APPROACH TO PUBLIC SPEAKING SKILLS DEVELOPMENT IN AN EDUCATIONAL ORGANIZATION: A GROUNDED THEORY
Communicating confidently and effectively before an audience is one of the skills highly desired to be developed by professionals. Hence, there is a high demand for public speaking skills development training. The purpose of this study was to generate a theory grounded from the data that explains the approach of how members of Toastmasters International (TI) develop their public speaking skills as they immerse in such educational organization. The analysis of this study was mainly guided by the systematic design of grounded theory developed by Corbin and Strauss (2008) Theoretical sampling guided the recruitment of 21 TI members as the participants of the personal interviews. A focus group discussion and researcher's observations were then utilized for a triangulated result of the study. Open coding categories were connected during axial coding and refined during selective coding to form a theory. "Four C's in Public Speaking Theory" explains the approach of how TI members develop their public speaking skills in order to transform from a novice public speaker to an expert one. The generated model can serve as a guide for the members' strategic plan in taking full advantage of the benefits that the organization offers in public speaking. This could also aid in the organization's planning and program development. Article visualizations: