I realize this post is about 7 or 8 days too late, but it’s been a wonderfully busy week and a half with the beginning of the first of my remaining quarters at Ohio University.
Roughly 10 days ago, accompanied by my wonderfully supportive girlfriend Rachel, I embarked on Labor Day Weekend trip to Chicago. While the trip was for mostly personal reasons, I didn’t want to miss an opportunity to meet with some professionals while in the city in which I desperately hope to reside in half a year. Thanks to some great success utilizing Twitter to make some contacts, I arranged a few meetings during my stay in the Windy City.
My first meeting was at 8:00 AM the day after my 6.5 hour bus ride from Ohio. I was to be meeting with the phenomonally helpful Bryan Blaise, a Senior Account Executive at Fleishman-Hillard. I could write an entire post on Bryan and his inspirational story, but I’ll save that for another day. I will simply say that Bryan earned his position, Senior Account Executive, by age 24.
Not wanting to be late, for fear of making a poor first impression, I was up and out of the hotel by 7:15 AM. Well, nearly ready. I had forgotten to pack my toothbrush, and I’ll be damned if I was going to make a first impression with bad breath and nasty teeth. Fortunately, there was a Walgreens a block from my hotel where I was able to purchase a new toothbrush and some toothpaste. Unfortunately, my favorite brand of toothpaste was only packaged in a “Buy one, get a travel-size tube for free!” which ultimately led to me carrying not one, but TWO tubes of toohpaste and a toothbrush in my pockets for most of the day.
After finding a Starbucks bathroom down the street, I was able to brush my teeth and feel ready to go for the meeting. The only problem was, I didn’t remember the name of the cafewhere we were supposed to meet! I figured I would just ask on of the friendly locals, who would happily direct me toward the right place. Following several blocks of back-tracking and second-guessing, I finally remembered I had my iPod touch and was luckily able to find an unprotected connection on the street (thank you Linksys!).
Finally, I found the last email that Bryan and I had exchanged containing the name and address of our mysterious meeting place. Success! I walked confidently toward Tempo, eagerly awaiting my first meeting with a Chicago PR professional. I reached the restaurant, told them happily my table was for two, and proceeded to drink a cup of coffee as I waited. I had arrived nearly 15 minutes early, despite the misadventures that had immediately preceded my arrival.
My meeting with Bran was exactly what I was hoping for in this trip: I got to sit down across the breakfast table from someone who is living my dream and talk shop. I was able to ask any and every question that came to mind about FH, about Chicago, about the state of PR, very briefly about show tunes, anything! The splendid host he is, Bryan took me on a tour of Fleishman’s offices in the John Hancock building after breakfast, where I was introduced to anyone we passed as we continued to talk about my goals, my experience and the agency itself. All-in-all, it was an extremely friendly, welcoming environment in which I found myself very comfortable.
My day was not done, however, as I had another stop on Danny Cox’s Chicago PR Tour 2009: Weber Shandwick.
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Danny — Great post. The pleasure was all mine. My colleagues and I enjoyed the chance to meet another OU public relations star and do hope you’ll come back to visit and talk with us more soon. And this time, the breakfast/drinks/whatever is on me.
Bryan, thank you for your kind words! I’ll be returning in early December (great time to visit Chicago, right?) and will certainly keep you posted. I’ll be sure to pass on the positive review to my fellow Bobcats at the next PRSSA meeting. Thanks again!