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HTM HERALD

“Winning or losing” usually makes us think of a game, a

contest or a competition. I have many a times, generally when in a

sombre mood, dwelt upon the deeper meaning of winning or losing.

What constitutes winning or losing in life? Isn’t winning and

losing relative to time, place, culture, age and one’s station in life? Can

there be a uniform yardstick to measure everyone’s victories and

debacles? Is it possible to rank people based on the commonly perceived

successes and failures? But, that is exactly what the society does with

utmost but misplaced conviction. And therein lays the root cause of

misery of the man and the society he is part of.

The commonly accepted societal notions of winning and losing

have a vice-like grip on the conscience of an average person. If winning

is equated to attainment of goals, then winning/losing must be unique to

each individual as everyone does not have the same goals. Yet, we have

collectively ordained upon ourselves certain achievements which

apparently are, most desirable. Should everyone become an engineer or

a doctor? Should everyone land a job with not less than Rs. 12 Lakhs

per annum package? Is a foreign vacation mandatory for a family to be

happy? Should a child always come first in the class? … more on pg 7

FOCUS: WINNING & LOSING

WISH YOU ALL A HAPPY AND PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR 2013 !

Oration 2013 –

Event dates 17 / 18 / 19 May 2013.

Cheapest Rates - may not last

long. 10+ members need to pay at a

time to qualify for the discount

You can avail of the 10%

registration discount for bulk

membership and pay by 31 Dec

2012 at INR 2250! Editors:

Sudharamani Vinnakota Abhishek Syal

www.hyderabadtoastmasters.in

HYDERABAD TOASTMASTERS

INSPIRING LEADERSHIP…

What is winning?

SBV Rajesh

DECEMBER 2012

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It’s five and a half months since the HTM year began for the new EC, filled with accelerated learning,

growing, giving and receiving .The role of VP PR came with a statutory warning…..that it is jinxed!!!

And the rejoinders and jovial ribbing bandied around during OTP’s and other meetings about how miniscule

and insignificant the role of PR is in a Toastmasters club only reinforced and added to the general feeling

that it was a thankless job. Fortunately for me this was a feeling I am very familiar with…being a wife and

mother you experience thanklessness on a day to day basis. And like all things I do ,I decided to take it in my

stride and look at the brighter side of things…which is that ,it is a role that comes with NO

Expectations…and that to me is a good place to start……

Having said that …being the VP PR of HTM gives me immense joy and a sense of pride and a sense of

belonging to the HTM family and my aspiration and focus for my term is to build the brand HTM from inside

out with the support of our ever growing members thanks to the continued efforts of the EC and the diligent

and meticulous manner in which Rajeev conducts his membership drives. Here are some ideas inspired by

some good reads on the net. The few things we CAN do to build our brand are to:

1. Get Feedback- this is what defines our brand. The comparisons and contrasts of how we view ourselves

and how we are perceived. So that we can isolate and advance in and tone down or discard areas that do

not work for us.

2. Focusing on our strengths- It is better to synergize our energies to build our strengths because

strengths demonstrate passion and drive while weakness lead us to frustration and stagnation if they are not

overcome or resolved in a timely fashion.

3. Unravel the mystery of our own Brand DNA- that which makes us unique –our USP .And each

individual member as the flag bearer of this brand should seek out and court the forthcoming contests,

participate in high numbers and keep the HTM flag flying high.

4. Inclusive Growth- Just personal branding would mean inflating our egos and putting ourselves ahead of

others and it is imperative to recognize that our success depends on both our individual capabilities and our

club members’ ability to magnify and multiply the same. This we can do by continually and unconditionally

offering to support and encourage our fellow members in their speech progression and achieving leadership

goals.

And finally recognizing and accepting that our brand cannot grow without the community and network of

Toastmasters around us. We are part of this fast growing tribe because we are all likeminded individuals

moving in the same direction who firmly recognize the power that it gives us to becoming more and more

successful in our careers and our lives.

And in between all this sooner or later one hope to receive an oversized coffee mug which reads “Worlds’

best mom” or “Worlds’ best wife “ or even one that reads “HTM’s Best PR” and then all this will be worth it

and the thanklessness ….What thanklessness????

