Samantha Flynn is president of Junipr Public Relations in Chicago, and has been featured in PR Week, Forbes, The Wrap and Authority Magazine, sharing expertise in best practices in public relations, reputation management, crisis communications, entrepreneurship and the continued advancement of women in the workplace. She and I talked about career progression, including her time as an in-house resource and the differences between in-house and agency work. We also talked a fair bit about what young people can do to stand out and survive in this very tough business. For someone so young Sarah is a little bit old school in her approach, and she and I bonded on that: some things in PR have changed, but some very crucial things have not. She's the author of the recently-released The EntrePReneur Advantage: Turning Chaos into Clarity, so check it out.

Ron Culp is a Chicago PR legend. Currently the lead of DePaul University's brilliant PR program, he joined DePaul after a long and storied career in politics, corporate communications and agency leadership. Prior to joining DePaul, Ron held senior public relations positions at four Fortune 500 corporations and two major agencies, as partner and managing director of Ketchum’s Midwest offices and head of the agency’s North American Corporate Practice, and also as founder and managing director of the Chicago office of financial comms powerhouse Sard Verbinnen and Company (now FGS Global). Earlier in his corporate career, he held senior communications positions at Sears, Sara Lee Corporation, Pitney Bowes, and Eli Lilly.

We discussed the state of the business, his brilliant career, how students get taught PR, ageism, and a bunch of other topics. Ron is a legend.

Anushka Seth is the head of communications for the Asia-Pacific region for The British Council, the UK's international organization for cultural relations. Her career has seen her move from her native India to America to pursue education and then career opportunities, moving from the tech to the financial industry and then to crisis communications, then returning to India to work with a top agency and then go in-house. As impressive as her career trajectory and her capabilities is her incredible humanity, questioning herself, working tirelessly to improve herself, and embracing the uncertainty that is such a hallmark of the public relations business... and such a challenge for many of us working in it. Listening to this podcast episode will make you a much better practitioner and perhaps a better person.

Dale Curtis is the founder and head of Dale Curtis Communications in Washington D.C, one of the very best boutique communications, public relations and public affairs firms in the city. He's a voice of normalcy and moderation in a city that is, certainly increasingly, anything but. A former journalist and White House communications staffer, we discussed his work, the post-facts world we live in, how he got his start in the business, and a variety of other topics. Apologies for the canine interlude at the end, my dog Jackson - a political name if there is one! - can't resist a doorbell.

Katie Pierini is the founder of Mindset Agency in greater Los Angeles, a boutique agency at the leading edge of understanding how integrated communications is done today. Katie herself is a powerhouse, there's no other word to describe her: from her start in tech PR in Chicago to helping build and run a major agency office in San Diego to launching her own operation, she is an amazing combination of tougher-than-steel and relentlessly upbeat and optimistic. We discussed a number of things, including a master class she provided on integrated programs and brand-building, Me Too and being a woman in PR, her career progression and lessons learned, and - acting as an arc over the entire conversation - we connected on how much we LOVE the industry and our jobs within it.

Noah Dye is the principal at Spoken Voice PR, a tech-focused communications boutique, after having been EVP of LEWIS PR, one the top mid-sized agencies worldwide. Noah is a battler, and a competitor, and someone who is relentless about his work, his clients and his career. We spoke about the challenges of the agency model both in terms of what it delivers to clients and what it demands of its people, about his career progression overcoming multiple crises including the implosion of the dot-com boom just as he was getting started, about the state of communications, and about business development, a shared love of ours.

Jackson Wightman is the head of Montreal agency Proper Propaganda, which specializes in consumer tech PR and marketing. A prolific contributor to LinkedIn and author, Jackson is especially informative on the topic of conducting PR campaigns with the specific aim of optimizing search results on AI platforms (GEO). We talked about fragmentation of media and reevaluating which platforms matter, AI and how it processes information and how that affects communications and marketing campaigns, and his own very interesting background.

Morgan McLintic is CEO of Firebrand Communications in San Francisco and one of the most experienced technology marketers and PR people, after having run US operations for a global agency before striking out on his own. As a brit who crossed over to working in the United States, he also brings a unique perspective. He and I discussed his career path, what works (and doesn't) in PR today, dealing with CEOs and especially tech entrepreneurs, what young PR practitioners can do to be successful, and business development (my perennial favorite subject!).