No show this time. Business only

These were the words our WorldSurfers member Sergey Saprykin said prior to holding the first meeting of a corporate Toastmasters club at NLMK (Новолипецкий Металлургический Комбинат).

Sergey invited experienced members of different Moscow clubs to help him hold a test meeting within his company doors. His aim was to establish a corporate Toastmasters club for NLMK employees. 

The meeting was planned at a beautiful NLMK office in Moscow, where even the elevators were covered in expensive marble. A fancy meeting room was allocated for this meeting with a video conference set up for employees from other offices to watch us. 

After a month of preparations that went into organising this meeting, the day has finally come. It was 19:10 already, but no company employees came (the meeting was supposed to start at 19:00). It seemed that Toastmasters will be the only people attending this meeting. The pressure was peaking.

Suddenly, a group of 4 employees came. Then another 3. Then 5 more. And some more. It reached the point when there were not enough chairs to allocate everyone, so more chairs had to be brought from other rooms. Over 20 people came and sat patiently, awaiting for the start.

Sergey came out and started the meeting. At first, all Toastmasters were shocked. His voice went really calm and quiet. He looked very corporate, and sounded very serious. It was Sergey we have never seen before. The tension could be felt in the air.

After that, the minor roles started to present themselves also in a very official manner. Then, brave company employee Tatiana was invited on stage to do her Ice Breaker. It was an outstanding Ice Breaker that by no means could be referred to as “serious and corporate”. This was the point where the Ice has been Broken between us all. The tension has totally dropped, giving place to the delightful atmosphere inherit to all Toastmasters clubs. It was beautiful.

Toastmasters and organisers did an outstanding job on that day - no wonders there, 7 of the participants invited were or currently are club or Moscow Area Presidents 😏 Together they showed what a high quality Toastmasters meeting should be like. It was clear by the end - the meeting was a success! NLMK employees were very engaged and actively participated in the Table Topics and evaluations. By the end of the meeting partial club committee has been formed as well. It was a strong start to what we hope will become a strong Toastmasters Club at Novolipetsk Steel. We wish Sergey and his team best of luck with that 🍀