These are words I learned from my participation and membership in the Public Relations Global Network. As past president of PRGN, I was honored to lead my PR colleagues in initiating the building of a multi national communications network. I suppose in many ways, this same passion guided me in creating and building Van Vechten & Company for the 25 years I chaired the firm.

I started the Agency with a borrowed Smith & Corona typewriter, working off a kitchen table in my New York apartment. The year was 1979. As a start up Agency, I could have opted to call upon local restaurants and stores, to see if they needed PR. I didn't. Instead I phoned or wrote to MCA Records, Johnson & Johnson, Pilot Pen Corporation, PageAmerica, and a host of other large national and multinational groups. Each had something interesting happening in their business. Within a year each was a client and I had a staff of a dozen people all crammed into the same New York flat. I kept one room in the back for myself, where I slept, and turned the rest of the place over to a great group of energetic, bright, like-minded individuals. I never hired based on what people had done in public relations or if they had majored in communications. Instead I sought employees based on what they had done in life, their native intelligence, and a host of other verbal and non-verbal skills I identified as transferable to my business. We succeeded as I expected we would, because we offered clients fresh, creatively driven programs. We offered solutions that didn’t always follow traditional paths. And we gave clients something else - very personal, senior level involvement 24/7.

The 25 years presiding over the company were dazzling. I feel honored to have worked in 34 nations, representing major client entities, each with a unique need for the caliber and quality of support we were able to provide.

From the time I left university life, I knew that I had to be involved with the communications process. My first job surprised even me, when I accepted a position with The Salvation Army, as director of special events for the Army’s 140+ New York City area based services and facilities. The pay was terrible, but the experience was intense and fulfilling. When I put together a benefit with Westinghouse Broadcasting, the president of Group W offered me a job to move the Merv Griffin Show from Manhattan to California. It was a great opportunity. At the end of the assignment, he sent me to Pittsburgh as public relations and promotions manager of KDKA- TV, the #1 station in the #10 market. I was on a roll.

Over the next few years I worked for several PR firms, among them Burson Marsteller and the Rowland Company. I grew, I learned, I listened, but I wasn’t always the best follower. I was always looking for new, fresh ways to approach a problem, and I sought more innovative ways to solve those problems than drawing from the traditional bag of PR tools so often favored by other practitioners. Creativity guided me, along with a healthy dose of common sense and a bit of humor. How can you offer the same array of solutions for every different client problem that presents itself? You can’t. So in 1979 I set off to change the world. I started Van Vechten & Company. I don’t know how much of the world we changed, but I do know we made a difference. To me, nothing is more satisfying than knowing that the information and outreach programs Van Vechten & Company has created for clients has impacted on the health and well being of millions of people both here and abroad. Now that the agency is under the guidance of Lowell Van Vechten, her experience and extraordinary career in promotional and PR work will carry Van Vechten & Company to even greater heights. We're grateful every single day for the opportunities we've had and for those yet to happen.

Jay