About Us
This blog is a project formed by Mike Smith Public Affairs, offering fly-on-the-wall commentary on the latest news stories coming from developments in social media. Stay tuned — there’s never a dull moment.
About our team:
Mike Smith is a Washington Insider and native with deep connections on Capitol Hill. He served on the President Clinton Transition Team in communications. He was more recently Communications Director of the Mark Warner for President PAC. Mike then joined the President Obama Press and advance Team in a volunteer media advisor role for the Tech, Media and Telecomm team over 18 months.
Smith also has specific crisis management expertise. He supported Defense Secretary Rumsfeld during the 9-11 response. He played a public affairs role with the Red Cross serving Governor’s Bush, Warner and Perry during several hurricane disasters. Mike recently helped the Pentagon on the Guantanamo Bay prisoner treatment concerns. He started his career at Dow Chemical.
Mike has had senior management roles with three of the top ten PR and public affairs firms in the world: Burson Marsteller, VP at Edelman Worldwide and EVP/GM with Euro RSCG in Washington, DC. He served as director of public affairs with the National Association of Manufacturers, and is a 16 year member of the National Press Club (serving on the Newsmakers Selection Committee). Mike is a columnist with Huffington Post, frequent university lecturer, and speaker at national public affairs industry meetings.
As Account Supervisor with MSPA, Ashley has managed influential accounts including Craig Newmark (founder of craigslist), comScore and dna13. She is an editorial writer and media strategist with an emphasis on corporate social responsibility and social media who effectively transforms clients’ ideas into measurable, pursuable goals. She brings a rare tenacity and energy to these projects and ensures long-range success for political, non-profit, CSR and corporate clients.
Previous to joining MSPA and MSBD, Ashley acted a campaign director with CCS Fundraising, blogger/new media communication associate at Peace Action/Peace Action Education Fund, and campaigned on behalf of Tom Perez, candidate for Maryland Attorney General. Ashley has a BA in Communications and Government and Politics from University of Maryland at College Park.
As social media manager for MSPA, Katie Rogers is specializing in business reporting and multimedia storytelling at the Medill School of Journalism. She worked for the Elkhart Truth newspaper in Elkhart, Ind. before coming to Northwestern. While working toward her undergraduate degree at Loyola University Chicago, she freelanced for The Chicago Tribune’s “Friday” and “On the Town” sections.
Wow, I am waiting to see what you do next.