Storytelling: A comprehensive, integrated outcomes-focused strategy

Author's Biography

Jeanette Dediemar is an award-winning Communications and Creative Strategist with international expertise in integrated marketing and communications, reputation management, brand development and crisis communications. She currently serves as Vice President for University Advancement and External Relations at Texas A&M University–San Antonio, the youngest institution in the Texas A&M system. The American Marketing Association’s 2014 Higher Education Marketer of the Year, Jeanette, is known for her creativity and innovation in building outcomes-focused higher education marketing and communications teams with a philosophy that ‘creativity takes courage’. She previously served as Vice President and Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at the University of Indianapolis, leading the institution through the creation of an award-winning, highly successful integrated marketing and communications change process — impacting admissions, advancement and institutional reputation and influencing enrolment strategy — and a record-breaking, comprehensive fundraising campaign. Past leadership positions included serving as Associate Vice President for integrated marketing and communications at Florida State University, where she launched an institution-wide ‘Communicators Network’, creating a networked strategy providing counsel for executive leadership and 150 campus communicators. During her tenure, she led the successful navigation of several high-profile crisis management situations of national interest. Jeanette has extensive marketing and communications, media relations and digital media experience in the private and public sectors in the United States and internationally. Jeanette has led the process of establishing communications infrastructures, services and brand development processes for several institutions. She is the current Chair-Elect for PRSA’s Counselors to Higher Education (CHE) as well as a frequent presenter at conferences. As a consultant, she has guided universities in discovering their brand and change management processes to sustain and scale effective marketing and communications strategies using internal resources, collaborative networks and return on investments. For her change management, alumni relations and brand development strategies at University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, she and her staff earned the inaugural Best Marketing Team in Higher Education Award from the American Marketing Association as well as the CASE Region V Teresa Du Bois Exline Award for Best Practices in Communications and Marketing. Her teams have received recognition from CASE, the American Marketing Association and the American Advertising Federation. Past roles include establishing Wales’ ‘first’ business incubator dedicated to accelerating the growth of the country’s digital media sector, supporting more than 500 startups providing business development support, military public affairs as a civilian contractor for the First Infantry Division during Operation Desert Storm, public relations for the Hoffman Agency’s cornerstone account with Hewlett-Packard and several positions in journalism and public relations. Jeanette has a PhD in curriculum and instruction and a master’s degree in mass communications from Kansas State University and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh.

Lesli Cartaya Franco For 15 years, Lesli has created comprehensive communication strategies for companies across a wide range of industries including higher education, health care, nonprofit and more. As Account Director at O’Connell & Goldberg PR, she is responsible for the creation and implementation of campaigns that support the goals of its clients. Lesli is the former Director of Communication at Broward College, a Florida community college boasting more than 63,000 students, where she led all media relations and communication tactics. Most notably, she orchestrated media efforts for the 2016 Senate Debate between US Senator Rubio and former US Representative Patrick Murphy. Under her leadership, the college increased its estimated earned media to US$8.5m and created a standardised flow for sharing content with the marketing team to increase audience and support paid efforts. Prior to her role at Broward College, Lesli was the marketing and public relations manager for Kids In Distress (KID). There she helped reimagine the KID image through design, storytelling and media relations. Previously, she was the Director of Marketing at Aventura Hospital. Lesli is active in organisations dedicated to improving South Florida. She is a graduate of Leadership Broward Foundation Class XXXIV and Emerge Broward and a member of the Gold Coast Marketing Council and PRSA, among others. She earned her master’s degree in integrated communications from Florida International University in Biscayne Bay, Florida, and her bachelor of arts in communications from Stetson University in Deland, Florida. In her personal life, Lesli is happily married, with a four-year old son and baby daughter.