Hiring for Good is a podcast exploring the transformative power of leadership and what happens when the right person takes the job. Thank you for tuning in to this episode with our guest, Shannon Berg, APR, the Founder & CEO of Berg & Associates.
Shannon Berg, APR LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shannon-berg-apr/
Berg & Associates: https://bergassociatesnw.com/
Hiring For Good Website: https://www.hiringforgood.net/
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hiring-for-good-podcast/id1725208602
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/288s2urueV7xjlsFoYW8QN
Acumen Executive Search Website: https://www.acumenexecutivesearch.com/
Suzanne Hanifin: President at Acumen Executive Search Email: su*****@*******************ch.com
Email: ta***@*******************ch.com
Hiring for Good is presented by Acumen Executive Search.
Acumen Executive Search is the leading certified woman-owned Executive Search and advisory Firm on the West Coast. Acumen sources, attracts, and qualifies world-class executive and management talent for organizations to support them in achieving their organizational goals. Due to their focus and local network, which is both broad and deep, we are able to leverage best practices across a broad range of industries. We employ an equity lens throughout the recruitment process.
Hiring for Good Transcript
0:00 Well, good morning. I am Suzanne Hanifin with Acumen Executive Search and I am here once again with my lovely
0:06 co-host Tanis Morris. Good morning, Suzanne. And I am so excited to have not only my
0:13 friend but somebody I really respect just in all aspects of life, business,
0:19 personal, everything. Shannon Berg with Bergen Associates. Welcome, Shannon.
0:25 Thank you, Suzanne. Well, let me read such an impressive bio. And so Shannon
0:30 Berg, APR, is the founder and CEO of Berg Associates, a PR agency
0:37 specializing in issue management and crisis communication. Bergen Associates is a certified
0:43 woman-owned business. Yay. So is Acumen. and in crisis communications. She um has
0:51 been honored as one of Portland Business Journal’s fastest growing 100 companies,
0:56 not only in 2025, 2024, but also in 2023.
1:03 The firm was also named number one 2024 best place to work in Oregon in
1:08 Southwest Washington in the small business category by the Portland Business Journal. Boy, that’s a lot.
1:17 So Shannon has more than 25 years of PR consulting experience specializing in
1:22 crisis communications and issue management. Shannon has expertise in
1:28 litigation PR, labor communications, reputation management, and critical
1:34 incident response. She is an experienced workshop facilitator and has built a
1:39 suite of training to help businesses evolve and elevate their communication skills and crisis preparedness. In
1:47 addition to advising clients, Shannon enjoys speaking to communicators and
1:52 industry groups on roles of communications in effective crisis response. Prior to founding Berg
1:59 Associates, Shannon was an owner and managing partner of a regional PR firm
2:05 where she led issue advocacies campaigns and provide crisis communications, issue
2:11 management, and litigation PR consulting services. Originally from Detroit,
2:16 Michigan, Shannon served as the director of communications for the city of Detroit and press secretary to Detroit’s
2:23 mayor. In that post, she played an integral role in the city’s response to
2:29 the 3-day northeast blackout of 2013. From there, her crisis communication
2:35 experience expanded to include class action and high-profile litigation, data
2:41 breaches, employment and labor disputes, regulatory threats, and complex issue
2:46 management. And I’m not going to go on too much more because your background though from MIT,
2:54 tons of certifications, and I kind of want to turn that part over to you and
2:59 really hear about your journey and and also that balance of wife, mom, huge
3:07 trail runner, intense marathons, what what’s the word? Um, ultra
3:13 ultra marathon runner, good god, woman. How do you do it? How do you do it? How do you do it,
3:19 Tanis? I know. Well, thank you so much for having me. This is an amazing forum and podcast. And I was telling you both
3:26 earlier, I’ve had a lot of fun learning about people who I’ve known for a long time, but didn’t know parts of their
3:32 journey. Um, some of my closest friends I learned things about by watching this podcast. So, thank you for creating this
3:39 um community building. Well, we are excited to hear your journey because it is very impressive.
