Dini Petty

Author of The Self Directed Journey , Celebrity, Mother, Entrepreneur, Daredevil and Free Spirit, Dini Petty is one remarkably accomplished woman.

Petty’s broadcast career began when she joined CKEY radio, flying a pink helicopter over Toronto reporting on local traffic. Moving further into celebrity status, her television career started at CityTV doing a variety of reporting, later hosting The Dini Petty Show.

A three-time Gemini Nominee, Dini has also won a number of CanPro Awards. Her interviewing skills have won her international awards, including the Iris Award from the National Association of Television Programming Executives for a very moving, funny, heart-warming interview with comedy legend Red Skelton.

Daredevil aside, Dini also enjoys the arts. She is a veracious reader and winner of the Book Promotions Award for her contribution to the promotion of Canadian authors and books. Her own book, A Self Directed Journey, has just been released. Well known across Canada, Petty is famous for her quick wit, inquisitive nature and her quirky sense of fun.
Petty’s contribution to the community, as well as to Canada, is well noted in her support of Canadian charities. One of her strongest characteristics is that she gives of herself sincerely and with passion.

Adept at addressing any audience, Dini Petty turns each presentation into a captivating performance, using her talent for comedy, flair for drama and love of people to personally touch each of her listeners.

Dini helps people transform uncertainty into confidence; teaching her audience how to discover and work with their sense of self. Her audiences learn how to make a shift from a survival mindset to a prosperous one - creating personal energy, overall health, confidence and a positive outlook, Dini is motivating, inspiring, and always entertaining.


Presentation Topics

• Looking Back moving Forward

Based on the observation that we have been presented with a fantasy about life through various forms of the media and that we think most of us come from good happy fully functional families; this speech deals with the reality that dysfunctional is truly the norm. As a result most of us have difficulties based on trying to be perfect, pleasing others and taking care of everyone else while neglecting ourselves.   I have presented this speech across Canada and have discovered that low self esteem (how we think about ourselves) is rampant.  Using my own life as an example of someone from a  dysfunctional background I speak about saving yourself first through food, water, rest and  exercise, the difference between self confidence and self esteem, how low self esteem starts and how to deal with it through using our most valuable self directing tool – our instinct.  I draw attention to the fact that we are all very much the same, our fears are the same and we all suffer from blame, shame and regret.  I use humor and my own poetry to illustrate points.   I have languaged this speech to fit male, female and teenage audiences. It has been very well received.

 

• The Pink Helicopter and The Green Room

This speech is pure entertainment. At age 22 I became the first woman in the world to fly and broadcast from a helicopter and logged about 5,000 hours up there…I worked in an all male environment and that was good ,  except for the few who were not too keen about a woman pilot, in one instance this prejudice almost cost me my life .This speech is a compilation of stories from the air and stories from the world of CITY TV, where I anchored the six o’clock news and began a talk show that eventually took me to CTV for eleven year’s as the host of a national talk show.. Stories from the green room include my friendship with Red Skeleton, my John Lennon moment where death and I met face to face, to the drunken guest who punched the other guest on camera and more. It is an inside look behind the camera and the insanity that happens from time to time. This speech is designed to entertain with stories from an insider’s perspective.

• The Promise

I have only made this kind of  promise to myself once in my life. It happened  when in Romania  while I was working  in third world aid.  We had finished our story and the  film crew and I climbed into the van and were driving away from the orphanage and that’s when it happened ,I silently promised myself  “That if  it’s the last thing I ever do, I’ll get that kid out of Romania.   It happened, eventually, it took two years but it did happen and  knowing every step of this story over the last eight years I have concluded, that it is “an event that appears unexplainable by the laws of nature and so is held to be supernatural in origin or an act of God” and this , according to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English language , is the definition of a “miracle.”   Along the way the twists and turns and disasters that occurred finally led me to conclude, at one point,  that I had just made the biggest mistake of life and the human tragedy  that now surrounded me, was all my fault.   Within days of this low point the “miracle” walked through the door.   This true story was eventually turned into a documentary called “The Healing Home” that ran on CTV and is making its way into a novel.

• Facilitator or MC

Over the last year I have moved into the role of facilitator or MC of conferences for either one day or three day events.  This is very natural transition from hosting/moderating talk shows and interview formats.  I have  worked for The Canadian Management Center, The Berlex Corporation and The Department of Defense. I include a portion of  a letter from CMC.

“Her participation as Conference Moderator and Closeout Keynote Speaker elevated the event to a new height of excellence. Although her Closeout Keynote Speaker address was a big hit, it was her role as MC that received the most rave reviews. Dini is a natural in the role of MC. She was entertaining, insightful, engaging, personable, and motivational. In sort, a true professional.  As Dini was a key reason for the success of CMC’s 3rd Annual Administrative Professionals Conference, we have asked her back to be the Moderator of our 4th Annual Administrative Professionals Conference.”
Chris Peacock, Executive Director, CMC Conferences.

• How to get it all to work together

Hosting a national talk show for 11 years has many similarities to running any business:

-getting the team to work together
-doing the impossible
-dealing with “whiners”
-getting everyone to be a professional
-what to do when it all falls apart
-getting everyone on the same page
-keeping the enthusiasm going
-dealing with failure
-dealing with stress

Television has one repetitive theme: when the red light goes on the show goes on, there are no excuses when the camera starts to roll.  Eighty percent of the shows in the last season of Dini met my own personal standards of excellence. That’s batting 800, that’s a rare achievement.

• The Moth to the Flame

This is an entertaining speech, based on stories from my life and my relationship with the stage. I knew where I was suppose to be at age four , I’ve never been sure what I was suppose to do once I got there.  The stories cover my five thousand hours as the first woman in the world to fly and broadcast from a helicopter, a pink one with pink shag rug. The aviation incident that almost cost me my life and was a result of prejudice “Women don’t belong in the air.” It also includes tales from the green room covering 10 years at CITY TV and ten years at CTV. Strictly entertainment this speech has become the foundation for a one woman show I am writing, have done in twice with great success.