Cally Beaton is a best-selling author, comedian, keynote speaker, podcaster, awards host, business leader and entrepreneur. Well-known for being a natural storyteller ,full of intelligent, distinctive and insightful material, Cally is one of the UK’s most sought-after names for corporate, broadcasting and live comedy work.
Early in her career she headed an independent television production company that was bought by ITV, and she became the youngest and only female member of the board. She left to set up an award-winning creative consultancy company, Road Trip Media, and then went on to do a ten-year stint as Senior Vice President at US studio giant Paramount, responsible for brands including MTV,Nickelodeon and Comedy Central. So, if you want someone to blame for bringing South Park and Spongebob to the world, you need look no further. It was while working for Comedy Central that Cally was nudged into the sphere of performance after a chance conversation with the late,great Joan Rivers, then 81, and so it was that as a 45 year old single parent, Cally first took to the stage.
Her Namaste Motherf*ckers book, a no bullsh*t handbook for unapologetic female reinvention , came out in the summer of 2025 and immediately became the number #1 self-improvement title in the UK as well as featuring in the prestigious Sunday Times Top 10 Bestsellers list.
KEYNOTES
Bringing humour and energy to her business insight, Cally considers the nature of the workplace and leadership culture.She looks at how to engender change (both personal and organisational), inspire teams and develop a positive, agile,and inclusive environment. She also tackles the working priorities and expectations of the so-called millennial generation and reveals how to be creative whilst keeping an eye on the bottom line. Her personality, love of performance and business knowledge has also seen her coach and train senior figures from a range of industries.
Having led teams at MTV, ViacomBS, and Comedy Central, she speaks with real authority on leadership, creativity, and change. Her background in comedy makes her delivery not just insightful, but also engaging, memorable and refreshingly human. Cally has delivered keynotes for global organisations including Google, Barclays, Unilever, and Soho House.
She's a trusted voice on culture, connection, and reinvention not because she speaks from theory, but because she's lived it: leading at board level in male-dominated industries while simultaneously building a second career in comedy. That rare dual perspective makes her uniquely credible.Cally is also a passionate advocate for raising awareness around the menopause. With candour and humour, she opens up space for honest conversations, breaking stigma,supporting wellbeing, and helping organisations become
more inclusive and informed.
SPEAKER TOPICS
LET ME ENTERTAIN YOU: LESSONS FROM THE TELEVISION INDUSTRY
With an invisible virus still affecting our daily lives, the need for reinvention and adaptation has never been more relevant. The process doesn’t have to be limiting, it can instead be daring to do things differently and in a way that defies expectation and creates meaningful, positive and permanent change. Here, Cally shares what she has learnt from her many years at the top of the entertainment industry and looks at how we can best equip ourselves as creative disruptors to thrive in a brave new world. Themes include:
The evolution of broadcast & digital media,how we watch/listen/produce, Walking towards discomfort – the power of the unexpected
Integrating live with virtual engagement
Creation of bespoke, proprietary assets (audio/visual/social media)
Audiences & attention spans
Embracing change & ambition
Structuring events: how vs. what; delivery vs. content
Types of speaker & relevance of varied tone
Generating added value: before, during & afterwards
Keeping it simple
Turning ideas into actions
GETTING OUT OF THE WEEDS – DARING TO LEAD
What is leadership in 2026? We can look around and see what it isn’t but how can we cultivate braver, more daring, more authentic leaders? From her many years at the top of the media industry, and as an executive coach to some of the most high-profile people in the world, Cally knows that leadership is not about titles, status and power over people; rather it is about vision, values and influence. Here Cally looks at what it takes to choose courage over comfort, make a difference and lead - whatever your business or background. Themes include:
Staying curious and asking the right questions
Walking towards discomfort & difference
Failing better
Urgent vs. important; power vs. influence
Leaning into vulnerability
EQ over IQ – the ‘how’ as well as the ‘what’
Empathy and human connection
How work cultures can enable the next generation of leaders
INVISIBLE WOMEN: #BREAKTHEBIAS
Gender balance is not solely a women's issue, but an economic issue. In keeping with this year’s International Women’s Day theme #BreakTheBias, Cally looks at how we can work collectively to eliminate bias and remove obstacles in women’s career paths. It is Cally’s belief, based on her many years’ experience first in an all boys’ school and later in male-dominated boardrooms, that we can all choose to challenge , calling out inequality and celebrating women's achievements and how the rise of women is not about the fall of men. Themes include:
