Member since April 2026
When organizations and event planners book Dr. Deitra C. Payne, they are not simply booking a speaker — they are bringing in a transformational leadership experience designed to move audiences from hesitation to courageous action.
Dr. Payne is a transformational leadership speaker and achievement strategist who helps women and organizations build courage, visibility, and resilience so they can lead more effectively through change, uncertainty, and reinvention. She is the Founder and CEO of Fabulous Coaching, Training, and Productions, LLC, based in Arizona.
With over 15 years of experience as a college and university professor specializing in human resource management and business, Dr. Payne brings a rare combination of academic expertise, real-world leadership insight, and powerful storytelling to every stage she steps on—including international presentations in France on empathetic leadership.
Her research paper, Broken: The Harmful Effects of Workplace Bullying, earned the Distinguished Paper Award at the 2015 Mustang Journal International Academic Conference, reflecting her deep commitment to workplace wellbeing, leadership development, and organizational effectiveness. She has also presented at CUPA-HR conferences, SHRM state chapters, academic institutions, and universities across the United States, where she has focused on leadership development and mentoring emerging professionals.
Dr. Payne’s signature keynote and workshop experience, Behind Door Number Next™, equips audiences with practical tools to recognize opportunity, overcome fear, increase visibility, and make courageous decisions under pressure.
She also incorporates her FABULOUS Framework™, a transformational development model designed to help individuals move from fear, hesitation, and self-doubt into clarity, confidence, and aligned action.
Her speaking topics center on:
Courageous Leadership Under Pressure
Reinvention & Career Transitions
Visibility, Confidence & Self-Advocacy
Decision-Making in Uncertain Environments
Women in Leadership & Organizational Empowerment
Resilience After Change and Adversity
Opportunity Mindset & Growth Thinking
What sets Dr. Payne apart is not only what she knows — it is what she has lived.
In November 2022, just two days after losing her father on Thanksgiving, Dr. Payne experienced a profound personal crisis when she temporarily lost her memory and ability to speak. Her journey of rebuilding her voice, identity, and confidence is at the core of every keynote she delivers. She does not simply teach resilience — she demonstrates what it means to rebuild it.
Her message is further shaped by a nationally televised experience as a featured winner on Let's Make a Deal, which serves as a powerful real-world illustration of courage, visibility, and decision-making under pressure.
Audiences consistently describe her presentations as deeply moving, highly relatable, and immediately applicable. She blends research-based insight, humor, and authentic storytelling to create experiences that inspire both reflection and action.
Dr. Payne is available for corporate events, conferences, ERG programs, leadership development sessions, educational institutions, women’s empowerment events, and community engagements. She offers keynote presentations, half-day and full-day workshops, virtual engagements, and customized leadership programs.
To book Dr. Deitra C. Payne, visit: https://fabulousctp.com/speaker
If you want to see Dr. Deitra C. Payne truly come alive, ask her about gratitude. She is so passionate about the transformative power of a grateful mindset that she created an entire journal around it — because for her, gratitude is not just a topic, it is a way of life.
Ask her about resilience and she will tell you her story — losing her father on Thanksgiving and her memory and voice just two days later — and how she fought her way back to the stage, stronger and more purposeful than ever. That journey is not just her greatest testimony, it is the fuel behind everything she does.
Dr. Payne lights up when she talks about mindset shift — that powerful moment when someone realizes they are not stuck, they are simply one decision away from a different life. She lives for those breakthroughs.
She is fiercely passionate about empowering women. Building workshops and conferences designed specifically to inspire and equip women is not just a business goal — it is a calling she walks in every day.
And above all, Dr. Payne smiles biggest when she talks about purposeful living — because she knows firsthand what it means to lose everything and choose to rebuild with intention, courage, and an unshakeable belief that the best is always yet to come.
The Thanksgiving That Changed Everything
Thanksgiving 2022 was not like most holidays.
There was no gathering around a table. No ordinary warmth of a holiday celebration. That Thanksgiving, Dr. Payne was miles away from her father, separated by distance at one of the most critical moments of her life. He was in the hospital. And though she could not be by his side, she was holding on to hope the only way she could — from a distance.
