The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association defines "accent" as a "phonetic trait from a person's original language that is carried over to a second language". Basically, aspects from another language carried over into English when descendants of those countries speak it. They define "dialect" as "sets of differences within English that are rule-governed phonological, morphological, or grammatical changes".
In reality, though, everyone speaks with an accent: the definition of that accent depends on who the listener is. We can try to fix some of the imperfections in vocal patterns, however. For instance, those from the South can learn to speak more through there mouth and rely less on their nose to prevent the nasal sound. They can also focus on the length of their vowels and make sure that they are no longer than the consonants.
Corporate leaders consider those who have the most clarity in their voice (i.e. the words are the most distinguished from each other) to be the best speakers. Those who do not speak too slow or too fast, those who do not slur their words together, and those who do not mumble tend to be the best public speakers and thus the most valuable in a corporate setting.
Sources
Sikorski, Lorna. "Regional Accents: A Rationale for Intervening and Competencies Required ."Seminars in Speech and Language . (2005): 118-125. http://www.ldsassoc.com/accent/trainer/news/articles/journal/RegionalAccentsArticle-May05.pdf (accessed December 16, 2013).
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