“Scottsdale?” I answered, “No, Gilbert”.
Three years ago I became Gilbert, Arizona’s first Chief Digital Officer. After recently attending the Chief Digital Officer Summit in New York City, it has never been clearer that this role is becoming more and more prevalent and necessary across multiple industries. It was inspiring to be in a room with so many other digital leaders who are watching this industry grow and transform each day. I was also reminded that digital is a progression; and it only happens when senior management is engaged. I’m fortunate to have a City Manager, Patrick Banger, who had a vision for creating a digital communications department in Gilbert, a growing and thriving suburb of Phoenix.
An interesting journey got me here. I grew up in Gilbert and graduated from Gilbert High School. After earning my Bachelor’s degree in Political Science at Arizona State University, I attended American University in Washington, DC, where I earned a Master’s degree in Journalism and Public Policy. From there, I moved to New York City, where I worked for six years at MTV as a Producer and Director and then to MSNBC where I was a producer and writer for Andrea Mitchell Reports. After having our first daughter in our small Brooklyn apartment, my husband and I looked at each other and decided to make the move back to Arizona where I had been raised. I took a job at Arizona State University teaching and handling media relations and then saw a job posting for Gilbert’s first Chief Digital Officer and knew the job was a perfect fit for me.
During the past three years, I’ve built a team and have established the first municipal digital communications team in Arizona and, perhaps, in the country. We have two digital journalists who handle both short and long-form video production and a Digital Applications Specialist who handles all of our mobile applications and data platform. We’ve created a mobile app development contest for high school students, sponsored by Google; SPARK App League. And we’ve created the first in the country Digital State of the Town; the Mayor’s annual address in a video format. The digital format allows people across Arizona and the country to view the production from home, from their phone or on their tablet devices. Every single aspect of the entire production was produced in-house. When I traveled to New York City for the Summit, people asked me where I was doing all of these interesting and innovative things. I replied, “In a suburb of Phoenix.” They replied, “Scottsdale?” I answered, “No, Gilbert”. There are amazing things happening in this growing Phoenix suburb of 235,000 people and I’m glad you’re following me so you can hear all about them.
