Our Team

Chris is Chairman of Ogilvy PR Australia and was previously the Managing Director for 7 years. He is also the founding partner in Ogilvy PR's specialist financial communication firm, Savage & Partners

Chris was appointed Chief Operating Officer of STW Group in September 2008.  Prior to this Chris was Head of Specialist Communications for the STW Group, a position held since  September 2007, where he led more than 20 specialist STW communication companies in the areas of public relations, market research, branded entertainment, sports marketing, training and facilitation, and strategy consulting.

He holds a Bachelor of Arts (Journalism) from the University of South Australia (Adelaide).

John Studdert was appointed the Managing Director of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, Australia, in January 2008.

In his role as Managing Director of Ogilvy PR Australia, John manages six specialist PR firms on behalf of Ogilvy PR Australia's shareholders.

Prior to that, John was the Managing Director of Impact Employee Communications, an Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide Company, which he co-founded in 1996 having identified the opportunity to significantly improve the success of important company initiatives through improved internal communication.

John has worked with numerous leading Australian and International organisations helping them build employee support for a wide variety of business initiatives.

John's formal qualifications include a Bachelor of Education (University of Sydney) and a Master of Business Administration (Macquarie University).

Samantha was appointed Executive Director of Ogilvy PR Worldwide, Australia, in September 2007, where she leads the integration and growth of Ogilvy PR Australia. 

Samantha joined Ogilvy PR in 2003 as the founder of Pulse Communications, one of Australia’s largest and most awarded consumer PR agencies, with a client base that includes some of Australia’s biggest brands: Tourism Australia, Nestle, Unilever, ANZ Banking Group, Fosters, Microsoft (Xbox) and Vodafone.   

Samantha’s communications and brand experience includes over a decade in the UK and in the US, with a focus on accountable, insight-driven ideas that influence audience attitudes and behaviours.

She holds a Bachelor of Business from RMIT (Melbourne), Graduate Diploma in Marketing, and Post-Graduate Diploma in Finance from Guildhall University (London).

Emma has been with Ogilvy group worldwide since 2000, moving to Sydney in 2003 to join the Ogilvy PR group and Ogilvy Healthworld in Australia.

Since relocating, Emma has headed up the Finance team of Ogilvy PR in Australia, and more recently has taken on the group's Talent and HR responsibilities. This varied role involves everything from HR and business strategy development to shareholder reporting, M&A and counsel.

Prior to living in Sydney, Emma spent 3 years working for the Ogilvy group in the UK - her roles there included Financial Accountant for O&M, finance systems training for Ogilvy in Europe, systems analysis and implementation and many other diverse projects.

She holds a Masters in Biochemistry from Jesus College, Oxford and is a fully qualified Chartered Accountant.

Craig has 21 years experience advising major listed and non-listed corporations, CEOs and management teams on their corporate and strategic communications needs.

He joined Savage & Partners in mid 2005, and has since provided counsel on media, thought leadership, issues and crisis, messaging and profile and reputation management to a range of companies such as Lend Lease, Hudson, Opportunity International, Microsoft, Vodafone, Leighton Contractors, Nestle, BNP Paribas, Orbis Funds Management, Nestlé,  JPMorgan, Henry Davis York and Cochlear.

Craig has advised numerous companies across the financial services, property and construction, professional services, telecoms, IT, and quasi government sectors.

He holds a BA and Higher Diploma in Education from the University of Cape Town, a Business Management Diploma from Damelin College and a Public Relations diploma and accreditation from the Public Relations Institute of South Africa (PRISA).

Leon has ten years experience implementing successful health communication campaigns for major pharmaceutical and biotech companies, as well as professional associations and health technology organisations.

His experience extends to the most significant reimbursement campaigns over the last 10 years.

Before forming Ogilvy PR Health, Leon was a Director at the public affairs agency, Parker & Partners, where he developed a strong understanding of the role and influence government has in healthcare.

Leon has a strong understanding in health, as well as issues around the reimbursement processes that many campaigns often seek to influence.

Importantly Leon’s insights into Government come   from a background in politics when he worked as a policy adviser in the office of then Minister for Health and Aged Care, the Hon Dr Michael Wooldridge and as a health policy adviser with then Victorian Premier, the Hon Jeff Kennett.

Leon is a Director with the Australian Institute of Policy & Science.

An experienced political and policy consultant, Sarah Cruickshank has more than a dozen years' experience in developing and implementing complex strategic communications campaigns on behalf of government, business and the community. Since joining Parker & Partners in 2002 she has led a number of the company's flagship client accounts including DFAT (2005 Aichi World Expo and APEC Australia 2007), WMC Resources and Unisys.

Sarah’s particular expertise is in the public policy issues and challenges facing Australian industry, as well as the inextricable link between business operations and the increasing social and environmental considerations driven by community and government. Related recent client programs of Sarah’s include EDS, BlueScope Steel, Origin Energy, Microsoft, Ricegrowers’ Association of Australia, Invest Brisbane, the Balmain Tigers redevelopment, and Cochlear. Effective advocacy, third party stakeholder relations and issues management have been core to each of these campaigns.

Prior to joining Parker & Partners, Sarah spent three years as a senior manager at a leading industry association, promoting the interests of business to State and Federal Government. She also spent four years as a political adviser to Federal Government.

Sarah holds a Bachelor of Arts (History) from the University of Sydney and is currently  enrolled in a M.A (Islamic studies) at University of New England.

Kieran has 20 years' experience in PR covering public relations strategy development and implementation, reputation and crisis management and corporate positioning for business to business and consumer focused companies both in the UK and Australia. 

