Mind the PR Gap 2021: programme and booking
The 2021 event has now passed. Register for Mind the PR Gap 2022 in July 2022!
Meet John Brown
John is a dad to two, a husband to one and the founder of Don’t Cry Wolf, the B Corp certified brand activism agency. He is a relentless advocate of businesses being a tremendous part of solving some of societies biggest problems. John is also an Ambassador for the B Corp movement and advises brands on their ESG approach. He’s worked with brands such as Virgin, Green Chef, Elvie, Flight Club and Meridian on campaigns and strategy.
Meet Scott MacKenzie
Scott leads the Change and Employee Engagement practice at Montfort. He has significant experience dealing with complex corporate crises and change programmes across the public and private sectors, including reorganisations, site closures and relocations, post-merger integrations, cultural change programmes and redundancy programmes. Scott has a strong specialism in employee engagement, helping organisations to define and articulate their purpose and strategy in a way which employees find credible and relevant.
Scott is a former joint-MD of Lansons, and was previously Head of Change and Internal Communications at H+K Strategies across the EMEA region. Previously, he spent ten years in-house at RBS and Lloyds Banking Group.
Meet Jennifer Vardeman, keynote speaker day two
Jennifer Vardman Ph.D. (University of Maryland, 2008), is an associate professor of public relations at the Jack J. Valenti School of Communication at the University of Houston, USA.
Dr. Vardeman currently serves as the director at the Valenti School, is an affiliate faculty member of UH’s Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality Studies, and is a visiting scientist with Houston Methodist Hospital’s Urogynecology Associates. In examining the nexus of public relations, identity, and public health, Dr. Vardeman takes an intersectional approach to determining solutions for gender and racial inequalities in the composition of the public relations workforce. She’s published more than 25 articles and chapters on topics of public relations, public health communication, and intersectionality.
As a former public relations professional, Dr. Vardeman has worked, taught, and consulted in the public relations field for 22+ years, previously working for firms such as Weber-Shandwick (Houston, TX, USA), Lois Paul & Partners, a Fleishman-Hilliard company (Austin, TX, USA), and ICF International (Rockville, MD, USA).
Meet Alexander Clelland
Alexander has 20 years’ experience in corporate communications, leading global and regional teams at leading financial services companies including RBC Investor & Treasury Services, Macquarie and Fitch Ratings. His consultancy experience covers a broad range of sectors, including technology, media and leisure and hospitality. During his career, he has managed and mentored employees suffering from poor mental health and also worked with mental health charities and The Priory, contributing advice and content. Prior to his career in journalism, he was a qualified social worker, specialising in mental health services in institutional and community settings.
Meet Sudha Singh
Sudha is the Founder of The Purpose Room, a future ready virtual consultancy advising clients at the intersection of organisational purpose, inclusion and business sustainability. She hosts The Elephant in the Room podcast a curated safe space to have uncomfortable conversations about the pervasive inequalities in society/workplaces on issues that are taboo and deserve to be mainstream
Sudha is a certified EDI trainer and advises clients on creating measurable frameworks for organisational change. She is Co-Chair of the PRCA Diversity Network; Founding member of PRCA Race and Ethnicity Equity Board (REEB) and an advisor to PRADAN.
She has more than 30 years experience advising C-Suite of multinationals, governments, industry associations and NGOs across geographies including UK and India on reputation management. She has advised clients faced with regulatory, political and environmental challenges as well as those facing union and civil society activism.
Meet Matt Peacock
Matt is a Partner with the strategic and creative advisory firm Blurred, specialising in environmental, social and governance risk and corporate purpose. He also lectures at international business schools including IESE, the London Business School and Henley Business School, where he is a Visiting Fellow.
He joined Blurred after a 20-year career in senior leadership roles with some of the world’s largest multinational corporations. He was previously Group Director of Corporate Affairs at Vodafone where he led the Group’s global ESG and communications strategy and established one of the world’s leading corporate human rights and transparency programmes. He’s also a former communications regulator, he’s worked in the oil and gas industry, and prior to entering corporate life he was a correspondent with BBC News.
Meet Sarah Duggan
Sarah is a Birmingham-based PR academic who was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome in 2017, aged 24. Sarah has a bachelor’s degree in English literature, a master’s in public relations, and is currently pursuing a career in public affairs. Sarah specialised in female entrepreneurship and leadership during her MA and her work on this subject is being published later this year, as part of the book ‘Women and Leadership in the Public Relations Industry: An International Perspective.’