An incredible afternoon on life and opportunities with Joan Detz

I saw Joan Detz @joandetz speak at a financial professional convention in DC two years ago. Is she a financial expert, a numbers specialist or a metrics expert? No; she is an incredible lady who has devoted her life to training and coaching people for all corners of the world and trades in different fields on the art of #PublicSpeaking. And after seeing how she did it and what she accomplished I needed to meet her, but I could not do it at the convention.

But wait; I am a simple guy living in a foreign country who happened to be in DC at that time. How will I meet her? Come possibilities: I contacted her with the advancement of technology. So after getting in touch I sent her some of my work (I am sure she needed to find out who this crazy person form Venezuela was). So back in late 2014 we started exchanging emails, got on a phone conversation and as they say, it was the start of a beautiful friendship; and indeed it has continued to be.

Fast forward two years, I have had incredible phone conversations with Joan, I have interviewed her on my internet radio show on two incredible subjects, public speaking tips and social media tools and how you can boost your life and careers using them and both are on the top list of my all time shows. And best of all, I was able to visit with Joan last week in New York to what I call a wonderful afternoon. We had lunch, we went to the New York Public Library, we saw old maps, and we strolled down Bryant Park. But best of all, we had an amazing but very short five-hour conversation; and it was incredible.

What do you speak with such an experienced, traveled and fabulous person? We talked about life’s journeys, we talked about the change in technology, age, knowledge, wisdom, politics, and life again and we talked about dreams, those fuzzy things you can actually convert into reality. We talked about peace and quiet, life on the countryside and on the complicated city life; and we talked about how we take things for granted, yes we all do. It was a deep thoughtful powerful conversation.

And this is what friendship is all about. It is a different kind of friendship, a beautiful one. It is not your friends form high school or college whom after a while you stopped seeing; it is the new friends you met along the path you cross, that you allow into your life, and what an incredible idea is it to invite new friends into your life. And we choose those friends, people who like us want better, look for nature’s beauty, who engage on interesting conversations which are very meaningful, important, thoughtful, wonderful and all together transformational.

This and more was my NY afternoon with Joan Detz. What an honor, what a pleasure. I flew in from Venezuela; she took a train ride from Pennsylvania. Was it worth it? Indeed and it was too short of a conversation on life’s journeys, on health, opportunities and future, with passion and vision and ideas and thoughts and dreams and why not, a touch of reality here and there. And what a wonderful friendship it has become. 

Joan, keep inspiring people, keep being a wonderful friend.

Luis Vicente

2015: Seven months of 'Performing at Your Best with Luis Vicente Garcia'

As we start a new year, I would like to thank the wonderful people that help me make my radio show a Success! 

When we started to think about it, Winston Price (now y Executive Producer on the Voice America Radio Network) and his team helped me create the many incredible parts to the show, such as the banners, the links, setting up the page, coming up with the Bio and creating the show’s name and page. And it was an amazing year. 

You can hear all of the shows on the Voice America Business Channel at Performing at Your Best: Mindset Evolution with Luis Vicente Garcia

Our first show was aired on June 2^nd so as we closed the year we  already did 32 shows, and getting ready later today for the second one of 2016. And the audio and technical people at VoiceAmerica have been incredible. Many thanks to all.

I have done several shows on my own and I have also had the most amazing guests. I interviewed my dear friends Margaret Maclay and Joan Detz; I interviewed incredible authors as Bob Burg and business colleagues as Ramon Palmero, Abel Calvo, Margarita Pasos, Tosin Ogunussi, Marc Kohler, Dr. Andreas Boettcher and Leeza Sipek. All are great friends, and they have shared with us and the incredible listeners - that week after week join us from several parts in the world - many amazing tips, new business ideas and they always give us this new perspective that we need to have in order to succeed in this fast changing world.

It was an incredible year of new and wonderful experiences. And today I want to share with you my top-5 shows of 2015 as reviewed by our listeners:

1. How to Boost Your Career and Building Your Business Through Public Speaking, with Joan Detz and Luis Vicente Garcia

2. Creating Magic in your Company

3. Conversations on Franchising with Abel Calvo and Luis Vicente Garcia

4. Grow by Empowering your Staff and Your TEAMs, with Tosin Ogunusi and Luis Vicente Garcia

5. Communication and Motivation - key factors for Business Success, with Margaret Maclay and Luis Vicente Garcia

All of the shows and interviews were incredible. Thank you so much to my incredible guests; to the VoiceAmerica TEAM who have been so wonderful through out the year and most of all, to all the listeners who are the ones that make this happen.

