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David Davis

Strictly Come Dancing
1970's style

Me. The Media Man

Left school at 16, became a reporter. How, Why? Don't Know.

Sacked from my first job sweeping up the office of the South London Advertiser, cried, got another job at Croydon Times and never looked back. Eventually after many interviews eventually got to Fleet Street (Press Association + secondment with Reuters) after using a forged birth certificate making me older than I was. Great learning years, managed to move to The Times.

Suddenly after returning to London from a rough assignment covering the Russian invasion of what was then Czechoslovakia I didn't want to be a reporter any more and found myself in public relations; more money, safer and much to my surprise more professionally satisfying because I realised that reporters never made a decision - they only reported other people's decisions.

Over the next 24 years I made decisions which helped build Edelman, today the world's best known and most successful PR agency in the world. Loved every moment of it.

As vice chairman of the worldwide organisation, I left to discover if there was life after Edelman for me and there was.first stop Medialink and the world of satellite television. Towards the end of seven years with the company I got bitten by the business opportunities of the Internet which continues to excite me every day.

Communications tools have changed over the years and will continue to do so as technology spawns new ideas to replace the likes of Face Book, Twitter, et all but not the principles -

  • What do you want to say, to whom, when?
  • What do you want to achieve?
  • How do you evaluate the ROI?

There are exciting times ahead for us lucky enough to be 'in the media' and I intend to be part of it for as long as my brain remains in good working order.