Press Room
Coaching Credibility: Former WBZ-TV anchor coaches execs, public figures on art of public speaking
by Jill Lerner, Journal Staff
WELLESLEY – It wasn't long after the Watergate scandal broke that former WBZ-TV anchorwoman Suzanne Bates had to make a decision about her career.
As a result, Bates took her degree from the University of Illinois in journalism and, upon graduating in 1974, set off for a career in news with the intention of helping others "get at the truth."
That path led her through television newsrooms from Illinois to Tampa, FLA., – making her, in many cases, among the first woman to do so as a reporter – and eventually landed her at Boston's WBZ-TV.
Looking for a new challenge after a 13-year stint as an anchor at WBZ, Bates last year drew upon a career spent conveying credibility in her newscasts and launched a business designed to helping corporate executives and public figures look as if they, too, are delivering the truth.
"My job reading the news just didn't interest me as much as it had before. It just wasn't enough for me," recalls Bates.
"I started feeling like there was a different kind of truth I could help people discover about themselves."
Founded in December 2000, Bates Communications Inc. is a one-woman show dedicated to helping professionals project credibility, be they business executives or others with a need to become media-savvy. Essentially, she is a media trainer and communications coach who helps clients project that which television news reporters are judged upon above all else – credibility.
The company, which is operated out of Bates' Wellesley home with the help of an assistant, generated approximately $200,000 in its inaugural year, and is on track to bring in between $350,000 and $400,000 this year with a client list that includes acting Gov. Jane Swift, whom Bates helped coach for her recent State of the State address.
Bates, 46, consults with clients at their offices. Among them are such marquee firms as FleetBoston Financial Corp., Hingham-based clothing retailer Talbots Inc., Boston College, AT&T Corp., accounting firm Ernst & Young International and the Massachusetts Bankers Association.
Kathleen Jones, senior vice president in charge of education and management development for the bankers association, hired Bates last fall to deliver three seminars to bankers about "building relationships and opening communications." Jones was so impressed that she contracted with Bates to speak at the association's annual convention in May in Bermuda.
"She just did a fantastic job," said Jones.
Fleet's Teri Cavanagh, a senior vice president who is regularly asked to address audiences in her capacity as director of Fleet's Women Entrepreneurs' Connection, has hired Bates on her own behalf.
"I was just feeling ... I needed to take my presentation skills to the next level," said Cavanagh, who began working with Bates about nine months ago, and who credits the communications coach with helping her develop her standard speech that she delivers often. They still get together about once every quarter, Cavanagh said.
"My main goal was to be heard," said Cavanagh, a women's business advocate. "People don't really come to listen to you speak. They come to hear what you have to say."
Bates' business venture seems especially well-timed, following the spectacular recent collapse of Enron Corp. – a watershed event that, like the Watergate scandal that inspired her to pursue reporting in the first place, centers around the betrayal of public trust.
"It has awakened people to how essential credibility is. They've realized a whole new level of integrity and honesty is required to do business," said Bates.
"And," she added, "that's a good thing. If there's anything good to come from this whole fiasco, it's that."