Prior to joining DePaul and becoming an independent public relations consultant, Ron Culp held senior public relations positions at four Fortune 500 corporations and two major agencies. Ron’s career spans a broad range of communications responsibilities in government and industry sectors including business-to-business, consumer products, pharmaceutical and retailing.
Ron’s two agency stints include being partner and managing director of Ketchum’s Midwest offices and head of the agency’s North American Corporate Practice. Prior to Ketchum, he opened and served as managing director of the Chicago office of Sard Verbinnen and Company, a leading financial communications firm.
Previously, Ron was a corporate officer and senior vice president, public relations and government affairs, at Sears. During his Sears career, Ron managed internal and external communications, marketing public relations support, state and federal government affairs, community relations and the Sears-Roebuck Foundation. Earlier in his corporate career, he held senior communications positions at Sara Lee Corporation, Pitney Bowes and Eli Lilly.
Following graduation from Indiana State, Ron began his career as a reporter for The Columbus (Ind.) Republic before moving to the New York State Assembly where he served as director of member services (the public relations support unit) under both Republican and Democratic administrations.
Ron is active in several civic organizations including the Economic Club of Chicago where he is a former board member and past vice chair. Culp serves on the boards of Gilda’s Club Chicago and the Plank Center for Leadership in Public Relations, which he chaired for five years. He also serves on the advisory boards of the Public Relations Museum and Library and Shields Meneley Partners, a nationally recognized executive coaching and consulting firm. Ron was listed in Crain's "Who in Chicago Business" from 2009 to 2017.
Culp was the first individual to receive both the Distinguished Service Award and the Hall of Fame Award from the Arthur W. Page Society, which is comprised of senior communication professionals, agency heads and leading academics. In 2011 he was honored with the John W. Hill Award by the New York Chapter of Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), and a year later he received the PR Professional of the Year from the Chicago chapter of PRSA. He also is featured in the PRSSA book, "Legacies from Legends in Public Relations" (2007) and was named to the PR News Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2012, Ron received the David Ferguson Award for Outstanding Contributions to Public Relations Education by a Practitioner, and in 2017 he received PRSA's Gold Anvil, the organization's lifetime achievement award. Ron received PRSA Chicago's Distinguished Leader Award in 2020.
Ron and his DePaul colleague Matt Ragas are co-authors of business-focused books for PR professionals entitled "Business Essentials for Strategic Communicators" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014) and "Business Acumen for Strategic Communicators" (Emerald 2021) and they jointly edited "Mastering Business for Strategic Communicators" (Emerald, 2018). In 2018 and 2019, Ron compiled and edited three editions of an eBook entitled, "The New Rules of Crisis Management."
Ron and his wife, Sandra, fund a scholarship at their alma mater, Indiana State, for first-generation college students. In 2020, Ron endowed the first scholarship for public relations and advertising students at DePaul. In addition, he sponsors an annual PRSSA scholarship for student mentors.
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