Maliha Aqeel, PMP

Director of Global Communications, Fix Network World

Director of Global Communications

Maliha Aqeel is an award-winning senior communication professional. She is currently a Director of Global Communications at Fix Network World . She serves on IABC’s international executive board and is a past president of IABC/Toronto. 

Her accomplishments include developing ICD’s new brand and revamping ICD’s Director Journal magazine, which earned IABC Gold Quill awards of merit and IABC Canada Silver Leaf awards of excellence. She also led EY’s Tax Canada Bot-a-thon campaign, which won several awards in internal communication and employee engagement including a Gold Quill “Best of the Best”, which represents the very best entries seen from around the globe.   

Previously, she spent several years in agency and led the financial communication practice for APCO Worldwide’s Dubai office. She is a Strategic Communication Management Professional (SCMP) and a Project Management Professional (PMP).

Bjorn Trowery

Meta

Consumer Communications & Brand PR

Allison Polly

PepsiCo

Head of Content Development

As the Head of Content Development at Creators League Studio, Ally oversees all content activities, scripted and unscripted, branded and original, across the PepsiCo portfolio including Pepsi, Gatorade, Mountain Dew, Tropicana, Quaker, Doritos, Lays and new products. She is also responsible for distribution strategies for select content, including strategic partnerships with top Hollywood studios. As a part of the new content model she has brought award winning talent to the organization to create documentary and scripted films, episodic series, music videos and digital content. Her current projects include a documentary feature with Steven Cantor and Robert Rodriguez with brand Gatorade; a scripted narrative feature with Cinetic based on the documentary short CLS made with David Darg; and a Pepsi Black commercial with the Mundo Sisters and Alexander Wang.
Ally was an EP on an award-winning series of documentary short films for Gatorade with David Darg, the Zimbalists, and Kirk Fraser. The films were selected to 15 top film festivals including the TriBeCa Film Festival and TIFF Kids, and were distributed on ESPN, Amazon Prime, and El Rey Network.
Throughout her award-winning career, Ally ran branded content for Bedrocket, a Ken Lerer venture company; launched the first digital entertainment studio, FILMAKA; was VP/Talent at a think-tank within Limited Brands that created the $1B brand PINK for Victoria’s Secret, and SVP/Creative Manager at McCann Erickson Worldwide.
Ally is a graduate of Brown University and is a member of The Academy of Television Arts and Science.

Mark Weiner

Author, "PR Technology, Data and Insights"

Chief Insights Officer, PublicRelay

Mark Weiner helps PublicRelay clients make better data-informed communications and business decisions. Mark's newest book, "PR Technology, Data and Insights" was named one of the top three PR books for 2022 and among the top 40 PR books of all time by Bookauthority.org. His first book, "Unleashing The Power of PR," is ranked at #11. Mark was named to PR Week's "Dashboard 25," the 25 most influential people in communications technology.

He serves as a member of The Arthur Page Society, a Trustee of The Museum of Public Relations and a Director of The Institute for Public Relations (IPR), for which he is the immediate past chair of the Measurement Commission. Mark is the 2018 recipient of the Jack Felton Medal awarded by the IPR for lifetime achievement in communications research. He sits on the Advisory Council at the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications.

PublicRelay delivers communications analytics and advisory services which fuel the world's most admired organizations with the interpretive analysis, actionable insights and strategic guidance they need to set objectives, develop strategies and tactics, and stay on track over time, versus competitors and in light of best practice.

Mark has held leadership positions in the communications research field since 1986. Before joining Cognito in 2021, Mark was the CEO of PRIME Research which was acquired by Cision in 2018, Mark led Ketchum's Global Research practice before which he was SVP at Cision and CEO of Delahaye, the PR research firm he founded as Medialink Research in 1994. As a member of Medialink's executive board, Mark helped to lead its 1999 initial public offering on the NASDAQ.

In addition to his latest book, Mark authored "Unleashing the Power of PR" published by John Wiley in 2005. Bookauthority.org named it one of the top 25 PR books in history. He writes for international trade media and speaks often at such conferences as The Conference Board, PRSA, AMEC, IABC, The Arthur Page Society and more. Mark has presented to audiences in Australia, Canada, Peru, Greece, Denmark, Slovenia, Sweden, Brazil, The Ukraine, and the UK. He sits on the editorial advisory boards of Ragan PR Daily, PR Journal, PR News and PRSA's The Strategist. In 2022, Mark was named among PR Week's Dashboard 25, the most influential people in public relations. In 2013, he was inducted into The PR News Hall of Fame.

His career began at the New York Times News Service and Tribune Media.

Kieran Fagan

CVS Health

VP, Communications - Content + Experiences

Kieran is Vice President, Communications at CVS Health, where he leads the teams responsible for the company’s corporate story, content strategy, digital and social media, and communications insights.

Kieran joined CVS Health in January 2019 through CVS’s acquisition of Aetna, where he led the communications centers of excellence for content, digital and internal communications. Before joining Aetna, Kieran was a managing director in the corporate strategy and healthcare practices of W2O Group, counseling Fortune 100 companies on communications strategy, reputation management, and using digital media analytics to modernize and reshape their communications and media strategies.

He’s held prior communications leadership roles in the financial services and healthcare sectors, including at BNY Mellon and for more than a decade at Novartis, where he led corporate communications teams in the U.S. and Europe through mergers and acquisitions, crisis communications, product launches and change management programs. 

Varsha Sreekumar

Johnson & Johnson

Social Media and Digital Influencer Lead

Colleen Marshall Delaney

Massachusetts General Hospital

Director of Internal Communication, Publications and Operations

Michelle Lefler

Aurora Cannabis Inc.

