FAQ

Until recently it was believed that charisma was a “gift” a god given talent reserved only for the few, something that people were born with.

Whenever it was spoken about it was esoteric in nature and vague, Socrates eluded to a part of it, he referred to it as Ethos, Pathos, Logos and Kairos.

In ancient Egypt it was regarded as magic, and ancient Egyptians believed in the power of words.

They believed that the manipulation of written words, images, and ritual could influence the world through a divinely created force known as Heqa.

Fortunately for leaders research and study into the “gift” of charisma demonstrates charisma as a set of skills that can be taught. The results from becoming more charismatic is that people will be drawn to another, to like another, to trust another and to respect another.

We know that the neuroscience indicates that neurotransmitters release neurochemicals that either make us feel good about someone and their intentions; to be moved towards them, or not good about someone and their intentions; to be repelled from them.

We also know that these are snap decisions made by our reptilian brain, and we know that once someone has made that unconscious decision it can be difficult to win back their trust, especially when we are either speaking to people we don’t know or speaking via a channel that puts distance between us.

In our training workshops we learn charismatic leadership skills that give us the ability to recognise firstly what repels people, and then what moves them towards us.

And then focus on developing the foundations that allow a person to build messaging that resonates at a deep level with their audiences and deliver them in a way that magnifies that resonance for lasting impact.

The Art of Epic Communication workshop is designed from research undertaken by John Antonakis, Marika Fenley, and Sue Liechti at The University of Lausanne in Lausanne, Switzerland.

In one study, 41 MBA students were asked to record a three to four minute video presentation. They were then trained in the 12 Charismatic Leadership Tactics (CLTs) over six weeks, averaging 80 - 90 hours of work and preparation.

They redelivered their presentations to camera, with the addition of the 12 CLTs, the videos were reviewed and compared by 135 independent assessors.

On average, they measured a 60% increase in individuals leadership scores.

We’ve incorporated the following techniques and tools into out training workshop:

• The 12 CLTs
• Accelerated adult brain based learning techniques from extensive training in New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and USA with Dr Rich Allen
• Neurolinguistic Programming techniques and principles from practitioner level training with Dr Richard Bolstad; and
• Marketing principles and practice from internationally renowned marketing expert Donald Miller

The growth each individual will experience is relative to the degree that they are willing to push themselves to try new things and get way outside their comfort zone.

The more a person pushes themselves the more growth they will see.

The Charismatic Leadership Tactics taught in the workshop are the foundation of every great speaker. However, even most of the paid public speakers in New Zealand are not skilled in them. We know this because we have coached many to go from good to great,  and it’s often been that they possess one or two of the foundational skills and we teach them the others in private speaker coaching.

That’s how we guarantee growth for everyone on the workshop.

Michael has coached both nervous novices and seasoned CEO’s and they’ve all learned something valuable they didn’t know that changed their perception of public speaking.

Your teams will come away with new knowledge and transferable skills to apply across a wide range of situations.

The most scared people tend to gain the most out of the training as they are at the beginning of their journey. There is abundance of learning opportunities without the burden of pre made negative habits - essentially starting out as a blank canvas, and that’s a wonderful thing.

We’ve taken extra care with the design of the workshop, ensuring that every step in the process is achievable and incremental.

We start off in pairs with a delivery to camera and then learn skills that help with confidence and then move up to a group of four to deliver the same message multiple times to gain practice and more confidence.

As there are 12 people on the workshop, there are three groups of four people delivering at the same time, so there is a feeling of comfort from being with a small group and there is ambient noise that allows everyone to feel like they are not a single person on a big stage all alone.

There is one presentation that is delivered one to many, however by the time we reach that part of the day the group has become well bonded and supportive and encouraging of each other.

Everyone, seasoned professional or new beginner, has nerves at the start of the day for their own reasons and in every workshop we’ve run, each person has achieved their desired outcome.

We believe and support “challenge by choice” and will not push anyone to do anything they are not comfortable with. A participant is more than welcome to sit out something that is overwhelming.

Not at all, the essence of the training workshop is for everyone to develop their talks together at the same pace and learn from each other through open dialog that we facilitate.

The only preparation needed is to bring the essential items that you will need on the day such as headphones to listen to your video recordings privately.

The room is usually vibrant and full of ambient noise when you’re delivering most of your presentations to camera, so the best way to hear your video presentation when you review it is through headphones. That way, you can have it as loud as you desire without disturbing others who will be listening to their recordings.

All your videos are captured on your own smartphones, that way you can be confident knowing they are safely stored on your device, and you can review them again after the workshop.

Also, it makes sense to practice on the equipment that you will most likely be using in the future to create your own marketing content.

The quality of cameras on most people’s phones are capable of HD or 4K and beyond, and if it’s set up to record on “cinematic” mode it produces quality more than adequate for releasing to the public, on social platforms such as LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and others.

Having ran this training a lot we are starting to notice a common theme. Each person soon discovers they have at least one limiting belief that they’ve formed that is holding them back from being truly authentic in their self-expression.

Once a limiting belief has been discovered that person is now able to practice freeing themselves from the behaviour that will be holding them back, often this belief when changed will have life changing effects for that person, both personally and professionally.

There is no required level of experience needed to come on the workshop.

However, it is good to have a goal in mind for where you want to use the skills you will learn and put them into practice as soon as possible.

Public speaking is a perishable skill, and confidence wanes for even the most seasoned speakers if they have not been in front of a camera or on stage for a while.

So, having something that you’re working towards will help ensure you keep up all the good work you will have achieved on the workshop. This is where you will see the most benefit from the long term gains.

Most definitely yes!!!

At the end of the majority of the workshops either in-house or public, we are being asked “what’s next, what more can I learn?”

So we are currently in the process of building “Unleash Limitless Leadership Potential”, this will be the second day of a two-day immersive training workshop.

It’s focused on honing the skills learnt in day one with the first six charismatic leadership tactics and adding three more that focus on building leaders who can influence more through their storytelling, metaphors, similes and analogies, rhetorical questions, and reflections of the group’s sentiment.

And we are working towards the design of our ultimate speaking offering, Unleash Limitless Executive Leadership Potential, a 4 day executive retreat that will weave together the final three charismatic leadership tactics; expressions of moral conviction, the setting of high goals, and conveying they can be achieved. Giving any CEO or Executive the full array of skills to move mountains.