Olympic Gold medaillist 10km Open Water
Maarten van der Weijden
Maarten van der Weijden is the only winner of Olympic Gold, after recovering from cancer. Maartens goal is to become better every day. Because of his persistence and realism he often succeeds in his goal and therefore he became a successful motivational speaker (over 250 speakings), writer ...
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About Maarten van der Weijden
As a young boy, Maarten challenged himself by setting out obstacle courses which he tried to complete as quickly as possible. Maarten experienced at a young age that investing time and making a great effort leads to success. These positive experiences helped him when he started to swim more often and began to break Dutch records.In 2001, Maarten was diagnosed with cancer (leukaemia) and his chances for recovery were very small. At this point, Maarten had little control over his life and he depended on the medical specialists to become better. Because of chemotherapy and a stem cell transplantation, Maarten was lucky to recover and started to swim again.By training hard and thinking a lot about his tactics, Maarten improved himself as a professional swimmer and became Olympic Champion at the Olympic Games of Beijing (Open Water Swimming, 10km). Maarten soon realized he had achieved his personal best in sports, retired from swimming and started looking for new goals. These days, Maarten is a successful motivational speaker and finance manager at Unilever and he wrote his own biography (Better, 2009).Maartens motivational speakings are personal and sincere. He has done over 250 speakings in the Netherlands and abroad (among United Kingdom, Germany, Norway, Thailand and Indonesia), but Maartens story still remains authentic. Preceding a presentation, Maarten always wants to know more about his audience (their age, background, composition, …) to make sure his story is in line with their interests.Main goal of Maarten his motivational speakings is to challenge his audience to think about their own chances and possibilities and to motivate them to improve themselves. Because of his experiences within the business world, Maarten is able to make a connection between this world and sports and dealing with misfortune. His story isnt a slick presentation, supported by a flashy PowerPoint, but its a pure story which makes you think about your own life and future.
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Aleksei Metelskiy, Sales Manager
"For me the ultimate goal of the training is, first of all, to increase the sales of my company and to improve the skills in the sales sphere. It is hard to understand everything after the first day, but I see the generalidea. I think that after this training the newly acquired practical skills will enable us to readjust the sales system not only in the sales department, but also in other departments which are directly engaged in customer services."
References
Gerrit Zalm
“Maarten his speaking is pure poetry combined with business insights”.
Roger van Boxtel
“Maarten has a speaking talent, you don’t often see. His presentation is an unique story about a cancer patient becoming Olympic champion”
Peter ter Kulve
“Both my team in the Netherlands and in South-East Asia, thought Maartens speaking was the highlight of the day”