THE STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS AGENCY

This week, the Public Relations Society of America announced the newest members of its College of Fellows—our profession's highest individual honor. As Chair of the College this year, I had the privilege of calling each of them before the public announcement. Every conversation was different, but they all shared one thing in common: gratitude. Not because they had "won" something. Because someone had recognized a lifetime of work. I've been thinking about that a lot.

For most of my life, I thought of my dad as someone who built things. Not in the abstract sense. Literally. He built a company at our dining room table. He built relationships that turned into lifelong friends. He built pieces in his workshop that have endured in all of our homes. And later, he built and repaired antique clocks. What I didn't fully understand until the end is that the most important thing he built was a life entirely on his own terms.

Some decisions are made in boardrooms. Others happen in places you never expect. Hospital hallways. Waiting rooms. In between phone calls, where you’re trying to sound focused while your mind is somewhere else entirely. That’s the kind of year I had. I’m not sharing this for sympathy. I’m sharing it because that sequence of events changed how I think about leadership in a way no professional experience ever had.

Communication is an absolute necessity for building trust. A single message can calm a parent’s fears, help a community through a tough moment, or nudge families toward healthier habits. Those messages aren’t abstract — they shape what happens in people’s lives, right here and right now. As communicators, we often step into the middle of urgent conversations, balancing what the public wants, what the media demands, and what the law allows.