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MAMALADE

Evaluation

Digging for Diamonds

Tonight we are going to look at the most important skill you can learn in Toastmasters. With this skill, you can win friends and influence people, get along with your co-workers and have them do what you want them to. This skill is Evaluation.

What is evaluation?



  • IMMEDIATE FEEDBACK

  • REINFORCES STRENGTHS

  • IMPROVEMENT

  • SELF ESTEEM

Immediate feedback. Encouragement. Helpful advice.It used to be called “Critique". Constructive criticism. The dictionary definition of evaluation is, “Ascertaining the value of." “Appraising carefully." I like to think of it as “Digging for diamonds.”

How does evaluation help the speaker? Evaluation provides immediate feedback. It reinforces the speaker's strengths and offers ways to improve. It builds and maintains self esteem. It motivates the speaker to return and give another speech – an even better speech.

How does evaluation help us?



  • LISTENING SKILLS

  • IMPROMPTU SPEAKING

  • LIFE SKILLS


Evaluation improves our listening skills. It provides an opportunity for impromptu speaking. Evaluation is one of life's most important skills, when you use the basic rule of presenting an evaluation, that is, praise, say what you want done, then praise again. This is the best way to get people to do what you want them to. You can successfully raise you children using this method. You can even train your dog! ("Here boy, SIT!" “Good dog!")

How does Evaluation help our club?



  • SETS CLUB STANDARDS

  • SHOWS PROGRAM

    IS WORKING

Evaluation sets the standard for the club. It shows that the Toastmasters programme is working. Without effective evaluations, you don't have a quality club.

What is a quality evaluation? To be effective, an evaluation should motivate the speaker to improve. If you just try to make him feel good by telling him his speech is wonderful when it isn't, then you are just wasting everyone's time and dragging down the standards of the organisation.

What should we do before we evaluate a speech?



  • SHOW INTEREST

  • TALK TO THE SPEAKER

    Manual objectives

    Evaluation guidelines

    Other concerns

An evaluator needs to prepare. Talk to the speaker. Show that you are interested.

Contact the speaker in advance and discuss the manual objectives and the evaluation guidelines.

Ask about any concerns regarding the speech or the speakers abilities.

Get to know the speaker. Observe their earlier speeches. Look at previous evaluators comments in their manual and note whether the speaker has worked on their suggestions for improvement.

Consider the objectives in the manual. Find out what the speaker is aiming for. And don't expect him to run before he can crawl. For instance, I've heard evaluators of the first 2 or 3 speeches suggest that the speaker could have used more gestures. Now, that is the objective for the 4th speech and I don't think it is fair to bring it up when evaluating an earlier speech. Of course, if he is already attempting gestures, he should be praised for his efforts, but it shouldn't be expected of him at this stage.

Presenting the evaluation.

Tonight, I'm concentrating mainly on how to present the evaluation. There's not time to discuss all the points you could look for.

So how do we go about delivering an evaluation?



  • OPENING

  • BODY

  • CONCLUSION

An evaluation is a three minute mini-spech. It needs an opening, a body and a conclusion.

Can you suggest a good opening?

Acknowledge the speaker. “This evening we had the privilege of listening to an interesting and informative speech by....” What other ways could you describe the speech? (Challenging, thought proving, humorous, inspiring, etc)

There's your opening. Now for the body.



  • PRAISE

  • PRAISE

  • POINTS FOR IMPROVEMENT

  • PRAISE

You want to reinforce the strong points of the speech.

Say what you liked about the speech and tell why. You could say, “I liked the way he used body language, for example, when he said this, he did this!”

Think of one or two more things to commend.

Next we come to points for improvement. Limit it to no more than two. We don't want to overwhelm the speaker – and we do want him to come back!

Don't say, “You did that wrong!” You are not issuing a judgement on behalf of the club, you are just telling what effect the speech had on you personally.

Personalise your language

Use phrases such as, “It seemed to me...”

“ I feel that...”

“ I believe...”

Instead of saying, “He spoke too fast, you might say something like, “If he had slowed his rate of speaking, I would have found it easier to take in the excellent points he was making.”

We usually use the third person rather than address the speaker directly. It brings in the whole audience and takes some of the pressure off the speaker.

Now for the conclusion.

How can you close in a way that will make the speaker want to start preparing his next speech when he goes home?



  • SUMMARISE

  • STRONG POINTS

  • CONGRATULATIONS

Summarise what you have already said.

Comment on what you think are his strongest points and congratulate the speaker on his effort.

Evaluation teaches us to think of the other person. To ask ourselves, “What advice can I give that will help him to do better?

Remember the diamond cutter. Just as the diamond grinder hones and polishes the diamond, you are honing and polishing a speaker. Slowly, gently, little by little, evaluation will bring out the potential and brilliance of our members.



I have borrowed the closing paragraph from "Elizabeth's Eleven Rules for Enlightened Evaluations" at Parramatta Toastmasters Their website is well worth a visit.

MAMALADE

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