Professional Experience
summary
Strategy and communications across multiple sectors: branding agency, financial services, technology, higher education, and more.
Inspires individuals and teams to produce exceptional work, with purpose, that gets results, and have fun doing it together.
A “natural diplomat” that listens and leads with empathy, respect, and principled civility.
Leverages human-centered design and collaborative leadership to broker win-win relationships and harness diverse viewpoints.
Delivers strategic insight from an “organizational systems mindset” to direct reports, peers, and executives.
Accomplishments
Senior Director,
Marketing &
Communications
Texas A&M University
School of Law
Currently
Lead reputation communication efforts supporting a 31 point rise in overall law school national ranking in just three years, concurrently delivering a 25% overall increase in application volume and improvement in application quality and diversity.
Oversee marketing and brand strategy for one of the largest and fastest growing online legal graduate degree programs in the country — with 10-fold gains in overall enrollment over four years and a marketing budget growing to more than $5.5 million.
Restructured and transformed Law Marcomm unit from a collection of individual members to an integrated team with defined roles and measurable processes to reflect the dean’s strategic priorities after a period of staff misalignment and attrition.
Chaired and facilitated working a group for university initiative to centralize more than a dozen marcomm units into a strategic, cohesive university unit.
Executive Director Marketing & Communications
University of Dallas
2017 - 2019
Led a 10-person team guiding institutional brand, marketing, development support, and creative services while serving as the university spokesperson; advised president, vice presidents, and trustees on strategic communications.
Increased lead generation, public awareness, as well as alumni-donor giving and engagement.
Made operational changes in staff and workflow to provide more strategic integration and focus on institutional priorities.
Launched the university’s first comprehensive marketing plan and built a brand framework to develop strategic communications, content marketing and social media plans to support both recruiting and philanthropic strategies.
Vice President Communications
& Strategic Initiatives
Erskine College
2010-2017
Achieved record admissions four years in a row while increasing overall enrollment, net tuition revenue and alumni giving.
Entirely overhauled brand, web and print, launched the institution’s first CRM platform, and implemented data-driven marketing that increased outreach to prospective students nearly four times previous levels.
Advised four presidents in six years through governance crises, institutional mission realignment, and financial challenges.
Navigated dozens of public relations events or controversies, including contact with local, trade, and national news outlets.
Erskine discovered its authentic identity and told its story in a clear and compelling voice.
Consulting Partner
thinkx intellectual capital, inc.
2009-2010
Guided clients toward more creative and entrepreneurial strategic planning, product development, opportunity spotting, customer experience, and organizational performance through design thinking and creative problem solving facilitation.
Senior Manager
Communications
& Marketing
Royal Bank of Canada
2001-2009
Led website redesign, marketing-sales support, and brand transitions for multi-million dollar mergers and acquisitions.
Piloted communications strategy for a three-year $5 million dollar new business venture with executive decision makers across multiple departments and partner organizations in Canada and the United States.
Championed and facilitated employee participation in groups and workshops that generated more than 2500 new ideas to reduce cost, increase efficiency or improve service; sustained 89% recognition among employees of innovation as a strategic priority.
Associate Creative Director
Vantage Point Marketing
1997-2001
Supervised 4-member creative team and numerous external vendors to produce hundreds of identity, print, digital, video, and event projects while ensuring brand integrity for clients representing more than 70% of the firm’s annual revenue.
Facilitated identity creation, brand transfer strategy, promotion and training material for a $70 million international telecomm services firm following its sale by AT&T to a private equity group.
education
The Masters University
Bachelor of Arts
History • Literature • Politics
Biola University
Non-Degree Graduate Credits
Applied Linguistics & Anthropology