Here was my final message to my District team as I neared the end of my service as District Director for Toastmasters East Africa in June 2020. The team went on to achieve extraordinary results despite disruptions resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic and emerged as the top 3rd district in the world out of 125 districts. In August 2019, a month after I had started my term in office as District Director my wife Wanjira and I received the wonderful news that we were going to have a baby. We were elated and celebrated the good news for a nice long moment. Our small celebration would have gone longer, had reality not then rudely knocked on the door. Behind it were the doubt and fears which had been held back at the fringes of our mind. And as we cranked the door open, all of them crudely burst through. How were we going to manage a new baby? Wanjira was the new District Administration Manager, a role she was well suited for as a Human Resource practitioner and with her detailed-oriented
On April 15, 2014 Early Birds Toastmasters became the first Toastmasters club in Kenya to use a whatsapp group to communicate with its members. Having participated in several other Toastmasters club whatsapp group, I can confidently claim that Early Birds whatsapp group remains the one of the best managed. With this article, I’d like to delve in what it takes to manage a whatsapp group effectively. Before we embark on that, maybe first we should define well managed. In my view a well-managed whatsapp group for a Toastmasters club should be: relevant in terms of information shared, vibrant in terms of the breadth and frequency of messages, and productive in terms of contributing to the goals of the club. Relevance Every whatsapp group when set up has a purpose. For a Toastmasters group this purpose should be either communication about Toastmasters related activities, learning on leadership and communication, or bonding by members within the values of the Toastmasters community o