The greatest mentors prefer to talk more about their mentors and mentees rather than themselves. That’s exactly what happened at this week’s Page Society annual meeting in Atlanta where Distinguished Service Awardee Bruce K. Berger shared his 15 minutes of stage time making sure everyone understood the greatness of his mentor and friend, Betsy Ann Plank.
So, before sharing key highlights from Bruce’s acceptance remarks, let me talk a bit about Bruce from my vantage point of nearly 50 years of friendship.
I first met Bruce when we both worked in the pharmaecutical industry — Bruce at the Upjohn Company and me at Eli Lilly. He had a couple years more experience in the industry, so he generously offered advice on the nuancesof doing PR for a drug company. That was especially important since it was my first corporate PR job after several years in government. A few years later, we both moved onto other corporate jobs. He landed a CCO position before me when he was named as Whirlpool’s vice president of corporate affairs and president of the Whirlpool Foundation, where he led 90 professionals across media relations, employee communications, government affairs, financial communications and community relations. Through encounters with fellow colleagues and friends such as Bill Heyman, we managed to stay in touch from time to time…