I've done both the older CC CL Manuals upto ACG ALB and completed a Pathway (VC).

What I've noticed is that the Pathways speeches are very boring, too corporate-y, everyone repeats the same thing over and over again and there is no creativity, or story telling involved in most projects. Its just not as interesting.

I've been a TM since 2018 and was one of the last ones to complete the older system. Frankly speaking, TM Club experience has also deteriorated since then as people are not as invested in the projects as before. The retention rate for clubs has also gone down drastically.

I think TM should revert back to CL CL, even if it's on an online portal and not via physical copies.

Kindly share your opinions.

I work in the tech industry and the creation, management and implementation of Pathways is horrible.. Dan Rex should be fired.. The big problem is Dan Rex is not accountable to anyone just a small board of cronies.

1- Dan Rex has made drives to open new clubs to show growth. In the corporate world more dues/money means raises for the CEO. The sad fact behind this is now we have thousands of new clubs that were tossed up then the “club sponsor” walks away and now a large percentage of these tossed up clubs are deteriorating now.

2- Pathways is a horrible failure.. Dan Rex is still trying to pretend it is fine and that “old people” have trouble getting used to new things.

The software needs to be scrapped.. You do not make pop ups mobile friendly. Who builds software out of pop ups in 2018 ?? This is not 1994.

The project instructions are confusing and unclear which is leading to different interpretations of them. How are we supposed to learn to be better communicators from people who cannot even make a simple set of instructions ?

After a couple of years of big messes and failure Dan Rex has patted him self on the back posted his cooked numbers and gave himself a raise he now make more then $600,000 a year.

I'm sure the golden parachute is already packed.

Everyone will quit Toastmasters at some point or another. Here's my story.

Toastmasters was a big part of my life for about a decade.

I had a full blown phobia of giving presentations in college and one day grandpa mentioned, "Hey, ever heard of Toastmasters?" It was uphill from there: I slowly gained skills and confidence, started serving in low-level leadership roles, knocked out my CC, moved onto President, served as President a few more times, Area Governor, started my own club, speech contests, you name it. I met a lot of incredible people and picked up some skills I'll carry with me for the rest of my life.

Tonight, I was reflecting on my time with Toastmasters, but also my "break up" with it. I feel it's important, and vital to productive change, for people to talk about these things which is why I'm sharing.

1. Pathways and Base Camp are terrible

I know I'm preaching to the choir here as there is no shortage of shade thrown at Pathways/Base-Camp 'round these parts.

Toastmasters had a beautiful thing going for it: a few simple paper manuals, a group of supportive people, and motivation was all you really needed to better yourself.

The Pathways/Boot-Camp rollout has been disheartening to say the least, degrading the Toastmasters experience by leaps and bounds. And this is coming from a software engineer that spends my working life designing and building products on the web.

My paper manuals, marked up with comments and speech notes, used to be a symbol of pride and accomplishment. The new experience is cold, clunky, and a major step back.

2. Too much focus on delivery

I've found that the most effective speaking qualities are generally these and in this order:

1. Authenticity

2. Compelling content

3. Delivery

Toastmasters puts, by and large, the vast majority of its focus on "Delivery". There is an obsessive focus on becoming perfectly polished:

• "I heard you say 'um' a few times in your speech. Try to cut those down"

• "You paused just a little too long at one point"

• "Try to maintain just a bit more eye contact"

• "You had some body language but I think you'd be more effective with just a bit more"

I often noticed that many newcomers would come across as extremely compelling and authentic for their first meet meeting. And I'd also see their speaking "polish" increase over time while losing a lot of their authenticity as they obsess over delivering the perfect Tony-Robbins-esque speech.

Some of the best speakers I've ever heard have plenty of "ahs" and "ums", don't maintain eye contact 100% of the time, and have speaking idiosyncrasies that really improve their overall authenticity and effectiveness.

What would bring me back

You can probably guess what would bring me back: bring back the paper manuals with less of a focus on delivery and more focus on the effectiveness of authenticity and content. I'm thankful for everything that Toastmasters did for me, and I'm hoping they'll start moving this direction (though I have strong doubts it will).

