No – but many professional speakers already getting paid to speak have taken the Academy. Most participants are subject matter experts, and career professionals (legal, engineering, corporate, etc.) with a history of professionally related speaking, and have something to say. Now, they want to make a living from that experience.

The Academy assumes you have spoken in public on your topic of expertise, probably several to many times, your experience was quite positive, and now you have a vision to pursue making a living at speaking, or to use speaking in service to promoting your professional expertise, to drive revenue. While we will address the issues of topic development and performance and the platform, the goal of the Academy is teaching you to build a business of speaking. There are other programs within the NSA to and elsewhere to help hone your craft and make you a great speaker.

Great key question! Toastmasters is a national organization with weekly meetings in small groups for people to learn public speaking, hone the craft through weekly practice with feedback of peer learners. The Academy is comprised of professional speakers who teach subject experts and speakers to turn their speaking activities (speaking, media, book promotion, seminars, etc.) into a revenue generating business. The Academy and Toastmasters focus on different, but complementary outcomes - and many people do both at the same time.

100% of the value can be extracted by 100% presence. The best value is to experience the course concurrently with the way your peers are experiencing it at the same time. So, a “live in-person”, or “live interactive webinar” can be best experienced concurrently with your classmates in the live sessions. For pre-recoded video supported with online materials, all students can consume the content at their own pace - then, great – that is a concurrent experience as well with support of messaging services in between. But if offered participation in a live session that must be missed, then you’ll be able to catch up via recording with willing clarifications by faculty and peers to help you catch up.

The professional speakers who mentor tend to do their own thing, in their own way. You will work with mentors in a working group of academy peers, and together you’ll determine the pace and structure of the interactions. What we’ve experienced in the past is that Academy students benefit from the generous time and insights of world class professionals throughout the Academy period, largely based on how thoughtful the students are in the questions they as and advice they seek.

Apply by clicking on any “APPLY NOW” button on this landing page.
Enroll by clicking on any “ENROLL NOW” button on this landing page.
You can have a 100% refund at any time up until the end of the first class held on October 12, 2019 when you will be asked if you’d like to discontinue the program for any reason. We are non-profit professional organization, offered by professional speakers dedicated to the success of aspiring professional speakers – not for a profit. After the first class, if you don’t opt-out, we’re committed to mutual success, full speed forward, no looking back, no further refunds, no tears!