Vice President, Communications and Public Relations

The Vice President of Communications, PR, Philanthropy and Brand is responsible for critical, tactical, and strategic executional aspects of internal and external communications plans and programs. This includes both ensuring messaging is clear and consistent across all constituencies and developing and executing communication plans and materials. This position is also responsive for driving brand awareness through corporate sponsorships for the enterprise as well as managing to the philanthropic strategy objectives. This position will manage all major home office and field events. It will also direct several defined policyholder, community and employee communication programs.

Responsibilities:

• Responsible for CNO Financial CEO internal and external communications, messaging, major announcements, and major presentations. 
• Responsible for executive speeches, communiqués, memos, presentations and videos for CEO and key members of CNO’s Executive Leadership Group. 
• Charged with strategic messaging and effectively communicates to different audiences internally and externally in support of all three business segments and shared service functions. 
• Partners with executives on communication plans and uses the broader communication strategy to reinforce messages and to send consistent messages.
• Solicits and receives feedback from audience to enhance effective communication and to ensure business alignment. 
• Responsible for brand awareness and equity tracking, reporting and competitor set tracking for CNO Financial’s consumer brands: Bankers Life, Colonial Penn and Washington National 
• Lead the development of department methods, policies, procedures and systems for sponsorships, branding and Corporate Social Responsibility (volunteer management and philanthropic efforts). 
• Accountable for the timely completion major home office and field events within established deadlines, and within agreed upon budgets. 
• Responsible for all phases of plan execution, including sourcing of content, project plan, writing of materials, coordinating requirements from other departments (i.e. graphics), approvals and multi-channel distribution. 
• Evaluate the effectiveness of communications programs through defined metrics and propose plans for their improvement. 
• Coordinate activities supporting change management, esprit de corps, and community outreach such as Town Hall meetings, and all-employee celebrations, ensuring feel and messaging supports corporate vision and values. 
• Develop and maintain CNO communications budget and oversees CNO Community Affairs budget.

Requirements:

• Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing, Communications, or Business related field; Master’s Degree preferred. 
• 15+ years’ experience in corporate communications and public relations with increasing responsibility. 
• Experience counseling senior leaders (including CEO) and developing key messages and communication plans. 
• Expert knowledge of communications, including distribution channels. 
• Ability to organize and manage project teams. 
• Ability to understand business, corporate goals and vision and articulate to a variety of audiences. 
• Ability to handle and present information about issues that could be controversial. 
• Outstanding writing, editing, presentation and negotiation skills. 
• Proficient in Microsoft Office.