Happy New Year!

I will start off first by introducing myself.  My name is Courtney Efird, I work for SunTrust Mortgage and I am your 2012 PRSA VA Peninsula Chapter President.  I would like to thank and welcome each and every one of you for being a part of our PRSA family. Last year was a great year for our PRSA chapter, led by our fearless leader Mike Brown who is now the Immediate Past President. We remained steady in our numbers and developed a Board of Directors that will be with us again this year and is already leading the chapter to great things.  In December we had our first BoD meeting and, needless to say, this is a fabulous group of people with some amazing ideas. We hope that this year we can provide you with informative meetings that bring us to the top of the PRSA chapter list.  With ideas ranging from personal branding to crisis communications and even a meeting providing free head shots, this year looks to be better than ever!

While we are excited about what the year has in store, the challenges that we face in 2012 have not been overlooked.  Hopefully you all by now know of the dues increase that National has introduced this year.  While this increase comes during challenging times we hope you all understand the value that a PRSA membership provides and that you plan to stick with us through this change.  We as a chapter plan to keep you involved in every decision making aspect of the PRSA VA Peninsula chapter.  We will provide surveys at the meetings and polls in the newsletter, as well as each of us being available to answer any and all of your questions.  Most importantly we want you to know that we are here, volunteering for you and your growth and anything that you can do to help us would be much appreciated.

In closing I ask each and every one of you to stay involved, stay focused and stay positive as we not only walk into 2012….but sprint into it with drive and excitement!  Happy New Year!

Next Meeting - January 19 at noon

Please join us for our meeting on January 19 as John P. Philbin, Ph.D., PMP, APR joins us to discuss Communication Management in Today's Hyper-media Environment.  

The meeting will begin at noon at The Arc of the Virginia Peninsula (2520 58th Street in Hampton).  Please join us for lunch, networking and an interesting presentation by a renowed leader in the public relations field.

Register Now!

$15.00 PRSA Chapter Members

$10.00 PRSSA Members

$20.00 Non-Chapter Members

About our speaker

John P. Philbin, Ph.D., PMP, APR

President & CEO

Crisis1, LLC 

Pat has a 25+ year career in U.S. federal government, congressional, public and international affairs; organizational and business development and transformation; change management initiatives and innovative leadership with top-level, senior government officials and company executives, including crisis communication, media relations, employee communications, reputation management, and strategic planning.   Pat’s experience in a wide range of strategic communication, program management and scenario-based planning projects has resulted in significant organizational improvements and cost savings/avoidance in such organizations as the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Federal Emergency Management Agency  (FEMA) and U.S. Coast Guard (USCG), and the Department of Defense’s Business Transformation Agency (DOD BTA). 

He has extensive executive level experience in leading, managing and participating in large scale, high-profile events, including, but not limited to, loss of the space shuttle Challenger in the mid-1980s, mass migrations of Haitians/Cubans in the early 1990s, the loss of TWA Flight 800 and Alaska Air, the loss of JFK, Jr.’s aircraft off of Martha’s Vineyard, and dozens of contentious and complex business and legislative issues associated with FEMA’s transformation following Hurricane Katrina.

Pat currently serves as a member of Firestorm Solutions Expert Council (www.firestorm.com), a company focused on business continuity, vulnerability analysis, risk mitigation and crisis management; and as a Member of Homeland Security Outlook’s Advisory Board (www.hsoutlook.com).

Prior to starting his own company, Pat served as Senior Vice President of PIER Systems, a technology-focused crisis communication company (2007-2008); Director, Office of External Affairs for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (2006-2007); and as a Technical Director/Program Manager for Anteon Corporation (now General Dynamics Information Technology) (2005-2006).

Pat served for more than 21 years in the U.S. Coast Guard, retiring as Chief of Public Affairs in 2004.  Other notable staff assignments include serving as the Deputy Chief of the Coast Guard’s Strategic Analysis Staff, Press Assistant to the Commandant and Chief of Coast Guard Media Relations.  Operational assignments include more than seven years of shipboard experience, including command of two Coast Guard cutters.

Pat holds a Doctorate in Communication from the University of Maryland, a Master of Science in Public Relations from Syracuse University, and a Bachelor of Science in Government from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy.  He is a member of the Project Management Institute (PMI) and a certified Project Management Professional (PMP).  Pat also holds an Accreditation in Public Relations (APR) and is a member of the Public Relations Society of America.  

He can be reached at 703.819.0457 (mobile) or jphilbin@crisis1.net.

Below is information distributed to our chapter from national.  Please take a moment to read about their efforts to "modernize the definition of public relations."  We'd love your feedback and ideas.  Please send them to Courtney Efird at Courtney.K.Efird@SunTrust.com. 

Text from email from Gerard F. Corbett, APR, Fellow PRSA - PRSA Chair and CEO

I’m writing today specifically to provide you with an update on PRSA’s “Public Relations Defined” initiative. This collaborative, industry-wide advocacy campaign aims to modernize the definition of public relations. Initiated last year under the auspices of PRSA Immediate Past Chair Rosanna Fiske, APR, the initiative is moving into its final stages — the presentation of three candidate definitions and a public vote.

After careful consideration and significant feedback from many of you, as well as our Board and partner organizations, we have decided to take a refreshed perspective and implement a slightly modified direction for #PRDefined; one that will allow for greater input from your Chapters and the profession, in a manner befitting the project’s stature.

Following a three-week public-input phase, the feedback collected will be used to finalize the candidate definitions as they go up for public vote.

And today, we were pleased to announce those candidate definitions. These were developed in conjunction with our partner organizations. You can find those draft definitions here.

Your Chapter members can add their opinions of each candidate definition here. Please also encourage them to tweet their thoughts using the hashtag #PRDefined or be one of the dozens of people who have shared their opinions of the project by writing a blog post about it.

Your Chapter’s input will prove invaluable in ensuring the candidate definitions meet the profession’s need for a modern definition for the new era of public relations.

Help us share the news about all the great things members of our chapter are doing!  We want to include information on your successes, so please send them to us.

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Please send your submissions to Sarah Bowman at sbowman@arcvap.org.