Bradley Harris didn't plan on a career in public relations. He was 21 when he was appointed executive assistant and advisor to West Virginia's Secretary of State, and he admits he had no idea what he was doing. From there he moved into agency work in economic development and tourism, then spent almost six years as the spokesperson for a publicly traded utility. Two years ago he went out on his own, and today he runs Bradley Harris Strategic Advisory in Charleston, West Virginia.
Bradley and I met through networking, and in this episode of The PR Bunker Podcast he talks about the lesson that taught him to speak up, why he rebranded seven months into running his own firm, and why the fundamentals of PR still beat every shiny new tool.
A few takeaways from the conversation:
In one of his first senior staff meetings, the Secretary of State turned to Bradley and asked what he thought. He told her he agreed with whatever she thought. She pulled him aside afterward and told him that when she asks for his opinion, she wants his answer, respectfully, and if he doesn't agree she wants to know why. He's never lost that. Bradley says the path to becoming a trusted advisor is two ears and one mouth: listen twice as much as you speak, take in legal's view, the media view and every other angle, and then give leaders your honest read.
Bradley launched as Bradley Harrison and Associates, a nod to Olivia Pope and Associates from Scandal, which he watched every Thursday while working in government. The problem was that nobody knew whether he was a lawyer or an engineer. Seven months in he rebranded as Bradley Harris Strategic Advisory, a boutique, white-glove firm that advises on positioning, messaging, internal and external communications and community engagement rather than doing tactical execution. He built the brand for the clients he wanted to attract, not the ones he already had.
Bradley gets calls all the time from people who need help with marketing and advertising, and he tells them straight that he's not their guy. He'll refer them to someone who is, because he'd rather be the subject matter expert in PR than fake it in another discipline. He thinks that cross-functional view is part of why more communicators are moving into CEO roles, since PR people have to understand operations, finance, legal and HR to answer for the whole organization.
When a nonprofit client wanted to grow from a regional to a statewide presence, Bradley went back to earned media and steady stakeholder engagement. Something as simple as a quarterly newsletter with three to five pieces of news keeps legislators, partners and providers informed, so when you need their support they've already heard from you. His networking runs on the same idea. After a conference he sends handwritten note cards, sealed with wax, to the people he connected with, and he says word of mouth is still his biggest source of new business.
Connect with Bradley on LinkedIn or at thebradleyharris.com.
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