Strategist
Strategy is built on listening first, generating actionable insights, making clear choices, and identifying and building capabilities. Guided by a central philosophy of putting "why" before "what," I have rebranded organizations, created programs, directed projects, and built committed and passionate teams.
Rebranding Grocery Manufacturers Association to Consumer Brands
The rebrand of a more than century-old trade organization was actually the third of my career, but by far the most challenging. A once venerable association had gone through substantial negative changes over a decade and, as part of the team brought in to revive the organization, we decided that a rebrand was necessary to survive and grow.
The transformation came with a new logo, website and all the trimmings. But the relaunch was not about visuals, but about vision. A successful rebrand must be about more than paint and gloss; it must be underpinned by meaningful transformation. The visuals of Consumer Brands rebrand were a perfect echo of larger change in the organization. To learn more, please see the piece I penned on behalf of our CEO.
U.S. Travel Association's Project: TIme Off Initiative
As the leader of U.S. Travel's Project: Time Off initiative, a behavior change campaign aimed at getting Americans to use their vacation time, I have built a program from the ground up. I am responsible for crafting strategic plans, defining the process for execution, and leading a highly capable and successful team.
Behavior change campaigns are challenging, particularly when they disrupt American work culture. Still, through cutting-edge research and targeted communications outreach, Project: Time Off has seen tangible success. With a very modest budget, supported in large part by more than 40 companies that help underwrite the mission, we focused our efforts on media relations and member engagement and activation. Since our 2013 launch, we have seen a reversal in vacation's downward trend, going up more than a full day on average for each American worker and generating $81 billion in the last three years alone. Project: Time Off has been responsible for nearly one billion media impressions in four years, and has helped launched brand campaigns with its messaging for MasterCard, Expedia, Alamo Rent A Car, Travel Channel, and LandShark, among others.
Project: Time Off's work was recognized in 2018 with The American Society of Association Executives' Gold Circle Award in Media/Public Relations category and selected by judges for the prestigious ASAE Excellence Award, given to the overall winner of all categories. Project: Time Off also earned a Public Relations Society of America Bronze Anvil Commendation for our work in Harvard Business Review.
Project: Time Off Strategic Events
National Plan for Vacation Day: Project: Time Off research repeatedly showed one distinct conclusion—the earlier vacation time is planned, the more days that are taken. It made for a clear call to action that required more than a concluding note or social post. To rally Americans around the importance of planning, we created the first-ever National Plan for Vacation Day in 2017 and brought in travel personality Samantha Brown as the day's official ambassador. In its first year, it shattered the goals of getting 50 organizations to participate by engaging with 600 organizations. In its second year, that number grew dramatically to 2,500. Most importantly, more than half of U.S. Travel members engaged with the day. Organic Twitter engagement—particularly from Disney, T-Mobile, Sephora, and Adobe—helped make the #PlanForVacation hashtag the number three trending topic, the same day as the State of the Union.
The Upside of Downtime Series: Creating a change in America's vacation culture needed to start where most employees feel challenged—the workplace. Taking the approach of influencing the influencers, the Upside of Downtime Series brought key business culture speakers to an audience of managers and company leaders. Hearing from respected voices like Arianna Huffington, Guy Kawasaki, and Netflix's Patty McCord helped our audience view the problem of unused vacation though a new lens—or, in some cases, for the first time. The limited series also helped us create a trove of evergreen content to use on our communications channels.
Other Notable work at The U.S. Travel Association
Crisis Readiness and Response Playbook: In the wake of increasing threats to traveler security and safety, from natural disasters to violent incidents, the importance of having a prepared organization cannot be overstated. While some travel organizations are well prepared for crises, we heard from many of our members that they had concerns about their planning, so we sought out to create a member resource that would address their concerns and better prepare the industry as a whole. Drawing on the crisis work I've done in my career, I was able to lend expertise, advice, and content development for U.S. Travel's Crisis Readiness and Response Playbook. The playbook is designed to be a plug-and-play resource for members, offering guidance and context, but also practical tools and templates for creating or updating their own plans.
Power of Travel Promotion 2018 Report: Travel is a pivotal industry that produces millions of jobs and trillions of dollars of economic impact—but all industries have big numbers. It requires a more thoughtful approach to give those numbers meaning. Historically, the Power of Travel Promotion report has focused on defending the importance of destination marketing budgets at the state and local government level. This year's iteration took a different approach. Investing in travel promotion is investing in economic development. A strong destination brand does more than build awareness; it has the power to attract businesses and talent, and create a thriving community—something that all legislators care about. By broadening the focus beyond travel, we were able to create an argument that was more effective for travel.
Notable work at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Free Enterprise initiative celebrates the vibrancy and diversity of America's small businesses and entrepreneurs. With the goal of increasing traffic to its digital home and attracting a new audience, I led the creation and execution of the Free Enterprise Tour that sent two bloggers on an 18-city cross-country road trip to tell the story of American innovation. The stories were rich and different. In one of the most compelling, the bloggers found themselves in Detroit 28 hours after the city filed for bankruptcy, but their story was not about the Motor City's decline, but the signs of rebirth they found all over town. It was the most visited page that year. The compelling content helped introduce FreeEnterprise.com to new visitors: traffic during the tour was the highest in the site's history, up 40% over the previous year, with a 63% increase in new visitors. It was also directly responsible for more than 12,000 new email sign-ups, a more-than-doubled Twitter following, and 10,000 new fans on Facebook.