Sergeant at Arms Duties

The following is a guide that can be used to perform the sergeant at arms duties at Dallas Social Toastmasters.  This guide is a summary of how the duties were performed by past sergeant at arms, and can be changed or adapted as needed.

The sergeant at arms position is extremely important to the flow of each meeting, and towards the recruitment of new members.  Normally two sergeant at arms will be present at each meeting to help facilitate the meeting.  If you go to the yahoo site there is a sign up list to schedule the sergeant at arms for each week.  Either the VP of membership or one sergeant of arms will maintain the list and circulate it at the meetings and by email.  A final copy will be emailed to each SAA and a copy should be maintained in the visitors’ folder or visitors sign in book. 

One sergeant at arms for the meeting will be responsible for room setup and breakdown and the other will be the host for visitors signing in.  Both sergeant at Arms should try to arrive at 6pm to set up or greet early arriving guests. 

Sergeant Arms Room Setup duty- Find the manager of Ozonas who has the key for the upstairs office where we keep our stuff.  You will need two people to carry down the blue storage bin, lectern, flagpole, and our Toastmasters banner.  The flag is in the blue bin.  Set the flag up at the right front of the stage.  Hang the Toastmasters banner on one of the metal signs at the front stage.  Place the wooden lectern on a table on the stage with the gavel on top.  Adjust the lights from the rear of the room where the timer sits.  All of the meeting tools are in the blue box and need to be given to the duty holders or placed on the tables (vote cups, ballots, pencils which need to be sharpened, ah horn, timer clock, etc…) Before the meeting you are responsible for getting together with each speaker and seeing how they want the stage set up for their speech.  Some speakers have special needs and we do not want them to have to set the stage up before or during  their speech.  Coordinate this with them and the Toastmaster of the night.  At the end of the meeting you are responsible for breaking everything down and ensuring it gets stored away in the containers and placed upstairs.  Please be sure to not leave any items out or behind, as we have had to replace numerous items in the past.   If items need to be replaced please work as a group to replace them or advise one of the officers depending on what needs to be bought or copied.  Most of the meeting documents can be downloaded from the yahoo site.  The treasurer with approval and a receipt can reimburse any purchases you make for items.  

Sergeant at Arms host for Guests- This position is extremely important to building our club membership.  Your duties in this position will relate to the VP of membership duties.  Make sure there is a folder containing visitors packets and a sign in sheet/book for guests.  This duty requires that you maintain a seat by the entry door to the club for the majority of the meeting.  When a guest arrives at the club they may be nervous and not comfortable with this idea or new environment.  It is a fact that if they are not greeted warmly they will walk in and sit at the booths in the rear……….which is a big no no in our club!  When a guest walks in the door we want you to greet them warmly and make them feel welcome to our awesome group…………because we really are!  Introduce yourself, ask their name, and give them a visitor’s guide. Ask them to sign in and clearly print their name and email! Why?  Because you will have to announce their names at the end of the meeting and the VP of membership will email them later to try and get them to join.  The VP of membership cannot email many visitors because they do not sign in or do not print their email addresses clearly.  When the guest enters the club ask them how they heard of the club or if they have ever been to a toastmasters meeting.  Walk with them to a table where you can sit and introduce them by name to an existing group of member’s………..try not to sit all the guests with other guests.  You need to stay at the front door for a minimum of 30 minutes into the meeting to greet new guests coming late.  This is important because you will not be able to greet guests from the tables in the club and they will enter unwelcomed.  At the end of the meeting you will announce each guest by name.  Tell them to stand up and take a few seconds to tell the group what they thought about the meeting or something else.  Please remember to tell them to just take a few seconds!  If you do not tell them this, some people will stand up and give a 5-minute presentation.

Both sergeant at arms get bonus points for taking iniative, being enthusiastic, and going beyond the call of duty to make the job fun for everyone involved in Dallas Social Toastmasters!