Sallie Poggi
Sallie Poggi is the chief communications officer at University of the Pacific, where she oversees the Office of Strategic Communications. She leads the team responsible for the overall storytelling, brand building and reputation enhancing efforts of Pacific, a small private university with campuses in Stockton, Sacramento and San Francisco. Pacific is one of a handful of private universities in the nation designated both a Hispanic-Serving Institution and an Asian American and Pacific Islander-Serving Institution.
Previous to her role at Pacific, Poggi served as the executive director of strategic communications at the University of California, Davis. Poggi was responsible for the operations and oversight of the strategic communications department and led the office in several award-winning efforts to deepen storytelling through digital, social media and news platforms. Her team directly supported the communication efforts of Chancellor Gary S. May, whose social media and internal communications efforts have been recognized nationally as a “gold star” standard.
Poggi has deep expertise in using digital communications to position leaders, create communities and move audiences to action. While at UC Davis she built the flagship social media team, provided executive digital communications support and oversaw Undergraduate Admissions digital communications. She was responsible for providing strategic and policy guidance to the university's network of over 150 social media communicators and served as part of the crisis and issue management and response team.
Poggi is a frequent guest speaker and panelist on the topics of crisis communication, community engagement, digital storytelling and trend forecasting. She is an advocate for the advancement of social media professionals and for mental health considerations in the communications and marketing profession.
Prior to her decade of work in the higher education sector, Poggi spent eight years crafting and executing social media strategies for national and global brands in a range of industries including food, wine, beverage, agriculture, grocery retail, natural resources, clean tech, technology, toys/games, government and higher education, and for C-suite level executives.