Sudha Ramani

VP PR, Editor

Editor’s Note

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DR. A. V. S. PRASAD

The next job was to make sure our toastmasters get value from

being a member. So I applied some more of my learning's from

the 20 plus years managing people - when you want people to

do something and be happy about it - 'Empower them'. So we

re- defined guidelines for members, right from the number of

speeches they would be required to deliver roles to volunteering

for meeting roles etc. The trick was to get all members to sign

up happily. So now if all members participate in the club whole

heartedly, they grow in turn and won’t leave. Standard

management technique, count the RSVP these days! Next job

done!

But in any organization, you need a bench strength, even after

doing all the hard work in retaining members, people still seem

to leave for various reasons. So we organized an 'Open house'.

I put the agenda together, TM Bharti, TM Salil, TM Jagrut,

TM Prasad and TM Ajit did all the hard work, and now week

after week we are being rewarded with an overwhelming

number of guests and prospective members

So there you go, we have high retention, members learning and

growing, and a wide bench to tap into for new members.

But one of my biggest achievements in the last quarter was to

successfully negotiate with TM Prasad our treasurer, in

allowing the Air conditioning to function and to serve snacks

at the membership drive. I think I deserve kudos for that alone!

It was a pleasant surprise for me the day TM Salil

suggested that I consider taking a larger role in driving the

Toastmaster movement. It was a surprise, given that it was

only a few weeks since I had joined the club. I hoped that I

would live up to the show of confidence. Soon I found

myself leading the Membership function. TM Ajit our past

president, who is well versed with metrics, was quick to

assign a target to me - 'get 20 new members'. I had full

support from TM Sudha, she said she will help put together

a membership drive. TM Prasad said you can do whatever

you like, as long as you don't ask for any money! I was all

set given all the support.

The Membership function is about retention, engagement

and growth. I am from the IT industry, we live and breathe

these terms, and I was an expert in performance appraisal,

bonus plans, stock options, employee survey analysis and all

the cool stuff we do in corporate. Soon I discovered doing

that for Toastmasters club is a lot different. I had to think!

So we attempted a few things in the last quarter, and here is

a summary...

Our Membership renewal collection was very effective, we

completed and paid TMI before time. I hired a collection

agent - TM Prasad (that’s’ one thing I have learnt in

corporate - hire people smarter than you, they will figure out

what to do). So he convinced people to renew, and we had

only 4 dropouts.

Membership Function Report - Rajeev

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My Sprint at Humor! - Raji

One sunny morning in the first week of August, 2012 TM

Salil came to me and asked “Raji, are you participating in

the humorous contest Speech? I said “Salil, I missed the

education session on Humorous speech contest, I don’t think

I can do it”. But Salil had a different view, he said “I think

you have humour in your attitude, you should do it, Raji”. It

was TM Salil who motivated me to join the TM family, so I

trusted the confidence he had in me. These words were very

encouraging and I thought, I will give it a try.

The first challenges I had to face was - picking up a

topic. Three to Four topics were revolving in my mind,

finally I zeroed in on my experience during my first flight

journey. Second challenge was allocating time for preparing

for the speech content - being a housewife, mother of two

demanding kids, a yoga teacher, and a student of classical

music, I had to squeeze out time for this. Even the day

before the club level contest, I was very busy and couldn’t

work on the speech as much as I wanted. I sat up late nights

but nothing had worked to my satisfaction. I was thinking to

drop out as I was not happy with the content and the way I

delivered in the speech during my rehearsals. I did a demo

to TM Salil, he thought it was good and asked me to go

ahead. Again I made some more modifications and made the

final draft of my speech. Finally the day 26th

Aug, 2012,

came an important day for me, to showcase my latent talent.

Having just done three speeches at club level, I was not sure

if I would be able to “Make People Laugh”.

The hall was full of audience, TMs and guests wearing

different facial expressions waiting to hear me. I started with

nervousness, but as I progressed, the nervousness slowly melted

away into the laughter of the audience. I fell into the flow of

speech with confidence. Everyone congratulated me for the

original content and the style of delivery with gestures.

