"The secret to winning is mastering persuasion—being great at selling."
Leonardo Zangrando Tweet
Welcome to ValiantCEO Magazine’s exclusive interview with Leonardo Zangrando, the visionary founder of Talk for Impact.
He’s a speakers’ coach with over 15 years of experience, starting from pharmaceutical sales training and progressing through entrepreneurship coaching and life coaching. Leonardo firmly believes that everyone has tremendous potential to achieve incredible things, and he is convinced that effective communication plays a crucial role in unlocking that potential. His work, which includes collaborations with renowned organizations like TESCO, BBC, and Google, has always revolved around unleashing potential through genuine communication.
In recent years, he focused on expertise gained from organizing three TEDx events into his speakers’ excellence business, “Talk for Impact.” Here, he dedicates himself to empowering impact leaders and changemakers in social and environmental causes to become influential speakers. His mission is to assist them in discovering their authentic voice to inspire, engage, and drive action – because that’s where true change begins.
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Table of Contents
We are thrilled to have you join us today, welcome to ValiantCEO Magazine’s exclusive interview! Let’s start off with a little introduction. Tell our readers a bit about yourself and your company.
Leonardo Zangrando: I’m the founder of Talk for Impact, a business focusing on speakers’ excellence, to empower impact leaders and changemakers with a social or environmental mission create and deliver inspiring talks that move audiences to action for their cause.
I have had a very diverse career spanning several industries and roles. From Shipbuilding to Biotech. From Sales to Learning & Development. A recurring theme for me has been the development of people’s potential, be it of sales people, product managers or entrepreneurs.
I firmly believe that people have an immense potential within, and often we play small and diminish ourselves out of fear. But as soon as we manage to see that massive potential that lies within us, we can do magic.
Besides of human potential, I have another core passion, which is Nature and the Ocean in particular. I have been swimming, diving or sailing since before I can remember.
My father was captain on big ships and I spent every summer in my teens on a shop’s bridge with him, sailing in the middle of the Ocean. My love for People and Nature has turned into a mission to inspire 100 million people to take action for the Ocean and the Planet.
In order to multiply as far as possible my impact, I help impact leaders and changemakers multiply their impact, though carefully crafted speeches that move audiences to action for social or environmental causes.
What advice do you wish you had received when you started your business journey and what do you intend on improving in the next quarter?
Leonardo Zangrando: The best advice I could have received is that entrepreneurship is just marginally about creating a new business, developing an idea into a proper business. Because the most important ingredient by far, is the ability to sell.
To sell your idea to potential co-founders to get them onboard. To “sell” your business to potential investors, to get funding for it. To sell your product or service from day one in order to develop relationships and finally will result in sales. With no sales there is no business.
My proposition for the next quarter is to keep developing my sales skills. Over 15 years ago I was training sales organisations on various sales methodologies invloving multi-stakeholder engagement and value-based selling.
Even 15 years later, it’s never finished. Sales skills have evolved, and every day is a great day to improve and fine toue your selling skills.
Because, paraphrasing George Clooney’s old TV spot, “no sales, no business.
Here is a two-fold question: What is the book that influenced you the most and how? Please share some life lessons you learned. Now what book have you gifted the most and why?
Leonardo Zangrando: Many books come to mind, but to stay in the entrepreneurship arena I would say Peter Thiel’s “Zero to One.” The core lesson being that it’s much more difficult to create something from nothing, than to replicate something that already exists. It’s the beauty of creation. Coming up with an unthought of idea, and bringing it to life.
The book that I have gifted the most is instead about the Ocean and sailing. That’s Bernard Moitessier’s “The Long Way,” or its French original “La Longue Route,” the story of one of the first people who sailed solo around the world non-stop.
That was 1968 and since then not even 200 people managed to do it. For me it’s a story of love for the Ocean and human capacity for endurance. We can do incredible things if only we love what we do.
Business is all about overcoming obstacles and creating opportunities for growth. What do you see as THE real challenge right now?
Leonardo Zangrando: Business has always been one of the highest achievements for men. Creating something from nothing, making an idea take life, in a very unpredictable environment as is Humanity.
In different ages the challenges have been different. Today’s challenge is for business leaders to be heard and understood by the public. Business is coming under increased scrutiny, and rightly so.
Only leaders who are able to communicate their company’s values and inspire their people, their clients, their partners, the public at large, are in the position to succeed. That’s where my mission plays a role.
I want to help the leaders of businesses with a strong ethos succeed in communicating their values to people and thrive.
Years 2020-2023 threw a lot of curve balls into businesses on a global scale. Based on the experience gleaned in the past years, how can businesses thrive in 2024? What lessons have you learned and what advice would you share?
Leonardo Zangrando: 2023 threw quite an important curve ball in the form of AI. Initially seen as something which was initially “interesting” and then “scary,” it has become a key issue for any company.
AI can improve exponentially the value a company can offer, for its ability to perform relatively creative tasks in a fraction of the time taken by an army of humans.
I’m not suggesting to use AI as the source of our creativity, as much as to use it to rapidly inform ur leaders of alternative options at hand, or spot potentially overseen opportunities. So my advice to any company, of any size, avoid AI at your own risk.
On a lighter note, if you had the ability to pick any business superpower, what would it be and how would you put it into practice?
Leonardo Zangrando: My business superpower… definitely the ability to speak from my heart to business people who are able to listen from their heart, to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings and transform zero-sum interactions in win-win exchanges.
The closest thing to this superpower is the ability to speak in public about our own mission with enthusiasm.
The ability to inspire people with our own words and deeds. The ability to make people take action for a just cause.
Jerome Knyszewski, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank Leonardo Zangrando for taking the time to do this interview and share his knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with Leonardo Zangrando or his company, you can do it through his – Linkedin Page
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