The Swinging Pendulum

 
There was a time when most investor relations professionals had either financial journalism or public relations backgrounds and applied their specialty communications skills to publicly traded companies.
 
Then there was a wave of IR executives entering the field with finance, investment banking and analyst backgrounds. What such backgrounds may have lacked in writing and mass communications skills typically were offset by technical financial acumen.
 
Now, yet another new surge of IR professionals is surfacing as Roger Pondel reports in a recent bylined article for NIRI’s IR Update titled, “The Road to the C-Suite.” Pondel also points out in the embedded video that these new IR folks not only have the financial chops, but are equipped with the necessary DNA to understand the more complex world of today’s media.
 
While today’s new-wave pros typically are on career tracks in IR, those who entered the field from financial roles may well be headed back to their roots. But no worries, in many cases, they are traversing the path to becoming CFO.

— George Medici, gmedici@pondel.com