3:45 Well, I was thinking a lot about this and the question I think that you had in your uh information that you had sent
3:52 over was about formative experiences that really informed and shaped um my career and my journey. And I kept
3:59 thinking about it and I think it’s easy to think that that story starts when you go to college and study something and
4:04 then begin your career. But what came to mind for me was actually a couple of earlier work experiences. And so the
4:11 first we have to go all the way back to the early 1980s. Um, I was 12 years old and I got my very
4:18 first job working on a farm in Ray Township, Michigan, working for a Dutch
4:23 farming family. And I worked uh on the farm and they also had a fruit stand in Romeo, Michigan. And then I went on
4:30 Saturdays down to Eastern Market in Detroit to the farmers market. And I did that job from the time I was 12 until I
4:37 graduated from high school. Wow. And while I worked on the farm, the farmer Rey and his wife Linda would talk
4:45 to me and they would share things about their faith and their life and their
4:51 farming, you know, family history and I learned so much. I remember my mom would
4:57 pick me up at the end of the day from the farm and I would fall asleep in the car on the way home
5:02 um from exhaustion. And at the end of that very first summer, I’ll never
5:07 forget this. I I took what I had earned and I went shopping for the first time ever at a department store. It was
5:15 Hudson’s and I bought clothes for school and I bought the clothes that were like
5:20 on the display like that season’s new clothes. And that feeling of accomplishment,
5:29 of empowerment, um some self-determination,
5:34 you know, and just the joy of working. It made a huge impact on me and I went
5:39 on to become known in my 20s and in um my college and high school years as like
5:46 for having a lot of jobs and when I tell you I have had a lot of jobs and a lot
5:52 of different kinds of jobs um because I love to work but it all started on the
5:58 farm and you know it’s it’s an interesting story I was thinking about too on the way here because
6:03 you know you don’t have to be a huge corporation you can be a small business, you can be a family farm and give people
6:10 opportunities and experiences that have huge impacts on, you know, their career
6:16 trajectories. And I think about how much I gained from that experience working on that farm. Um, and then in high school,
6:24 I had another job in the wintertime when I wasn’t working on the farm. my very good friend, his mother was an interior
6:33 designer and she was a very accomplished um interior designer. She was a self-made entrepreneur. She owned a
6:40 design business and she also owned a store in Rochester, Michigan and they sold antiques and home furnishings.
6:47 And she was the first woman I had ever met who was a a business person, a
6:54 business owner, an entrepreneur, and also a mother. and she exuded this
7:00 confidence and this grace and she was kind, but she was also kind of powerful.
7:07 And I think to this day, a lot of what I’ve done in business has been emulating
7:14 that. You know, they say if you can see it, you can be it. She that was the first time I saw it. I saw a woman and
7:20 met someone who, you know, held all of these roles and did it with a lot of grace
7:26 and and that made a huge impact on me. And then there’s two more. I swear I’ll
7:32 be before I graduated from college, I went to Wayne State University and studied public relations. Wayne State University
7:38 is an uh a school in downtown Detroit. And I got really lucky and I landed a
7:44 job working at a premier boutique public relations agency owned by a gentleman
7:50 named Bob Berg who would later become my father-in-law. Oh my gosh.
