Mary Jane Walker Joins Weber Shandwick as Senior Vice President, Corporate Healthcare

NEW YORK, May 31, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Weber Shandwick, a leading global public relations firm, today announced that Mary Jane Walker has joined the agency as senior vice president, corporate healthcare. She is based in the New York office.

Walker has more than 20 years of experience in corporate communications and media relations for clients across the healthcare industry. Throughout her career, she has worked on major industry issues such as healthcare reform, medicine safety and ethics in clinical trials. In her role at Weber Shandwick, she will work on key healthcare accounts, developing communications strategies for corporate positioning and reputation-building, C-suite executive visibility and thought leadership platforms. In addition, Walker will support clients experiencing CEO transitions, corporate restructurings, acquisitions, divestitures and lend support to them with other communications needs such as crisis and issues management, corporate social responsibility and employee communications. 

She joins Weber Shandwick from Hill & Knowlton, where she was a senior vice president supporting clients such as Deloitte's health care sector, Pfizer's Worldwide Research and Development division, Forest Laboratories and Amgen. Previously, Walker served as an executive vice president at Robinson, Lerer and Montgomery where she supported all areas of Pfizer's Corporate Communications efforts. Prior to that, she spent 11 years at the National Institutes of Health in a variety of communications and media relations roles. 

"Mary Jane's deep industry experience, coupled with her proven track record of success for some of the pharmaceutical industry's leading brands, will make her an asset to the Healthcare practice, the firm and its clients," said Barbara Box, president, New York and Chicago Healthcare practice. "We welcome her to Weber Shandwick and look forward to benefitting from her insights, expertise and leadership."

"We're delighted to welcome Mary Jane as more clients seek our counsel in the corporate healthcare arena," said Paul Jensen, president of the firm's North American Corporate practice.  "Healthcare companies and organizations continue to face a myriad of reputational and other communications challenges, and we look forward to Mary Jane's client contributions in this critical area."

Walker has a Master of Arts in Communications: Public Communications from the American University in Washington D.C. and a Bachelor of Science degree in Journalism, Mass Communications from the University of Utah.

About Weber Shandwick

Weber Shandwick is a leading global public relations agency with offices in 81 countries around the world. The firm's success is built on its deep commitment to client service, our people, creativity, collaboration and   engaging stakeholders in new and creative ways to build brands and reputation. Weber Shandwick provides strategy and execution across practices such as consumer marketing, healthcare, technology, public affairs, financial services, corporate and crisis management. Its specialized services include digital/social media, advocacy advertising, market research, and corporate responsibility. The firm has also won numerous 'best place to work' awards around the world. Weber Shandwick is part of the Interpublic Group (NYSE: IPG). For more information, visit http://www.webershandwick.com.

SOURCE Weber Shandwick