Our Executive bios are due next Tuesday (coming up fast!) so I thought it would be fun to share the information I received from my interview. The PR executive I contacted was Ms. Stephanie Minna Cass, Manager, Corporate Communications for Cadbury Canada in Toronto. Hope you enjoy!
Q: How/when did you decide to pursue a career in public relations?
A: I studied journalism at Ryerson and French at York. I don't have any formal education in PR; however, I was always told I didn't need it if I had a degree in Journalism. I began my post-secondary education in Journalism. I also had a love of writing and an extreme curiosity in knowing more about things. After graduating from Ryerson journalism, I worked for a year at a local newspaper. I learned very quickly that the newsroom wasn't for me. While I was at Ryerson, I had a part time job doing PR/communications for Cystic Fibrosis, which I really loved. I decided to go back to school for a French degree. I realized that combining my love of writing, my journalism degree and my French was really just setting me up for a career in PR/communications.
Q: How did you end up working for Cadbury?
A: I spent almost 5 years working at the agency level. Although agency is the best learning ground for a new PR professional/communicator, I learned that I needed a change and wanted to broaden my communications knowledge. I wanted to build my internal communications, crisis and issues communications experience and realized going client-side was the best way. I was approached by a headhunter who helped place me in an Internal communications role at Kraft. After almost 4 years at Kraft, I again was approached by a headhunter who helped place me at Cadbury. I have been here since November 2004.
Q: What are some of your daily tasks?
A: As a communications professional working in a small team, my days are never the same and are continually jam packed. In any one day I will be working closely with some of our brand teams to develop strategic PR plans, in collaboration with our PR agency, to help drive their brands. I am also handling all media calls as the first point of contact for all media relations. Depending on the media request, I will prepare key messages/Q&A documents (if they do not currently exist) and will act as spokesperson or will find the appropriate corporate/brand spokesperson for the request. Sometimes these happen very quickly and sometimes they can happen within a few days of the original request. I also manage a team of about 10 PR specialists from our PR agency -- at any one time we will have about 5 or 6 PR programs underway either for a corporate and/or brand program. I drive my agency hard to deliver superior results. On a daily basis I may be reviewing press releases, key messages/Q&A documents, spokespeople recommendations, new strategies, etc.
I will also be managing various internal communications in support of different functions including HR, legal, business services, etc. This could include development a message for our General Manager or writing content for our internal communications vehicles (e-newsletter, plasma screens, Town Hall meetings, etc) Also, since I am the only full time communicator in Canada -- my VP is shared between Canada, the US and Mexico -- I also act as the first point of contact for consumer issues, customer communications, and business to business communications. Lastly, my role also supports our company's community investment program. I work closely with various volunteer committees on site and across the country to support them with communications and program guidance.
The days are busy and long, and this is a brief look inside any day.
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