7:56 And he and his um business partner Georgella Mirhead had this firm Berg Murehead and Associates. And I’m Berg
8:03 and Associates. Um Bob was sort of an icon and and a local legend in politics and in public
8:10 relations. He had been a political reporter writing for the United Press International. And then he had served as
8:16 the press secretary to Michigan’s longest serving governor, William Milikin. And then he went on to serve 11
8:22 years as a press secretary and one of the closest adviserss to the iconic
8:27 mayor of Detroit, Coleman A. Young. And 11 years as a press secretary, by the way, is an eternity. Most press
8:35 secretaries don’t serve that long. and then he started this agency. And so it
8:41 was an incredible opportunity to work for both of them. Not only because I I saw what a healthy work environment, an
8:49 agency work environment looked like, but Bob embodied
8:54 um what it means to be a trusted advisor to clients. And I really watched how he
9:01 gave advice, how he was valuesdriven, the integrity, um he was humble, he was
9:09 wise. He had these sayings and some of them, you know, I still use like if
9:14 you’re angry and it feels good, don’t do it. Oh wow. Um, so it it really had a huge
9:23 impact on me and they taught me the business and they taught me how to be a trusted adviser and the role of you know
9:32 your integrity, your personal integrity um and trust in that. So those are and
9:38 then the last one was the one that you mentioned in my bio. I was years later working in the city of Detroit as the
9:44 communications director and it was August and it was um hot in 2003 and the
9:50 city much of the eastern seabboard lost power for 3 days. It was a grid failure. And I remember running down 11 flights
9:58 of stairs in the Coleman Young Municipal Center and getting in my car and reporting to an emergency operations
10:04 center and being there for 3 days with all of the city’s leadership, managing
10:10 our response to that event, including how we were communicating with citizens
10:15 and with residents and communicating with the rest of the world about what was happening in Detroit. And that is
10:21 what started my my career and my expertise in crisis communications. Um,
10:27 you know, I’m I’m trained in PR. That’s what my degree was in. But it’s interesting because crisis is sort of a
10:34 practice area or a niche. And it’s the one part of my profession that you
10:39 almost can’t purpose to go into. Most people who do it, it’s it tracks back to
10:45 some experience they had early in their career where they found themselves managing a crisis and and then
10:52 everything sort of grew from there. And that was certainly my experience. So I’d like to follow up on that. I’m
10:58 curious, you know, a couple of different points. You probably learned to work
11:04 really hard on the farm. It and then you’ve had these incredibly fortunate opportunities to work for people who
11:12 modeled different aspects of what you embody as a leader now. But with the
11:17 crisis stuff, you know, I think in in PR, you’re learning to help people
11:24 connect with a story or a message that that resonates with them. With crisis management, it’s a little bit different.
11:31 Is it’s helping people navigate or helping I mean what’s how would you sum up exactly the purpose of PR and crisis
11:40 man? Is it ju just to make things better for the company that you’re representing and teach the company how to tell that
11:45 story or is it to also then create a path forward for the the audience that
11:50 they’re working with or is it both? It’s really about helping leaders and helping companies live and demonstrate their
11:56 values when they are experiencing a crisis or a threat either to their reputation or to their ability to
12:03 operate. What happens to companies, this is really fascinating, is the same exact thing that happens to any one of us
12:10 when we perceive a threat. We go into fight or flight mode and that’s survival
12:16 mode. And even a great leader when you put them in survival mode will have
12:22 impulses to do things that we know because of case studies and you know and
12:28 many many years of practice can actually make things worse. Right? The impulse to downplay the situation or to not talk
12:36 about it until you feel like you have your arms around it a little bit better or to you know try to explain things
12:43 away. Well, if I just explain this, then people will understand. When the truth is, it’s very hard, if not impossible,
12:50 to educate when you’re in a crisis. So, a lot of what we do is we we look at
12:56 the values, right? Who do you say you are? And then do your actions and words
13:03 reflect those values. That is your north star. That is your guidepost. That is
13:10 what tells you how we need to engage and and who we need to be in this moment. I
13:16 absolutely believe that in every crisis, in every challenge, in every situation
13:22 that’s difficult for leaders, there is an opportunity. There is a shining
13:28 opportunity if you can step into that and say, “How do I be the best leader and do right by
13:38 the people who trust us? Our customers, our employees, our partners, our
13:43 vendors, the community. How do I do the right thing right now in this moment?
13:48 There’s always an opportunity.” And so that’s a lot of what I do is like walk
13:54 with them through that. and um remind them of of the values, but also um let
14:02 me tell you what we know about what works in this moment. And and the the truth is the public will forgive
14:10 a lot. What they’re really looking at is your motivation, your intention, and
14:17 what you do next, right? It’s it’s okay, this difficult thing happened. How did
14:24 you behave once you knew Mh. Right. Um, what were the actions and steps that you took and how did you
14:29 communicate with me? That’s what you’re going to be judged by. And can I I’m sorry. I I just I love
14:35 this. It’s so interesting. What part of that crisis management kind of um I don’t even know. It’s it’s it’s so
14:48 much more than like segment of the market. You know, you all of these elements all of these elements of crisis
14:53 management. What do you think was in you that that resonated so
14:59 strongly with this aspect of the business? You know, that is such a great question.
