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If you are a foreign born professional, we would like to hear from you. We are very interested in the story of how you are overcoming self-doubt and learning new skills.
We would be happy to feature your story in a future issue.
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trOur Mission is to help our clients transform their accents from a communication barrier to a charming cultural flavor using "listener friendly" speech.
Order Mastering Meaning from Lulu.com today online. For an autographed copy contact Judith Bergman through our web site. (Pay for autographed copies with check by mail or credit card phone order only). $19.99 + S & H and applicable sales taxes.
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We tell our clients, "If you can hear it, you can fix it."
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Triangle Speech Services is the private, professional practice of Judith L. Bergman, a licensed speech-language pathologist (SLP) who specializes in foreign accent and regional dialect modification and related communication skills. I offer customized, individual tutorials to corporate-sponsored and self-enrolled individuals who speak English fluently but with moderate to severe accents that create challenges and frustrations in the workplace.
We all can complete this sentence, "I feel that I'm good enough at _________ even though I'm sure I could be/do better." I can insert "tai chi" or "yoga" or "ringing hand bells." In the world of business, I could insert "professional marketing." How would you complete this sentence? Are there important skill sets in your personal or professional life that you have acquired through lots of effort and practice where you know you are "good enough," that is, operating through habit on an OK Plateau while others keep improving and perfecting the same skill sets?
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Maria Popova on "How to Overcome The OK Plateau" in Brainpickings.
We believe in giving credit where credit is due and Maria Popova's article resonated with us and relates directly to the experiences of our clients.
Our clients are all fluent speakers of English, especially when they are in control of the content and speaking in their own area of professional expertise. Their grammar may not be perfect and may reflect the usage patterns of their native language. Their intonation and pronunciation patterns may be so distorted acoustically that a native speaker of English may struggle to understand them, but the client knows exactly what he or she is saying and can even "picture" the spelled words. Our clients first contact us when they realize that their "achievement" of rapidly spoken and automatic English is their plateau. They may want to advance beyond their current technical roles, but the "soft skill" of clear, "listener friendly" speech and confident presentation skills will require "more climbing" and more of what Popova calls "deliberate practice."
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| Cultivating Conscious Control with Strategic, Deliberate Practice 
| "Top achievers...develop strategies for consciously keeping out of the autonomous [automatic, routine] stage while they practice by doing three things: focusing on their technique, staying goal oriented and getting constant immediate feedback on their performance.
"...the best way to transcend the OK Plateau...is to cultivate conscious control over the thing we're practicing and, above all, to practice failing."
"Deliberate practice, by its nature, must be hard...To improve we must watch ourselves fail, and learn from our mistakes."
"The way to get better at a skill is to force yourself to practice just beyond your limits."
Those reading this who are current or former accent modification clients will immediately recognize how this process is applied in their training. I tell them, "You must get the correct sound patterns in your mind and the movement patterns in your muscles." Drill, repetition, recording and playing back, instructor feedback and guidance and our new "Awareness and Self-Correction" carryover routines are all essential requirements that allow our clients to advance beyond their "Not Really Okay" Plateau!
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We invite you to click on Triangle Speech Services to visit our informative website. Our goal is always to provide information, inspiration and encouragement since these are essential components of any successful learning experience. If you are seriously considering enrolling yourself or an employee in an individual tutorial with us or simply want to talk to us about our programs, please contact us through the contact page of our web site. Sincerely,
Judith L. Bergman M.A. CCC-SLP
Speech-Language Pathologist and Corporate Speech Trainer
Founder & Director of Triangle Speech Services |
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