Nordic Business Forum and the speaker and coaching company MySpeaker have agreed to cooperate and train aspiring speakers to meet the growing communication demands of international business life. Thanks to the cooperation with MySpeaker, the most promising participants in the Nordic Business Forum Speaker Contest will be given personalised coaching on how to win over large audiences. The NBF Speaker Contest is a contest through which a new Nordic top speaker will be selected to present on the prestigious Nordic Business Forum stage in autumn 2019 before an audience of 7500 participants. Qualifing events will be arranged in Oslo, Stockholm and Helsinki in March. On the base of the applications, eight speakers will make it to speak at these qualifiers and each of them will be given personalised coaching by top experts in the field of public speaking and performance and coached on how to effectively convey their knowledge. The coaching will be arranged by MySpeaker, a leading speaker and coaching company. “This cooperation with Nordic Business Forum, which is one of the best seminars in the world involving key business decision-makers, supports our goal of increasing the appreciation and value of good speaking and the development of Nordic experts to become more compelling speakers. James Hewitt, who won the first Speaker Contest last year and who demonstrated his expertise and performing talent on the stage at NBF in the autumn, has quickly risen to become one of our most trusted speakers. Through the addition of professional coaching in the next contest, I am certain that we can help several new stars win over significant audiences and get on more demanding business stages around the world,” says Johan Sjöstrand, CEO of MySpeaker. According to André Noël Chaker, who is responsible for MySpeaker’s speaker coaching and who has twice won awards as speaker of the year, Finnish and Nordic speakers have all the prerequisites for becoming some of the top performers at international business seminars. “I cannot imagine a better channel for identifying new talented speakers than the Nordic Business Forum. The art of giving business-critical and inspirational speeches requires a lot of work and expertise. It is an honour for us to be in a position to coach the participants in the contests and help them become better speakers,” says André Noël Chaker. “Solid content is a necessity. Once you have that, practice makes a better speaker and performer,” he continues. “The Nordic countries already have world-class experts and inspiring success stories, but we need to make sure that we can also tell others about these in a compelling way. The importance of public speaking effectiveness needs to be prioritised in our society. An effective and inspirational speech may have a significant effect on the future success of those listening.” The first contest, which was arranged in the spring, attracted a total of 170 applications for the qualifiers in Oslo, Stockholm and Helsinki. In the second instalment of the contest, to be arranged next year, the themes for the speeches will be innovation, leadership and marketing. Through the cooperation with MySpeaker, 24 promising speakers will be given personalised coaching and speaker training. The winner of the competition will get to speak at Nordic Business Forum 2019 and receive a €30,000 speaker fee for the engagement. “Just like a good speech, our cooperation with MySpeaker provides added value for all parties. The best speakers among the contest participants are given expert coaching on how to convey their message, MySpeaker can provide companies with new talented speakers and Nordic Business Forum is able to introduce new and exciting performers to the global business seminar scene. I believe the next international star speaker may be closer to us than we think” says Hans-Peter Siefen, one of the founders of Nordic Business Forum.