Cool talk alert: How to make your first impression count

Finally, a professional development event for women that doesn’t tell you how to act or to pretend to be someone you’re not. Instead, it’s an event that encourages you to nurture your true authentic professional self while making a first impression.
Welcome to the final event in the Great Dames’ spring series of Powerful Conversations. The May 15 event will focus on first impressions and how to gain control of your image during that brief period of time when first meeting a new business associate. Panel speakers Dr. Laura Sicola, founder of coaching business Vocal Impact Productions, and Linda Farquhar, founder of custom suiting boutique entreDonovan, will drop their nuggets of wisdom on a crowd of dames at Harry’s Savoy Grill ballroom on Naamans Road.
Tickets are $40 to $50. Interested in winning a pair of tickets (valued at $100) to this event? Sign up for the Technically Delaware newsletter, which sends the site’s daily headlines to your inbox every day, or our national newsletter, which sends headlines from our five Mid-Atlantic markets. When you sign up, use the code DAMES. We’ll choose a winner on Monday, May 8, at 1 p.m.
Get tickets
Why are first impressions so important? Studies have shown that you only get seven seconds or fewer to make a lasting first impression on an individual when you first meet them.
“When you open your mouth, you’re gonna do one of two things: you’re gonna prove them right or prove them wrong. That’s what’s important to me … They want the package, they buy into the package. You want your package to look and sound like what you want to represent, you need to make sure all those different communication channels fit with what your goals,” Sicola said.
Intent is the name of the game, as Farquhar explained it. “Thanks to confirmation bias is real, the message you convey upon meeting someone is lasting. You should control your own message. It shouldn’t be accidental, it should be deliberate.”
Remember the first time you met your best friend? The first time you met your boss? The first time you met your significant other? Of course you do. First impressions last a lifetime.