Motivational Speakers | After Dinner Speakers | Keynote Speakers | JLA Speaker Bureau - JLA

JLA is the UK's biggest specialist agency for keynote, motivational speakers and after dinner speakers, conference presenters, awards hosts and cabaret for corporate, industry and public sector events.

Photo of Marc Woods
CONFERENCE SPEAKERS

Fee band C £2.5K TO £5K

"Marc was excellent - a real life role model."

Royal Mail

YOUR FEEDBACK

"Everyone was absolutely delighted, Marc was fantastic."

Alexander Forbes Financial Services

TOPICS

Overcoming Adversity, Peak Performance

SPEECH TITLES

From 90% to 100%
Effective communication
Teamwork: making every member of the team important
Setting Goals

BIOGRAPHY

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Marc Woods was diagnosed with cancer at 17 and consequently had his left leg amputated below the knee. Not knowing whether he had 6 months or 60 years left to live, he was determined to make the most of whatever time he did have.

Before losing his leg to cancer, Marc Woods swam in local races, but never achieved his full potential. After surgery, he stepped up his training, winning a race while still undergoing chemotherapy. Six months later, he was swimming faster with one leg than he ever had with two. Eighteen months later, he represented Great Britain for the first time. In five Paralympics games Marc has won 12 medals - four of them Gold.

Since retiring from Great Britain's Paralympics Swimming Team, Marc has become a 2012 Ambassador, BBC commentator and author. Marc takes audiences on a remarkable journey that leaves them inspired to be the very best, in all dimensions of their lives. Woods' distinctive, open style demonstrates his passion for life, translating into a moving and motivating experience for audiences.

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EXTRACT FROM JLA SPEAKERS BREAKFAST
by Marc Woods

In Atlanta I really thought we had a relay team that could win - then we came second. I was absolutely devastated. It wasn't until I watched the race again that I realised where we had gone wrong. I saw on the podium two happy guys and two sad guys. In that moment it dawned on me that as a team we had totally different objectives. We lost purely because we didn't all believe in what we were doing. Some were happy to come second - and there is a big difference between that and wanting to win.

I started to wonder whether the people in the support team that worked with us were as motivated as we were. Even the people who put the lane ropes in the pool -if they put them in 5 minutes late, I would miss 5 minutes of training. And I bet Australia don't miss out on 5 minutes of training every day.

We decided we would get everyone to focus on what they were doing - to understand that if they could do their job as well as they could, every day, we had a better chance of winning a gold medal. It doesn't matter what your job is - if we get everyone to move on a fraction, it would have an accumulative effect.

That was our focus - and because of that, our team went on to be seven seconds quicker in Athens - it was already a world record.

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