To all, my best wishes for a wonderful 2016 filled with joy, happiness, new opportunities and many learning experiences.

And have a wonderful and a very successful year!

Luis Vicente Garcia

New Blog on the Radio Show: 'Performing at Your Best'

Dear Friends,

I would like to invite you to read my new blog PERFORMING AT YOUR BEST.

It presents all the different episodes of my Radio Show 'Performing at Your Best: Mindset Evolution with Luis Vicente Garcia', which started back in June 2015. The show airs live every Tuesday at 3 pm PST, 6 pm EST.

You can visit this new Blog at http://performingatyourbestmindsetevolution.blogspot.com/ or click the following link: New Blog click HERE

We cover many aspects that directly relate to business owners, entrepreneurs, managers and executives. The topics range from entrepreneurship, franchising, public speaking, Teams, Customer Satisfaction Empowerment, and Business MAGIC, among other topics and I have been very fortunate to interview such incredible people as Bob Burg, Marc Koehler, Joan Detz, Abel Calvo, Dr. Andreas Boettcher, Margarita Pasos and other amazing guests that are now fabulous friends.

I hope you like the posts, listen to the radio shows, share them and comment them. You can send me your emails to coachluis@luisvicentegarcia.com

To go to the show's main page click on the following link: Show's Main Page

Here's to your increase Performance and your Success!

Luis Vicente Garcia

FocalPoint Coaching: Training week 2015!

What will FocalPoint coaches and trainers have in common next week? We will all be dedicated to training and facilitating managerial and entrepreneurial growth throughout the world.

Yes, the week of November 16^th- 20^th will be dedicated to training business owners, entrepreneurs, executives and managers in many areas, from setting goals, to time management techniques to improving sales; also many of us will be training in personal and professional development and peak performance. This is what we - at FocalPoint Coaching -do all year round; however for the first time we are dedicating a full week to training and, more importantly, will do it all over the world.

Our goal is to help more people grow, achieve their goals faster and feel more empowered with engaged team members. This is why we are inviting as many people as possible to join us next week in the many places and cities throughout the world to grow both personally and professionally.  Now is the time to take massive action and go start unleashing your peak performance levels.

International Training Week is next week! We will also be donating 10% of proceeds to children's cancer research. This is why training is also very important to all of us as we contribute constantly to improve the lives of others as well.

We will be delivering training and coaching sessions in several cities simultaneously, like in different places in the US and Canada, and in cities as Sydney, London, Singapore and New Delhi, India. I myself will be training teams in my home city of Caracas, Venezuela on Monday and then will be flying to Nicaragua for a series of training and coaching events in Managua with Alejandro and Margarita Pasos from SuccessFactor in Nicaragua. A very interesting week indeed!

Start getting the new skills and learning you need and that will drive you forward for years to come.

If you are interested on learning more on what FocalPoint Coaching and Training can do for you and your company, please contact us at www.focalpointcoaching.com or myself at www.coachluisvgarcia.com

To Your Success!

Luis Vicente Garcia, FocalPoint Coach & Trainer.

Learning is Life in itself: And a Business Performance Coach is always Learning!

There is not a single day in which I do not learn something. It can be from a course, a class, my kids, a client, a video seminar, a conference, a live event, a podcast, a radio show; you name it. And this has been one of those amazing weeks.

I have done all of the activities I have mentioned above; and besides that, today I started a three-day training session at the FocalPoint Coaching training headquarters in San Diego, CA. It is very simple: never stop learning and embrace learning (as a speaker yesterday told a group of 150+ authors that gathered in Los Angeles: you will do it anyways whether you like it or not!).

This week alone (which for me started last Sunday), started by attending a TEDx talk, reading a book about coloring your business, being invited as a guest to a financial radio show, listened to a friend’s podcast on strategy, learned from my oldest kid about generating ideas, worked with few of my clients - thanks to the new technology -, had an amazing Episode of my Radio Show 'Performing at Your Best: Mindset Evolution' and was present at the 2015 Book Extravaganza and EIPPY Award Ceremony in LA; all in one week. You see, 'You learn from all of these different activities, and from the people you meet, form the messages that you hear, from the training you give and receive, and from the experiences you listened form strangers who now become your friends. It is a never ending and a continuous process, combined together. Does it make sense? I have to say: Yes!

