VP, Communications and Public Affairs

The Aspen Group•Chicago, IL

About The Position

The Vice President, Communications and Public Affairs is the senior leader responsible for protecting, shaping and advancing The Aspen Group’s (TAG) external reputation across media, public discourse and community engagement. This role oversees TAG’s earned media strategy, crisis and issues management, social care and real-time response and philanthropy/community engagement efforts. This role exists to ensure that TAG and its brands show up with credibility, discipline and empathy especially in moments that matter. The VP, External Affairs serves as a key counselor to senior leadership and a central point of coordination for reputational risk, external narrative control and community impact.

Requirements

15+ years of experience in external affairs, corporate communications, public relations, or reputation management, with demonstrated senior-level leadership.
Proven experience leading crisis and issues management in complex, high-visibility environments.
Strong media relations expertise, including executive positioning and national media engagement.
Experience overseeing social care or real-time engagement functions strongly preferred.
Demonstrated ability to connect philanthropy and community engagement to broader reputation and brand objectives.
Exceptional judgment, executive presence and ability to operate calmly under pressure.
Experience in healthcare, consumer services, retail, or regulated industries strongly preferred.
Outstanding written, verbal and interpersonal communication skills.

Nice To Haves

Experience overseeing social care or real-time engagement functions strongly preferred.
Experience in healthcare, consumer services, retail, or regulated industries strongly preferred.

Responsibilities

Own TAG's enterprise external affairs strategy end-to-end - earned media, crisis, social care, community engagement and public affairs with a single, cohesive narrative at the center.
Serve as the primary reputational steward for TAG and its portfolio brands, proactively shaping how the organization is perceived by media, consumers, policymakers and communities.
Partner with the SVP, Head of Communications to align external affairs execution with enterprise narrative and brand strategy.
Advise executive leadership with clear, commercially-grounded counsel on reputational risk, emerging issues and external opportunity not just communication tactics.
Drive a proactive earned media program that positions TAG and its portfolio brands - Aspen Dental, ClearChoice, WellNow, Chapter and Lovet as authoritative voices in their respective categories, unified by a common narrative of accessible, high-quality care — across national, regional, trade and digital media.
Build and protect executive visibility for TAG's senior leadership, with a focus on thought leadership that advances the brand's commercial and reputational agenda.
Ensure enterprise messaging, brand narratives and executive communications are consistent, credible and differentiated across all external channels.
Counsel and prepare executives for high-stakes media, public and policy engagements with rigor and specificity.
Own TAG's crisis and issues management function - serving as the operational lead during any incident with reputational, legal, or consumer impact, with a mandate to contain, respond and resolve with speed.
Engineer crisis readiness as infrastructure: playbooks, escalation protocols, scenario planning and executive preparation that are tested and current - not built reactively.
Anticipate reputational risk across a 1,500-location, multi-brand, multi-state footprint - identifying patterns before they become incidents.
Lead cross-functional coordination with Legal, Risk, HR, Operations and Brand to ensure disciplined, aligned responses that protect the enterprise and its patients.
Oversee social care and real-time digital engagement as a frontline patient experience and brand protection function - measuring it accordingly.
Build and maintain TAG's public affairs capability, managing the external narrative in regulatory, legislative and policy environments across the states in which TAG operates.
Develop relationships with key external stakeholders - trade associations, advocacy groups, healthcare coalitions that expand TAG's credibility and influence beyond earned media.
Ensure TAG's voice is present and credible in policy conversations relevant to healthcare access, workforce and consumer experience.
Lead TAG's community engagement and philanthropic strategy as a reputational and brand equity driver with measurable outcomes tied to earned media, local market impact and mission storytelling.
Ensure every signature initiative and partnership advances TAG's narrative on access and care - not just goodwill and is activated consistently across brand, field and operations teams.
Set clear ROI expectations for philanthropic investment: media impressions earned, communities reached, stories generated.
Build, lead and develop a high-performing External Affairs team across PR, crisis/issues, social care, community engagement and public affairs.
Establish clear accountability, decision-making frameworks and performance metrics for all external affairs functions operating with the same rigor expected of a revenue-generating team.
Navigate a complex, matrixed environment across Brand, Marketing, Legal, Risk, HR and Operations with the credibility and relationships to move fast when it matters.
Build processes and capabilities that scale with a growing multi-brand organization, reducing single-point-of-failure risk and increasing team velocity.