Shel Holtz

Shel Holtz, SCMP (Certified Strategic Communication Management Professional), is currently director of Internal Communication at Webcor, a San Francisco-based commercial contractor. He is responsible for employee and executive communication, as well as social media. He also supports Webcor’s corporate public relations efforts.

Before joining Webcor in October 2017, Shel spent 21 years as principal of Holtz Communication + Technology, where he brought more than 40 years of organizational communications experience in both corporate and consulting environments to his long list of clients. He is experienced in employee communications, corporate public relations, crisis communications, media relations, financial communications, investor relations, marketing communications, and compensation and benefits communications. In addition to integrating technology into communications strategies, his expertise includes strategic communications planning, change management, organizational culture, business initiatives, and communications research.

Before forming Holtz Communication + Technology, Shel was senior communications consultant and the communications practice leader for Alexander & Alexander Consulting Group in San Francisco, California. (A&ACG has since been acquired by Aon Consulting.) Other positions include director of corporate communications for Allergan, Inc., a Fortune 400 pharmaceutical company, and at Mattel, Inc. He also has worked for William M. Mercer, Inc., ARCO and Transamerica Financial Corporation.

In addition to his consulting and development work, Shel is a regular speaker on topics surrounding the application of online technology to strategic organizational communication. He speaks regularly at IABC and Ragan Communication conferences. He also has been on programs for the International Quality and Productivity Center, The American Association of Collegiate Schools of Business, the American Gas Association, the American Institute of Certified Public Accounts, the Association of California Water Agencies, and the Western Pension & Benefits Conference, among others. He also spoke regularly on the Lexis-Nexis touring seminar, “Communicating in a Wired World.”

Shel is a five-time winner of IABC’s Gold Quill award (most recently winning in 1997 for external Web sites) and was named IABC/Los Angeles’s Communicator of the Year in 1988. Shel served six years on IABC’s executive board, two as director of U.S. District 6 and four as a director-at-large. While a director-at-large, he held the Technology portfolio, among others. During his term on the board, he served three times as a member of the executive committee. He has also served as chapter president for IABC/Los Angeles and in a variety of other volunteer positions in IABC at the chapter, district and international levels. Shel earned his IABC accreditation (ABC/Accredited Business Communicator) in 1984.

In 2005, Shel was named an IABC Fellow, the highest honor IABC confers on its members. He also is an Accredited Business Communicator through IABC.

Shel is a Senior Fellow with the Conference Board’s Marketing and Communications Center and a Platinum Fellow of The Mayo Clinic Social Media Network.

Shel has applied online technology to his communication efforts on behalf of companies and clients since the mid-1980s. His most recent book is “Tactical Transparency,” co-written with John C. Havens and published by Jossey-Bass, an imprint of Wiley. Shel is also the co-author of “How to Do Everything with Podcasting,” co-written with Neville Hobson and published by Osborne/McGraw-Hill and “Blogging for Business,” co-written with Ted Demopoulos and published by Kaplan. Earlier books include “Corporate Conversations,” a guide to employee communications, published by Amacom. “Public Relations on the Net,” published by AMACOM; and “The Intranet Advantage,” published by Ziff-Davis Press. He also wrote the manuals, “Communication and Technology” and “Communicator’s Guide to Intranets,” published by Ragan Communications and “Writing for the Wired World,” published by IABC.

Shel graduated with a bachelor of arts degree in Journalism from California State University, Northridge, in 1976.