Kieran is currently responsible for strategic level communication services as well as the development of new value-added services that will enhance Howorth’s clients’ reputations.  She manages a number of clients and is responsible for the company’s marketing and business development.  Her teams have won more than a dozen international awards for client campaign.

She has a BA in Communications (PR/Journalism), Charles Sturt University (formerly Mitchell College), Australia.

Greg is joint Managing Director of Parker & Partners, joining the company in 2003.

He is a specialist in government and public health having worked at the Senior Executive level in Federal and state and international health systems over many years.

Greg has significant international experience in the health and development sector having worked for the World Health Organisation,  the Asian Development Bank and World Bank in Central Asia, South East Asia and Western Pacific countries.

He has led major assignments for P&P in the areas of health and social policy, government relations and major policy reform campaigns.

Greg holds a number of senior Directorships including the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Council, The Asthma Foundation of the ACT, L2S Communications New Zealand and Vaxine Pty Ltd. He also lectures in Health Sciences and Health Administration

Greg holds a Masters of Public Health, Degrees in Public Administration and Applied Science.

As one of Impact's managing directors, Tam has been developing and driving strategic communication campaigns for a range of major organisations across employee, corporate, crisis and issues management and consumer disciplines in Australia, Asia Pacific and the UK for more than 14 years.

Also heading up Impact's major change practice, her work has focused on tackling some of today's toughest business challenges - downsizing, mergers and acquisitions, restructuring and culture change - ensuring better alignment of internal messaging with business goals and associated behaviour change. Her change management communication work has taken her as far a field as South Africa, Korea, Malaysia and China.

Her clients have included Nestlé, BlueScope Steel, American Express, St George, Luxottica Retail and Specialty Fashion Group. And, while they're varied, they all have one thing in common - a large, diverse workforce with tough communication challenges.

Previous experience includes a senior role at Ogilvy PR's Pulse Communications, eight years in consultancy in London, two years with an NGO in Central America and Fiji, as well as other in-house marketing and PR roles in the UK.

Passionate about corporate social responsibility, Tam is also responsible for driving Ogilvy PR's corporate social responsibility program, So Inspired, and is a director for FebFast, a registered Australian charity, which fundraises for alcohol and drug dependant adolescents and young adults.

She holds a BA (Hons) in Public Relations from Bournemouth University in the UK and a diploma in business information technology and is a member of the IABC and Australia's Change Management Institute (CMI).

After an extensive, results-driven background in the hospitality industry, David Sawicki co-founded Impact Employee Communications with John Studdert in 1996, and together they built what is now the region’s leading employee communication consultancy.

Appointed managing director in 2006 and working across a diverse industries with tough business challenges, David has played a pivotal role in developing, managing and achieving results for a wide range of our clients including: Arnott’s Biscuits, Austrade, Caltex Australia, Colonial, Commonwealth Bank, David Jones, FreightCorp (now Pacific National), Glaxo Smith Kline, Leighton Contractors, Pfizer, Qantas, Southcorp, TNT and Telstra.

While he has ultimate responsibility for the running of Impact, he is still very hands-on with clients, sharing a high level of skill and insight gained from one of the most successful careers in employee communication in Australia today.  He's a regular facilitator for high profile employee events and summits and currently works as a coach to some of Australia's most senior captains of industry.

Critical to David’s success has always been his ability to relate equally well with front-line employees and CEOs, which has always been a unique and valuable asset to our clients. 

With the growing local and international recognition of Impact as a powerful force for change in employee communication, David regularly presents as a guest speaker to both local and international audiences.

Graham White is currently joint managing director of Howorth Communications.  He joined Howorth in 2000 with more than ten years’ management and communications experience gained in the UK.

At Howorth, Graham has directed communications programs covering strategy development and implementation for major technology clients including AMD, BMC Software, Borland Software, Citrix Online, D-Link, EMC, Genesys Telecommunications, HDS, Intel, Lexmark, Manugistics, Microsoft, NCR, Network Appliance, RSA Security, Senetas, Teradata and VERITAS Software. He also established and managed a pan-Asian network for both Borland and Lexmark.

As joint managing director, in addition to his client and business development responsibilities, Graham looks after finance and operations.

Graham has a first-class Bachelor of Arts Honours degree in Public Relations from Bournemouth University in England.

Stephen brings very strong and diverse experience gained from working across a number of industries in a range of different senior roles. He works with project teams to develop and drive communication campaigns for a range of clients. However, his true passion at Impact has been to develop and drive its now rapidly-growing sustainability and environmental communication practice, OgilvyEarth, which he heads. Stephen has been instrumental in forging a close and successful partnership between Impact and the NSW Department of Environment and Climate Change (DECC), partnering with them to encourage major energy users to implement government-funded projects aimed at achieving energy saving through employee behaviour change. The OgilvyEarth practice has expanded its services to offer solutions in communicating with a wide range of stakeholders on sustainability performance and climate change response. Their client base includes airlines, government departments, manufacturing and industrial, banks, energy companies, major retail chains, facilities management and agencies.

In addition to his sustainability work, Stephen's work for major companies across Australia has included realigning and embedding vision and values across large complex workforces, and developing campaigns to engage sales teams and safety programs to reduce injuries in heavily-industrial environments. To date, his growing client portfolio has included Qantas, Woolworths, Visy, Thales, Kellogg, Railcorp, Department of Defence, Inghams, Origin Energy and Telstra.

In 2007 Stephen was a panelist at the Climate Change Summit and a guest speaker at Origin Energy's Climate Change presentation, where he presented key learnings and practices that lead to an effective sustainability program. He was on the expert panel at the Green Capital Event "Is it easy being Green. Marketing in the age of Spin"