Bridgett McGowen

It was December 2006 when she was well into adulthood before learning her existence had been a complete lie perpetuated by her adoptive parents, then it was April 2016 when she was laid-off just days before her and her husband’s first born turned two. Still stunned after nearly a decade of trying figuring out her true identity but needing to keep a straight face and a façade of strength and courage, Bridgett McGowen-Hawkins refused to allow life’s disappointments and twists to get in the way of her becoming an award-winning international professional speaker; author; and owner of BMcTALKS Press, an independent publishing company. Since 2001, Bridgett has been a professional speaker appearing on programs alongside notable figures such as former President Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Katie Couric, Deepak Chopra, and Amy Cuddy.

​Bridgett mostly writes her profession and presentation skills. However, as she continues to figure out how to make sense of her identity as an adopted black person in America who not only does not have the last name of her biological family (of whom most did not know anything about her until 2018) but also that she has the last name of her adoptive parents’ ancestors’ slaveowner, it creates an even greater sense of lost identity. As she grows more into understanding her reality, she shifted in 2020 and began writing on more personal levels about Bridgett, the person, not the professional, in Triumph Over the Trials and A Collective Breath.

A Collective Breath: Stories of Being Black in America and Visions of Change

Non-Fiction, Social Science

Open. Sincere. Honest. Unfiltered.

A Collective Breath’s collaborators’ candid, personal thoughts and feelings reveal the many challenges that blacks face in America today—challenges they may not directly divulge to others but that are part of their realities, and they offer ideas for solutions and actions to pave the way to a more optimistic future.

Consisting of a wide variety of blacks who are well-educated; who are community leaders, entrepreneurs, business owners, and professionals; and who are involved with their families and religious organizations, the contributors tell of what it is like to be black in America.

In A Collective Breath, the contributors do not hold back.

They take a collective breath—the breaths that George Floyd, Manuel Ellis, Javier Ambler, Eric Garner, and so many others could not take—to document for the world how they feel in this moment; the lenses through which they, as blacks in America, view and live their lives; and what they believe needs to change today for a different tomorrow.

Triumph Over the Trials

Non-Fiction, Social Science

By late March of 2020, we all came to realize we were living in different times—times that pushed us out of our comfort zones.

When you thought about the global pandemic and what the future holds for you, there may have been uncertainty. Fear. Worry. Or you may have felt excited, optimistic, or even hopeful.

Triumph Over the Trials contains messages from voices in the higher education, business, and medical communities who came together virtually in April 2020 to write chapters about personal trials. The goal is to encourage you to push through even when it’s uncomfortable—even when pushing through is the absolute last thing you want to do.

We answer the question “What is one of the biggest trials or challenges you have ever had, and how did you overcome it?” And you get a piece of advice from each contributor that lets you know the triumphs are always greater than the trials. Always.

REAL TALK: What Other Experts Won't Tell You About How to Make Presentations
​That Sizzle

Non-Fiction, Social Science

REAL TALK details, step-by-step, what to do in your presentations so you look and sound like a master on the mic. REAL TALK goes a step further and also details what not to do and provides the rationale behind every recommendation.

A Next Generation 2020 Indie Award Finalist, REAL TALK: What Other Experts Won't Tell You About How to Make Presentations That Sizzle provides no-nonsense, practical, ready-to-use advice and strategies that are based on the work of an award-winning international professional speaker who, since 2001, has designed and facilitated hundreds of webinars and face-to-face presentations to thousands of people positioned all around the globe.

No one will ever again leave your presentations disappointed, and you will proudly walk away from each performance knowing you crushed it. REAL TALK gives you real direction and real advice on how to make presentations that sizzle every single time!

Own the Microphone: How 50 of the World's Best Professional Speakers Launched Their Careers (And How You Can, Too!)

Non-Fiction

Professional speaking is not just for those who are extroverts, who have the gift of gab, or who love being in the spotlight. Whether you are an accountant, a coach, an entrepreneur, an educator, an engineer, a marketer, a sales expert, or a medical professional … if you are in any industry and you know you are an expert, then you need to have professional speaking in your sights.

In Own the Microphone: How More Than 50 of the World's Best Professional Speakers Launched Their Careers (And How You Can, Too!), award-winning international professional speaker Bridgett McGowen brought together the voices of 50 professional speakers who tell you exactly how they launched their professional speaking careers, and they each give you brilliant advice for how you can launch your own speaking career either as a side gig or full-time.

But before you get their stories and advice, Bridgett gives you the 25 steps she took to launch her career. This one is a must-read even if you have no interest in getting paid to speak. The stories of resiliency, pressing through when it feels like you cannot take another step, and embracing your unique power will move anyone.

Show Up and Show Out: 52 Communication Habits to Make You Unforgettable

Non-Fiction

Show Up and Show Out: 52 Communication Habits to Make You Unforgettable empowers you to take control of HOW YOU LOOK, HOW YOU SOUND, WHAT YOU SAY, and HOW YOU SAY IT so your image and message consistently create the kind of impression you want to make and has others taking notice.

Forego being common and ordinary and, instead, be uncommonly extraordinary. Put in place one habit a week, and make it a year to remember. It's time to step up. It’s time to speak up. It’s time to show up and show out!​

Redesign Your 9-to-5: Advice and Strategies from 50 of the World's Most Ambitious Business Owners and Entrepreneurs

Non-Fiction

If you have ever thought of launching your own business either as a side gig or as a full-time passion, forever changing how your 9-to-5 looks, then this book is for you.

In Redesign Your 9-to-5, you find out how 50 of the world’s most ambitious business owners and entrepreneurs made the decision to turn on the “open” sign to their physical or virtual shops.

Can it be scary? Absolutely!

Is it worth it? Without a doubt!

In these pages, you find out from go-getters who have businesses in areas such as software, marketing, coaching, hospitality and tourism, event planning, chiropractic medicine, martial arts, radio broadcasting, professional organizing, trade show consulting, naturopathic medicine, and many more.

Each of the 50 business owners and entrepreneurs gives you a glimpse into the real world of business ownership, mistakes to avoid, lessons learned, and a piece of advice that speaks directly to the aspiring business owner or entrepreneur—something they wish they had known prior to making the bold move to redesign their 9-to-5.