Shari first honed her communications skills flogging stories about fast food chains and drug companies to the news media while employed by the world’s largest PR agency. All she can say now is she’s sorry, and she’s been putting the insights she gained to much better use ever since.

She’s parlayed her enhanced persuasive powers into column-writing, commentary performing and flak-deflecting jobs for a daily newspaper, national broadcaster and BC premier. In between times, she has taught public speaking to business executives, strategic communications to non-profits and media literacy to audiences of all ages.

Throughout the 1990s, Shari served as the President of a national non-profit women’s organization, delivering guest lectures, sharpening her sense of humour and challenging stereotypes. Since then, she has written two best-selling, award-winning books for youth about media and applied her writing talents to speeches and op eds for a range of health, education and human rights organizations and clients.

As a result, her communications arsenal now includes the ability to:
• listen between the lines;
• create compelling openers regardless of the topic;
• write for easily distracted ears (i.e. short and audience-focused);
• deliver with attitude;
• anticipate and defuse the objections of resistant listeners;
• make complex material accessible;
• enliven technical information with real life, human implications;
• clarify and deliver on communication objectives;
• employ appropriate humour to relax and engage;
• package important messages in quotable sound-bites.