A couple of weeks ago, a few members of our team attended the annual Thrive Summit, put on by our client, Virgin Pulse. This three-day conference was jam-packed with inspiring wellness messages delivered through motivating keynotes, client testimonials and other informative sessions. Here are some of our takeaways and highlights.

Prior to my college graduation this past December, I had the opportunity to work as an intern at Aria Marketing for eight months. During that time, I was able to not only explore the world of healthcare PR, but also gain first-hand experience working in an active marketing agency. Communicating with reporters, drafting monthly reports, and tracking events/awards were a few of my daily tasks that allowed me to expand and enhance my skills learned in college. It was even more exciting to learn that, at the end of my internship, Aria wanted to offer me a full-time Account Coordinator position. There is nothing more satisfying than knowing you have a job waiting for you right after college.

As we begin the New Year, we can’t help but do some reflecting. So, for this first blog post of 2018, I sat down with an Aria veteran, EVP Jessica Cohen, to uncover some of the lessons she has learned working in healthcare PR, her thoughts on the changing industry, and why she has called Aria home for more than a decade.

The change of administration resulting from the November election will surely have big implications for the healthcare industry.  Just how big remains to be seen, as Georgia’s two Senate seats and the fate of the Senate majority remain in question.  With or without the Senate, the Biden administration will have a very different agenda than the previous administration with regard to the future of the ACA, pharmaceutical pricing, and many other issues at hand for the US healthcare system.

I started working at Aria Marketing just over a month ago, and one of the first things that impressed me about the company is that there are so many people who have become “Aria lifers” (Scott, Jessica, Ross, Nancy, Chanel and Katie). So, I set out to find out what keeps people at this PR agency. Is it the #BreakfastWednesdays (a habit hard to break, once you get used to it), the diversity that each one of Aria’s clients brings to the table, the continuously evolving and exciting field of healthcare, the energetic and passionate  team, or Aria’s monthly #HappyHour event? To get to the bottom of the “Aria lifer” trend, I decided to go right to the source(s). Here’s what they had to say:

Anniversaries are a big deal at Aria. We know that working at a PR agency can be challenging and we pride ourselves on offering our staff an awesome work environment and great perks that makes them want to stick around for years. Regardless of whether it is your one year anniversary or your 15 year anniversary, we celebrate our employees – and our anniversary awards program is just one of the many ways we do so!

We’ve had a slew of anniversaries over the last few months (including my own!) as we’ve retained 93% our staff in 2019, so we thought this would be the perfect time to shine a light on some of the anniversary rewards our employees have selected recently.