Unbelievable!! I won the first runner-up. I was over the moon.

Next was the challenge for me to prepare for the Area Level

contest. I consulted the mentors and worked on delivering the

same speech at Area level with changes suiting the audience at

that level. I delivered the speech on Sept 16th

& stood the first

runner up. But, I knew that a bigger challenge lay ahead for me,

as I had to compete at the Division level contest on Oct. 6.

For this level, I wanted to try a different topic. I spoke to my

mentors regarding changing of my speech topic for the division

level. They told me that, I could go ahead with the old speech

but I insisted on changing it for a different level of contest and

contestants. After lot of mind churning, I zeroed in on topic of

‘obesity’, as I was experiencing it myself for the past few years.

I delivered the Division level speech on 6th, Oct

. I was

the 4th

speaker in the order. As luck would have it, the speaker

number 3 had the same topic as mine. And I think, he did a

good job. I knew that it was battle I was going to lose, but I

went on the stage like a brave warrior, not letting my energy to

drop even for a micro second.

I lost, but the praises and appreciations I got were not

less than any awards. For sure, I will cherish these memories

and I am looking forward for the next contest season.

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What

makes

HTM

special?

Dr. A V S Prasad

With so many new members joining our club, I felt it might be a good idea for them

to know something about the history of our club. As I joined much later, I only

know about the early beginnings from the time I joined which is 5 years ago.

Hyderabad Toastmasters is the first community club in the twin cities. TM

Vidyashankar started this club when the Toastmasters movement in Hyderabad was

almost non-existent. The first club here was Infosys, but it had shut down. CSC

Toastmasters was holding rare meetings, and there was really no action at all. TM

Vidyashankar put up a post on meetup.com calling people interested in Public

speaking. This resulted in Mario Rozario (presently Area Governor in Pune) and

then Salil G (our VP-ed) meeting with Vidya, and thus the club began. Later, Ajit

joined the club, followed still later by Padmaja, Rameshwar, Shujath, VMRG

Suresh, Ashfaq and Venkata. At that time, the members were meeting regularly, but

without being affiliated to Toastmasters International.

It was at this point that I joined HTM. I was introduced to the club by Salil, who had

come to see me for a homoeopathic consultation. I found him to be a very

interesting person, and when he mentioned this public speaking club, I was

extremely keen to join. However, the meetings were held then on Saturdays, when I

had my clinic. I told him that Sunday would work for me. Since there were not too

many members at that time, they changed the day to accommodate me. I think we

were 8-10 members strong at that time. We struggled a lot to get 20 members to sign

up for chartering with TMI.

On several occasions, we bought a cake because we had reached the "magic

number" 20, but each time someone would drop out, and so we could not charter.

Finally, at one point TM Ashfaq, our VP-Membership at that time got five of his

subordinates at his office to join the club! With that, HTM became affiliated to TMI.

None of those 5 members attended a single club meeting!!

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However, once we were affiliated with TMI, we started growing

steadily, and as the first community club, we gave life to the

Toastmasters movement here in the twin cities. We were present

everywhere, helping other clubs, guiding them, helping in the

first speechcraft conducted at Dell Toastmasters (no longer in

existence). About this time, many corporates wanted to start

Toastmasters, but they were all doing their own thing. The VPs-

membership of all the existing club were called for a meeting at

Barista in Jubilee hills, and here we found out the different clubs'

meeting timings etc, and shared this with all via email. Thus,

members of one club started going to other clubs. Then, HTM

held the first joint meeting of all clubs - members from Dell,

Oracle, Vision, CSC and HTM were present, as well as one other

club which finally did not take off.

The highlights for HTM were the special Intent-to-Charter

meeting, when District Governor Bosco and District LGET

Venkat came down to Hyderabad. Later, we received the charter

from TMI and for this an extra-special meeting was held at the

Secunderabad Club on 7th January. This is always celebrated as

our Charter day - the day we actually received our charter from

the District Governor and were installed as officers. It was a

fantastic event and for me, it was the highlight of being in HTM,

the biggest thrill. Later, our club gained some prominence when

TM Mario, Vidyashankar and I won awards in different contests.

