John Chu

Background

About John Chu

Growing up in Brooklyn, New York, John was passionate about communications, leading projects and student organizations, and helping others in the community. Today, John continues to do this in his 17+ year career in communications. John was a Director of Communications at MedStar Health, the National Institutes of Health, Treasury Department, Department of Energy, and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He led major initiatives in fast-paced, challenging environments while optimizing ROI and saving money for the organizations he served in, • John successfully led national communications campaigns at the Energy Department to help consumers save money by saving energy. At the time, LEDs, EVs, and solar energy needed to drop in price for widespread adoption. John conducted focus groups and surveys, and worked with technical experts to plan out various data-driven campaigns. He strategically built coalitions of government, nonprofit, business, and Congressional stakeholders to deliver a cohesive message that resulted in increased awareness of clean energy, greater competition, and lowered prices after a 1 year campaign- effectively saving U.S. households energy and millions of dollars over the long term. • John stepped in to swiftly turn around a mismanaged communications team at the Treasury Department that suddenly transferred its two top communications leaders. Acting as the Chief Communications Officer, Deputy Chief, and Branch Chief, John led with his own human-centered leadership style, blending the best of people management and project management, and leaned on the strong relationships that he built to transform the team within 6 months to a cohesive, engaged, collaborative, high performing unit. • When facing budget constraints at the NIH, John identified and reduced duplicate efforts, found new channels to convey messaging more cost effectively, and leveraged technology to increase productivity and ROI. John led a major initiative with the Energy Department's COO to streamline communications processes, and trained employees on the new process, saving the organization time and money. John streamlined social media and media relations approval processes in several organizations, leading to greater consistency in language and on time delivery.