Gender equality – the facts & figures
Difficult conversations around gender at work
Male allyship – a major trend in accelerating women’s equality
'Sex' and 'gender'
Becoming an upstander, not a bystander
Extending personal networks to become more inclusive
Getting comfortable with being uncomfortable
Advocacy, inclusive mindsets and tangible actions
**MENOPAUSE: Cally is an in-demand speaker when it comes to the menopause. She has written for The Guardian, Financial Times and others on the subject and it is a recurring theme in her podcast and comedy material**
NAMASTE MOTHERF**KERS – WELLBEING AT WORK
Drawing on her time at the top of the media industry, together with life lessons from the celebrity guests on her hit podcast, Namaste Motherf**kers (the only podcast where the worlds of work, comedy and wellbeing collide), Cally shares stories, inspiration and life hacks. Her humorous and insightful take on her own experiences of tackling the everyday issues that affect us all, as well as the many she has interviewed, offer up ideas that may just change your life. Themes include:
Isolation - the impact of our social & professional ‘tribes’
The celebrity anecdote & what we can learn from it
Stress – understanding and managing our reaction to it
Reframing – challenge into opportunity
Promotion of professional and personal wellbeing
Belonging & vulnerability
Boundary setting
Committing to meaningful change
LITTLE BLACK BOOKS & WHY WE STILL NEED THEM: NETWORKING, ALLYSHIP & CONNECTION
In a world where our networks were for a time reduced to faces on screens, Cally explores how we can recapture the energy, affirmation and momentum of serendipitous networking and long lost water cooler moments, and why this is not just a luxury item. She explores our capacity to rebuild and extend our connections, within working life and without - enhancing motivation, opportunity and professional results:
Keeping connected & maintaining a support network
Networking – how to work your little black book
Sponsorship – enhancing executive presence and gaining traction within an organisation ∙ Allies – how to identify & lean into them
Wellbeing, linked with human connection
Benefits of mentoring (for companies, mentees & mentors)
STAND UP, STAND OUT: CHANGE, AMBITION & REINVENTION
Here Cally explores the relationship between change, ambition and the unexpected. With people living longer, economics getting tougher and ever-increasing uncertainties affecting our daily lives, the need for reinvention and adaptation is relevant to us all. Whatever challenges you are facing and whatever your reason for change, the process doesn't have to be limiting, it can instead be daring to do things differently and in a way that creates meaningful and positive change. Themes include:
Change and ambition
Being a creative disruptor
Human connection linked to commercial excellence
Walking towards difference/discomfort
The unexpected – notches on the dial to radical reinvention
Defying stereotypes/expectations
Failing better
Redefining success
CONFESSIONS OF A PUBLIC SPEAKER: FINDING YOUR VOICE IN 2022
In the early 00’s, Cally nearly left her job on the ITV board when she was told she was going to have to present to over two thousand people on the stage of a West End cinema; public speaking was definitely not her thing. Fast forward nearly two decades and she is making a living on stages (and virtual stages) as a broadcaster, awards host, comedian and after-dinner speaker. Here Cally demonstrates that if she can do it, anyone can do it. Themes include:
Finding your voice, not imitating someone else’s
Knowing your audience & how to reach them
Making an impact in a virtual or hybrid world
Content – creating and editing your message
Using humour to engage your audience (not how to become a stand-up!) ∙ Maximising timing, body language, and choice of words
Pauses, silence and the power of nothing
GETTING TO ‘YES’: NEGOTIATION, INFLUENCING & CONNECTION
As a business leader, mentor and executive coach for over two decades, it is Cally’s belief that professional excellence comes from human connection and here she looks at what it takes to influence, persuade, listen and connect – all of which can have a dramatic effect on the bottom line. Themes include:
EQ over IQ
Assertiveness and having difficult conversations
Increased self-awareness and awareness of others
Rapport-building
Filters - the impact of how you and others see the world
What they want to hear vs. what you want to say
Effective listening & non-verbal communication
Overcoming obstacles & closing the deal/conversation
IMPOSTOR SYNDROME: HOW NOT TO GET FOUND OUT
Maya Angelou famously said: “I have written 11 books, but each time I think, ‘Uh oh, they’re going to find out now". As a girl in a boys’ school who went on to be the only female member in the boardroom, Cally gets under the skin of impostor syndrome. How do we reconcile the different versions of ourselves – our overwhelming tendency to compare our insides with other people’s outsides? Themes include:
What is impostor syndrome?
