Experience

2004 – Present  Streetcar Communications, Inc., Doylestown, PA

Owner/President

• Participate in the startup of a global e-zine as a contributing editor, writer, and blogger—one-year-old site gets approximately 250,000 hits per month.
• Consult with consumer-brand and other companies regarding training, strategic planning, focus groups, and communications.
• Develop marketing, public relations, educational, and corporate communications for various traditional and online media.
• Ghostwrite books and other communications for business- and healthcare-related industry experts.
• Facilitate workshops for writers, corporations, small businesses, and other audiences.
• Teach creative writing to K-12 students.
• Featured as Shape Magazine’s Weight Loss Diarist, reaching six million readers each month with essays in magazine and on Web site about my personal journey to get fit.

2002 – Present The Gatorade Company  Chicago, IL
Consultant for the Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI)

9/04 - Present

• Work with brand managers to employ change management techniques and strategies.
• Help create and implement communication plans, programs, and materials for professional audiences.
• Help research key health and scientific issues related to hydration and exercise science to generate new ideas, projects, and initiatives.
• Develop, design, manage, and facilitate training on the science of Gatorade for new employees, agency partners, PepsiCo executives, and others—number of classes required each year has doubled due to the success of the program.
• Create and help implement web-based marketing and communication strategies.
• Develop scripts to educate internal and external audiences about the science of Gatorade.

Assistant Manager, Professional Marketing

3/02 – 9/04

• Assisted in the management of Gatorade professional marketing responsibilities
• Identified, processed, and communicated appropriate brand messages to key professional audiences.
• Led “best of” marketing programs for five audiences.
• Led strategic redesign and messaging effort for all brand-focused collateral.
• Developed first in-school educational program (for Gatorade and, later, PepsiCo) that reached six million middle-school students nationwide. 
• Helped educate school legislators about Gatorade’s functional superiority to deflect threat on brand’s presence in schools as a result of obesity crisis.
• Helped manage the GSSI Web site, leading usability testing, redesign, and content management.
• Led four outside agencies and three external boards in developing, implementing, and measuring educational, marketing, and contractual programs for professional audiences.
• Managed a $5 million professional marketing budget.
• Created ambassadors to help brand retain its leadership position among professional influencers.
• Managed distribution and design of collateral materials.
• Worked with appropriate agency and internal partners to coordinate professional and consumer efforts.
• Worked with GSSI to identify new research opportunities, translating technical and scientific language for lay audiences. 
• Presented components of professional marketing efforts to new agencies, internal hires, call-center employees, and other brand partners.
• Led ideation sessions to generate new programs for key audiences.
   

1998 – 2001 Hewitt Associates Lincolnshire, IL

3/01 – 11/01 Part-Time Temporary Writing Consultant/Project Manager for the Center for Distance Learning

• Hired as senior writer and co-project manager to redesign computer-based training (CBT) programs for call-center employees servicing all of HA’s client organizations.
• Developed the project plan and worked to ensure the timely delivery of work.
• Worked with instructional designers, graphic designers, and programmers to make sure CBT optimized the medium.
• Led development of electronic performance support tools (EPSS) for call-center employees.
  
  5/00 – 2/01 Sageo, a Hewitt e-business offering clients e-benefits outsourcing and administration services
  
  Group Leader, Internal Communications and Change Management & Enterprise Process Owner, Design, Strategy, and Innovation
• Hired during the company’s start- as a member of senior leadership to head change management and internal communication initiatives. 
• Developed internal communications and change management program during merger. 
• Worked with Sageo’s CEO to develop and deliver key messages for internal and investor audiences.
• Coached leaders on how to speak to various audiences, and worked with them to develop Sageo’s internal voice and mission, values, and work philosophy statements.
• Worked with communications team from Sageo’s parent company to inform employees.
• Developed and managed a communications team to function as a small consulting firm in supporting internal clients across six regional offices and departments.
• Managed internal communications budget, quarterly reviews and targets, and bonus payouts for team members.
• Allocated team assignments, set direction, identified resources, applied branding, and conceptualized original documentation (i.e., RFP, benefits, compensation, orientation, performance, stock option program, etc.).
• Built internal brand identity for HR that helped employees distinguish its action items from other business communications.
• Helped develop employee-listening activities.
• Monitored company databases for employees and researched internal portal options.
  
  8/99 – 5/00 Part-Time Permanent Senior Writer for the Learning Technologies Team
• Hired the global organization’s Learning Technologies team.
• Developing CBT programs, identifying workflow processes, managing scripts, and developing a team of writers.
• Taught writers to create for the medium, interpret instructional design materials, conceptualize storylines, direct graphic designers/programmers, use templates, ensure consistency in style and tone, and meet deadlines.
• Worked with designers to develop user manuals for distance- learning technology.
• Presented on humor and story in alternative media and facilitated creativity workshops for development teams.
  
  3/98 – 8/99 Instructional Design/Writing Consultant
• Worked with instructional designers, programmers, and graphic designers to turn pure learning content into an interactive 33-module CBT that engages users in a variety of storylines and simulations.
• Worked with instructional designers to prepare job and training aids, creative presentations, and web sites.
• Coached human resources professionals on how to conceptualize and develop employee communications.
  
  

1995–1997  CopyDesk, Inc.  Chicago, IL
Co-Founder and Principal

• Launched an innovative creative-outsourcing agency that was featured in The Chicago Reader as a company to watch.
• Developed company concept (which had no existing prototype), wrote the business plan, and secured funding.
• Compiled a market analysis and plan, generated new business contacts, conducted client needs assessments, and managed quality assurance program.
• Set up business systems, policies, and procedures—and co-wrote all policy and marketing pieces.
• Interviewed, selected, and managed a database of more than 300 writers.
• Handled writers on assignments and placed them in full-time positions.
• Lectured on business communications, journalism, and freelance trends to professional groups and university classes.

1992–1995  American Hospital Publishing, Inc. Chicago, IL
Staff Editor: Hospitals & Health Networks

• Wrote articles about leadership, culture, and human resources for the company’s flagship publication, which went to 125,000 health care executives nationally.
• Scored consistently high ratings on readership surveys and introduced concepts that attracted new readers.

1989–1992  The Academy of General Dentistry Chicago, IL
Staff Writer: AGD Impact
Wrote for the company’s newsmagazine, which went to 33,000 dental professionals nationally.

• Received the Morris Fishbein Award of Excellence from the American Medical Writers Association for a cover story that moved the American Dental Association to amend one of its policies.
• Wrote newsletters and press releases designed to promote general dentistry to the public, with key placements reaching more than five million consumers.
   
• 1988–1989  Crain Communications, Inc.   Chicago, IL

Researcher/Writer

• On call for six associate editors in helping them meet their publishing deadlines.
• Wrote copy for Advertising Age, Crain’s Chicago Business, Electronic Media, and City & State.

• MS Communications/Emphasis on Print Media, Boston University
• BA Journalism, Temple University
• Graduate of Langevin Training Center’s “Instructional Design” course
• Graduate of Julia Cameron’s “The Artist’s Way” course
• Graduate of The Second City Training Center’s 12-month “Improvisational Techniques” course
• Graduate of expert and author Natalie Goldberg’s intensive writing workshop
  
  

• Junior Partner, The Writers Corner USA/www.writerscornerusa.com
• Contributing Editor, The Wild River Review/www.wildriverreview.com