TL;DR We dropped out because of Pathways and because the Fall contest has been permanently cancelled.

I've been an on/off member of Toastmasters for 9 years. I've been a member of three different clubs, served as the president for two different clubs, and served in a number of other officer roles as well. I really credit Toastmasters with helping me dramatically improve my verbal communication skills.

Two years ago I decided to start a closed corporate club at my company with the help of another long time Toastmaster. Relatively soon after we started, Pathways was rolled out to our District. All of our members were new to Toastmasters, so we heavily pushed Pathways since no one was more than 2-3 speeches deep into the CC manual. Despite us pushing for Pathways, doing education session during meetings, etc, it never caught on.

In my opinion Pathways is fundamentally flawed and cannot be fixed. Everyone knows it is hard to use, poor UI, etc, but the problems are much deeper than that.

1. The best thing about the CC manual was it's simplicity. I can explain to a new member in 30 seconds how to get started. "Here is the manual, there are 10 speeches, work your way through them." Every member is the club is familiar with those ten speeches and can help a new member with them. I worked in product development and it is a fundamental law of product development that the more friction you add, the fewer people will use the product. The level of friction in Pathways is so high that I saw almost none of our members actually do a project from Pathways.

2. Pathways has a lot of hokey projects like doing a podcast, writing a blog, managing a panel discussion, running an online meeting, or developing a social media presence listed under many of the paths. Many members have told me these projects don't really seem interesting to them and do not seem related to why they are there at Toastmasters. They are there at Toastmasters to just get comfortable getting up and speaking in front of other people. I believe many of Pathway's projects fundamentally lack product/market fit.

So last October, when it was time to renew dues, our club decided to not renew and drop out of Toastmasters. The reason is because we had a couple dozen people paying $50 every 6 months and we felt like we were no longer getting any value for that money.

1. Toastmaster's Pathways education program was so difficult to use that no one was using it, and everyone was just doing ad-hoc speeches

2. As a closed corporate club, Toastmasters did not help bring us new members

3. We felt at least one big benefit of being a Toastmasters club and part of Toastmasters network was the contests. It is a chance to interact, challenge yourself, and learn from some of the best speakers of other clubs. However, since Toastmasters decided to cancel the Fall contest, there is now only 1 contest a year, and much less benefit.

Our club is continuing to run as a non-affiliated public speaking club since October and things have been going well. For other closed corporate clubs (and even open clubs), I would really encourage you to re-evaluate if Toastmasters is providing you your money's worth for the dues you pay every 6 months or if you can run just as effectively independent from Toastmasters.

As a long time member of Toastmasters and someone who got a lot of value from Toastmasters, I really hope Toastmasters International will have the courage to reverse their decisions on Pathways and on the Fall contest before Toastmasters slowly atrophies away due to fewer new members sticking around and old members dropping off.

I joined Toastmasters exactly 7 years ago. It was to improve my communication skills but I also had some speakers who I admired and wanted to emulate such as Steve Jobs or Winston Churchill. I wanted to deliver speeches that could change the world.

But when I watch the speech contests and especially world championship, I feel that all the speeches are the same. There's only one type of speech that wins. Don't get me wrong. These are great speakers. Better than I could ever be. But a Winston Churchill or Steve Jobs would never make it even in a club contest.

It reminds me a lot of AI slop, where every output looks the same because that's what's most likely.

I wanted to read the classics about public speaking and started with Aristotle's Rhetorics and there's so much that I didn't learn at Toastmasters, which is the place where we are supposed to learn these things. Again, because we perpetuate that linear way of delivering speeches (including evaluation and table topics).

Anyone else feels this way and what are you doing to change that?

I just saw the email about increasing dues from $60 to $72. Although you could argue that an extra $12 ($2/month) is small in the grand scheme of things, the price hike rubs me the wrong way. I've been part of Toastmasters for 3 years now and I love my club, but I feel like I don't gain much from the International organization as a whole to justify a higher fee without any seemingly added value. Anyone else feel the same way? At what point ($80? $100?) would you feel that the costs outweigh the benefits?