15:04 I’m sorry I’m kind of going off script. No, but I’m just fascinated because, you know, you’ve talked about it’s
15:10 interesting because you started by talking about people that you admired and their values and now you’ve brought
15:16 it back to having people having your values be your north star. But I’m curious like what do
15:22 you think is in you that really drew you to this particular element of the business? Well, some of it is my strengths
15:28 profile. So, I don’t know if you’ve done like strengthfinder. So, assess, select,
15:34 strike. My professional coach has always told me like there’s actually a reason why you’re good at this. It’s about how
15:39 you’re wired and your strengths, which you know, I see connections. I see patterns. I’m able to really really
15:45 assess quickly assess select a path forward and kind of see it. M. So, I’m I’m I’m wired to be good at it,
15:53 but I actually just really like helping people. And some of the most satisfying moments
16:00 have been um these times when I’ve been working with leaders, walking with them
16:06 through a situation. And you know, I I worked with someone once who said, “You
16:12 have to tell me honestly, should I like step down from this? is this going to
16:19 harm my my reputation as a leader? And I said, “No, you’re there’s all and I, you
16:26 know, I said,”There’s always an opportunity. You’re going to get through this. It’s going to there’s going to be moments of discomfort, but here’s the
16:33 good news and here’s what I see.” And that’s exactly how it played out. And I think he came through that experience a
16:40 stronger leader. And he stepped into that moment with so much integrity.
16:46 And just to be with him through that whole progression from uncertainty to
16:52 doing the hard thing, having courage and then seeing how that um contributed like
16:59 to his growth as a leader. Deeply gratifying. like that feels almost like
17:04 an honor for me to to be able to play that role and be with someone in that in
17:09 that moment. So, I think some of it is just liking helping people. You know, I had another
17:15 um leader I worked with for many years who would always call me when something, you know, unexpected happened and one
17:21 day he said, “God, I just I always feel so much better after I talk to you.” And I savored that. I was like, “That’s what
17:28 I’m here for.” Well, and you talk about the these the intentionality of in a crisis or in any
17:35 any challenging moment, you have to go back to those core values. So, for you
17:41 as a business owner, how did you kind of start Bergen Associates and and the the
17:48 values that you bring into your own organization? Yeah. So I mean the values that I’ve
17:56 always um said that are important to me is courage and empathy.
18:02 Um a lot of what we do you know and what we’re advising clients to do does require sometimes some courage to really
18:10 you know and even in the workplace sometimes that’s about having a difficult conversation but always
18:16 bringing courage to the work that we do. And then empathy is actually
18:22 it’s actually so core to the practice of communicating, right? So as
18:28 communicators and in public relations, we talk about thinking about your audience first. Who are you talking to?
18:34 Right? What do they care about? What do they need to hear? I mean, starting with
18:40 your audience is step number one. No matter what it is you’re communicating or what story you’re telling or who
18:45 you’re talking to, who who’s in the room, who are we talking to, that is in my view really about empathy, putting
18:53 yourself in someone else’s shoes and starting from their perspective. How do
19:00 you earn the right to present your rationale? Right? It’s by first
19:06 acknowledging the view of the person that you’re engaging with. And so
19:12 courage and empathy are the two values that have always meant a lot to me. I think I started the company because I am
19:19 wired for entrepreneurship. I started another agency in Detroit actually. But when I moved out here to Oregon, I knew
19:27 that I was starting from scratch with building a new network. And so I closed
19:32 my my first consulting business and embedded with a agency a um public affairs agency here in Oregon so that I
19:41 could really get to know the region and build that network from scratch. But 10
19:46 years later, um, I had built a network here and it means so much to me and
19:51 you’re part of that network, Suzanne, and you’re part of that network by extension. And, and so I realized that I
19:57 had the resources once again to set out on my own. And that entrepreneurial
20:02 drive, that get out there and create something. And I had had all these examples in my early work experiences of
20:10 people doing that. And then that sense of you know autonomy and self-determination that you have um that
20:18 was always in me. So it was just the time was right and so I started the business in 2017 with those two values
20:24 as my guiding guiding light. And then talk about how you built your team. Like I
