Michel De Coster

Speaker
Dutch
French
English
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Who is Michel De Coster?

Michel is known as bass player of De Mens. In daily life he is a coach, advisor and director of companies. He earned his stripes in the ICT sector. Successively at Bosch Telecom, COLT, BT and Belgacom, where he made it to Executive Vice-President in 2008. He then moved into consultancy as an independent consultant for companies. At the end of 2013 he reappeared at the French telecom operator SFR as Director Enterprise and since the summer of 2015 he has again been advising and coaching at Accenture, SAP, Fortino, Tobania, UCB, VUB, Flanders Digital Agency, Sabam and Belisol, among others. In 2012 he wrote the book No Nonsense: Brains, Heart and Guts, the assets of the modern manager and in 2018 People Peppers was published, about the importance of empathy. His latest book Back to Basics in Leadership was published in December 2022 and focuses on leadership skills. So this speaker knows what leadership is. Due to his years of experience in the ICT business, he knows the tricks of the trade at the top. Like no other, he can give practical tips on leadership, time management and how to convert a vision into a tight policy. Listed companies, large SMEs, start-ups, leadership everywhere is based on the same expertise, only the context is different.
His presentations are based on the expertise of the manager and are mainly practice-oriented, due to the countless examples that he draws from his own experience.

    Leadership

    A manager's expertise revolves primarily around leadership! This is independent of the manager's position in the organization, independent of the sector in which he/she is active, independent of the department he/she leads. Michel has filtered that expertise into twenty generic characteristics, which he believes a successful manager should master, use and refine. In an inspiring presentation, without slides as usual, interspersed with examples from his rich experience and always seasoned with humor, he brings those 20 skills to life step by step. A few are obvious: nobody needs to be reminded of the importance of building a strong team, but the way to do it. Every executive will recognize that making decisions is their job, but how long has it been since you made a decision that actually changed something, started something? Don't worry too much about details? That is another classic where he will emphasize the importance of not doing that with recognizable examples. Or how about the statement that a manager continuously 'recruits' himself? Do you think that is a task for the HR department? In short, as a listener you are confronted with a set of traits and qualities that Michel believes applying will make you a better leader.

Michel De Coster is excellent! Although he doesn’t use slides, he is well structured and easily captures people’s attention for 1.5 hours. His hands-on experience allows him to provide clear examples. A solid argument for the need for balance between brains, heart & guts during every management decision.

Foodservice

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The feedback was very positive. Particularly the fact that he was able to fascinate people for over an hour, without having to use a single slide.
Of course, it is useful when you can provide examples from a variety of disciplines - business, sport, art - which you have personally experienced. Most speakers rely on examples from the world of sport, but have sometimes never even ridden a bike.
In addition, the lecture also supplied a degree of humour.

Filip

SAS Institute

Michel was able, without over complicating things, to visually and verbally encapsulate the essence of leadership for managers at all levels.

Karel

Acerta

Michel opened an event to celebrate the launch of the Flemish Business Club. He was charming, likeable and, in particular, spontaneous, which meant he was able to enthral the audience until the very end. He is a captain of industry who will be more than welcome at many other business clubs.

An De Jonghe

Chairman Vlaamse Business Club

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Michel is the person you have to meet and learning to know.
Combining so many different heterogeneous professional activities and hobbies with success is not due to hazard. During a very helpful session with our Management Team, Michel give us a lot of tips to optimize the way we spend time!
Work better instead of trying to work more.
3 slides are enough in a Face to Face.
Define and respect strict house rules.
Focus on target and objectives.
So many you should know but that due to pressure, lack of discipline is difficult to respect.
Michel speaks about EQ - your emotions and soft skills, IQ – your technical skills, but he also insist on your capacity to take risk and to make the difference within uncertainty.

Giovanni d'Ieteren

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