Presentation Skills Training with Maria Guida
"Maria Guida's training in Presentation Skills is creative, enjoyable, and highly effective. Her performance techniques are a wonderful foundation for better business communication in any industry."
- Ms. Nancy Ploeger
President
Manhattan Chamber of Commerce
As a former actor on Broadway and television, Maria Guida offers an exciting, unique, and highly-effective approach to business speaking that inspires trust and generates business. Successful Speaker, Inc. clients learn how to speak with the poise, passion, and persuasive power of our finest professional actors - to sell more ideas, products, and services.
Maria employs a sound pedagogical approach: combining tradition training methods with experiential learning in a creative context. To help business speakers in all industries project a positive professional image, she has adapted and enhanced stage and television techniques specifically for the business arena: this work is based upon time-honored approaches originally designed for the training of actors.
To develop a natural and powerful speaking style and cultivate "presence", this active training stimulates creative problem-solving and the ability to think clearly "on one's feet".
Focused on business situations and customized for professionals in any industry, each session uses common business topics as the springboard for role-play and practice.
Each program builds upon the unique features of individual personality/style and offers a set of portable skills to enhance the way you present yourself - in the office, boardroom courtroom, or in front of the media.
Every Successful Speaker, Inc. program is completely custom-designed. Private, semi-private, and group training are available.
A Sampling of Frequently-addressed Topics
"Maria's training helped me enormously. Now I feel much more confident speaking in public!"
- Ms. Nancy Poon
Vice President, Corporate Accounting
JPMorgan Chase
Content Area Topics
- Preparing/delivering the Opening
- Preparing/delivering the Closing
- "Reading" the audience and becoming flexible
- Using PowerPoint and visual aids effectively
- Handling distractions, interruptions, and hostile audiences
- Great Q & A sessions
- Engaging the audience immediately after the presentation
- Discerning what and what not to rehearse; effective rehearsal techniques
Performance Skill Topics
- Commanding attention and keeping the listeners focused
- Using PowerPoint without losing "speaker power"
- Using body language purposefully, appropriately, and with ease
- Expanding the creative/descriptive use of language
- Speaking clearly and using the voice effectively
- Reducing the use of "fillers"
- Building-projecting confidence and cultivating "presence"
- Practicing acting improvisation to decrease inhibition, increase
commitment/passion, and speak assertively
- Relaxation techniques: transforming anxiety into positive
performance energy
- Inspiring belief and persuading an audience: techniques from the
stage
"I really enjoyed learning with Maria and know that my skills have improved. Maria understood my business and customized the program specifically for my needs."
- Mr. Pierre Manzetti
Client Advisor
UBS AG
Other Custom-designed Programs
Using PowerPoint Without Losing "Speaker Power"
This program is designed to solve a problem observed in many business presentations today: a weak delivery caused by the ineffective use of (and over-dependence on) PowerPoint and other presentation software. The training helps speakers command attention, project authority, and persuade business audiences with step-by-step techniques to maintain "speaker power" by managing presentation software/slides seamlessly.
"Maria Guida's presentation to the Westchester Women's Bar Association was lively and interesting and gave us a new way to approach public speaking. I look forward to incorporating her techniques in my presentations."
- Dawn K. Arnold, Esq.
President
Westchester Women's Bar Association
Effective Performance Appraisal Meetings
This training program helps managers conduct meaningful and effective meetings for performance appraisals. It provides best practices and opportunities for role-play, analysis, and feedback to managers who wish to communicate with clarity, authority, and diplomacy.
"Maria Guida was instrumental in helping me develop my skills as a speaker, and her training has helped me tremendously on a day-to-day basis."
- Mr. Jianwei Miao
Sales Manager
New York Marriott Financial Center Hotel
Speaking Style and Culture
This program is designed to help professionals speak appropriately within varied cultural contexts. It presents the underlying norms that vary from culture to culture and affect speaking style in every culture. Participants become more aware of their own speaking style and how it can be managed -- in order to foster harmony within the global marketplace.
"Every time I use these techniques, I feel grateful for what Maria taught me. She did a great job"
- Nan-I Chen, Esq.
Shearman & Sterling
Foreign Accent Reduction
This program teaches correct American English pronunciation and the clear, confident, and natural speaking style that American professionals want to hear. The goal is to reduce (rather than eliminate!) any foreign accent. Foreign-born professionals who are already comprehensible learn to minimize the foreign accent, so that it will not distract American listeners from the business message. Those with heavy accents learn how to make themselves understood the first time they speak - and every time - to communicate clearly and make a positive impression in American business.
"For a busy, foreign-born manager, Maria Guida is a Godsend. She is a true professional. If I had had Maria's training thirty years ago, I could have been the CEO already!"
- Mr. Peter Liu
Managing Director
Securities Industry Automation Corporation
Business Writing that Gets Results
This program teaches professionals how to write business correspondence with clarity, effective style/tone, and persuasive power - to project a positive professional image and get what they want. Sessions offer step-by-step techniques to craft email and other correspondence that commands attention and motivates readers to take the desired actions.
"In today's highly competitive business environment, the professionals who succeed are the ones who have superb communication skills, and Maria Guida really helped me improve my business writing."
- Mr. Antonio Perrotta
Senior Manager
PricewaterhouseCoopers
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