Today I also learned from business friends and colleagues I had the pleasure to see again after a year and being with them in meetings all morning or for lunch. So you see; learning is about growth, about potential, and future. Learning is about creating a new vision that will allow you to see from a different perspective. Learning is Life in itself!

And as for my coaching side, there is always a new learning process. I had not been back in San Diego for over a year now and what will I be doing form today until Sunday is being trained by the best performance coaches on how to continue to be a better business coach and now in the new incredible programs at FocalPoint Corporate Trainig. And it does wonders for our clients and for us. I have called it my S2SLM! my Sunday2Sunday Learning Marathon! And you can have one as well. Just prepare it and take it as it does wonders to your Mind.

So what does a Business Performance Coach does when he is not coaching, mentoring or creating ideas? We are learning, learning and learning. It is the only way to be ahead in the game; it is the only way to better help our clients, our colleagues and our community to grow, constantly and achieve ther goals faster.

So next time you ask your coach: 'what have you been up to lately?' Do not be surprised if the answer is LEARNING!

Luis Vicente Garcia

Luis Vicente Garcia, Key-note Speaker at the United Nations!

Dear Friends, queridos amigos

It is my real pleasure to share with you the video of an amazing opportunity I had to speak at the headquarters of the United Nations last June. I was one of the founding members of the Global Economic Initiative where 30 entrepreneurs from seven different countries gathered to speak and discuss about some the issues that are affecting the world of business, education and economics today. It was an incredible event.

Luis Vicente Garcia speech at the 'Global Economic Initiative' at the United Nations

My message was that regardless of our circumstances, you need to be positive, be an optimist and have a strong personal motivation. Once you have these key-ingredients, you will be able to become a better entrepreneur and business owner, have more clarity and see things in a much better way.

We cannot leave everything that needs to be fixed to the governments we have in many countries, particularly in Latin America. This is why I call out to the local and regional entrepreneurs to:

a)      Be the ‘change factor’ we need to be and want to become;

b)      Generate the initiatives that are needed to empower our people and our teams – basically through training and education; and,

c)       Guide our countries to a higher level of growth and development.

We can do this and much more form the private sector and need to start working on these initiatives today, as taking ACTION today is a must.

Thanks to the National Association of Experts, Writers and Speakers and to the International Entrepreneur Foundation for such an incredible invitation to speak at this life-changing event on this magnificent institution in New York.

Luis Vicente  

An Entrepreneurial trip to ARMONIA

I can describe my trip to Oaxaca, Mexico earlier this year as a "Magical" life changing experience. Being part of the entrepreneurial team that went to visit ARMONIA near the mountains of Oaxaca was an inspiration. Representing the National Association of Experts, Writers and Speakers as well as the International Entrepreneur Foundation I felt that it was an honor, an incredible learning experience as well as a new big responsibility.

ARMONIA is the life work of Dr. Saul Cruz, who saw poverty not as the lack of money but as the lack of opportunity. Being in Oaxaca I felt that experience with energy and passion, learning that there is so much we can do - individually and as a group - to change poverty, inequality and unfairness in many parts of the world.  Having had the chance to travel with 3-time Emmy Award winning Director Nick Nanton and his team, as well as other members of these incredible organizations, allowed me to learn, develop as a person, make new friends and see the world from a different perspective.

Being from Venezuela I am confronted with many issues in my daily life: scarcity, insecurity, hyper-inflation and an increase also in the country's poverty rate; but it happens in many countries as well. Thus, this new and bigger responsibility comes from understanding really what poverty is: discrimination of any kind, the lack of vision, little or no opportunities, no education and having no future. When you add the lack of money, it turns into misery.

Travelling with a group of incredible entrepreneurs from all over the world to Mexico, to have the chance to make a difference onto others, allowed me to grow personally and also see my business in a different way. This is why I am now looking for new ideas and insights that will create new opportunities for others to prosper and have a better future. And being a part of the Celebrity Films crew that created an amazing documentary also called ARMONIA, and becoming one of its Executive Producers was something I had never dream of; and something I will always be grateful for. If you want to see the documentary trailer please visit the following link

If you want to help the ARMONIA idea and project grow, please contact me at coachluis@luisvicentegarcia.com 

I then would invite anyone who wants to change their lives and also the lives of so many other people, who are in need of guidance, inspiration and motivation, to do something different, to see new ways to help people and to envision new ideas to change the world. And if you have the opportunity to go on a trip like this one, I can assure you it will be the trip of your entrepreneurial career, a life changing event and an emotional connection with the people you will be helping for years to come.

