This year was a strange year. COVID-19 kept us at home and made many of us sick – I had extended family members who caught COVID-19 and survived, thankfully. As many of you know, my life revolves around my work as a professor of communication studies and communications management at McMaster University and my work …
Category Archives: Academic Life
Datasci is the third pillar of PR and comms management
The field of professional communications has been evolving for the last 100 years. When it began, with the early work of Eddie Bernays and Ivy Lee, the focus was largely on promotions. This larger communications field split into several over the years. One can argue that public relations, marketing, advertising, investor relations, etc. are all …
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Learnings from teaching online for an intensive week
Last week, we had the Summer Residency of the Master of Communications Management program at McMaster University (offered in partnership with the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communication at Syracuse University). However, this was MCM Residency with a COVID-19 pandemic twist – for the first time, we delivered the entire residency via Zoom. It was …
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New Year’s Resolutions 2020
Last year, I committed to fitness, developing my consulting business and getting down to some research and writing. I can say that while I didn’t get all the way to the end of those objectives, I made a lot of progress with each. In terms of consulting, I expanded my knowledge and abilities in the …
Endings and beginnings
The gathering of students, faculty and alumni who came together for my last Residency Gala Dinner as MCM Director, at Trius Winery in Niagara-on-the-Lake. A lovely night. I was very grateful. Sometimes we immerse ourselves so completely in something, that we don’t see the years roll by, focused as we are on the exciting task …
A new project: 52 weeks on the Bruce Trail
I have always be an avid hiker, a habit that I gained from my father, who would take me on long hikes after church on Sunday afternoon in the Hockley Valley north of Toronto. We would go to Mass, have lunch and then drive the 80 or so minutes from our home in King City …
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What makes the McMaster-Syracuse MCM program so special?
Last week, I was happy to host my 17th residency as director of the Master of Communications Management program, offered in partnership McMaster University and the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. It was, as they all have been, a beautiful, warm, exciting and fascinating experience. The MCM program and community is …
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On a chill night (and a warm heart)
Sometimes, in the dead of summer, we forget that in a few short months, the heat will be replaced by icy winter paths – shivers, tingling faces and a chill wind blowing around the ears. What does this changeable environment mean? Being cold reminds me that I am alive. Today I was in Ottawa, walking along …
On illness, loss and identity
We begin life fresh and surprised at the sensory assault of even the limited confines of the birthing room. After that initiation into chaos, followed by the first reassuring embrace from our mother, we linger through the slow days of childhood, looking forward with anticipation to our adult years, which we think may signal freedom …
My faith in humanity is renewed
Last Friday I did an intensely stupid thing and left my wallet on he GO bus from Pearson Airport in Toronto to Hamilton. Wow I felt so dumb and hapless. I spent the weekend worrying about all the applications I would have to fill out to replace all the cards in the wallet. Plus, it …