Today we’d like to introduce you to Tara Goodwin.
Tara, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I was working at Edelman, a global PR company that opened a Boston office in the late 1990’s. I was hired to help manage the Boston office and serve as vice president of public affairs. After the 9/11 tragedy and the tech bubble burst, CEO Richard Edelman decided to close several of the smaller corporate offices and Boston was among them. He suggested that I take the clients I brought in to the firm and start my own consultancy.
At the time, I was pregnant with my youngest son Will (who is now 15) and decided to go for it. One of my first employees was a former colleague and friend Margrette Mondillo who I worked with at WBZ-TV prior to starting at Edelman. Margrette had returned from Los Angeles to raise her family in Massachusetts and she agreed to join me on this crazy ride.
Fifteen years later, we have built a company that is relatively small (six employees) with 5-10 consultants and have an impressive client list that includes professional athletes and coaches, professional service firms, luxury retail, restaurants, real estate and everything in-between.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Smooth would be boring! My journey to build Goodwin Group PR was filled with a lot of ups and downs including in the early years, making sure that we had enough money to meet payroll every week and surviving a recession when even some of our best clients needed to pull their belt in and chose to cut out PR/marketing activities until the economy improved!
One of the biggest challenges I had to face was learning how to become a CEO and not just a PR professional. I didn’t realize when I started my company that I was auditioning for an entirely different role than I was used to. I had to learn how to run a company not just be a successful PR person. It takes a whole different skill set to be effective at this and I’ve had the pleasure of working with several phenomenal business consultants to help me along the way.
Another challenge we faced as we grew the company was making sure that we built the right team to not only serve our clients but that were the right with our culture. Although I’ve had to fire several people over the years who weren’t gelling with our team, It was painful to go through but we have one of the best PR teams in the business because we won’t settle for “B’ or “C” players.
Goodwin Group PR – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Goodwin Group PR is a full-service public relations company that works with B2B and B2C clients in a wide range of industries. We often say we work with professional service companies to professional athletes and everything in between.
We have developed a niche in helping professional athletes and coaches run, manage and promote their nonprofit organizations and have a long history helping former NE Patriot Matt Light increase visibility of his charity, The Light Foundation. Four years ago, Coach Bill Belichick wanted to start a nonprofit foundation and asked us if we would help him bring his vision to life. It has been particularly gratifying to watch all of the nonprofit foundations we work with grow in visibility, supporters, and revenues with our assistance.
What sets Goodwin Group PR apart from others is our mantra – “whatever it takes” to get the job done. My team enjoys some unheard of employee benefits including unlimited vacation time but it’s because they give 100% day in and day out that they deserve that and more.
What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
I’ve had many proud moments over the past 15 years but three, in particular, stand out:
1. Watching my team flawlessly execute one of our many events – I take great pride in their accomplishments and the trust they have developed with our clients.
2. When my two sons tell me that they have the coolest mom in the world who works with some of their idols and that they are very proud of me and what I have built.
3. Our 15-year anniversary party last November. We were surrounded by family, friends, clients, and vendors who have all supported us on this journey. Seeing slides of our accomplishments and a video that we just produced on our company was a moment I’ll long remember.
Contact Info:
- Address: 1600 Providence Highway, Suite 125
Walpole, MA 02081 - Website: www.goodwinpr.com
- Phone: 508-404-1745
- Email: tara@goodwinpr.com
- Instagram: tarag97@instagram.com
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/tarafrier
Image Credit:
Russ Mezikofsky, Dina K Photography and Pure Style Photography
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