(This story originally appeared in the Bulldog Reporter, News & Intelligence for PR Pros)

Issue Date: Daily ‘Dog – March 17, 2010

Gorney is Appointed Senior Vice President of The Cline Group

When Josh Cline graduated from Lehigh University in 1999, he told his public relations professor that someday he would own his own strategic marketing and public relations firm. Today he is president of The Cline Group (www.theclinegroup.net) headquartered in Bala Cynwyd, and he has just hired his former professor, Carole Gorney, to be senior vice-president of his firm.

“Carole is a perfect match for the agency,” according to Cline, who founded The Cline Group in 2007, the same year Gorney retired as professor emeritus from Lehigh University. “She brings more than 30 years of extensive public relations, marketing and strategic communication experience to us, but on top of that, as an internationally recognized guru in media relations and crisis planning and management, she adds an extremely valuable dimension to the agency.”

For more than two decades Gorney has served as an independent consultant to corporate, government and non-profit clients, among them the defense contractor Lockheed Martin and the national engineering firm Gannett Fleming.

“The Cline Group serves a broad spectrum of clients in many different market sectors, such as technology, healthcare, non-profit, e-commerce, commercial, retail, education and public affairs, and Carole is uniquely qualified to provide senior-level consulting in every one of our specialty areas,” Cline said.

The two things that Gorney said helped her decide to accept the position with The Cline Group was the firm’s approach to integrating proven strategic marketing and public relations planning with new social media initiatives without sacrificing one to the other. She said she also approved of the fact that the firm is committed to having senior staff work directly with clients from start to finish. “As a consultant, I’ve been used to serving all my clients on a very personal, individualized level, consistently and over a long period of time. I wouldn’t want to work any other way.”

Gorney said she was extremely “pleased and flattered” when Cline sought her out and offered her the senior vice-presidency. “You never know what life holds in store for you. In my wildest dreams I never imagined that I’d ever be working with one of my own former students, but here I am, and it’s very gratifying.”