“I have incorporated the public speaking techniques Barbara taught me and discovered the most amazing feeling—COMFORT combined with ENERGY while speaking.”
PATTY BRETON
Breton Consulting Services
public speaking training
Speak with confidence. Connect with your audience.
Strong public speaking is about more than standing at the front of a room.
It’s about connecting with people, communicating ideas clearly, thinking on your feet, and staying grounded when the pressure is on.
Barbara May helps leaders and professionals develop practical public speaking and presentation skills through demonstration, practice, coaching and feedback.
how it works
Public speaking skills are developed by doing.
People become stronger speakers when they have an opportunity to practice, receive useful feedback, make adjustments, and try again.
Barbara creates a supportive learning environment where participants can identify the stumbling blocks getting in the way and develop the skills to get past them.
Training is practical, highly interactive and shaped around the people in the room.
Build the skills to communicate when it matters.
Public speaking shows up in more places than formal presentations.
Leaders and professionals may need to present an idea, lead a meeting, answer an unexpected question, tell a compelling story, speak at an event, or represent their organization in public.
Public speaking training can help participants strengthen skills such as:
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Managing nervousness and pressure
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Organizing ideas clearly
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Speaking with greater confidence and presence
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Connecting with different audiences
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Thinking on their feet
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Answering difficult or unexpected questions
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Using stories effectively
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Leading discussions and facilitating groups
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Presenting in person and online
The focus is on practical skills participants can continue using in meetings, presentations, conversations and leadership roles.
Babara watches what happens--and coaches from there.
Every speaker has different strengths and different stumbling blocks.
Barbara watches how participants communicate, where they become uncomfortable, what is getting in the way and what adjustment could make the biggest difference.
She may demonstrate a technique, offer specific feedback or have someone try the same section again with a different approach.
That immediate coaching helps participants understand what to change and gives them an opportunity to feel the difference for themselves.
why barbara
More than 30 years helping people communicate.
Barbara has spent more than 30 years teaching, coaching, presenting and helping people communicate with greater confidence and clarity.
Her background includes television hosting and reporting, stand-up comedy, keynote speaking, leadership training, coaching athletes and instructors, 15 years teaching coaches how to coach, and facilitating more than 500 career and employment workshops.
She has taught thousands of participants how to present ideas, connect with an audience, think on their feet and communicate effectively when the pressure is on.
She has worked with leaders, professionals, instructors and presenters who need to communicate clearly when people are watching, listening and responding in real time.
That range gives Barbara a practical understanding of what makes communication work—and how to help someone improve when it doesn’t.
Real People. Real results.
What leaders are saying.
“An interview with a camera in your face can be intimidating and make you self-conscious, which I definitely was at first, but that stopped after only a couple ground-breaking sessions with Barbara May.”
2nd Runner Up, Miss Universe Canada
KATHRYN KOHUT
“After I launched a weekly
feature on local television news many people gave me helpful advice. Barbara May's coaching was the best of all. Everyone noticed an immediate improvement. Barbara removed my TV stumbling blocks.”
DAVE LIEBER
Speaker and Watchdog columnist for The Dallas Morning News
“Barbara May is the person who helped me the most to improve my comedy delivery on stage. In this competitive field she could have let me flounder. Instead, she lifted me up.”
SHARON LACEY
Comedian and Author of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Dementia
