Tom Barritt

Position(s):

Facilitator

Mr. Barritt directs Ketchum’s network of communications trainers. He creates and facilitates customized training workshops to help clients effectively deliver messages in a variety of forums.

As Director of Ketchum’s Global Issues and Crisis Management Network, Mr. Barritt has specialized in preparing clients for hostile media interviews. He has coached clients preparing for interviews on major new broadcasts, including Nightline, ABC News Primetime, 60 Minutes and Today. In this capacity, he has counseled CEOs, senior executives and spokespeople for numerous corporations and associations including Wyeth, Bridgestone Firestone, Feld Entertainment, Dow, Coty Inc., UCB Pharma, Merial Animal Health, The California Strawberry Commission, Church & Dwight, Dannon, Mott’s USA and the American Dental Association.

Prior to joining Ketchum, Mr. Barritt was a Managing Director in the U.S. Healthcare Practice of Burson-Marsteller where he was responsible for American Home Products and Wyeth-Ayerst Laboratories and served as a senior counselor on health issues across all accounts. During his 15 years at Burson-Marsteller, Mr. Barritt worked on various industries and issues for the consumer, healthcare and corporate practices. As part of an award-winning consumer education campaign for the American Dental Association, he prepared a cadre of dentists to address the media on the issue of safety in the dental office. On behalf of U.S. fur retailers, he trained regional spokespeople and devised the strategy that defeated a proposed ban on the sale of fur in Aspen, Colorado. As part of that effort, he trained local retailers to make their case in the media.

He has also developed issues and crisis preparedness plans and executive training programs for numerous corporations, manufacturers and packaged goods companies, including Aetna, Merck, Dannon, Johnson & Johnson, Bacardi, Columbia House Music Club, The NutraSweet Company and Unilever.

Earlier in his career, Mr. Barritt worked for three years as a news writer and producer for WPIX-TV’s Action News and Independent Network News in New York City.