October 9, 2024 • 10 mins
This is the first episode of our agency's new podcast, Coffee and Tea with SCG, featuring our president, Valerie Doyle with host Lupe Dragon.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Tom (00:00):
Welcome to Coffee and Tea with SCG, a podcast from the
industry experts at SCGAdvertising and PR.
We are a full-servicewoman-owned agency that offers
advertising, public relations,recruitment, marketing, and
association management.
In this season, we'll bechatting with some members of
our team about theirspecialties.
So grab your coffee and yourtea and let's brew up a good
(00:23):
conversation.
Lupe and Val (00:25):
Hello, everybody.
Welcome to the Coffee and Teawith SCG podcast.
Today on our podcast, we haveValerie Doyle.
Val, thank you for coming ontothe podcast today.
Thank you so much for havingme.
A question for all of ourinterviewees on the podcast is
do you prefer coffee or tea?
Val (00:43):
Of course, coffee.
Couldn't live without it, beenbrought up on it, and will
always love coffee.
Lupe (00:47):
How do you usually take your coffee?
Val (00:49):
I take my coffee with cream and sugar.
Lupe (00:51):
Awesome.
A classic.
So just to start off, what is aday in the life of a president
at an ad agency?
Val (00:58):
A day in the life starts very early, starts around 6:30,
answering and checking emails,verifying my schedule for the
day, taking out of any firesthat developed over the evening.
Then I'm allowed to be myselffor an hour, come into the
office.
We come in every day.
I go over the agenda again witheverybody.
I greet everybody that I see asI come in most days, as long as
(01:21):
everything's working out well.
Then I review the finances andthe fires that are still
existing.
I meet with sales reps to goover sales initiatives every day
in each of the vicinities andeach of a line of business.
I then tend to my daily jobs,my regular chores, but then I
answer any and all of theoutside offices as they come in
(01:43):
because of the time differences.
Obviously, not everybody's inthe beginning.
We go across the nation.
And throughout the afternoon, Ispend on pre-planning,
overseeing systems, following upon commitments coming up,
planning future commitments, andresearch for new prospects
falls into that, you know,world.
Where we're going, what'shappening, all new technologies.
(02:05):
And at the end of the day, wewrap up, oversee the fires, and
we try to go home and check itagain at 8 p.m.
Val and Lupe (02:11):
And that's the end of the day.
Awesome.
That sounds like you have a loton your plate every day.
Val (02:16):
Some days, some days worse than others.
Lupe (02:19):
So, how did you get your start at SCG and what was your
first role in the company?
Val (02:24):
I started SCG while I was in college studying advertising,
and I came in as a creditcollection person, believe it or
not.
So it was in the finance.
Lupe (02:33):
Okay.
So you've always been a financebird.
That's interesting.
And you've been the longest atthe agency, probably out of
anyone here.
Bring us through a brieftimeline of the history and the
evolution of what is now SCG.
Val (02:45):
When I was hired, SCG wasn't SCG.
It was the Cherenson, Caroll and Holzer.
Cherenson Group was the morphof the name of Cherenson ,
Caroll and Holzer.
Lee Cherenson ran the company,and he had just brought on a new
account executive, GlennGershaw, who was doing something
different.
Lee Cherenson was huge inpublic relations and writing,
worked with the ledger, as Iknew.
(03:06):
Lee and his wife ran thecompany, and Glenn was strictly
recruitment advertising.
Glenn grew and morphed thepublic relations size, so it
became more of a recruitmentagency.
And Glenn brought in agentleman called Kurt Schwartz,
who was working in New YorkCity, who was more national.
Kurt started a subcompanycalled Success Advertising
because he had such a nationalpresence.
(03:29):
He morphed then the CherensonGroup and actually took over the
Chere nson group, and thatbecame Success Advertising.
So then Lee retired, and Glennand Kurt Schwartz, basically
Kurt Schwartz was the president,Glenn was the secretary, and
they ran the company togetherfor 15 years, where we blew up
to be a company with about 150employees, and they were across
(03:52):
the nation.
We had offices from Hawaii toNew Jersey.
Then we had the recession, andKurt decided to close down his
side somewhat, take his backseat, and Glenn took over the
company.
So then after that, we trieddifferent names because it was
more of a communication with theintroduction, the internet,
email, everything like that.
So it was SuccessCommunications.
And then we became SCG, whichis Success Communications
(04:15):
Group's initials.
