Welcome to ‘Meet the Board Mondays’, a new series to help you get to know your 2019 Board of Directors. This year, the San Francisco Bay Area chapter is led by a dynamic, passionate group of PR pros who are committed to help advance the profession and the professional in this foggy city! In our second installation, we bring you our Director of Awards and President-Elect (2020), Aida Zepeda-Torres.

 

Give me a P-R-S-A!

 

P: PERSON  

Tell us a little about yourself.

Hi! I'm Aida Zepeda-Torres and I'm this year's PRSA SF Bay Area Director of Awards and President-Elect (2020). By day, I work as Communications Manager at financial services startup, Affirm. I've lived and worked in San Francisco for almost six years and I'm super excited about getting increasingly involved in PRSA along with meeting more of our amazing members! 

 

R: REASON

What’s the reason you joined and serve PRSA?

I joined the SF Bay Area chapter a couple years ago when my friend Marquise (also on the board) asked me to join his committee for Professional Development. We put together a great event and it was awesome to see so much involvement that I honestly didn't think the chapter had. Since then I've become more involved as last year's Director of Diversity & Inclusion and now working to re-launch the chapter's awards program to bring more recognition to the amazing professionals and campaigns in the area. 

 

S: SPECIALTIES

What are your specialties in your personal and professional life?

(i.e. Media relations, writing, cooking, singing in the shower, etc. Have fun with it!)

Professionally I've always been a generalist, which I love. I really enjoy getting to do everything from media relations to internal communications along with all the various things that fall under the communications umbrella. In my current position I focus on corporate reputation and internal communications which involves working with a lot of different departments at my company and really getting to build relationships with my colleagues I may otherwise not have the opportunity to do. 

Personally, I specialize in talking about my dog to anyone who will listen. I'm mostly joking. I really enjoy being outside whether that's just taking my dog on a walk, going on a hike, or hanging out at the park. My others specialties involve eating everything that looks delicious and working out in order to eat more. But seriously my dog's name is Cheddar Biscuit and you should follow him on Instagram @cheddarsbigadventure! 

 

A: ADVICE

What advice would you give other PR pros?

PR and communications are so wide that finding something you love to do can be quite easy – getting really good at it takes work. Invest in your craft and always look at how you can improve. How can you provide even more value for your client or your company? 

The PRSA SF Bay Area chapter is working hard this year to offer more ways our members can show more value. At the end of the day you have to PR yourself and your work – why not join others and learn how they're doing it?