I think I will quit, as I have become a better public speaker, no longer using many fillers words. I can do impromptu speeches. I am also finding the club I am in boring and to formal. I don't enjoy doing the pathways anymore. I don't really enjoy going once a week to meetings and find excuses to skip them. As I feel like it drags on too long and is no longer enjoyable.

Edit; Look Toastmaster has some great skills, but I don't see lasting in the future. If Toastmasters really wanted to get more members. They need to get rid of the Outdated format. Possibly wipe pathways completely and start a- fresh. Have less focus on leadership, filler words and hand gestures. More about just what keeps audience captivated. How to do a speech in story form like a youtuber. Maybe instead online zoom meetings and committee meetings. They have once month, a person comes in from acting class and show cases new skill, or inspirational speaker talks to the club, we do debating two topics once a month, we have theme nights where we do speeches and TT on a certain topic. There is so much TI could do, to make it more exciting and insteresting but they are stuck in their old ways. So maybe the best thing is it for it to slowly die off.

It's happened to me 3 times so far.

"Hey-hey-hey!! /u/ProfessorGigs, I loved your speech!! So articulate and passionate!! I think you'd be great in sales!! Listen, if you'd like to make more money I'd like to talk with you some more."

Then they lure you to sell your soul to Amway, World Financial Group, Primerica, etc. There's many more, but those are the 3 MLM groups that I've encountered as a result of joining Toastmasters.

Take Care + Do Your Research!

I’ve been a toastmaster for 13 years and an officer for 12. I cannot stand that I need to be trained twice a year and my district requires 3 hours of training each time. I have to give up time on the weekends or evenings to take the most pointless training. The one hour role specific training is fine but then add on two hours of inane filler. At least on zoom I can just have it playing in the background. It’s honestly a real barrier to getting new members try out being officers.

Rant over.

Hey,

Yesterday, I completed my first icebreaker speech. A typical icebreaker is around 4 minutes. My icebreaker was under 2 minutes. I was really nervous and I increased tempo, forgot my pauses and several point's that I wanted to make. I booked my icebreaker within a month of joining the club. At the time it felt like a great idea, but on the day I wanted to cancel my speech completely. I also underestimated the level and type of preparation required as well.

I thought my speech was horrible but the feedback from my evaluator and other meeting attendees was worth it. The responses were more positive than I expected and stated that I looked comfortable on stage, articulated my points well and delivered my message very clearly. A strong contrast to my own perception of my speech.

I've been trying to build up the confidence to attend and join Toastmasters for a while. I am ashamed that it has taken me over two years. But last night, I started to experience some of the benefits of Toastmaster and I am excited about my journey and next speech.

Thank you.

I’ve found myself being far less willing to recommend Toastmasters recently- personally and professionally. I used to tell our young employees to “go to Toastmasters for a year or two” to work on getting comfortable with speaking, presenting, running meetings, etc. During my experience as VP of Membership in a club, I saw so many people struggle to gain traction in Pathways that I can’t sell it as a good/easy experience. Anyone else feeling this way?

Word of mouth in the business world was always a huge engine of membership and I feel like that channel is in jeopardy.

I'm from Pakistan, It's difficult for people here to manage this amount here and I'm seeing many clubs getting closed soon. It's almost impossible to find people only because of what toastmasters charge. Many people are willing to join but they cant because of hefty fees.

Toastmasters need to consider this decision, charging this amount for an old portal.

Maybe it’s time to stop renewing and start protecting our clubs and communities.

Toastmasters was built around a great community spirit: members helping members grow, members taking care of their club expenses , doing all the work as a way of work to keep everything affordable.. But international dues keep increasing without any reason and little improvement in the value we receive.

Fees has increased from 12$ in 1982 to 72$ today , from 45$ in 2017 to 60$ just last semester and 72$ today

And if you want to understand where the money goes, at least part of it go to the district , Check your District’s own budget that gets 25% of the total fees, Look at how much is allocated to travel, accommodation, meals compared to supporting club growth , food has more budget that club growth ,

The District leaders are supposed to represent members’ voices. So members should also hold the organization accountable and ask for transparency, but they Don't,

And remember: your local club community is much important than the Toastmasters brand.