He passed away that Thanksgiving Day.
There is no graceful way to lose your father. There is no handbook for that kind of pain — especially when you could not be there. When the miles between you become the regret you carry in the quietest moments. You just survive it — minute by minute, hour by hour — grieving and pressing forward the only way you know how.
And then, as if the weight of that loss was not enough, as the day wore on and evening began to settle in, Dr. Payne began to feel it — something was not right with her own body. She was becoming sick.
She thought this was being overworked and grief taking its toll.
She was wrong.
Two days later, Dr. Payne woke up and everything was gone — all at once. Not just her words. Not just her voice. Her memory too. The details of her life, the people she loved, the moments that made her who she is — all of it, vanished. She could not speak. She could not remember. It was as if someone had not just turned off the lights in the library of her mind — they had removed every single book from the shelves.
She was a professor. A communicator. A woman whose entire identity was built on the power of words and the wealth of knowledge she had spent a lifetime building.
And in what felt like an instant, it was all gone.
Imagine, just for a moment, what that feels like. No words to tell someone you are scared. No memories to remind you of who you are or where you came from. Sitting in a silence and a emptiness that is not peaceful — it is absolutely terrifying. And experiencing all of that while grieving a father she never got to say goodbye to in person.
She had just lost her father. She was sick. And now she had lost herself.
She chose to fight. And today, Dr. Payne stands before audiences — telling this story — as living proof that what tries to silence you does not get the final word.
She does not share this story for sympathy. She shares it because she knows that someone in every room she enters is in their own silent season. Someone is carrying a loss, a fear, a setback so heavy they are not sure they can take another step.
And her message is clear:
Your silence is not your ending. Your struggle is not your story. And the obstacles standing between you and your purpose do not get to win — not today, not ever.
If Dr. Deitra C. Payne can find her voice and her memory after losing everything, you can find yours too.
The question is — what will you do with it?
Some people stumble into their purpose. Dr. Deitra C. Payne was born knowing hers.
From the time she was a young girl, she knew she was going to be an educator. It was not a fleeting childhood dream — it was a conviction. A calling she carried with her into adulthood and refused to put down, no matter what life demanded of her.
And life demanded a lot.
While building her career in corporate America, Dr. Payne did what most people would consider impossible — she studied. Late nights, early mornings, weekends sacrificed — she pursued her Master's degree and then her Ph.D. without losing her footing in the professional world. She was not waiting for the perfect moment. She was creating it.
When she graduated, the door she had always believed was waiting for her swung open. She was offered a position at a college in South Carolina — and just like that, the little girl who always knew she would be an educator was standing at the front of a classroom, doing exactly what she was born to do.
For over 15 years, Dr. Payne poured herself into her students, her research, and her craft. She published award-winning research. She presented at national and international conferences. She mentored the next generation of leaders. She paid it forward — because paying it forward was never just something she did. It was who she was.
And then came Thanksgiving 2022.
The health crisis that followed — losing her father and then, just two days later, losing both her memory and her ability to speak — did not just change her life. It redirected it. As Dr. Payne fought her way back — reclaiming her words, her memories, and her sense of self — something shifted deep within her. The season that was meant to silence her became the very season that clarified everything.
She left academia. And she began to dream in a new direction.
What if her story — the struggle, the loss, the comeback — was not just her testimony? What if it was her assignment? What if everything she had lived through, every classroom she had stood in, every life she had touched as an educator, had been preparing her for something bigger?
Fabulous Coaching, Training, and Productions, LLC was born from that question.
Today, Dr. Payne channels over 15 years of academic expertise, a lifetime of passion for helping others, and one of the most extraordinary personal comeback stories imaginable into a mission that sets her soul on fire — inspiring and empowering others to go after their big, bold dreams. Because life, as she knows better than most, is far too short not to.
She is no longer just an educator. She is a living example of what happens when you refuse to let your hardest chapter be your last one.
And she is just getting started.
The Thanksgiving That Changed Everything
Thanksgiving 2022 was not like most holidays.
