Introduction to Moments of Truth

1. What's MoT?

Moments of Truth (or MoT) is a club maintenance program that Toastmasters International has developed to help clubs keep key areas of their club in working order. It focuses on the following six areas:

• First Impressions
• New Member Orientation
• Fellowship, Variety, & Communication
• Program Planning & Meeting Organization
• Membership Strength
• Achievement Recognition

TI has a digital kit (linked above) that includes slides, worksheets, and so on, based on the assumption that clubs will run MoT perhaps once a year, and in one sitting. This strategy may work for your club, but it's more likely that a different approach is more advantageous to your club, some of which will be advocated for and explained in this section. 

TI describes a "moment of truth" as the impression formed when someone comes into contact with any aspect of Toastmasters based on their experience at that particular time. Doing what you can to make sure these impressions are of RDG quality is the goal of this section. If you use the scorecards provided when evaluating your MoT quality, RDG quality would rate at a four or better in most (if not all) categories, with plans to maintain this quality as well as shore up lagging elements.

2. Why MoT?

What's the point of using MoT? If your club uses the program effectively, you'll find that:

• Getting new members is easier. This means your club will achieve membership growth DCP points and have all the benefits a strong club has, like less doubling up on roles, more variety, and more fun
  
• Retaining members is easier, which means your membership will be more stable over time
• Meetings will be more organized, which means more fun and less stress
• You'll have more varied and engaging meetings, plus outside the club events, to help maintain interest and motivation strong
• Because they've been given the training and confidence to succeed, newer members will step into roles sooner rather than later, lessening the learning curve they have 

Note the "if" statement above. It's very easy to have a session about MoT from time to time, collect suggestions and discover pain points, but then sit on these and not follow through (this can happen for a number of reasons). By following this section, you'll discover not only what to look for to improve, but also how to plan and execute so these gaps are effectively addressed and closed.

3. How do you use MoT?

By now, you should have a handle on what MoT is and why it matters. How do you use it effectively, though? Traditionally, the approach has been to reserve an entire meeting to the program and try to tackle the six modules all at once. While this can work, it often can result in too many "wish list items" coming up that aren't addressed. 

If you decide to use MoT this way, here are some suggestions for doing so:

• Perform the MoT meeting near the beginning or the very end of the Toastmasters year, so that an implementation plan can be drafted for the year ahead.
• Open with lecture about the MoT's; briefly describe what they are, and what their purpose is. After that, focus more on small group activities than lecture. Make sure to mix up the groups so that there's a good distribution of new and old members for more perspectives.
• Provide worksheets to keep the groups on task. (worksheets are available in the planning section in the resources folder)
• Allow groups to work on more than one MoT by rotating them. This will give you more perspectives. Don't expect every group to touch all the MoTs, however - expect that they can really get into 2-3 depending on your time limits. 10-15 minutes per MoT should do.
• Have each group do the ratings as an aggregate to turn in on a worksheet, as well as their top 3-5 suggestions for improvement and the 3-5 top things the club does well for that MoT.
• Collect the aggregate worksheets for review by the officers. Review the suggestions and scores briefly and get some feedback on them. 
• You may want to put the suggestions up on a whiteboard or other medium, and have club members vote on what month they should be completed/focused on, then have the club secretary record a month-by-month plan. Try to narrow down how many objectives you'll pursue, and make sure it is clear who will do what by when. If you have a clear idea of what the top 3 suggestions are for each MoT, you'll have a better time than trying to pursue 33 objectives.

Whatever you do, if you want this to work, you must record the results and act on them, or the suggestions turn into "wish list items" that get done if and when someone feels like it. This makes the whole exercise a waste of time.

If taking a whole meeting isn't practical, what are some other options for conducting MoT?

• Focus on one MoT per month. Since there are six MoTs, you can either do them one month at a time twice during the year, or two months at a time. Do a brief session at the first meeting of the month similar to the above process to collect data (use the worksheets), then figure out what you want to achieve by the end and who will do what by when. At the end of the period, have a brief session to collect data again to see if you've improved that MoT. Use club business at the opening to remind people of the monthly MoT the club is focusing on.
• Use a MoT-themed meeting to collect data. You can use the MoT theme cheat sheet to facilitate this. This can work well with the above.
• Do it as an officer meeting. You won't get as much feedback, but if this is your only option, it's still valuable.
• If you have the people and the motivation, create a MoT or Club Quality committee that is dedicated to making sure the club is continually improving.

No matter how you run MoT, you must get the feedback recorded and followed up on consistently. If you don't do this, you won't get anything out of the program.

4. Who should implement MoT plans?

So you've gone through the MoT process and collected data, however your club has elected to do it. What now? As I've tried to stress, you need people to carry out the suggestions.

In many clubs, this is going to be the officers who have to divide the work and carry it out. If you're in a RDG club, each officer should have a committee they can further sub-divide the work between. Work can be split according to whose office best fits the particular action item. For example, if the club doesn't have a guestbook, this might be seen as a supply issue, and the SAA made responsible to create or purchase one.

As suggested on the last page, you may also want to have an independent committee that provides a report to the officers on MoT, if you have the members to do it. This can help keep the officers accountable.

For an example, let's suppose Superstar Speakers decides that July and August will be the months for MoT #1: First Impressions. They have a twenty minute segment at their first meeting where the MoT is introduced, and the corresponding worksheet is distributed to small groups of 2-3. The worksheets are collected, and the proposed improvements are listed on a white board (repeated suggestions from different groups are given a tick mark). Discussion and voting on the top three changes takes place.

In this example, the selected suggestions are to update the new guest packets, buy more guest name tags and markers, and have a designated greeter to meet and talk to guests. The treasurer notes these items were already covered by the budget, so will order or buy them before the next meeting. The VPE is assigned to update the agenda with the new greeter role by next meeting.

At the end of the month, a review segment shows that the new supplies have been purchased and put into use, but the greeter role has been inconsistently filled. The club has further discussion about how to amend this.