If you don’t want to renew your international membership, you can still support your local club and keep meeting, practicing, learning, and helping each other.

The spirit of Toastmasters belongs to its members not to a logo or an affiliation , or a top management disconnected from the realities all clubs and members are facing .

I'm a career communicator and recently decided to join Toastmasters to improve public speaking and leadership skills.

I was stunned to find most of the clubs in my area are still meeting online only. I understand why that was necessary during the pandemic but it seems lazy as we continue to emerge from covid.

Also I'm finding the application process cumbersome, as it's not available online. I'm surprised the organization hasn't figured out how to accept applications and club dues electronically.

It makes me wonder, is Toastmasters even relevant anymore? Has it become antiquated? I remember attending as a guest with my sister 20 something years ago and it seemed like such an awesome group!

Do I need to keep looking? Have I just not found the right group? Am I expecting too much? Did covid change everything?

Edit: Thank you, everyone, for the thoughtful responses. I appreciate the feedback. Plenty of food for thought.

Im 19 and Im wondering if joining a toastmasters club will help me become a better speaker. I want to get rid of this before it gets any worse and I don’t want to go my entire life being intimidated by speaking to people.

A couple of weeks back, it was announced that the membership fees would increase from $60 to $72, a 20% rise in the fees. They also increased the price of the paths from $20 to $35, a 75% rise. My question is WHY!

They charge money for EVERYTHING, for conferences, club/district officers training, entry for a contest, merchandise etc. On top of that there are government charges and credit card charges. Where does this stop??!

In some countries, this becomes too expensive, and it makes us question whether the value it is adding is worth the money or not. TM continues to run because of the members. It gives a stage to people who come from not-so-privileged financial backgrounds, who never got an opportunity to work on their communication and leadership skills. The price hike will affect this. We have a member who clearly said that he is not going to renew after March 2027.

Can't we members raise a voice against this hike? Write an email, maybe a petition. Anything that can make TI reconsider?

I'm a VP in one of the smaller clubs. We are bunch of broke college students and essentially none of us can actually afford to pay the membership fee (the currency exchange rates are in hell right now as well). I've attended a few meetings at other Toastmasters Clubs, and also training events. I just can't help but find myself losing interest. There's just so much insistence on getting memberships, it's as if the organisation's main aim isn't even to help its members' improve their speaking skills. We have senior members from other clubs and district heads blow up our phones insisting on getting members. Our club executive committee (all college students) just raised money from our own pockets (we all are struggling financially) to get the club chartered but it seems like there's just never enough with Toastmasters. I truly DO NOT care about the memberships, or being in the leadership at this point. In fact, I am questioning the motivations of TI as it's giving MLM/cult signs. When I brought up these red flags to our club president, who is a dear friend of mine, they became quite defensive. They told me that I don't believe in the cause. The indoctrination has begun.

This may be a silly question, but I had someone suggest Toastmasters to me at work yesterday. I'm very afraid of public speaking, very shy, and I lack confidence. I want to move up professionally, but I know I need to work on my social skills.

I had never hard of this before so I've been looking into it but before I visit a club I wanted to have a better understanding of how it all works. Do you have to give speeches every meeting? (it looks like the clubs around me meet twice a month). Is it an issue if you miss a meeting? How do you know what to give speeches on? Is it more of a speech writing group? I am not very good at writing and haven't written a speech or given a presentation since I was in college 15 years ago- so I'm not really sure what I would even write about or if I'm smart enough to give good speeches. Are most people who do this good at it that you will feel judged/embarassed when you're not good at it and they give evaluations?

I have been a toastmaster for just over a year now and have improved remarkably. My icebreaker was embarrassing. I didn't look up from my paper and shook the entire time. Now I can get up in front of a crowd without too much trouble and my confidence has improved markedly. It's still scary but TM has definitely helped me improve.