There was no gathering around a table. No ordinary warmth of a holiday celebration. That Thanksgiving, Dr. Payne was miles away from her father, separated by distance at one of the most critical moments of her life. He was in the hospital. And though she could not be by his side, she was holding on to hope the only way she could — from a distance.
He passed away that Thanksgiving Day.
There is no graceful way to lose your father. There is no handbook for that kind of pain — especially when you could not be there. When the miles between you become the regret you carry in the quietest moments. You just survive it — minute by minute, hour by hour — grieving and pressing forward the only way you know how.
And then, as if the weight of that loss was not enough, as the day wore on and evening began to settle in, Dr. Payne began to feel it — something was not right with her own body. She was becoming sick.
She thought this was being overworked and grief taking its toll.
She was wrong.
Two days later, Dr. Payne woke up and everything was gone — all at once. Not just her words. Not just her voice. Her memory too. The details of her life, the people she loved, the moments that made her who she is — all of it, vanished. She could not speak. She could not remember. It was as if someone had not just turned off the lights in the library of her mind — they had removed every single book from the shelves.
She was a professor. A communicator. A woman whose entire identity was built on the power of words and the wealth of knowledge she had spent a lifetime building.
And in what felt like an instant, it was all gone.
Imagine, just for a moment, what that feels like. No words to tell someone you are scared. No memories to remind you of who you are or where you came from. Sitting in a silence and a emptiness that is not peaceful — it is absolutely terrifying. And experiencing all of that while grieving a father she never got to say goodbye to in person.
She had just lost her father. She was sick. And now she had lost herself.
She chose to fight. And today, Dr. Payne stands before audiences — telling this story — as living proof that what tries to silence you does not get the final word.
She does not share this story for sympathy. She shares it because she knows that someone in every room she enters is in their own silent season. Someone is carrying a loss, a fear, a setback so heavy they are not sure they can take another step.
And her message is clear:
Your silence is not your ending. Your struggle is not your story. And the obstacles standing between you and your purpose do not get to win — not today, not ever.
If Dr. Deitra C. Payne can find her voice and her memory after losing everything, you can find yours too.
The question is — what will you do with it?
Some people stumble into their purpose. Dr. Deitra C. Payne was born knowing hers.
From the time she was a young girl, she knew she was going to be an educator. It was not a fleeting childhood dream — it was a conviction. A calling she carried with her into adulthood and refused to put down, no matter what life demanded of her.
And life demanded a lot.
While building her career in corporate America, Dr. Payne did what most people would consider impossible — she studied. Late nights, early mornings, weekends sacrificed — she pursued her Master's degree and then her Ph.D. without losing her footing in the professional world. She was not waiting for the perfect moment. She was creating it.
When she graduated, the door she had always believed was waiting for her swung open. She was offered a position at a college in South Carolina — and just like that, the little girl who always knew she would be an educator was standing at the front of a classroom, doing exactly what she was born to do.
For over 15 years, Dr. Payne poured herself into her students, her research, and her craft. She published award-winning research. She presented at national and international conferences. She mentored the next generation of leaders. She paid it forward — because paying it forward was never just something she did. It was who she was.
And then came Thanksgiving 2022.
The health crisis that followed — losing her father and then, just two days later, losing both her memory and her ability to speak — did not just change her life. It redirected it. As Dr. Payne fought her way back — reclaiming her words, her memories, and her sense of self — something shifted deep within her. The season that was meant to silence her became the very season that clarified everything.
She left academia. And she began to dream in a new direction.
What if her story — the struggle, the loss, the comeback — was not just her testimony? What if it was her assignment? What if everything she had lived through, every classroom she had stood in, every life she had touched as an educator, had been preparing her for something bigger?
Fabulous Coaching, Training, and Productions, LLC was born from that question.
Today, Dr. Payne channels over 15 years of academic expertise, a lifetime of passion for helping others, and one of the most extraordinary personal comeback stories imaginable into a mission that sets her soul on fire — inspiring and empowering others to go after their big, bold dreams. Because life, as she knows better than most, is far too short not to.
She is no longer just an educator. She is a living example of what happens when you refuse to let your hardest chapter be your last one.
And she is just getting started.