PUBLIC SPEAKING
SPEECH WRITING
Building Confidence in Public Speaking
the writers
Our team of followers of Aristotle, practised in the ancient skill of rhetoric, will assure your speech is an occasion by bringing into it the freshness of youth.
We will assure that your speech has spontaneity and enthusiasm but also balance and acumen. We believe in teamwork above all, and in enjoying what you do to get the best results.
Manuel Antunes
Manuel Antunes is one of the youngest sprouts in the Podium team. Carried by the wind, he decided to root himself in this project. For him, connecting with people from different backgrounds shines a light during a dark, cloudy day.
What Manuel values the most in life is empathy. From a small seed to a blooming flower, his empathy grew alongside him and is now part of Manuel’s fascinating flora. He wants to plant more of these empathetic seeds throughout his life and stand out in this beautiful garden we call Earth.
João Couto
João Couto has an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. Like his ancestors, he is an explorer. While they braved the waves to explore new worlds, he navigates the oceans of information to learn more about this wondrous world. From technology to psychology, from bonsai to almond pies, from modern history to yesterday's mystery, he is a Renaissance man in modern times.
Reserved but outgoing when required, João knows when to speak and when to listen. He prides himself on his ever-growing set of passions and his dedication to forming unique, informed, and nuanced opinions on every subject presented before him. He is as much uniquely himself as he is a reflection of those he loves and admires. He is both the wallflower and the garden.
Emanuel Cruz
Emanuel Cruz is an ambitious aspiring adventurer who does not look ahead to the future without remembering all the life lessons he was taught through his experience and the people who have helped to cultivate his keenness to dream big. His grandmother’s concern for her beloved ones’ happiness instead of her own has made it clear for him how important it is to be selfless when dealing with people. He believes that to achieve success in any sphere of activity takes serious commitment.
Emanuel was lucky enough to explore his charismatic side through theatre, which still enables him to enjoy life in a more festive way. Also, he believes that we live in a world brimming with dubiousness where values such as authenticity need to be fostered.
Cláudia Duarte
Cláudia Duarte has been teaching for more than half her life and has been learning for double that time. She has worked with business clients in Europe and America for nearly 25 years, helping them to express themselves and coaching them in presentations and speeches with a personal touch and unrelenting enthusiasm.
Cláudia believes every speaker can be interesting if they learn how to speak with empathy and authority, and that every topic can be engaging, when presented with creativity and logic. Her passion drives her to help her d clients use their verbal skills to their full potential, working in an environment of mutual trust, pursuit of knowledge, and the odd laugh.
Rita Homem
Rita Homem had discovered as a child the objectivity of Physics and the enchantment of Early Music which had always separated her into two different halves, until she finally found Speechwriting and Linguistics. This combination of structure, sobriety and sincerity necessary for an inquisitive scientist also plays with the magic, mystique and mischief vital for a curious musician.
She first thought her two halves were at war with each other, not realising how they could walk hand-in-hand on this journey we call life. If you find an extremely tall woman, sitting on a park bench and listening to Corelli’s Follia, do not assume her head is in the clouds. She is in fact reaching for the sky, with tree diagrams and tons of fun puns in the spotlight.
António Luz
António Luz is a former lawyer who fell in love with all Humanities. He has walked among classical culture and medieval worlds, in which he now finds most of his answers. Tolkien’s Middle-Earth, and Homer’s shores of Ilion are his foster motherlands.
António is baffled by the neglect rhetoric suffers these days, especially in places where it should be ever-present. How could inspiring words such as “The Ode to Traitors” by Alexander, the words of Martin Luther King Jr., Socrates’ dying speech, how could these rallying cries to the human spirit be forgotten, and how could cheap fearmongering and rudeness have taken its place? His passion has become his mission, to bring rhetoric to the twenty-first century, and use this ancient knowledge to foster a more reasonable era.
André pintor
Have you ever found yourself looking at a new product and thinking: "How did they come up with this?" That's the usual reaction people have after a few minutes of talking with André Pintor.
From Poetry to Music, from Bossa Nova to Punk Rock, from Leonardo to Manet, André is an art lover who found his passion in the Art of Rhetoric, always aiming to compose speeches as he would compose a song, a painting or a movie. The youngest in an extensive family of immigrants, André has had to use persuasion and his wits all his life in order to be heard. André will take an interest in everything that crosses his path; he will look at it like fireworks in the midnight sky and transpose all the beauty and wonder into your memorable speech.
Inês Valente
If you have ever been to the North of Portugal, it won’t be difficult to picture Inês Valente. Imagine a country housewife, screaming away next to a stove brimming with boiling pots. That’s her. But don’t let the small-town girl stereotype fool you, she has big opinions and is ready to voice them. Shooting irony like arrows and talking louder than necessary, the Northern woman mentality stands to this day. Her writing is versatile, witty and open minded. With ideas pouring out and the blood boiling, Inês is prepared for any challenge you throw her way.
From short stories, poems and a children’s book, Inês has been writing all her life, perfecting her craft and finding her way as a writer. After graduating, she studied journalism and communication and discovered humour is the best way to whet people’s appetite and entice them.
