SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY

With over 40 years of professional speaking around the world, Jim Cathcart is one of the best known and most award-winning motivational speakers in the business. He has delivered more than 3,100 presentations to audiences in every state of the US, most provinces of Canada and countries from Scotland to Singapore. Some of his most recent international engagements were for thousands of business leaders in Taiwan and Mainland China; hoteliers in Bali, Indonesia; engineers in Toulouse, France; business owners in Bogota’, Colombia; Costa Rica; Panama;  sales people in Warsaw & Wroclaw, Poland; Santiago, Chile  and Macau, China! A business strategist, psychological researcher and philosopher at heart, Jim is also a down-to-earth regular guy. He has worked in warehouses, driven trucks, sold door to door and at trade shows, been a bank teller, plays guitar in night clubs and pubs, and has toured much of the world on a motorcycle.

A TV interviewer said, “Jim Cathcart is what ‘Fonzie’ would have been if he’d gone to business school.” (Millennials are asking, “Who is Fonzie?”) Jim was an insurance agent for many years, an Army officer and a bill collector who, while in his twenties, had to repossess log trucks in the mountains of northern Arkansas. From this varied background he decided in 1972 to become an authority on the subject of motivation and through decades of dedication, study and hard work, he made it happen. And even today, he’s also an active motorcyclist and guitar performer.

After hearing Earl Nightingale on the radio one day in 1972, Jim was inspired to change his life. While working as a government clerk in the Housing Authority he determined to learn psychology and master the process of self-improvement. Through years of fanatical dedication to this quest he learned new skills, became a certified trainer for a variety of programs, read stacks of books, attended countless seminars and volunteered thousands of hours to civic organizations. In this process he moved from clerk, to manager, to sales person, to leader, to trainer, to author and professional speaker.

Today he is listed in the professional Speaker Hall of Fame, is a recipient of the prestigious Golden Gavel Award (along with Earl Nightingale, Art Linkletter, Zig Ziglar, Tony Robbins and many others), has been the president of the National Speakers Association and received the Cavett Award  for a lifetime of service. He has authored 17 books and scores of recorded programs. In 2014, 15 & 16 he was listed as one of Top 50 Sales Influencers in the World by Top Sales World. The San Diego chapter of the National Speakers Association renamed their member of the year award “The Jim Cathcart Service Award” and the Greater Los Angeles chapter gave Jim the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2003. In 2008 he was inducted as one of the “Legends of the Speaking Profession.”  And in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 & 2014 he was selected as one of the Top 5 Sales and Customer Service Speakers by Speaking.com in an online survey of over 14,000 people.

Jim Cathcart is an active motivational speaker and prolific author plus an executive coach to numerous high-achievers. In his personal time he plays Rock & Roll guitar in clubs, rides his motorcycle on the twistiest roads he can find and runs the trails of the mountains near his home at least twice each week. He’s a proud parent and grandparent and an active civic leader. He is an Artist in Residence for High Point University and serves on the Dean’s Advisory Council and Adjunct Faculty of the School of Management at California Lutheran University. His messages can be seen daily on Thrive 15.com and TSTN.com or YouTube and he does radio interviews almost every week.