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What do you do?
I'm responsible for media relations, employee communications, executive communications, event sponsorship, and financial communications. I've been working here since October.

How did you get this job?
I have twenty-seven years experience in both corporate communications and consulting.

What is your best professional lesson learned at the J-School?
To be an excellent communicator. The J-School provides a discipline to both written and verbal communication that is hard to get elsewhere.

What is your favorite J-School memory?
I actually loved that first course that you take. It was a history course.

What would be your best advice to current students?
I am very pleased to have had a Missouri degree because the good thing is the J-School is widely recognized. That's a plus. Also, everyone knows that Missouri has a particular style in that they really put you through your paces. The most important course I took was that beginning news-writing course. That was the most important course because it really made you focus on delivering a product in a very short period of time without making mistakes, and that really comes in handy across a lot of different situations. I think it's a great place to start if you want to be a working journalist, and I think it's a equally great place to start if you want to go on and do something in business because you do come away with a set of skills and discipline that really put you in a position to have a lot of choices.

What do you consider to be your best professional achievement?
I am an expert in corporate positioning. Basically, I'm an expert at telling companies how best to articulate their strategies to various audiences with the ultimate objective that their stock prices will be as high as they possibly can be. When I was at PaineWebber we did a total turn around in perception across all audiences. For example, when I started in 1996 we had no credibility with the number of key offices and key audiences and we were able to turn that around over several years through a very focused and disciplined communications program. That is hopefully what I will do here as well.

What makes you good at your job?
I'm very focused, have high energy and the ability to relate well with senior management as well as lead a team of professionals to a very high performance. I understand business and I like it.

What are your next career steps?
The question for me is always if I will ever go back to consulting. I don't think this is my last job, but I am very happy where I am right now.

What did you want to be as a kid?
When I was twelve years old I knew I was going to go to college. I was always a good writer. No one told me, but I always assumed I was going to go journalism school. Because I'm from St. Louis there was no reason for me to go anywhere else. There wasn't any place that was going to be better. I always knew very early that was the place I was going to go, and I knew pretty early that I wanted to work in business.