Blanaid Colley has spent more than 20 years working within the PR industry developing and implementing global and regional corporate reputation, crisis management and internal communications programs. She has led the global coordination team for clients such as TNT, ABN AMRO, EBS [now ICAP] and Europcar.

Blanaid began her professional career in Brussels, working for four years in the European Parliament as Assistant to the Secretary General of the RDE Group. She then moved to London and joined Shandwick in 1988 as an Account Director, managing several high profile corporate and consumer accounts. Blanaid was appointed Managing Director at Shandwick Communications in 1993 and was responsible for the development of a strong corporate and consumer practice of over 50 PR executives running major global and regional accounts.

After ten years with Shandwick, Blanaid co-founded Ergo Communications in 1997, a corporate communications and EU specialist public affairs company that was acquired by the Huntsworth Group Plc in 2004. At Huntsworth, she led the further development of a major corporate communications offering, responding to client needs regionally and globally. She has implemented several original best practice initiatives to assist clients in the smooth running of a global account.

Some of these initiatives include:

o The development of a Huntsworth client portal
o A bespoke evaluation program
o A widely focused strategic council for global clients, bringing together the best thinking in the business and in industry sectors
o Radar – a global issues monitoring digest

Today, Blanaid advises clients on a wide range of corporate reputation, crisis management and stakeholder engagement issues. Her client experience includes ABN AMRO, Bank of New York Mellon, Charles Stanley, CLS, EBS, FC Exchange, L’Oreal, P&O, Pfizer, Perot Systems Corporation, PPR, Ryanair, Seagram, States of Guernsey, Stolt-Nielsen, TNT and Viking Moorings.

Languages: English, Irish and French