And that's where we are todaybecause it has passed on from
Glenn to Robin Gershaw.
And now Robin Gershaw haspassed it on to the estate of
hers, which is owned by thethree children.
So that is where we are now,and that is how I am the
president because Robin waspredeceased since this meeting.
Lupe and Val (04:34):
So this timeline scales over 60 plus years, which
is incredible.
Yes.
I wasn't here for all 60 years.
No, no, no.
But with that being said, whatare your favorite memories of
past presidents at the agency?
Val (04:48):
Well, my first memory and always was, and this past year
when we lost Lee Cherenson wasvery hard because he was like
the beginning.
When you came in, he would comearound.
And that's one of the things Ido more if between him and Kurt,
they both came around andchecked in with every single
person in the office in themorning.
You know, how you doing?
What's going on?
What's happening?
That type of thing.
And I think that's one of thestrongest points that I like to
(05:10):
carry through our day is that Ikind of have a little bit of
connection, hopefully, sometimeswith everybody at some point in
the day.
Just checking in, seeing what'sgoing on, because you know,
email's great and you see anddata and everything's there, but
the human aspect is one of thebiggest things I think at
success that we like to bringout is that we pay attention and
we care enough to know aboutevery single part of this
(05:32):
company.
And same with our clients, wepass that on to.
So I think that is one of thethings with Lee.
Kurt Schwartz was a fun-lovingindividual.
So on top of just knowing us,we did things as groups, which
we hadn't done too much ofbefore because we were smaller.
When it became Kurt Schwartz'scompany, we went to games, we
had events, we had so much teambuilding.
(05:53):
It was, it was crazy.
I mean, literally looked likethe agency from Mad Men.
It was fun.
So Kurt was a fun-loving guy,still is to this day.
Glenn and Robin were alwaysthere in the background.
They were huge supporters ofanybody, you know, they were
very business-like, but theywere very caring.
So I think all three ownershave carried that same thing:
(06:14):
caring.
They really had the humanaspect of, hey, if something's
going on at home, it'sgonna affect your day.
They want to know about it.
How can they help?
So every single owner, andthat's what I try to carry on,
is concerned about everything.
And that's where I kind offollow the suit and try to use
as what it was exampled to me.
Lupe (06:31):
Yeah.
And I think it's important tocommunicate with the people that
you work with because beingable to have the face-to-face
interaction is how you continuethe camaraderie in the
workplace.
I think that's super importantas well.
Val (06:43):
Oh, I definitely think so.
It adds to what you're going tolearn, how you bring new things
in, how everybody adapts.
Because if you don't have agreat relationship with
everybody, it's very hard tounderstand if it's actually
being absorbed, if it's beingused correctly.
And I just think it's part ofthe overall what we're trying to
communicate.
Lupe (06:58):
Yeah, absolutely.
As a communications agency andthen an advertising agency and a
recruitment marketing agency,the main thing you need to be
good at is communicating.
So if we're not practicingthat, then you can't be good at
it.
So I think that's superimportant.
The agency is a women-ownedbusiness.
I don't think a lot of peopleunderstand what that means.
So, what does it mean to you,Val?
Val (07:19):
To me, it just shows the accomplishment that can be done,
how you can actually show.
I mean, I think I came from ageneration where I kind of felt
a little bit, it wasman-oriented and we were the
admin people.
We weren't the forward thinkersback in the day.
I guess, you know, going tocollege, you saw it as much as
we were doing the same thing.
There was always a subpar.
And I've seen that change overthe years to being woman-owned
(07:42):
now and being very heavy inwomen employees in our company.
I mean, we definitely outnumberthem two to one, if not three
to one.
We show those skills that wecan multitask and we can handle
fires and do everything at thesame time.
And I think woman-ownedbusiness just means we work that
much harder.
And it's it's sad to say, youknow, you look back because it
(08:03):
was something I grew up and youwere, okay, it's just what we
had we did.
I go, but a woman-owned agencymeans that I go, we have
multifaceted sides to us.
Every woman does.
And I think we can bring thatto our clients, we can bring
that to the organization.
It just shows that we have thatdetermination to carry us
forward and move us to thefuture.
It helps other women, you know.
(08:24):
I think it just shows what whatyou can accomplish.
You know, here I started aslike a clerk and now I'm the
president.
I've been through many facetsof it recessions, up and down,
hills.
Still here, you know.
It's how hard do you want towork?
How much do you, you know, youeverybody took hits and we still
came back.
