Say "Bonjour" to a true People's Person.

March 10, 2010

By Jillian Manon Chopin

What can public relations do for you? Well, it can do several things including open you to an endless world of connections and possibilities and serve as the main avenue for which to reach your career goals. Angenene Gibbs Kendrick, mother of three and native of Sapulpa, Oklahoma, knows this very well.

Angenene, who is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma, earned a degree in public relations from the Gaylord College of Journalism with a minor in French. Knowing Angenene personally, I have seen how welcoming she is to every person around her. She speaks French very well, and thus when she graduated I knew she was going to get any job for which she aspired.

Angenene currently serves as the City Reporter for the Sapulpa Daily Herald where she oversees several tasks including, but not limited to: producing the daily paper, generating news leads, writing various pieces, producing and gathering photography to be printed, and collaborating with the managing editor. Angenene also has the daily opportunity to use her greatly developed people skills, as she is also responsible for maintaining contact with the local publics, and keeping track of local government and sunshine laws. Angenene is most definitely fit for this position, seeing as she is quite the public relations pro and loves interacting with people on a daily basis.

On the other hand, having a career that is driven by public relations and journalism is surely a very time-consuming job, and when asked "What do you not so much love about PR?", Angenene responded by saying, "...the time away from my family."

Seeing as I will be graduating from OU in a mere two months, I asked Angenene for her best advice in jumping in to the public relations field. She urged the importance of developed skills such as formal news writing, research methods, and crisis planning; these skills being the most important and useful from which she gained at OU.

Angenene also advised me that when I do land that first job, I need to place emphasis on writing well (in AP style of course), know my media and their schedule, and always make my press releases completely relevant to the publication's public.

I thoroughly enjoyed interviewing Angenene and will implement her advice in every way possible as I begin to pursue my career post graduation. I wish my fellow classmates and Angenene the best of luck!