Michael E. O’Connor
Field(s) of Expertise
Marketing, Communications, Advertising, Public Relations
Background
Mr. O’Connor is a marketing and executive communications professional with strong analytical, verbal and written communication skills. He has demonstrated strengths and experience in marketing, advertising, public relations and executive communications as well as brand positioning and consumer research initiatives. He is manager of Communications Services for FirstEnergy, one of the nation’s largest electric utility systems, with responsibility for executive communications, including speech writing, presentations, testimony, Q&A and briefing materials. Other duties include contributing writing for the corporate sustainability report and annual report to shareholders, executing the annual shareholders’ meeting and overseeing the visual communications group. Michael worked in the public relations unit at Progressive Insurance with responsibility for reputation management, media relations, news release and media event production for a part of the company’s western U.S. division. At TravelCenters of America, he held the position of director of Advertising, Sales Promotion and Public Relations for the nation’s largest network of full-service highway travel centers. At the John Carroll University Boler College of Business, he serves as an instructor for its MBA-level course in Executive Communications, where he develops and further advances students’ skills in the fundamentals of presentation preparation, content and delivery. Michael earned an MBA from John Carroll University, a BS from Iowa State University, and attended the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School. He is a member of the John Carroll University Boler College of Business Part-Time MBA Advisory Committee and former Board member of the Conservancy for Cuyahoga Valley National Park.