20:29 would be curious to know. So how long was it just you and then when it was time to grow? How did you you know what
20:36 qualities were you looking for? And how did you go ahead and and build you know what is now being recognized as one of
20:43 the very best places to work in the state? Yeah, it it was a progression, right? First it was just me and then it was me
20:49 with some independent contractors and then over time I said okay now I need um
20:55 something a little bit different. I need a full-time employee team where we can
21:00 create more brand cohesion and I can have more certainty to service the
21:06 commitments that the company is now engaged in for client services. So it evolved over time. I think there are two
21:13 things that have been that I feel really proud about. So there are two types of workers that
21:19 have thrived in our environment. One is um women who took time away from careers
21:27 to be at home with children while they were young and then were stepping back
21:33 into the workforce after a long break. Mhm. So, we’ve had more than a couple of
21:39 women um come back into the workforce through our firm and do so well. And the
21:48 reason why is because I created a place where they could kind of do that on their terms. for the people that I hired
21:55 in that category. Um, the idea of going from I haven’t worked in 10 years to
22:03 being in an office 40 hours a week was just too much, right? That was too
22:08 jarring of a transition. So, one of these women, for example, said, “Okay, I
22:14 can do 10 hours a week from home and I never want to see a client.” And I was like done because you are so talented
22:21 that you’re worth it. And then at some point she said you know what this feels good. I’m acclimated. I want to do a
22:29 little bit more. And you know after a number of years she was a VP. She was
22:34 leading client relationships but she was able to do that on her terms. And we were just grateful for whatever it was
22:41 however she wanted to show up um because the talent was undeniable. So, I’m
22:48 really proud that we’ve been a workplace that has allowed, you know, more than one um incredibly talented woman to
22:56 reenter the workforce after a break. And then we do also really well with um very
23:04 early career professionals just graduated from co college right out of college first professional job
23:11 and training and investing in them and seeing them grow and you’re seeing me
23:17 light up because it’s so fun to watch I bet and to be a part of you know to see like
23:23 the expansion of what they’re capable of starting from I just graduated from
23:29 college. I don’t know how to use Outlook. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, really
23:34 to leading client relationships and leading projects and using tools and
23:40 platforms and learning how to, you know, uh manage relationships and communicate
23:48 effectively and move work forward. Um so we’ve created a place um that’s been a
23:56 place where both of those uh folks can can really thrive and I’m really proud
24:03 of that. So I first of all as as a woman who stayed home with her kids for a
24:08 really long time before re-entering the workforce I love hearing that pathway you’ve created because it’s very
24:14 daunting and hard to find a way back in at times. Yeah. And um I think I just have so much
24:20 um love honestly, not just respect and um admiration for but love for the
24:27 companies that uh that create that that avenue. Suzanne’s being one. Um so that’s really interesting. I’m I’m
24:35 curious to know like what skill set I mean so if you’re having like a college graduate come out I know you can get a
24:42 pretty good sense of people through meeting with them but I’m curious to know how you know what specific
24:49 qualities and even even with I I guess in some to some extent both of those
24:54 kind of demographics are untested and and they’ve both thrived in your company. So, I suspect you have a little
25:02 bit of secret sauce or magic for identifying who’s going to really, you know, do well. And would do you know
25:10 what that is or is it just kind of gut? A lot of it is gut. Yeah. Um, you know, I know who our team has
25:17 become. We’re high performing team. I mean, this is a team of people who care
25:23 a lot about the quality of the work, about the outcomes and the results. um
25:30 high integrity, high performing um but also highly it’s a highly supportive
25:35 environment and we invest a lot in giving our employees in in the
25:41 generosity of the company in competitive pay and benefits. Um we do as much as we
25:47 can to to make it a a welcoming and comfortable and empowering place to
25:54 work. And one of the things, you know, that sometimes is challenging to even
26:00 talk about, but you have to protect that as well. You know, sometimes
26:06 um because the most demoralizing thing for a really high-erforming great employee is to be teamed up with someone
26:14 that doesn’t share the commitment. And in a we are 100% remote workplace.
26:20 And so in an environment like that, you have to be, you know, self-managing.