We didn't stop how hard weworked.
We just had to work that muchharder.
So I think that's part of beinga woman-owned business.
(08:46):
It just shows that yourdetermination and your work.
Lupe (08:48):
Yeah, and I think that's the important part to really
note is we've come such a longway.
I mean, now we're in 2024.
A lot of women in business arebusiness leaders and CEOs, and
we weren't really seeing a lotof that before.
Now you see it all over onLinkedIn, which I think is
incredible growth.
Val (09:03):
It's incredible.
It's it's wonderful, you know,to be acknowledged and see so
much in the innovative thinkingthat wasn't able to be done
because you were put indifferent roles.
You're you weren't given theopportunities.
And I definitely see that theopportunities are there for you
guys, especially when you comeout or like anybody coming out
of school, anybody startingtheir career now, they have so
many more opportunities.
Lupe and Val (09:22):
Yeah.
And as long as you're doinganything possible to strike at
the opportunity, there's no waysomeone could take that away
from you.
No, not at all.
All right.
So just to close us off,continuing on the women-owned
business aspect, what is youradvice to executive women?
Val (09:38):
I'm not limiting it to executive women, women, any
woman who wants to succeed,it's, you know, I think you
always have to work hard andwork consistent and be
confident.
Everybody doesn't get throughlife without pitfalls.
You wouldn't know success ifyou didn't go down, you know.
And that's one of the things Ithink is really important is you
don't know happiness if youweren't sad.
You don't know that you'redoing well if you didn't have a
(10:00):
mistake or two.
And we all make mistakes.
But as women, it's sometimesheld against us a little more.
And I think my advice is don'tlet it be held against you.
We all make mistakes.
Just keep working harder.
Go after your dreams because,you know, it's there.
You just have to get there.
So that's my advice toeverybody, not just executives
and anybody else.
Lupe (10:19):
Absolutely.
That was a nice positive soundbite for all the women out there
who are listening.
So again, thank you so much,Val, for being on the first
episode.
I hope everyone listeningdecides to come back and see
what SCG has to show you on thecoffee and tea with SCG podcast.
And we'll see you guys soon.
Tom (10:41):
Don't forget to subscribe whenever you listen to your
podcast so you never miss anepisode.
And leave us a review.
Until next time, keep thosemugs filled and those ideas
flowing.
Welcome to Coffee and Tea with SCG, a podcast from the
industry experts at SCGAdvertising and PR.
We are a full-servicewoman-owned agency that offers
advertising, public relations,recruitment, marketing, and
association management.
In this season, we'll bechatting with some members of
our team about theirspecialties.
So grab your coffee and yourtea and let's brew up a good
(00:23):
conversation.
Lupe and Val (00:25):
Hello, everybody.
Welcome to the Coffee and Teawith SCG podcast.
Today on our podcast, we haveValerie Doyle.
Val, thank you for coming ontothe podcast today.
Thank you so much for havingme.
A question for all of ourinterviewees on the podcast is
do you prefer coffee or tea?
Val (00:43):
Of course, coffee.
Couldn't live without it, beenbrought up on it, and will
always love coffee.
Lupe (00:47):
How do you usually take your coffee?
Val (00:49):
I take my coffee with cream and sugar.
Lupe (00:51):
Awesome.
A classic.
So just to start off, what is aday in the life of a president
at an ad agency?
Val (00:58):
A day in the life starts very early, starts around 6:30,
answering and checking emails,verifying my schedule for the
day, taking out of any firesthat developed over the evening.
Then I'm allowed to be myselffor an hour, come into the
office.
We come in every day.
I go over the agenda again witheverybody.
I greet everybody that I see asI come in most days, as long as
(01:21):
everything's working out well.
Then I review the finances andthe fires that are still
existing.
I meet with sales reps to goover sales initiatives every day
in each of the vicinities andeach of a line of business.
I then tend to my daily jobs,my regular chores, but then I
answer any and all of theoutside offices as they come in
(01:43):
because of the time differences.
Obviously, not everybody's inthe beginning.
We go across the nation.
And throughout the afternoon, Ispend on pre-planning,
overseeing systems, following upon commitments coming up,
planning future commitments, andresearch for new prospects
falls into that, you know,world.
Where we're going, what'shappening, all new technologies.
(02:05):
And at the end of the day, wewrap up, oversee the fires, and
we try to go home and check itagain at 8 p.m.
Val and Lupe (02:11):
And that's the end of the day.
