Maril Gagen MacDonald is a globally recognized leader in communication, strategy execution and transformation, who has pioneered a discipline that collaborates with corporate leaders to optimize business performance by engaging and mobilizing their workforce behind a company’s strategic goals, its culture and its brand. Her clients have included some of the world’s most recognized brands, including Bristol-Myers Squibb, Coca-Cola, DuPont, GE, Johnson & Johnson and United Airlines.
Maril is also a member of the board and Global Leadership Team at APCO. She is also founder of Let Go & Lead, an online community dedicated to new philosophies and strategies for leadership. Until its successful sale in 2016, she was the CEO of Son&Sons, a leading branding and identity firm.
She is a past chairman and long-service board member of the Arthur W. Page Society and is also on the Board of the Institute for Public Relations. She is a former board member of American University and the Women Presidents’ Organization, a non-profit international membership organization for successful female entrepreneurs. Maril previously served as chief communication officer and Executive Management Committee member for Navistar and its operating company International Truck and Engine Corporation. She worked closely with CEO John Horne to direct the company’s highly successful cultural turnaround. This was a key factor in Navistar’s resurgence from the brink of bankruptcy to being named in the Wall Street Journal’s Top 10 Performers list and Business Week’s Top 50 Companies list.
Prior to joining Navistar, Maril was vice president of communications for Pitman-Moore Inc., and held several leadership positions spanning operations, communications, and human resources with Bayer USA and The Standard Oil Company/British Petroleum. Her broad range of corporate experience has allowed her to claim “the white space between the silos” as her area of ultimate functional expertise.
Maril is a recipient of Arthur W. Page Society’s Hall of Fame and Distinguished Service Awards and has received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Institute for Public Relations and the top Milestones In Mentoring Award from the Betsy Plank Center for Leadership. Maril has been recognized by PR Week as one of the top 25 leaders in the industry and one of The 50 Most Powerful Women in PR.
She holds a B.A. in Communication from Purdue University.
