Workshop:  Antonio Meza – Give voice to your hands

Antonio Meza – Give voice to your hands

Have you ever wondered what to do with your hands when you are under the spotlight?

When you speak with your friends or family, you naturally communicate with your hands. And yet, when you are on stage delivering a speech you may become self-conscious about your hands.

You can learn how to use your hands in a more confident, eloquent and efficient way, respecting your culture and personality, when you are connecting with an audience.

Give voice to your hands. Use them to support your message, the stories that you tell, and the emotions that you want to convey.

Join this workshop and you will learn how to use your hands to your advantage when it is your time to shine.

• Discover the natural voice of your hands and how to enhance it depending on your goals

• Understand how to use signs, signals and metaphors to support your words

• Integrate principles from theater, martial arts, neuroscience and animated cartoons!

Bring along your curiosity, your hands and smile!

*Note: while this is a workshop about giving voice of your hands, you will be using your feet as well! It is not a sitting down experience. Be prepared for some workout!

Antonio Meza profile

An independent consultant, coach, and trainer, Antonio is the founder of Akrobatas, a provider of creative empowerment tools. His programs bring people together from diverse cultures to participate in a lively environment, making bridges with communication. He is committed to the creation of “common ground” across cultures.

His clients include OXFAM, the Open Society Foundation (OSF), and the European Public Health Alliance (EPHA). He has also conducted workshops for ESCP-Europe, the American University of Paris, and the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC).

A native of Pachuca, Mexico, Antonio is a Trainer of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). He has degrees in Communication Sciences, a Masters Film Studies, Scriptwriting, and Documentary Film.

Antonio is fully fluent in English, French, and Spanish. He is also an accomplished cartoon artist and has co-authored two books.

In April 2013 Antonio achieved third place overall in the District 59 (Continental Europe) International Speech Contest in Antwerp.

Ed Tate, 2000 Toastmasters world champion said about Antonio’s performance:

“Antonio does something that is exceptional, I’ve never seen it before, your use of hands, because your hands actually help to tell the story”.

Workshop: Elisabeth Dancet – Boost your impact drawing upon emotional intelligence

Elisabeth Dancet – Boost your impact drawing upon emotional intelligence

This workshop will help you develop your ability to use the power of emotion – including stress – to enhance the impact of your speeches.

In this workshop, participants will learn how to:

• be more conscious of their emotional states before and throughout their speech delivery
• use a simple energy technique to reduce their level of stress
• draw upon their emotional intelligence to reinforce their message and key points and connect with their audience.

In this workshop I will give you an overview of what you need to know about emotional intelligence and show you how to apply it when communicating with an audience. We will experiment through a set of exercises designed to help you become more conscious of your emotional states and to teach you how to use the power of emotion.

In the first one we will learn how to reduce your level of stress before you deliver a speech, even in tough circumstances, using a simple energy technique. Next we will design a personal mantra to help you change some of your limiting beliefs. Finally we will work on your relationship to the audience. I will show you how you can enhance your connection, harnessing the power of your emotions.

Elisabeth Dancet profile

A French national, Elisabeth Dancet is a Management Consultant and Change Management Facilitator with twenty years of experience in consulting, training and coaching business executives and managers.

Elisabeth focuses on developing leadership skills and accessing resources and high potential talents when faced with change situations. She works with management teams, groups and face to face with business executives and managers using a variety of tools and methods to help managers and teams reach their objectives.

Elisabeth has worked extensively in the banking sector, industry, services and telecom sectors, both in France and Europe.

Academically, Elisabeth holds an MBA from ESSEC, one of the top Business schools in Paris, and also studied at University of Chicago GBS in the USA.

An NLP Practitioner, she also holds a diploma from IFAT (Institut Français d’Analyse Transactionnelle), and is MBTI certified with coaching certification from the Kishori Institute in Montréal, Canada.

Elisabeth is passionate about scriptwriting and storytelling; she wrote, directed and produced 3 short films while living in the US, and applies these skills to storytelling for companies.

An active Toastmaster, Elisabeth is a member and VPPR of SpeechMasters, an English-speaking club in Paris, France.

For more information on Elisabeth Dancet: www.drh-tv.com 

Workshop: Christian Block – Creating your own humor for your speeches

Christian Block – Creating your own humor for your speeches

Many speakers quarrel with themselves when thinking about using humour in speeches: (e.g. “I cannot tell jokes, I am not humorous.”). In this workshop you can overcome this hurdle. You learn to take the first steps into a humorous speaking “career”.

Christian Block’s practical workshop is about creating your own individual humour and including it in your speeches.

You will get to know the basics and the structure of humour: how humour works and what makes the audience laugh. Furthermore, you will explore and develop your own humour with easy exercises.

You learn to embed humour into speeches to achieve the maximal attention and impact on the audience.

And of course the workshop will be entertaining and very funny – you will laugh and learn.

Christian Block profile

Christian Block’s 20-year professional career in the departments of Sales, Marketing and After Sales at Toyota’s German headquarters has giving him the opportunity to deliver presentations to fellow employees, dealer, business partner and customer on a regular basis.

Besides this, he has been a member of Toastmasters for more than 4 years. During this time he has delivered over one hundred speeches, including presentations, educational sessions, workshops, special events, and has moderated contests and meetings. He served as the VP Education and president of the Rheinredner, a Toastmaster club in Cologne. In addition, he is a member of another club, the Kölner Sprechbar. Christian Block is a certified trainer and is planning to become a professional speaker in 2014.

There is one specific thing Christian Block learned in his jobs and from Toastmasters: selling a product and delivering a message requires emotions. It is not enough to deliver a factual speech. A speaker has to create enthusiasm to connect and convince his audience. It makes no difference if you are speaking in front of employees, customers or fellow Toastmasters. Using humor in speeches is one of the most effective strategies to enthuse the listeners. Furthermore, it’s fun for everybody.