Awesome.
That sounds like you have a loton your plate every day.
Val (02:16):
Some days, some days worse than others.
Lupe (02:19):
So, how did you get your start at SCG and what was your
first role in the company?
Val (02:24):
I started SCG while I was in college studying advertising,
and I came in as a creditcollection person, believe it or
not.
So it was in the finance.
Lupe (02:33):
Okay.
So you've always been a financebird.
That's interesting.
And you've been the longest atthe agency, probably out of
anyone here.
Bring us through a brieftimeline of the history and the
evolution of what is now SCG.
Val (02:45):
When I was hired, SCG wasn't SCG.
It was the Cherenson, Caroll and Holzer.
Cherenson Group was the morphof the name of Cherenson ,
Caroll and Holzer.
Lee Cherenson ran the company,and he had just brought on a new
account executive, GlennGershaw, who was doing something
different.
Lee Cherenson was huge inpublic relations and writing,
worked with the ledger, as Iknew.
(03:06):
Lee and his wife ran thecompany, and Glenn was strictly
recruitment advertising.
Glenn grew and morphed thepublic relations size, so it
became more of a recruitmentagency.
And Glenn brought in agentleman called Kurt Schwartz,
who was working in New YorkCity, who was more national.
Kurt started a subcompanycalled Success Advertising
because he had such a nationalpresence.
(03:29):
He morphed then the CherensonGroup and actually took over the
Chere nson group, and thatbecame Success Advertising.
So then Lee retired, and Glennand Kurt Schwartz, basically
Kurt Schwartz was the president,Glenn was the secretary, and
they ran the company togetherfor 15 years, where we blew up
to be a company with about 150employees, and they were across
(03:52):
the nation.
We had offices from Hawaii toNew Jersey.
Then we had the recession, andKurt decided to close down his
side somewhat, take his backseat, and Glenn took over the
company.
So then after that, we trieddifferent names because it was
more of a communication with theintroduction, the internet,
email, everything like that.
So it was SuccessCommunications.
And then we became SCG, whichis Success Communications
(04:15):
Group's initials.
And that's where we are todaybecause it has passed on from
Glenn to Robin Gershaw.
And now Robin Gershaw haspassed it on to the estate of
hers, which is owned by thethree children.
So that is where we are now,and that is how I am the
president because Robin waspredeceased since this meeting.
Lupe and Val (04:34):
So this timeline scales over 60 plus years, which
is incredible.
Yes.
I wasn't here for all 60 years.
No, no, no.
But with that being said, whatare your favorite memories of
past presidents at the agency?
Val (04:48):
Well, my first memory and always was, and this past year
when we lost Lee Cherenson wasvery hard because he was like
the beginning.
When you came in, he would comearound.
And that's one of the things Ido more if between him and Kurt,
they both came around andchecked in with every single
person in the office in themorning.
You know, how you doing?
What's going on?
What's happening?
That type of thing.
And I think that's one of thestrongest points that I like to
(05:10):
carry through our day is that Ikind of have a little bit of
connection, hopefully, sometimeswith everybody at some point in
the day.
Just checking in, seeing what'sgoing on, because you know,
email's great and you see anddata and everything's there, but
the human aspect is one of thebiggest things I think at
success that we like to bringout is that we pay attention and
we care enough to know aboutevery single part of this
(05:32):
company.
And same with our clients, wepass that on to.
So I think that is one of thethings with Lee.
Kurt Schwartz was a fun-lovingindividual.
So on top of just knowing us,we did things as groups, which
we hadn't done too much ofbefore because we were smaller.
When it became Kurt Schwartz'scompany, we went to games, we
had events, we had so much teambuilding.
(05:53):
It was, it was crazy.
I mean, literally looked likethe agency from Mad Men.
It was fun.
So Kurt was a fun-loving guy,still is to this day.
Glenn and Robin were alwaysthere in the background.
They were huge supporters ofanybody, you know, they were
very business-like, but theywere very caring.
So I think all three ownershave carried that same thing:
(06:14):
caring.
They really had the humanaspect of, hey, if something's
going on at home, it'sgonna affect your day.
They want to know about it.
How can they help?
So every single owner, andthat's what I try to carry on,
is concerned about everything.
And that's where I kind offollow the suit and try to use
as what it was exampled to me.
Lupe (06:31):
Yeah.
And I think it's important tocommunicate with the people that
you work with because beingable to have the face-to-face
interaction is how you continuethe camaraderie in the
workplace.
