Getting to know you…
Name: Jon Goldberg
Agency: Reputation Architects
Position: Founder and Chief Reputation Architect
First job in PR: Campaign for the reform of onerous playground rules in the fifth grade. Then internal comms and PR for Prudential Insurance and 20+ years at J. Walter Thompson, Edelman and Porter Novelli.
Your insights…
Most loved thing about being in PR: Talking executives off the ledge and showing them how to transform major crisis situations into opportunities to demonstrate responsible leadership.
Best source for breaking PR news: PR Week online alerts
Number one recommendation to new PR professionals: Don’t be afraid to introduce yourself and ask for advice from people who are older and wiser. Find an excuse to go meet executives you admire, or are just interested in talking with. Make those connections early and they’ll remember you later on.
About Counselors Academy…
Most valuable aspect of being a Counselors Academy member: For me, it all comes down to something Eric Morgenstern said during my Counselors 101 session, which is that the odds of any of us competing against one another are slim, so we might as well work together and have all of us succeed. Annual membership in Counselors Academy: $195. Being able to access the brains of hundreds of people who share that mindset: Priceless.
Role on the planning committee: Marketing and PR, doing what Abbie says, and antagonizing Ken Jacobs.
Best thing about the Counselors Academy conference: The chance to meet and really get to know the most energetic, entrepreneurial, smart, and fun-as-all-hell people in the PR business. I arrived in Asheville a skeptic. I left with Las Vegas already on my calendar and a constellation of new friends and trusted colleagues.
Most fun memory of a Counselors Academy conference: Seeing the Eagles live at the New Orleans Jazz Festival, with around a dozen Counselors crammed into the tiny patch of turf Eric and Shanny Morgenstern staked out and guarded for us for the entire day. That’s what Counselors do for each other.
Counselors Academy Member Spotlight Blog Series:
Our very own Dana Hughens is the PRSA’s Counselors Academy Conference Chair for the 2013 conference June 9-11 in Austin, Texas. As conference chair, she has the privilege to work with other members of the conference planning committee, which consists of senior-level PR counselors and agency owners from across the United States and Canada. We caught up with these PR pros to find out their secret to success and what they love most about Counselors Academy.
