Mighty Citizen in 2022: A Year of Growth and Expansion
Insights, delivered.
As Mighty Citizen continues to meet the ever-evolving needs of our clients in partnership to further their missions, we are also evolving—in our capacity, expertise, structure, and resources. With growth comes exciting changes, like promotions, hiring, and the restructuring of some of our departments and practices!
2022 was truly a year of growth and expansion for Mighty Citizen, and to be frank: we’re damn proud.
One of the most valuable assets we have is our people. They’re the experts who wake up every day to empower mission-driven organizations, like yours, through the lens of their own disciplines—and they work really hard! Here are some of the recent and upcoming changes you’ve seen on our team:
Promotions and New Hires
Creative Department
Gardiner Rhoderick has been promoted to VP of Creative and Marketing, joining our executive team. Gardiner has been a crucial part of the Mighty Citizen team and the work we produce. His passion for our work is contagious!
Polly Thurston has been promoted to Associate Creative Director - Design. Polly is a long-time Mighty Citizen who has shown tremendous ability to lead and mentor our team. As ACD - Design, she’ll oversee the design direction of all the work in our agency.
Andrew Buck has been promoted to Associate Creative Director - Copy, transitioning from our UX department to the Creative department. If you’ve had the honor of meeting Andrew or attending any of his presentations, you know he is a copywriting and storytelling powerhouse. As ACD - Copy, he’ll oversee the direction of all creative copywriting work in our agency.
John Rockwell has joined our team as Senior Graphic Designer. This is actually a return for John, who formerly worked with our team and is responsible for projects like the You’re My Butter Half mural with The United Way for Greater Austin.
User Experience (UX) Department
Mike Steckel has been promoted to Senior Director of UX & Research. Mike is a foundational member of our team, and just about every project passes through his department. He is a tremendous leader who wears many hats here at Mighty Citizen!
Sandhya Soorya has joined our UX Department as a UX Designer. In this role, Sandhya transforms puzzling content and data into usable, accessible (and did we mention beautiful?) masterpieces. She’s a lot like a digital, classical artist—crafting functional art for our clients.
Project Management Office
Carly Hohl will be promoted to Executive Vice President of Operations, effective January 2023. As a veteran team member at Mighty Citizen, Carly lives our core values. In her new role, Carly will oversee agency operations, ensuring the processes and values of Mighty Citizen are upheld in all we do.
Val Hinze will be promoted to Director of Project Management in the new year. Val has been a project management go-getter at Mighty Citizen since 2015. A natural leader, Val is an essential component of our project management office (PMO) dream team, ensuring all clients and internal departments stay on time and on budget.
Jen O’Hair has been promoted to Senior Project Manager. Jen is a cornerstone of the PMO and knows how to drive projects to completion all while ensuring everyone involved stays engaged and excited.
Marc Hamel has been promoted to Senior Project Manager. Marc recently earned his Project Management Professional Certification from the Project Management Institute and continues to keep our projects running smoothly!
Sophia Espinosa has been promoted to Project Manager. Sophia joined our PMO in 2019 after interning for our marketing department. She will continue to bring the curiosity, energy, and tact needed to keep clients happy and projects on course!
Katie Jade has been promoted to Senior Project Coordinator. Katie sets up our projects for success and is an asset to our team and clients.
Sinovia Mayfield has joined our PMO as a Project Manager. Day to day, Sinovia efficiently and effectively manages projects and organizes people for our clients and their work.
Brooke Ostrom has joined our PMO as a Project Coordinator. We’re excited to see all the ways she’ll support our clients!
Hannah McGee has joined our PMO as a Project Coordinator. In this role, she’ll create more efficiencies and productivity for the Mighty Citizen team.
Brand Marketing Department
Brianna Martin has been promoted to Director of Brand Marketing. As our in-house marketing aficionado, she is responsible for how the world perceives Mighty Citizen. In this role, she will continue to develop strategies and opportunities for sharing our resources and promoting our services to the mission-driven organizations we aim to serve.
Mindy Avitia has joined our brand marketing department as Senior Events & Marketing Manager. As our team grows, Mindy will help provide the crucial marketing support we need to present our best work and resources to our mission-driven audiences.
Elizabeth Thorp also joined the brand marketing team as a Content Marketing Intern. Liz helps support the department with copywriting, event planning, and other marketing logistics. If you’ve appreciated any witty emails or social media posts from us this year, Liz had a hand in that!
Operations
Arielle Axelrod has joined our Operations team as Bookkeeper & Billing Manager. We’re lucky to have her ambition for greater change as well as her love for numbers!
New Department and Practice
Client Marketing Department
As we saw steady growth in marketing work for our clients, we decided it needed its own focus and launched a new department: Client Marketing! We brought in a new Director of Client Marketing, Manu Lizzio-Hashime, to help manage the team. Because Manu has spent most of her career working for international nonprofits and associations, she understands her clients’ marketing challenges firsthand. She takes those lessons from her own career and actively listens to their needs, then leads her team to deliver solutions that support mission-driven organizations in achieving their strategic goals.
Account Management
We’re also thrilled to announce the creation of our Account Management team! We’ve hired Jen Schumacher-Kocik as our Senior Account Manager to formalize and champion our efforts. Though the role is new, its purpose is foundational: to strengthen the strategic relationships between our teams and our clients. Look out for more info about our account management in the new year!
We wouldn’t be the agency we are today without our amazing team. Our growth is the result of these Mighty Citizens (as well as the couple dozen others under our roof) empowering the mission-driven organizations we work with. Organizational growth is exciting, and we’re honored to have the opportunity to continue to better the world alongside our clients.
Join the Mighty Citizen Team
Speaking of growth, do you want a career that feels like a mission? Then Mighty Citizen might be the agency for you! We are currently hiring for a variety of positions.
We think deeply. We dissect problems and challenge each other to consider alternatives. Join a team of mighty thinkers who help our clients change the world.
