I am currently in a contemplative mood. As my time at Washington State University comes to a close, I find myself reflecting on the nearly 1,600 days that have passed since I became a Coug on March 16, 2020. Most of those days were spent in either a closet (first house), bedroom (second house), or (finally) a legit home office (third house). It would be understandable to think that a chapter in my career where I worked mostly from home wouldn’t produce the type of distinctive moments that I experienced at previous stops.

We moved to Washington when I was hired by WSU. I worked one day on campus and that afternoon we received the directive to work from home. We rented a house and I worked out of a closet space while the pandemic rocked the world.

However, that’s just not the case.

Truth be told, I did enjoy some defining moments while working at WSU. Yes, some of them did occur while I was on campus or traveling BUT others occurred at home as I sat in the ancient red office chair that my grandpa once used (and that my wife hates). It is with great pride that I present this blog post that counts down my top 10 moments working for WSU.

10. Winning Gold – In 2022, Holly Sitzmann (my boss) and I wrote a CASE award submission for an enrollment management marketing piece our UMC team put together. I was hoping it would just receive some recognition but my expectations were far exceeded when it won the highest honor bestowed by the organization. Our CougBeat magazine, a play on the teen fan publications wildly popular in the 1990s (i.e. Tiger Beat), earned the CASE Circle of Excellence Grand Gold award. I was proud of the social media-specific activation I oversaw in the issue but mostly I was elated that our UMC team was honored in such a profound way.

CougBeat was a creative and collaborative effort that won top honors from CASE. It was a pleasure to write the winning submission.

9. Presenting to the President’s Cabinet – Our social media program hit it out of the park in 2021 when it came to smashing benchmarks from previous years. As was custom for me at the beginning of each calendar year, I would deliver a presentation to our UMC leadership team recapping the analytics from the previous year. However, I gave an extra presentation in February 2022 when Phil Weiler and Holly asked me to also present the data to WSU’s top administrators at the president’s cabinet meeting. I nervously agreed and when the day came I fought back anxiety so I could coherently talk analytics with WSU big wigs such as President Kirk Schulz himself, the campus chancellors, provost, athletic director, and more. It was a proud moment for me because I was able to overcome nerves to deliver the presentation in a way that made sense to these senior administrators. But more importantly, the opportunity allowed me to showcase the solid work of our social unit and overall UMC team.

I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous to deliver this presentation. However, it ended up being a successful afternoon and a positive experience.

8. #PalouseUnity – One of the first big campaigns I worked on after arriving at WSU was our #PalouseUnity initiative. With COVID wreaking havoc across the Inland Northwest, we teamed up with the University of Idaho to promote positive pandemic behaviors. It wasn’t long after we launched that our dual university effort grew to a community coalition that was TEN organizations strong. Pullman and Moscow healthcare providers, city chambers, law enforcement, and even an electrical equipment company all joined the cause and lent their marketing/comms teams to help in whatever way possible. Throughout the entirety of #PalouseUnity, I worked with Holli Sampson from UI to execute the digital portion of the campaign in a strategic and organized manner. To partner with Holli and lead so many Palouse-based social media managers and digital strategists was the perfect way for me to meet area professionals and advance a worthy cause.

The #PalouseUnity project mattered and I was honored to work on it. Our photographers and designers worked together to create some powerful images of Palouse community members coming together with an “It takes all of us” message.

7. Rolling Out the Brand – Our UMC team pulled off the remarkable by executing a successful in-house modernization of our brand. Although I had nothing to do with the nearly two years of hard work it took to refresh a brand with 130 years of history, I did assist with the rollout. I was enlisted to serve on the training team that taught WSU employees across the system how to engage with/use the new brand assets and narrative. Throughout a series of Zoom trainings, I partnered with Danial Bliele, our web development director, to educate the WSU community on how to use the modernized brand on web and social. It was a thrill to teach these trainings because you could sense how hungry and curious these large audiences of WSU employees were to learn about the modernized brand and how to use it.

It was an honor to help facilitate training for our brand modernization rollout. This image is a sceenshot from one of the sessions I did.

6. #CougCounties – During my time at WSU, we were hit with crisis after crisis (COVID, Idaho tragedy, Pac-12 demise…just to name a few). Because of this, it wasn’t always an option to do fun stuff on social media. However, just this month I was able to conclude a major organic social media campaign that turned out really cool. Called #CougCounties, we took five months to feature all 39 counties of Washington. We designed special #CougCounties t-shirts and sent them to Coug volunteers who agreed to “rep” the Washington county they lived in. The volunteers slipped on the t-shirts and went to a landmark or point of interest in their county and posed for photos. The images turned out fabulous! We incorporated them into social posts that contained info on the county, fun facts about the landmark, and a quote from the volunteer on what WSU meant to them. The campaign pulled in massive numbers and became something that our social media audience looked forward to every Monday and Thursday. Here is the recap blog post I did on the campaign and here is where you can view a photo album of all the reps at the locations they visited.