Celebration of flaws, fears and f-up’s
The power of vulnerability
Accepting and enhancing the different versions of self
Befriending your inner critic
Managing your amygdale
Techniques for overcoming impostor syndrome
ENGAGING MILLENNIALS AND GEN Z - IN THE WORKPLACE AND BEYOND.
In this talk, Cally addresses the working priorities and expectations of the various generations. As a Gen X-er who successfully drove some of the biggest and youngest-skewing media brands in the world, she is no stranger to working with, motivating and retaining talent that is not like her. From her many years at the top of the entertainment industry, and as an executive coach to some of the most high-profile people in the world, Cally knows that leadership is not about titles, status and power over people; rather it is about vision, values and influence. She believes that the need for adaptation has never been more relevant and
that we should under-estimate and stereotype generations other than ours at our peril. Themes include:
Walking towards discomfort – the power of the unexpected
Work/life balance & hybrid working
Pleasure vs. purpose
Side hustles
Motivational theory
Leaning into vulnerability
Choosing your platform
EQ over IQ – the ‘how’ as well as the ‘what’
Empathy and human connection
How work cultures can enable the next generation of leaders
Extending personal networks to become more inclusive
Reframing failure
Reverse mentoring
Embracing change and ambition
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY 2026 SPEAKER CONTENT
Cally gives inspirational talks with a difference and is particularly passionate about her work in the arena of removing obstacles for women, at work and at home. Her recent hit book - a manual for empowering women - contains thirty tangible take-outs, designed to enable people to start living their own stories, rather than those dictated to them by outmoded social stereotypes. Her new book on the topic of mansplaining is a humorous exploration of a phenomenon that is in fact less of a buzzword, more of a serious societal problem; it is Cally’s belief that it is our collective responsibility to address the underlying inequality and assumptions that give rise to it.
In line with this year’s IWD theme - #GiveToGain - Cally shares some of the take-outs from her writing, alongside her experience of what it takes to create truly meaningful, collaborative and positive working environments, and thereby outstanding business results. No stranger to being creative in the face of adversity, Cally is walking, talking advocate for coping with change and reinvention, and doing ‘one thing every day that scares you’. It is her belief, based on her many years’ experience first in an all-boys’ school and then in male-dominated boardrooms, that we can choose to challenge collectively – raising awareness about discrimination, calling out inequality and lifting women up. The rise of women is not about the fall of men; rather it is about taking action to drive gender parity. However you identify, there is much in Cally’s speeches with which you will identify. Themes include:
Gender equality – the facts and figures
Becoming an upstander, not a bystander
Mansplaining – an everyone problem
Microaggressions and what to do about them
Your own personal boardroom: allies, sponsors and advocates
Getting comfortable with being uncomfortable
Change - befriending it and making reinvention a positive
Turning up the dial on your authentic self
Inspired leadership
Failing forward
The truth about imposter syndrome
Different, not less - extending personal and professional networks
Male allyship – a major trend in accelerating women’s equality
Vulnerability and resilience
What can you do?
TESTIMONIALS
“Cally is a comedy queen – fiery, intelligent and totally original”
Sara Pascoe
“Sprightly wit and considerable storytelling prowess”
**** The Scotsman
“Exciting and hilarious talent...she’s got it”
Time Out
“Properly funny. A real find”
Sandi Toksvig
"Original and clever"
**** The Arts Desk – pick of the Edinburgh Fringe
“A very funny and original comedic voice”
Gotham Comedy Club, New York
“Analytical, incisive and sassy”
**** Funny Women
“Gripping, perceptive and uplifting”
Steve Bennett, Chortle
"Not even a bit funny. She's just embarrassing"
teenage daughter
“SMART AND INSPIRATIONAL, IT'S HARD TO
CAPTURE THE AMAZING EFFECT AND THE
SENSE OF FUN SHE EMITS ON STAGE. A
BRILLIANT, QUICK-TALKING SELF-DEPRECATING
RACONTEUR.
“SUPERB AND INSPIRING, THE HIGHLIGHT OF
OUR EVENT"