VP, Communications and Public Relations

Kirsten Walkom

Smith & Company

Executive Vice President

Katherine Wolfgang

CBC

Head of PR

Katherine Wolfgang is Head of Public Relations for Canada’s national public broadcaster, CBC, where she leads public relations strategies and narratives across all platforms and services including television, streaming, radio, podcasts, music, news and sports. With more than 20 years of experience in the global media industry, Katherine joined CBC from leading content production company Shaftesbury, where she served as VP, Marketing and Communications. Prior to that, she was VP, International Communications for factual entertainment leader Discovery, where she oversaw communications for the company’s international division and was a member of the team honoured with PR Week's Large Corporate Communications Team of the Year Award in 2008. Katherine serves on the Board of Directors of the Alliance for Women in Media, a non-profit organization focused on increasing gender parity at all levels and areas of the global media industry.

Joung-ah Ghedini-Williams

UNHCR

Head, Global Communications Desk

Cam Gordon

Twitter Canada

Head of Communications

An experienced communications practitioner with 15+ years working in Canadian and global markets. A confident, well-spoken media relations expert with a deep knowledge of the Canadian print, broadcast and online media landscapes. A senior project lead with vast experience managing colleagues and agency teams. An issues management expert with experience working with top brands and top executives on reputational management, product recalls, user safety issues and other crisis situations. A veteran of policy communications, working with government officials at federal, provincial and municipal levels on a variety of campaigns and support programs.

Stephanie Nadalin

Canadian Tire Corporation, Ltd.

AVP, External Communications

With her career spanning politics and government to global agency work and now leading external communications for one of Canada’s most iconic retail brands, Stephanie Nadalin has run the gamut of proactive, reactive, strategic and marketing communications challenges.

An expert at juggling priorities and personalities, while maintaining a laser focus on creative, strategic and influential communications, she has built and led teams to deliver highly effective programs and campaigns. Over the years, Stephanie and her teams have earned top industry awards from reputable organizations; a testament to her proven ability to bring teams together, promote innovative thinking and drive growth and strategy forward.

Drawing on her breadth of experience, Stephanie will detail how teamwork, collaboration, and cross functional excellence inform her approach to building and maintaining high performance PR teams.

Russell Baker

IABC Toronto

Immediate Past President

As Immediate Past President of IABC/Toronto, Russell grew the profile and prominence of the largest chapter in an international association of business communicators and elevated member experiences during the most prominent global healthcare crisis in a century.  

Day-to-day, Russell serves as the Corporate Spokesperson for Toronto Hydro, where he's responsible for setting the strategic direction for media relations, corporate issues management and emergency management communications.

He is certified in Incident Command Systems (Canada) and Post-Disaster Public Engagement from IAP2 Canada.

Aaron Brindle

Google Canada

Head of Public Affairs

Krista Webster

Veritas Communications

President & CEO

Named one of US PR Week's Top 40 Under 40, Krista Webster brings more than 20 years of public relations, social media and influencer marketing experience, working with blue chip clients in the US, Canada, Europe and Asia to her role as President & CEO of Veritas Communications. A self-professed change agent, Webster is always looking for ways to push the envelope creatively and strategically, consistently striving to innovate ahead of the curve. Just this year, Webster expanded the Veritas family to include performance driven influencer co-creation and digital content hub Meat & Produce (M&P) as a means to strategically bring influencers more fully to the table and fill a gap she identified in the market.

Credited with managing 30+ million in client portfolios on both sides of the border by her late twenties, Webster attributes her accelerated success to a strong focus on integration between media channels and with agencies from other disciplines. She believes wholeheartedly that the best ideas are media agnostic. The channels you employ – earned, owned or paid – are secondary to the power of an idea that truly transcends and breaks through. 

In addition to the business of PR, Webster also makes it her business to look for ways to give back philanthropically through work and play. Veritas continues to be committed to pro-bono service for several global charities, in addition to helping build award-winning Corporate Social Responsibility programs for key clients. In fact, she was the winner of the first-ever Cannes PR Lion in 2009 for her cause work on P&G’s Global Campaign that supported the education of girls in Africa called “Protecting Futures.”

David Bauer

Purolator Inc.

Head of Corporate Communications

As the Head of Corporate Communications, Dave Bauer plays a lead role in advancing the Purolator’s strategic priorities through reputation management, brand building, influencer relationships and employee engagement. Since joining the company, Dave launched Purolator’s historic $1B Delivering the Future investment plan, which has been covered in all major Canadian media markets and by the Wall Street Journal. 

With more than 15 years of experience leading strategic and executive communications, media relations and employee engagement, Dave is a dynamic leader with the proven ability to help admired Canadian organizations standout in highly competitive markets, build brand loyalty and trust, elevate employees as brand ambassadors, and increase market share. As Director, Media Relations and Social Media for the Canadian Banker Association, Dave was responsible for spearheading an integrated traditional and digital media strategy on behalf of the largest banks in Canada to influence consumers’ perception of the evolution of banking in a hyper-connected digital world. He led all external communications and corporate social responsibility communications for Maple Leaf Foods during its $1B transformation investment with the goal of positioning the food manufacturer as the most sustainable protein company on the planet. He also launched Maple Leaf’s first sustainability report and played an integral role in the company’s growing corporate social responsibility mandate.

Dave has held progressive roles overseeing internal, external and executive communications at CIBC, the Region of Peel, Hydro One and the Government of Ontario. He has a graduated degree in Communications from the University of Ottawa