Luis Vicente Garcia

www.luisvicentegarcia.com 

Caracas, Venezuela

It’s time to go Back to Work!

Well, summer is over and with autumn just approaching, we might remember the feeling of going back to the classroom. We can all recall the feelings of anticipation that come with the start of the new school year. Going back to school each fall, we experienced a change in mindset and reset our focus after the long summer days.

How can you keep this attitude working for you in your professional career?

Now is the Time to Learn Something New

The most successful individuals and entrepreneurs are constantly reading, attending seminars, engaging with mentors, and exposing themselves to new ideas and opportunities. Bolstering your knowledge in your field and improving your leadership skills can enhance your career and give you an edge. The extra contacts that continuing education provides are also beneficial in today’s competitive market.

What about Goals?

Are you 66% of the way to accomplishing the goals you set for 2015? The next 4 months are the prime time to make progress toward your year-end goals.

What is next?

Plan the last four months of the year; work on your goals; review your Team and their activities. See and visualize where you want to end the 2015 year so that you start to get ready for 2016. Have you thought of your strategic plan and the actions and steps you will have to follow in order to reach your goal?

As a FocalPoint Business Coach (powered by Brian Tracy) I do this for many clients in several countries, working hand in hand with them, guiding their teams, pushing their limits, stablishing goals and developing a coaching program that will take them to new levels of performance.

Take action!

Email us at lgarcia@focalpointcoaching.comto get your free 20-minute consultation call and see how we can help you grow and reach your goals faster.

Luis Vicente Garcia

FocalPoint Business Performance Coach

Brian Tracy International Certified Trainer

www.coachluisgarcia.com

www.luisvicentegarcia.com    

Earth Day 2015: Managing our Environment.

Earth Day has been celebrated on April 22^nd since 1970, when then US Senator, Gaylord Nelson, saw the oil spill off the coast of California and decided to do something about it. Raising awareness was his goal and already by 1990 had reached a massive turnout, mobilizing more than 200 million people in over 140 countries.

This year we are commemorating the 45^th anniversary of that first day when people decided to celebrate "Earth Day". A movement - perhaps as many - which failed at the beginning to see the extent it would have. For many, this is the starting date of the modern environmental movement.

Yes we do have events in many countries, states or cities; we have understood and probably changed our own judgments about what is good or bad for our environment. But this has to be something more. We all need to realize the importance of our natural resources and our precious Earth, understanding the use we give them, and more importantly the commitment we have to make not only for us but for future generations. It should be the ideal of a better, greener, less polluted and more livable world.

Since the 90’s, with creativity and getting various groups and institutions involved, different activities and movements worldwide have resulted. Among the many achievements we can cite the following:

- Home Recycling;
- The Conservationism movement;
- Major Environmental Commitment;
- Sustainable Agriculture auto;
- Promotion of local production rather than the big international chains;
- Changes on many topics related to Nutrition
- The development of organic replacing the synthetic;
- Understanding the consequences of global warming;
- Development of Energy "Clean";
- Efforts for reducing Carbon Dioxide.

There are many initiatives, programs, movements and ideas that have come out so far; but more effort is required. A joint effort of all and for all required; greater commitment on the part of companies and governments is required; more action is required. And this goes beyond planting trees or visiting a festival during Earth week. That of course has to be done; but our commitment must be in education, teaching, generating new ideas to improve the use of these precious resources and, of course, our active participation is required.

As for the past five years, around this date I do not write about attitude, motivation, entrepreneurship or leadership; I dedicate an article to the welfare of our environment. But if we think in a serious way, this is rather a matter of "ENVIRONMENTAL ATTITUDE". It means to be accountable for what needs to be done; creating different initiatives; and realizing the changes that we can generate for a better environment. I think we're just - still - starting out, and really need to do more. In other words we should be talking about ‘managing our Environment’.

Let's make Earth Day every day. 

This is the only way that will lead us to act in a different and more sustainable way.

In other words, let’s start 'Motivating' the idea of ​​caring for and improving our environment.

Luis Vicente Garcia.