Thank you Colistie & Daymon Worldwide!

When MRF Evangelist, Colistie Harkness, heard about the opportunity in January to give a speech to her colleagues at the Daymon Worldwide’s Charity Showdown she followed her heart and her instincts and volunteered.

This Charity Showdown was sponsored by Daymon, to promote their Toastmasters club, to encourage employees to develop their public speaking skills and to find lesser known causes to donate to.

For Colistie, she was able to draw on her years of experience as a corporate trainer as well as her own experience living with MS for the event.

Colistie has been described by her colleagues as a real go-getter, she will get things done and is extremely competent in everything she does. She’s been an inspirational leader to her colleagues throughout her years at Daymon.

Colistie was diagnosed 8 years ago with secondary-progressive MS, a type of MS which is initially like relapsing-remitting with occasional attacks but then it is followed by a steadily worsening disease course.

Many of her symptoms were misdiagnosed for years prior.  Her doctor chalked it up to stress. It wasn’t until she lost the vision in her right eye that a diagnosis was made.  She regained her vision but occasionally faces vision issues and she is now relying on a wheelchair for mobility.

For her speech, she decided to focus on drawing attention to multiple sclerosis’ many invisible symptoms. She described the feelings of uncertainty, the role of the myelin sheath, the slurred speech and the stinging feeling she gets on her face. She even used props like a lamp to demonstrate how myelin works.

Towards the end, she gave her endorsement of the Myelin Repair Foundation and our research in developing MS treatments. She encouraged everyone to support our research to make her future less frightening.

Her speech was judged by a panel of five judges that were part of Toastmasters. She won out of  6 speakers, based on her persuasive skills, her voice, her manner and use of language.  The final prize amount has not been determined as all the money raised during different events through March 2010 will be donated to the Myelin Repair Foundation and an additional $260 from Daymon Worldwide was collected last week.

Colistie decided to support the Myelin Repair Foundation after being introduced to us by the Wheelchair Kamikaze’s blog in December. We are grateful to Marc for meeting with Rusty Bromley, our COO, and writing up that blog post on our organization – facilitating this introduction. Colistie was happy to support a smaller nonprofit MS research organization that was devoted to investing in research & development for a treatment or cure.

Daymon Worldwide will be fundraising for the Myelin Repair Foundation throughout March 2010. They are committed to supporting medical research as an organization.  Daymon provides support for their Customers’ Private Brand programs through brand strategy, sourcing, product development facilitation, and marketing.  As the largest global Consumer Experience Marketing company, Daymon Interactions provides professional, informational, and sales-driven product events for our Supplier Partners and Customers.

Do you have any tips on public speaking you’d like to share? Are there opportunities for you to speak in support of the Myelin Repair Foundation? Check out local Toastmasters clubs to see if you can join one and start practicing!

Tags: charity showdown, colistie harkness, daymon worldwide, public speaking, toastmasters, wheelchair kamikaze

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 9th, 2010 at 8:00 am and is filed under Fundraising, Interviews, Stories, Take Action. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.