San Diego, California, United States
I’m a passionate strategic communications professional who utilizes the breadth of communications to tell stories that positively impact an organization's bottom line. For me, this means being in the office to talk face-to-face, have daily interactions, feed off the in-person brainstorming and collaboration, and have water cooler moments. Building and executing integrated, strategically aligned corporate programs that span employee communications and engagement, media/public relations, digital marketing, and social media, I work to get results. I believe in the value of metrics-based, outcome-oriented, and creative communications programs that make a difference. My career continues to grow in many ways and I’m always interested in new opportunities that provide a forum to use my current skills, learn new competencies that broaden my horizons, and inspire teams and individuals to understand the power of communications. Skills include: Strategic Communications Planning and Execution Trusted Advisor to Senior Leaders Communications Methodology Identification and Development Communications Measurement Large Scale Employee Events Employee Engagement Program Development Collaboration Team Leadership Storytelling Best Practice Development
Co-creating, leading and collaborating with Zscaler colleagues across the globe to build our recognition program, expand and grow our SNOW Employee Experience center (ZService Desk) and strategic internal communications driving our OKRs and priority objectives.
I joined Zscaler contractually as a strategist to bring an intranet-first philosophy to life, including expanding the intranet in two phases in less than 6 months. Shortly thereafter (and as a full-time employee) my responsibilities expanded to support the IT, Finance, Marketing and HR leaders and their teams with global internal communications needs. Successes include: • Led two intranet phased launches driving a 25% increase in users after three weeks and total content views by 10k • Collaborated with Global Head of DEIB to communicate company’s first-ever DEIB strategy • Researched and wrote employee-centric stories for intranet publication, two of which were promoted externally on company blog • Provided strategic counsel to internal client leaders for internal comms, successfully moving written communications from email to web-based
Supported corporate functional leaders and communications department head with employee communications needs, including executive emails, global employee town halls, company intranet stories and new storytelling concepts. (Note: this contract ended due to budget limitations.) Successes included: • Partnered with VP, Communications to build out CEO strategy and messaging • Supported initial Communities by Yammer launch with 13 communities and 1,000+ employees
I joined Kyriba to help build out and modernize internal global communications for a rapidly growing employee base. I owned global communications programs, advised global business partners on employee communications and supported culture initiatives in support of a 5% increase in engagement scores. Successes included: • Led company intranet from a Google-based site to a modern, interactive and content-rich platform; received praise from leadership and employees and achieved 50% adoption in first week • Ideated, developed and executed company's first International Women's Day in support of growing DEIB program • Supported inaugural hackathon; used storytelling to engage second-year participation from non-engineering teams
Created as a new role within the HR team, I served in a multi-functional capacity. I collaborated with HR partners (and business unit leaders) to establish a communications foundation, use current and developed tools to drive the communications and engagement of a new work culture program, and support a growing guest-service focus in a 24-7-365 organization of 2,200 employees. I later inherited employee engagement programs and managerial responsibilities. This additional focus included working with a talented team to grow monthly, quarterly and annual employee-focused recognition and celebration. A highlight included Viejas’ inaugural participation in the annual National Employee Appreciation Day that, in its second year, included nearly 80% of the population. Successes included: • Created more than 10 new internal communications tools to engage, inspire and align Team Members • Focused on employee-centric, human interest storytelling, including highlighting more than 150 colleagues in weekly newsletter and increasing photography use within tools • Supported a new innovative Guest service program launch that achieved nearly a 2% guest satisfaction increase in the first six months
This unique contract role supported one of the largest US protestant denominations in honoring the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation by engaging more than 9,000 parishes, four million members and the media. As the primary driver, I collaborated internally with a host of talented marketing and communications team members, senior leadership (in Chicago and nationally), across the country with regional and location-specific celebration leads, and externally with a variety of vendors and agencies to collect, synthesize, and create and execute a strategic communications programs. Holistically, the body of work focused on engaging individual leaders, churches and church members in a push/pull effort to tell themed stories via a strategic multi-channel communications set. The mix included exiting digital platforms, new digital tools created for this purpose, speaking engagements, and a host of written and printed materials. (Note: this contract was a limited 14 month engagement) Campaign highlights included: • Increased constituent awareness and participation throughout the entire campaign by 20% • 115% engagement increase across six digital marketing platforms (that were competing against 5 sub-brands) • A new CEO video platform that garnered a minimum of 10,000 views per episode and organization’s second-highest-ranking Facebook video during series run