The Winners of the Evening
They say it’s not about the destination but the journey we experience along the way. While this is true, it sure is exciting to reach monumental milestones after traveling down a long and treacherous road to get there. This past weekend was a culmination of hard work, endurance, perseverance, commitment, discipline and dedication to my role as a PR professional and my own personal landmark.
Spending long hours sifting through e-mails and gathering evidence of all my work to get Farmers & Merchants Bank into the spotlight this past year was like running a marathon. It started out slow but then required a faster pace as the deadline to submit entries for the annual OC-PRSA (Public Relations Society of America) PROTOS Awards approached, honoring outstanding PR work in Orange County. As a first time applicant, I was unprepared for the rocky road ahead that required hours of compiling information, articulating the value of our hard work and sweating up hills to complete a nomination worthy of submission. The race was a series of peaks and valleys that culminated in tears once I crossed the finish line.
This was not an individual endeavor, as my colleagues here at HKA were an instrumental part of the process. The tedious tasks of typing, stapling, writing, hole-punching and copying were completed by my co-workers, Mari, Anika, and Linda to ensure my entry would receive recognition (Nicole was supporting us in spirit, although she had not quite yet joined our team!) It was a team effort with Hilary, Inez, Martha, Emily and myself actually running in the race.
Although Inez was struggling to forge ahead with her submissions, she served as a cheerleader, providing constant encouragement and support at the wee hours of the morning and at night. The road was familiar territory for her since she had entered the race last year and was hard at work to complete her nominations at the same time. Hilary dedicated countless hours to writing, refining and revising the final outlines to confirm they were worthy of winning. After the final revisions were instituted, we did our annual “blessing of the nominations,” hoping they would lead to victory.
- The Blessing of the PROTOS
This past Friday night was the countdown to the outcome of the race announcing the recipients of the awards at the PRSA awards dinner at Rancho Las Lomas. As we sat underneath the stars hearing Steve Churm announce the categories I had entered, my heart started beating and my palms started sweating. As he presented the media relations category, I jumped up and screamed when he announced the Award of Excellence goes to…Robyn Williams! It felt like a drum roll when he started to announce the Award of Excellence for Total Program goes to…Robyn Williams!
It was unbelievable night with Inez winning an Award of Excellence for Media Relations on behalf of Komen for the Cure OC along with a PROTOS statue for ethnic media outreach. Martha and Emily were victorious in receiving an Award of Excellence for an article pitched to the Orange County Register on behalf of O’Connor Mortuary. At the end of the night, HKA walked away with 5 prestigious awards, claiming the PRSA marathon a victory!
We are all winners with HKA!
Tags: award of excellence, awards, Events, farmers and merchants bank, komen oc, o'connor mortuary, ocprsa, PROTOS, prsa, rancho las lomas, Susan G. Komen for the Cure
July 1, 2009 at 12:07 pm |
Robyn, you are SO deserving of your awards! You poured in blood, sweat, and tears, and I was screaming with joy alongside you when they first called your name! I only wish you could have given an acceptance speech and said “nanu nanu” in front of OC’s PR elite.
Also, I still think the Blessing of the PROTOS picture looks a little creepy, but our ritual WORKS! Five awards, woohoo!!
July 1, 2009 at 1:35 pm |
What a whirlwind…and I only got to be there for the fun part!
Congratulations to all our HKA winners! You ladies did such a fabulous job. I’m so proud to be a part of such a dedicated and successful team. Can’t wait to experience the whole process next year!
July 1, 2009 at 2:30 pm |
Whoaa, and what a race to the finish it was! I loved we came home with the gold – the HKA team rocks! All our winners, and helpers, were so deserving! And so cool that each of you won for every category entered! And don’t any of you knock our ritual blessing of the PROTOS ceremony we do each year — it works!! (we are scared to stop doing it, who knows what would happen??)
July 1, 2009 at 3:29 pm |
Congrats Robyn, Inez, Martha & Emily! Preparing for PROTOS was definitely intense, but we were happy to help you all, and it was fun going up to receive the award on Em and Martha’s behalf (; I love our Blessing of the PROTOS ritual!
July 1, 2009 at 8:26 pm |
I soooooo wish I had been there to celebrate with all of you-but thanks to the stellar live tweeting I felt those exciting moments too! Robyn, I’ve won 10 times now…it never gets less exciting!!!!
July 2, 2009 at 2:06 pm |
Wow Emily, a 10-time winner? What amazing talent we have here at HKA! There was never a doubt in my mind that all of our winners would take home some gold. And it was so fun to live-tweet about our victories!!
July 6, 2009 at 4:20 pm |
CONGRATULATIONS to ALL the HKA ladies! You are an amazing bunch of hardworking, dedicated and fun-loving people. It is such a pleasure to be associated with the BEST in the PR world. Thank you for including me in the festivities. Here’s to your future success – I’m doing my own version of the PROTOS victory blessing (my feet are really moving).
July 11, 2009 at 9:33 am |
Great job ladies!
July 13, 2009 at 7:58 am |
After going to PROTOS with the HKA team (a team I am so lucky to be a part of) and experiencing the fun and intensity of it all, I can understand why Inez, Emily and Robyn poured their blood, sweat and tears into their entries. It was an amazing experience–the energy and excitement at the event was contagious, even for someone like me in a supporting role! When the HKA name appeared on the screen and Inez, Robyn and Emily were each announced as winners, it was hard not to scream too loud (although I did yell out some semi-loud whoo-hoos!).
It was a great experience with an even greater team. Congratulations Inez, Emily and Robyn–I’m proud to say I work with all of you!