26:26 And so I’ve had to protect the workplace as well and make sure that I’m honoring
26:32 these high performers by making sure that every anyone that we have in our in
26:38 our environment, in our team shares that commitment and, you know, is is a good
26:44 fit. Mhm. Absolutely. And so I I love that again these two demographics that you bring
26:51 in, but if you were to look back on your life or even with these new college
26:58 grads, what advice would would do you offer them and what
27:03 advice would you give yourself? The advice that I would give myself if I
27:09 could go back a couple of decades, well, there’s a lot of advice I’d probably give myself, but I think I would
27:15 encourage myself to nurture and cultivate my intuition.
27:22 I think you probably hear some version of this quite often from folks, right? I would tell myself to to trust my instincts or to trust my intuition.
27:29 More than that, though, it’s listening for it. How do you And I feel like that
27:35 actually takes some practice recognizing these these thoughts that pass through
27:41 your head. You know, it could be a person. Why is that person popping into my head
27:46 over and over? Maybe I should reach out to them. And I’ve had to really work on
27:52 like listening to that inner voice and trusting it. So I think I would I would
28:00 tell myself that and then hope that my my earlier self would know what that meant. Yeah. Exactly.
28:06 But but you know really nurturing your intuition figuring out how to hear and
28:11 listen and honor that that inner voice and to trust it. And so do you take that
28:16 same advice when you have recent college grads and do you offer that advice to
28:22 them? Yeah. I what I really believe in timely
28:29 specific feedback I think that’s something I learned early in in Vistage right so what I try to do with my team
28:36 members especially earlier career folks is like in the moment when I notice something like that email could have
28:43 been worded a little bit differently I call them immediately and I say hey I want to just share with you my thinking
28:49 here’s how you might have worded this in a different way or you know if they send something to me and I look at it and I
28:56 mark it up and make a bunch of changes, I will call them immediately and say, “I want to share with you what my thinking
29:01 was. Here’s why I chose this word. It has this intonation or here’s why I
29:07 moved this piece down a little bit further. I want to make sure that we’re highlighting this.” And I try to make
29:13 sure that I’m giving them the benefit of how my mind is working based on all
29:18 these years of experience and in the moment really being committed to that in
29:24 the moment giving them that feedback and letting them know, you know, here’s
29:29 here’s how I think about this. So that timely specific feedback. I don’t know if I’ve ever had the the intuition
29:35 conversation, but that’s now you’ve planted that seed and I think I might need to. Well, and I think that example
29:41 of the timely feedback and very specific and not personal. Yeah.
29:47 Really shouts out what a great leader you are. I mean truly and why you are so
29:54 recognized in our community as one of those fabulous fabulous leaders.
30:00 So that was very insightful. So this podcast is called hiring for good and we
30:06 always like to ask what does hiring for good mean for you? So I think it’s about the good that you
30:13 as an organization or as a company bring to your community and to the world.
30:19 Why how is the world better because you exist, right? I help companies tell the
30:24 stories of their impact, their positive impact. Um I help companies communicate
30:30 with their people. I contribute to the strength of our business community, right? But what is the good that you do?
30:37 Because when we hire people, we are resourcing our mission. We are resourcing our purpose. You are
30:44 literally resourcing the good that you bring to the world when you’re hiring
30:50 folks. And I think there’s a lot of other good that you do in the process, right? You create great opportunities
30:55 and jobs for people so that they can take care of their family and grow and learn new things, but the core impulse,
31:03 the core need is the resourcing of the work, right? That’s why you’re hiring people. And so if you think about
31:09 instead of thinking about the work or the function, if you think about the good that you’re bringing to the world
31:16 or to the community because you exist, because you create the product or the
31:21 service that you offer. Um, that’s what hiring for good means to me. Oh my gosh,
31:27 that was probably the most beautiful summation of for good we’ve ever had. It
31:33 was such an honor to have you. I looked forward to this interview and I was not wrong to do so. It was just wonderful.
31:39 Thank you so much. Thank you. You are a rock star. You are too, Suzanne.
31:45 Thank you so much for having me. Thanks for joining us today at Hiring for Good. If you were inspired by our
31:51 conversation, don’t forget to like, follow, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. And if you want to learn more about our
31:57 executive search services, check us out at www.hiringforgood.net
32:03 or our company website Acumen Executive Search. Thanks so much, and don’t forget
32:08 to join us next time for another in-depth conversation about transformational leadership. Until then,
32:13 Have fun!