I’m a communicator and strategist

me

My name is Jason Phenicie (FEN-ih-see) and I specialize in creating and managing strategies for communicating and storytelling using technology.

I pair my ability to write well with an ingrained understanding of technology and a passion for communicating. At the University of Florida, I put this combination to work moving potential donors from prospect to engagement via a comprehensive digital strategy that includes inspirational storytelling, effective email marketing, relevant social media, and an easy-to-use website. While my current focus is on development and alumni engagement, I spent 13 years at Old Dominion University, where the comprehesive digital strategy I developed and executed supported student and faculty recruitment, development, community engagement, and internal communications.

Effective and successful communication begins with the audience and objective, then the strategy blooms from there. I ensure that the selected platforms for tactical execution fit the strategy and that all executions are consistent with the established brand. Strategies are living, changing creatures, so I continuously assess the strategy and planned tactics and make iterative changes, as necessary, to ensure maximum effectiveness.

How I got here

Commodore 64 main screen

From the time my first grade teacher wheeled a computer on a cart into the classroom, I was hooked on computers. I went home that evening and asked my parents for a computer. That Christmas, my parents were very generous and they gave me a Commodore 64. I taught myself BASIC using books and the wealth of magazines that were available at the time to share code.

Fast forward a few years and I discoverd geoPublish for my C-64. With geoPublish, I found a way to not only put my words to “paper,” but to share them with others in an engaging format. This started to shape my career, as I set my sights on working in the publishing industry.

As a freshman at Elizabethtown College, I was a computer science major, learning more advanced programming languages. However, the Internet, to which I had access for the first time, was a far more intriguing pursuit. I started a "joke of the day" email listserv that, over the course of the six months I ran it, amassed over 1000 subscribers from across the country. I decided that publishing in the future would be digital, not print, so set my sights on the next phase of my exploration – Web pages.

Transferring to Penn State University was an opportunity to refine my goals and explore possible careers where I could work with the Internet. I utilized the growing resources online and taught myself HTML and, with a $30 coupon to Kinko’s for an hour of digital scanner time and a free Geocities account, I created my first personal website. Since that first site, I’ve reinvented my personal website several times, maintained an online blog and, most importantly, taught myself JavaScript, CSS, PHP, SQL, jQuery, and more. I love experimenting with code and finding new ways to create engaging, yet clean and effective, websites.

After switching from computer science at Elizabethtown to computer engineering at Penn State, I then majored in education for a bit and even spent some time as a French major before settling on English. I knew I wanted to communicate and I always enjoyed writing, so I took advantage of my college education to grow my writing and communication abilities.

Making a career of a hobby

Fargo, my executive assistant

Jobs working solely on websites were practically non-existent when I first entered the professional workforce, so my first professional job was as a staff assistant that was also responsible for the unit’s wesbites. In that role, I discovered one of my passions, making websites that are not only effective marketing vehicles, but also serve as rich resources for all constituents. I leveraged my successes in digitizing much of that office’s resources and improving their websites into another position where I managed three departmental websites. I learned about recruitment, faculty needs, fundraising, and alumni engagement through my second position.

After Penn State, I advanced my career at Old Dominion University. I worked in marketing for an enterprise research center and leveraged that into what would become known as a “communications technology specialist” position, blending communications and marketing with knowledge of design and technology. I used this position to learn more about recruitment, the student lifecycle (I was even in charge of the university’s semi-annual commencement exercises for five years), community engagement, event planning, and university leadership.

When ODU decided to embark on its first concerted branding and marketing campaign, the university's website was identified as a priority area for improvement. The Assistant Vice President for Marketing and Communications tapped me to lead that effort, in an acting role, along with other digital branding efforts. I forged a strong partnership with a hesitant computing group and we created what, at the time, was a unique university website that not only demonstrated our focus on recruitment and research, but also launched the university's new logo. The Web director position was officially created and I interviewed and landed the job. Since then, I've worked to hire and cultivate talented, hard-working employees. Three of my former employees now run their own departments.