Jeannette Kavanagh
Through her consultancy Jeannette Kavanagh and Daughter Limited, Jeannette works with schools, Universities, and small businesses to help clients set up mentoring and coaching programs and to evaluate their performance so that they know how best to improve. Jeannette also works as a solution-oriented personal coach, inspiring people to be their very best when speaking and performing in public.
Until the mid 1990s Dr Kavanagh was the deputy director of Box Hill Institute of Technical and Further Education (TAFE) in Victoria, Australia. She’s also worked as an education policy analyst and as advisor on post-secondary education to state Ministers of Parliament.
Throughout the past two decades Jeannette has gained a reputation as an entertaining and informative public speaker, and has spoken in every sort of setting, from keynote addresses at international academic conferences, to addressing Parliamentary committees, and making countless toasts at birthday parties and weddings.
Conquer Your Fear of Public Speaking: Presenting Your Best evolved over the past twenty years from her own public presentation experience, and from the many public speaking seminars that she designed and ran. Almost from the first seminar, Jeannette realised that most participants were actually nervous or even terrified about public speaking, regardless of whether their talk was to a small group of friends, or to thousands of people. She also learned that even the most experienced performers spent hours in a total panic before their talk or musical recital. Realising that she was dealing with a more complex level of the very normal and natural “butterflies in the tummy”, Jeannette sought input from a number of psychologists. Together they designed strategies to overcome that fear. Dr Kavanagh always seeks feedback from participants about which strategies worked best, and Conquer Your Fear of Public Speaking: Presenting Your Best brings you all those proven strategies, in a step-by-step program
Jeannette firmly believes that everyone can learn the techniques of great public speaking and that we can all speak in public without fear.
Offline Professional Services
Public presentation skills seminars
Through my consultancy, Jeannette Kavanagh and Daughter Limited, I offer seminars in public presentation skills. They’re offered in a variety of locations around Melbourne, Australia. In those seminars, you’ll learn by doing, not just listening to me telling you how it’s done.
These seminars are delivered in two main formats.
- Saturday seminar. From 9am to 5pm, the seminar is delivered to a group of not more than 15 participants. Limiting the group size means that each person can be given individualised tuition.
- Thursday evening seminars: From 7pm to 9pm over five consecutive Thursdays. Once again, the numbers are limited. This timeframe suits people who like to have time between sessions to practise.
Course content
In the beginning, and the end, the three aims of making a public presentation are to
- Transfer knowledge and/or skills to your listeners in a dynamic, engaging way, or
- Entertain them and/or to
- Move them to action. Whether you’re informing or entertaining, and hopefully you’re doing both, you must convince your listeners to follow a course of action – eg vote for you, buy your product, donate to your organisation.
In my seminars you’ll learn how to:
- Conquer your fear of public speaking using my guaranteed strategies.
- Establish and maintain the appropriate level of eye contact, as well as how to manage hand gestures.
- Structure your preparation so it fits into the time you have.
- Use the three important ‘p’s of using your voice: pitch, pace, phrasing,
- Create visual aids which have optimum impact.
Presentation skills coaching
I’m a certified Coach with training in solution-oriented coaching and counselling.
I offer one-to-one public presentation skills coaching sessions. The sessions are one hour long followed by structured exercises for you to practise between coaching sessions. Those exercises are tailored to maximise your strengths and eliminate your weaknesses. Many people prefer that individualised approach. Unlike many coaching services, I do not set up a contract with a minimum number of sessions. Some people get all they need in an hour, many take three, or even twenty sessions to reach their goal.
Free coaching consultation
In the first session, you set up your public presentation skills coaching goals. I make that free of charge because you need to have the opportunity to decide if we’d work well as a team.
Life coaching and counselling
I offer a life coaching and personal counselling to a limited number of people.
My counselling practice focuses mainly but not entirely on dealing with anxiety issues. I have helped many people to overcome the negative effects of anxiety, panic attacks and phobias on their lives.
To learn more bout the approach I use in my practice, please go to the Centre of Effective Therapy (CET).
On the CET website, you’ll see that the emphasis of Solution-Oriented Coaching and Counselling is on working with you, to find the best solutions. Unlike most traditional psychotherapeutic coaching and counselling practices, we won’t spend endless hours, or even years, delving into your past to look at the possible causes of your problems.
That’s because it’s been found that in the majority of cases, no one cause, or set of causes, can be identified as the proven source of a particular problem. Besides, even when the cause of a problem has been found, that insight alone doesn’t eliminate the problem.
In my coaching and counselling practice, I look instead at creative and ingenious ways to help you find your solutions.
