While every nonprofit’s mission is unique and worthy, the work Vicki Cerven-Astell has done leading Troy Kiwanis lands for us in a particular way.

For the past four years, Vicki has served as president of Troy Kiwanis, whose mission focuses on serving local youth who need – but cannot afford – mental health services. Vicki has helped lead the establishment of the KIT Fund, through which donors can pay for counseling sessions for local youth. Today, hundreds of sessions have been funded and countless lives have been changed for the better as a result.

Vicki came to this position following career stints in retail and data analysis. And as she prepares to retire from the position, we thought you would enjoy meeting her, which is why she’s this month’s guest on Six Questions with Dan and Michelle!

We are journalists who write marketing content, so we’re certainly not going to argue with the general premise.

The author noted that many journalists are losing long-term jobs because of the changes in the industry, and that this represents a golden opportunity for both the marketing firms who need writing talent and for the journalists who still have a lot of talent to offer.

Yes.

All that is true.

But we’ve also seen some things that should serve as a cautionary tale, even as we generally endorse this idea (especially because we are living examples of it working).

Journalists are trained from the time they’re in J-school to be skeptical of corporate messaging, not to mention the talking points they hear from politicians and others in that realm. This is not a criticism. This is their job. As we swing between journalistic work and marketing content work, we must constantly reset our perspective about why we’re writing a piece. Marketing work is to tout a particular point of view, service or company. News writing is to report the facts without bias.

Journalists who have been reading press releases their entire careers will be familiar with the structure of how they’re written, and they’ll have the knowledge of how newsrooms work. But many of them also have a long history of scoffing and sneering at those same press releases for their promotional audacity. Many have no background in client service because it was never their job.

So the issue is this: Journalists absolutely have the skill to do the writing your clients need, but it might not come all that naturally to them to embrace the mission of your organization, which is to advocate for your clients.

That doesn’t mean they can’t be taught, or that they’re unwilling to learn.

It just means you need to work with them on that.

We’ve seen journalists come into major PR firms and flame out because they never really stopped thinking like news reporters. The last thing you want is for your client copy to be written by people who have a cynical attitude about it. It’s technically proficient but it doesn’t land the way you want it to because the heart of the writer isn’t really in it.

So yes, hire journalists. But make sure you work with them so they can make this transition. It’s not as easy as our LinkedIn author made it sound, but it’s not impossible either.

We’re really good at it, if we do say so ourselves! And we think our journalism background makes us better at telling stories for marketing purposes.

It helps us to avoid marketing cliches and tell real, engaging stories. That’s from nearly 30 years of swinging between the two and enjoying the variety.

Some other journalists can learn this as well. But they won’t all, so do apply some scrutiny before you just assume someone will be a natural.

Happy birthday Angie! We’re not going to tell you her age because you wouldn’t believe us anyway. And she gets a bit of short shrift at times because you don’t see Angie as much as you see Dan and Michelle in client interactions and our public activity. But Angie is both the backbone of our quality control and the boss of our biggest client. She gets the least attention but her hands are in absolutely everything. So join us in celebrating Angie’s birthday on August 23! Nothing we do would be the same, or as good, without her – even if we are the only ones who really see it.

Because a good celebration deserves to linger, once again happy birthday to Michelle! The big day was July 31, and it was celebrated by so many people (including us), we thought you should hear about it one more time. Also, there were peanut butter chocolate bars involved – and they were scrumptious.

Look for an upcoming feature we wrote for DBusiness on Ideal Group, an exceptional company based in southwest Detroit that has not only built a successful enterprise – with seven companies under one roof – but has absolutely transformed the Mexicantown neighborhood through its support and generosity over the past 30 years. It was an honor to meet the Venegas family and interview them.

Congratulations to Rebecca Brewster on her impending retirement from the American Transportation Research Institute. We recently wrote a feature on Rebecca’s career in partnership with our client Matthews Publishing.

We’re grateful to God for the recovery of writer Diane Gale Andreassi, who is one of the top reporters working for Angie at the Today Magazines. Diane went through a fierce health battle but she has fully recovered, and we’re hoping Angie can start giving her assignments again in the near future. So happy to have you back at it again, Diane!

Congratulations to our client Victors Aviation for being recognized by Cessna as one of the nation’s top dealers of Cessna Aircraft. Victors sells general aviation aircraft, and is also training the pilots of tomorrow at its facility in Troy, Michigan.

We dissected the miracle Jesus did at the wedding in Cana, turning the water into wine, and considered: Why would He perform a sign like this – so different from those in which he healed the sick, cast out demons or fed thousands?

Angie had a strong answer: Turning water into wine (at that time water was really not safe to drink) foreshadowed the purifying sacrifice He would later make with the shedding of his own blood, which of course was also represented by wine during the Last Supper.

It wasn’t to show off. And it wasn’t to keep the party going, although celebrations under God do matter! It was for His disciples to later remember how he set the stage for his ultimate purifying sacrifice on the cross. That’s our take. What’s yours?