#CougCounties was a really fun and successful organic campaign I had the opportunity to introduce at the beginning of 2024. We just now wrapped it up earlier this month.

5. Sharing the Stage with Colleagues – While at WSU, I was able to network with counterparts at other major universities. In fact, some of these “counterparts” became great friends. I teamed up with Victoria “V.” Mendoza from USC and Andy Thompson from the University of Utah to submit a proposal to present at the 2022 American Marketing Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Ed. Our proposal, #LearnOnTikTok: Higher Ed Strategies, was accepted and we spent the next few months preparing together for the big day in November. Prior to us traveling to the Washington D.C. area to present, our team grew stronger when Katie Camacho Smith from TikTok joined us. Our presentation went well as the four of us each focused on a different aspect of TikTok (I covered paid ads). To make things even sweeter, my boss, Holly, was in attendance to watch.

A photo of me presenting at the 2022 American Marketing Association’s Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Ed as Katie (left) and Victoria (right) look on.

4. A Rewarding Mentorship – Throughout my career, I have enjoyed the honor of mentoring many students. However, my most recent experience might be the most rewarding of all. At the beginning of this year, then-WSU student Timothy Duenas emailed me to ask if I would mentor him about the marketing industry and best practices for entering the professional world. Over the course of several meetings, I was so impressed with the questions Timothy asked coupled with his curious/respectful nature. I looked forward to each session and was thrilled that our last meeting was in-person. Shortly after that final chat and just prior to graduating with a marketing degree, Timothy published a LinkedIn post about our time together that really touched me. I look forward to following his career long after I work my final day at WSU.

Timothy Duenas and I take a photo together after our last mentorship meeting in May 2024.

3. Meeting Colleagues in Vancouver – In October 2022, I attended my first #WSU System Marketers and Communicators Conference. The annual opportunity for marketing and communications professionals from across the system to meet for networking and presentations was revived after a COVID hiatus. Since it was my first time attending, I didn’t know what to expect but I left feeling so thankful for the opportunity. This particular conference took place on the beautiful WSU Vancouver campus and provided me the chance to visit in-person with many colleagues who I had only engaged with on Zoom up to that point. I also delivered one of the conference keynote presentations that I felt really helped introduce me on a greater level to my fellow Coug marketers and communicators.

Even though it was an internal conference, I relished the opportunity to network with many colleagues who I had only engaged with on Zoom. I also gave one of the keynote addresses.

2. Wisconsin Fans Try Cougar Gold – One of the best parts of my job was serving in a producer role for the creation of fun and engaging videos. The fact that I was able to complete these projects with our brilliant video team made it even better. Out of the many videos I worked on with Jason Refsland and Kara Billington, nothing tops the one we made prior to the 2023 WSU vs. Wisconsin football home opener. A few hours before kickoff, we approached Badger fans and asked them to sample Cougar Gold cheese. Of course the angle was whether self-proclaimed Cheeseheads would admit that WSU’s signature cheese was on par with what they produce in Wisconsin. The reactions were priceless and our video team executed an incredible edit in record time that allowed us to release the video near halftime. The video took a lot of planning and the filming took place on a scorching hot gameday but the final product was so worth it! I can only wonder if the University of Wisconsin will impact me at Eastern Washington University in the same it has at my previous three colleges…

Collaborating on this video took a lot of planning and a lot of sweat, but the end result was awesome!

1. Presenting With Cara In Chicago – Although it took place almost 2,000 miles away from Washington, presenting with my co-worker and friend Cara Hoag at the 2023 AMA Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Ed in Chicago was my favorite moment as a Coug. Our submission titled Not Your Parents’ YouTube made the slim 11% acceptance rate for the stacked conference. However, earning the right to present at such a prestigious higher ed gathering was only part of what made this experience so special. The topic we covered was a major success story that resulted from our semester-long effort to transform our WSU YouTube presence. To be able to present our method and results to a packed conference room in the engaging way we did will always be a career moment for me. I can’t thank Cara enough for teaming up with me and working so hard to positively represent WSU on the national stage.

Cara and I were all smiles after we answered the final question that put a cap on our AMA Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Ed presentation.

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I have so many other happy moments like working on our holiday video, serving on a committee that planned fun gatherings for our department, and winning the 2023 UMC end-of-year trivia contest (😂) but you have to draw the line somewhere.

Bottom line, I was blessed to enjoy four years at WSU packed with opportunities and memories. However, none of the above would have happened if not for my UMC team. I can’t wait to thank them in a couple days. Don’t Blink.