Fred Cook Email & Phone Number

I've worked at Golin for more than 35 years and I've enjoyed every moment. I started as an account supervisor in our Los Angeles office and moved to Chicago to become our third CEO. And now I have a second job as the Director of the USC Center for Public Relations.Before joining the corporate ranks at the age of 36, I talked my way into a job as a cabin boy on a Norwegian tanker, peddled fake Italian leather goods to unsuspecting tourists, ran a rock-and- roll record company, started a service chauffeuring drunks home from bars, worked as a doorman at a five-star hotel, substitute-taught in Los Angeles’s worst schools, and winged it as a novice tour guide. In the beginning, I lacked all of the predictable prerequisites associated with being a CEO. I barely graduated from college, never took a business course, had no connections, didn’t own a suit and rode a motorcycle to work. But my experiences gave me the confidence I needed to reinvent myself at every stage of my career. I wrote a book called Improvise -- Unorthodox Career Advice from an Unlikely CEO, that shares the wisdom I've accumulated through my unconventional life experiences. I'm now trying to instill USC students with the creativity and courage they need to step outside their comfort zones and find their own special paths. Working everyday with twenty somethings at my company and on college campuses, I've come to understand the pressure that demanding loans, worried parents and a tough economy place on those seeking fulfillment in the business world. I hope my stories will encourage them to worry less and experience more. I have two children and currently live in Los Angeles with my wife, Cheryl. When I'm not working teaching or writing, I like to run. And have completed marathons in Los Angeles, Boston, London and Chicago.

Listed skills include Public Relations, Strategic Communications, Crisis Communications, Reputation Management, and 14 others.