"Help!"

Evaluating others is most difficult. It seems to me that I hadn't been compelled to do so in any real way until fairly recently when I started Toastmasters. People are there to get better as speakers and expect greater success in life as a result. Therefore, one must take seriously the responsibility of offering a critique of someone's speech. Firstly, you must be honest and clear about your assessment of what's good and why as well as what's bad and how it may be fixed. Secondly, you must be conscious of the specific person in question and how you may sensitively convey things that could hurt feelings or ruffle feathers.

All that is a challenge for the best of people, and becomes even harder if one is personally insecure and thinks a lot about throwing the first stone, as the Biblical story goes. When I offer an evaluation, I remind myself that I'm speaking not as the world's greatest public speaker, but instead merely as an objective observer giving an alternative perspective to that which comes from the speaker themself.

I'm glad that I have been through some of this, as I am now being called upon to do the same thing in the "real world". Hopefully I am somewhat the wiser for my experiences in Toastmasters and manage to genuinely help those who seek my counsel.