loud voice, sense of humor (both use of and amount of), natural interaction with the audience, and relaxed movement. He suggested that Bill try to incorporate more purposeful movement, though, and that he add an outline for us to follow, state his references and quote his external sources, and that he provide in introduction for Keri to read rather than introducing himself in order to increase credibility. (Time: 2:50 minutes)

Reports
Wordmaster/Grammarian – Livestock was used three times. Phrases Marian liked include: “shove a stick up it”, “calories I don’t need”, “kids are hearty”, “watch out for the Looping Starship”. There were also several variations of ahs/ums.

Timer – See parenthesis following each speech.

Mark H was the General Evaluator. His favorite State Fair food is pronto pups, and his record is 15 of them! Mark commended Keri on kicking off the meeting on time, having everyone introduce themselves, moving the meeting along, providing good transitions, and the theme that she chose. He liked Marian’s usable word and its explanation and thought Mary did a good job timing and using the word of the day. Mark said that Liz gave a good explanation of her questions and used good humor. For the Table Topics respondents, he liked Kathy’s structure, Laura B’s stall, and Laura G’s turning the question to site a Valleyfair example. He liked Bob’s examples in his evaluation, as well as, his specific suggestions for ways to improve, but suggested that he add more structure. Mike, Mark thought, had good structure, introduction, and a balanced evaluation, and reiterated Mike’s suggestion that we all use introductions for the Toastmaster.

Spirit Award – Betsy

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home