I think that's super importantas well.
Val (06:43):
Oh, I definitely think so.
It adds to what you're going tolearn, how you bring new things
in, how everybody adapts.
Because if you don't have agreat relationship with
everybody, it's very hard tounderstand if it's actually
being absorbed, if it's beingused correctly.
And I just think it's part ofthe overall what we're trying to
communicate.
Lupe (06:58):
Yeah, absolutely.
As a communications agency andthen an advertising agency and a
recruitment marketing agency,the main thing you need to be
good at is communicating.
So if we're not practicingthat, then you can't be good at
it.
So I think that's superimportant.
The agency is a women-ownedbusiness.
I don't think a lot of peopleunderstand what that means.
So, what does it mean to you,Val?
Val (07:19):
To me, it just shows the accomplishment that can be done,
how you can actually show.
I mean, I think I came from ageneration where I kind of felt
a little bit, it wasman-oriented and we were the
admin people.
We weren't the forward thinkersback in the day.
I guess, you know, going tocollege, you saw it as much as
we were doing the same thing.
There was always a subpar.
And I've seen that change overthe years to being woman-owned
(07:42):
now and being very heavy inwomen employees in our company.
I mean, we definitely outnumberthem two to one, if not three
to one.
We show those skills that wecan multitask and we can handle
fires and do everything at thesame time.
And I think woman-ownedbusiness just means we work that
much harder.
And it's it's sad to say, youknow, you look back because it
(08:03):
was something I grew up and youwere, okay, it's just what we
had we did.
I go, but a woman-owned agencymeans that I go, we have
multifaceted sides to us.
Every woman does.
And I think we can bring thatto our clients, we can bring
that to the organization.
It just shows that we have thatdetermination to carry us
forward and move us to thefuture.
It helps other women, you know.
(08:24):
I think it just shows what whatyou can accomplish.
You know, here I started aslike a clerk and now I'm the
president.
I've been through many facetsof it recessions, up and down,
hills.
Still here, you know.
It's how hard do you want towork?
How much do you, you know, youeverybody took hits and we still
came back.
We didn't stop how hard weworked.
We just had to work that muchharder.
So I think that's part of beinga woman-owned business.
(08:46):
It just shows that yourdetermination and your work.
Lupe (08:48):
Yeah, and I think that's the important part to really
note is we've come such a longway.
I mean, now we're in 2024.
A lot of women in business arebusiness leaders and CEOs, and
we weren't really seeing a lotof that before.
Now you see it all over onLinkedIn, which I think is
incredible growth.
Val (09:03):
It's incredible.
It's it's wonderful, you know,to be acknowledged and see so
much in the innovative thinkingthat wasn't able to be done
because you were put indifferent roles.
You're you weren't given theopportunities.
And I definitely see that theopportunities are there for you
guys, especially when you comeout or like anybody coming out
of school, anybody startingtheir career now, they have so
many more opportunities.
Lupe and Val (09:22):
Yeah.
And as long as you're doinganything possible to strike at
the opportunity, there's no waysomeone could take that away
from you.
No, not at all.
All right.
So just to close us off,continuing on the women-owned
business aspect, what is youradvice to executive women?
Val (09:38):
I'm not limiting it to executive women, women, any
woman who wants to succeed,it's, you know, I think you
always have to work hard andwork consistent and be
confident.
Everybody doesn't get throughlife without pitfalls.
You wouldn't know success ifyou didn't go down, you know.
And that's one of the things Ithink is really important is you
don't know happiness if youweren't sad.
You don't know that you'redoing well if you didn't have a
(10:00):
mistake or two.
And we all make mistakes.
But as women, it's sometimesheld against us a little more.
And I think my advice is don'tlet it be held against you.
We all make mistakes.
Just keep working harder.
Go after your dreams because,you know, it's there.
You just have to get there.
So that's my advice toeverybody, not just executives
and anybody else.
Lupe (10:19):
Absolutely.
That was a nice positive soundbite for all the women out there
who are listening.
So again, thank you so much,Val, for being on the first
episode.
I hope everyone listeningdecides to come back and see
what SCG has to show you on thecoffee and tea with SCG podcast.
And we'll see you guys soon.
Tom (10:41):
Don't forget to subscribe whenever you listen to your
podcast so you never miss anepisode.
And leave us a review.
Until next time, keep thosemugs filled and those ideas
flowing.
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