Erin Bossen
A media and public relations strategist, Erin has built upon her 20 years experience as a journalist with expertise in crisis communications, issues management, reputational risk assessment, and emergency response. With a keen understanding of the nature and speed of modern media, she offers clients real-time, discerning advice aligned with their core values and principles.
Most recently, Erin served as senior director of media and public relations for one of California’s top-ranked private universities, Loyola Marymount University, where she was responsible for the institution’s external communications strategy as well as safeguarding and enhancing its public reputation. A trusted adviser to university leadership, she developed plans for and responded to issues surrounding COVID-19, public safety, Title IX, academic freedom, high-profile speakers, DACA, protests, doxxing, public art and imagery, Greek life and athletics. She led the successful campaign to host a presidential debate on campus, elevating the university’s national profile. She also expanded its roster of trained public speakers and media experts, coaching campus leaders and faculty to respond to media inquiries and appear on television, radio, podcasts and digital outlets.
Erin is an Emmy award-winning journalist who served as a senior producer at CNN/HLN where she covered breaking news, civil unrest, extreme weather, the opioid crisis, high-profile trials, the military and politics. She led editorial teams producing live newscasts, talk shows and special programming. Prior to joining the network, she was an executive producer in San Diego covering political debates, elections, wildfires, immigration and environmental issues. She began her journalism career as a news editor at the #1news/talk radio station in Arizona.
Erin earned a Bachelor of Arts in journalism, magna cum laude, from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University.
Kent Cassella
Kent has over 30 years of experience as a member of and working with executive leadership teams for large, complex, diverse and dispersed organizations developing strategy in crisis, conflict, emergency and highly hazardous conditions.
A retired U.S. Army officer with more than 20 years of active-duty service, Kent has held a variety of leadership positions and has directed public relations and crisis management and communication strategy around the world. His active service culminated with assignment as director of Public Relations at the United States Military Academy at West Point where he led all communications and reputation management activities for the nation’s premier military academy and national historic landmark campus.
Prior to joining the BMCG in 2018, Kent was the Associate Vice President for Communications and Brand Strategy at Michigan State University for ten years. He was responsible for developing and leading strategic issues planning, brand building, crisis management and crisis communications proactive planning to reduce reputational risk, for one of the world’s leading public research universities.
A graduate of West Virginia University’s communications school, Kent also holds a master’s degree in journalism from Marshall University and an MBA from Touro University International.
Jennifer Rettig
Jen leads the development of BMCG’s crisis readiness assessment methodology and supports clients through the development of crisis management exercises, business resiliency, crisis and communication plans, and facilitated crisis management planning sessions. She also directs stakeholder research and creates proactive messaging platforms including promotional videos and issue dark sites.
Over the past five years, Jen has supported our client response to a variety of issues and crisis events including racial and sexual harassment, whistleblower claims, academic freedom issues, protests, and terrorism. On the planning side, she developed and facilitated both domestic and international tabletop exercises and led functional exercise simulation cells.
Prior to launching BMCG, Jen was a Senior Marketing Manager for Math Solutions, a division of Scholastic where she developed nationally recognized marketing campaigns, a Producer with Sony PlayStation, and a Product Manager for Riverdeep, an educational software division of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Jen has an MBA from Cornell, an MA in Japanese Studies from Ehime Daigaku, and a BA in Political Science from the University of Maryland, College Park.
Simon Barker
Simon Barker is Managing Partner at Blue Moon Consulting Group. Prior to founding Blue Moon, he was a senior vice president in Marsh & McLennan’s Reputational Risk & Crisis Management practice. Simon provides issues and crisis management advice and counsel to clients spanning high profile product recalls, protests, cyber attacks and data breaches, active aggressor events, natural disasters and a broad range of ethical, financial and social issues. He brings this “hands-on” experience and applies it to helping clients in advance of a crisis or issue and has developed crisis management and crisis communications plans for clients in the higher education, technology, financial services, consumer goods, healthcare, and sports industries amongst others. He has led training sessions, tabletop and functional exercises for organizations in the US, Europe and Asia.
Prior to joining Marsh, Simon was a vice president at Visa International where he was recruited to build and then manage Visa’s global issues and reputation management program. He led Visa’s approach on a range of issues including data security, fees, corporate governance, and global sponsorship risks. In addition, Simon was responsible for developing Visa’s Corporate Social Responsibility strategy prior to the company’s IPO.
Earlier in his career, Simon was a vice president of the International Public Affairs group at Edelman Public Relations Worldwide, in Washington, DC. Clients included the International Monetary Fund, Chevron, the government of Portugal and the government of Kazakhstan amongst others.
In other roles, he has served as a strategic advisor to the head of communications of the International Labor Organization in Geneva, and was also an international news reporter at a Japanese television network. Simon has his MBA from Cornell University, New York, his MA in Japanese Studies from Ehime Daigaku, Japan, and his BA in English Literature from Leicester University, UK.