At the end of the first year (this past August), I became the treasurer of my club and I gotta tell you, I absolutely hate having to beg people for money for Pathways. It's one of the worst pieces of software I have ever used, and I work for a software company. A software company that, when I tell people I work there and they know what it is, they usually say "I hate that software". So I have seen bad software. Pathways is worse. It kills my soul to have to beg people for money for such a low quality product, and there is no benefit to being a TMI member aside from pathways as far as I can tell. $60 for 6 months is highway robbery for what you get. this will be my last year paying for it.

for what it's worth, I love the people at the group I go to. they are very supportive, and there are a few very talented speakers. I learn a lot from them. but paying $120 a year is beyond the pail for the toastmasters international group.

edit: minor grammatical changes

I joined Toastmasters about two years ago. Really nice group, great people, and I’ve overcome a lot of my anxiety around public speaking. With that said, as a consistent (and generally upbeat/positive member) I feel like so much is being asked of me from my club and the district as a whole. Again, I’ve only been in Toastmasters for two years and I’ve served as VPE, VPM, and have now been asked to serve as President of a newly chartered club. At first I was enthusiastic about helping my club but the more I help, the more is asked from me. As I’ve begun saying ‘no’ to more things I find that leadership seems to be colder to me?

I’ve enjoyed my time in Toastmasters but I’m at the point where so much is being asked of me that I feel like to don’t have time to actually work on my public speaking anymore.

Sorry to vent. I was hoping others may be able to relate. I’m struggling to determine whether or not to even continue with Toastmasters.

ETA: To the person who reported this post to Reddit and, thus, had Reddit send me info on a crisis text line - your reporting is misguided and, frankly, bizarre.

There have been some District or club leaders who have been great to work with, very flexible. And others who are retired who want me to treat Toastmasters like it's another full-time job. Point is, I do love Toastmasters, but it is nothing more to me than a hobby--like traveling, going to the movies or golfing.

Has it been the experience of anyone else that some retired folks treat it a little too seriously?

I was so so so nervous, but it went just so smooth. Everyone was so receptive and kind. I even missed my evaluator poiting on things I should improve, because she was just so kind and pointed good things about what I presented. I feel so relieved.

This is the hugest pain in my life, I just freeze on social situations (not only presenting and stuff), being diagnosed with social anxiety and investigating the possibility of being in the Autistic Spectrum. I always wondered if I would ever be able to connect better with people, to have a voice and not be afraid of people laughing at my voice (which does not sound as the manlier voice out there). There was a time I was called in school "the little mute kid", it still hurts.

But it seems like I can actually TAME THIS SHIT! I really don't think everyone was so kind just because, I really think I did good actually and was able to be clear and open. I'm so happy, so so happy. It may be the happiest day ever in my life. I'm 31 and this has always been my biggest fear, which now I WILL OVERCOME.

I'm really proud of myself. At yesterday's Toastmasters meeting I gave my icebreaker speech (I told my story about childhood cancer). I had written the speech a few weeks ago, but was having trouble memorizing it because I have a brain injury, so I wrote cues on some note cards that I took with me to help. I successfully gave the speech and met the time requirement (barely), everyone had super positive feedback as well which was comforting. I love Toastmasters!

I’ve been going down the rabbit hole of Toastmasters speech videos and club sessions, and I noticed something interesting:

The best speakers don’t always say the smartest things — they just sound clear and in control.

So I started experimenting with a few small things:

Pausing for 2 seconds after my opening line

Lowering my pitch slightly when making a strong point

Ending with a sentence I memorized word-for-word for impact

Honestly, these small tweaks made me feel more grounded — and the feedback I got improved immediately.

Curious to learn from you all: What’s one subtle delivery or mindset shift that had a surprising impact on your speaking? Could be pacing, voice, gestures, or even mental prep — anything that gave a boost you didn’t expect.

Would love to try some of your techniques too!

First time speaking in front of a large crowd. 2,900 attendees. I am a ball of nerves. Hoping I don't fall walking up the stairs or forget how to speak. Showtime is in 1 hour and I want to just walk to my car and go home 😂. I would never walk away but it sure has crossed my mind a few times.