My focus this week has been on helping and advising prospective online clubs in the use of easy-Speak for their club management. In this post I will include ‘Ten Tips and Tasks’ for best practice in using easy-Speak for the first time as an administrator.

Note 1: If your preferred choice of club management tools is FreeToastHost, you may find this FreeToastHost Support  site useful.

Note 2: If your preferred choice of club management tools is WordPress, you may find this WordPress for Toastmasters site useful.

Why use easy-Speak?

Let’s put everything into context first. Once you have gathered a critical mass of prospective members of your online club, and you wish to plan ahead for the meetings, assign roles for that event, record speeches; you will find it useful to have a web based system like easy-Speak to manage that process.

The easy-Speak system provides the following tools and functions:

1. a base camp where your members and visitors can see information on the Home page, find the Agenda pages with links to the online meeting spaces
2. a database of records of meeting roles performed and speeches delivered providing a full electronic record for each member in their Communication and Leadership Charts
3. a planning tool for meetings that enable many things to be done in advance:
   • signups for meetings by members and visitors
   • self-assignment of meeting roles
   • speech requests
4. a communication tool for
   • sending: meeting reminder emails, club mass emails, club executive emails
   • recording: agendas and minutes of Executive meetings, documentation relevant to membership
5. a menu driven website that enables ease of navigation for members and a plethora of tools for the club officers

King Arthur’s Playground

This is an easy-Speak practice site setup for easy-Speak learners.

Above is an example of the Home page of this practice site and below an example of an Agenda assignment page.

Note: If you require access to this site please join the group of enthusiasts and champions in the easy-Speak Toastmasters Community.

Ten Tips and Tasks

Here are my recommended steps for using easy-Speak effectively as you setup for your new online club.

1. Customize your Home page with the images and information you want on display
2. Use the Control Panel to ‘setup‘ the meeting locations, officer permissions etc.
3. Add your Club Officer Executive team as users of the site and to the list of officers
4. Create your first meeting Agenda using a simple template included in the options
5. Add your pre-charter members individually or as a group
6. Assign members to the roles of the meeting (after private consultation)
7. Request speeches on behalf of your speakers (after private consultation)
8. Adjust the timing and layout of your Agenda ready for printing
9. Send instructions to your members on how to access the easy-Speak site
10. Send out your first meeting email from the system

Each one of these tasks will require some training for you as the administrator of the site. Alternatively you may have an easy-Speak champion among your prospective members; delegate some of the tasks and responsibilities of the easy-Speak site setup to them.

Case Study: The brand new online prospective club Witty Storytellers are using a team approach to the setup of their easy-Speak site. Julie as VPE and Svetlana as President. Between them they are planning ahead for their meetings and getting their members to embrace easy-Speak.

easy-Speak Training

Currently there are several options for your easy-speak training opportunities. Select the one that works best for you:

• watch video tutorials at the easy-Speak Support Team channel in YouTube
• enrol as a guest in the easy-Speak Made Easy online course (Password = easyspeak)
• attend or review the webinars from the easy-Speak Help Desk online flyer
• access the articles in the Knowledge Base at easy-Speak (Using this Site  and Club Management)
• join and participate in the easy-Speak Toastmasters Community in Facebook

Next week I will focus on more of the easy-Speak functions worth implementing for your online club.