TM Pradeep Raghunathan of CSC and TM Vidyashankar

both wanted to be Area Governor (Hyderabad was an

Area then), but without an election, Vidya agreed to let

Pradeep take the office as the first Area Governor. When

Hyderabad became a Division, TM Ajit became the first

Division Governor. A very special moment for all of us

was when we conducted our club's 100th meeting,

presided by TM Johnny - all 4 Past Presidents were

present at the meeting: TM Vidyashankar, Ajit, Venkata,

AVSPrasad! No club we know in India has had such

continuity of leadership - being guided by past as well as

present presidents.

When one of the senior Toastmasters in India, DTM J.P.

Patnaik visited Hyderabad, he was very impressed by our

club and the range of our activities. He called us the

Lighthouse club. With that, we took on the logo of the

Lighthouse for HTM, an idea suggested by TM Harsh

Singhal. Our initial logo was the four minarets of

Charminar with the TMI logo. When Ajit was president,

he asked us to think of a motto, and I suggested "Inspiring

Leadership", in the sense of the verb as well as noun - i.e.,

that we inspire leadership, and that we are an inspiring

leadership. I believe this to be true of HTM.

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WHAT IS WINNING?

… contd from pg 1 | The answer to the above

is obvious. There is no ambiguity that being happy and

contended is the ultimate goal for any person. But

often we find ourselves on a slippery ground in

deciding what makes us happy! So it follows that

setting up realistic, achievable and relevant goals is the

key to winning in life. That does not mean that one

should not aim high. The mantra is one should set high

but practically possible targets and strive hard to

achieve those targets. Even more critically important is

to cultivate the spiritual strength to prevent the failures

from making you crestfallen.

Real losing is not the failure to achieve a

goal, but being resigned to defeat and giving up the

efforts to even try to achieve a goal. Winning or losing

is just a toss of a coin, true victory lies in giving your

best to win. True victory is not getting too elated with

successes or getting discouraged with failures.

Winning is the ability take defeat in your stride and to

learn lessons from defeat and never repeating the same

mistake. Winning is ability to see the big picture of

life without missing the nitty-gritty of mundane

victories and defeats.

Happy Winning and Happier Losing for a

Life full of Happiness !!

In January of 2012, I attended the Youth Speechcraft program

conducted by the Hyderabad Toastmasters. I was interested in

public speaking but didn't have the guts to speak in front of an

audience. I had taken part in a few debates and elocutions and

always was got cold feet! My father encouraged me to join this

program.

I expected a formal, boring atmosphere but it was pretty lively

and free-flowing. I learnt some very important skills from YSP

like giving feedback and evaluation. I also gained the courage to

speak in front of people and learned the art of impromptu

speaking which can help in almost every situation in the life. I

earned a few ribbons for Table Topics and made quite a few

friends. I have now started frequenting debates and also

participated in a Model United Nations conference in HPS

.Needless to say, all of my impromptu speaking skills helped me

when I had to argue with other members of the UN Security

Council. Despite being the youngest, I won Special Mention

Award. Toastmasters is a rewarding experience where every

time you attend a meeting you pick up a tip or two on how to

improve your public speaking and communication. Inspired by

my experiences and success at public speaking, my father

Shailesh has also joined Hyderabad Toastmasters .

MY EXPERIENCE AT HTM - NEEL

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Hyderabad Toastmasters

Ajit Dembla Past President

Jagrut Vaishnav President

Salil.G VP, Education

Rajeev Shroff VP, Membership

Sudha Ramani VP, Public Relations

Dr. AVS Prasad Treasurer

Raji.V Sergeant at Arms

Bharathi Ramineni Secretary

CONTACT:

Rajeev vp.membership@hyderabadtoastmasters.in 93915 39626

Sudha vp.pr@hyderabadtoastmasters.in 98480 21663

DECEMBER 2012

Our

Executive

Committee