I remember when I was growing up taking a weird interest in viewing press conferences. Mind you, these were mainly sports-related, unless there was some other “big news.”

I must have watched hours and hours of Maple Leafs, Raptors, Blue Jays, etc. conferences for trades, signings, coaches and GMs hired – you name it – for as long as I can remember – and then watching the analysis on TSN, and the Sportsnet later.

For me, that was the dream. How do I get to do that?

What I didn’t realize, in a round-about way until many years later, was that these events were fundamental to public relations and, more importantly, media relations. I would actually end up in the same industry and actually helped (in a minor role) execute a press conference in my very first PR job.

I still believe, with some exceptions (COVID-19 being one), that there are only a handful of guarantees when it comes to media pitching and attendance – they’ll come for the Maple Leafs/Raptors and Blue Jays, the Premier of Ontario and/or Prime Minister and any kind of big city building project in Toronto – Olympics, Sidewalk Labs, etc. That’s about it. The rest of us need to work for it.

I had no idea what public relations is and what it meant. It wasn’t until I went to check out an open house event at Humber College that I got hooked into, and eventually accepted into, their PR program at the Lakeshore Campus.

While I’ve never worked with the Maple Leafs, Raptors or anyone else (but I’m available as GM for any of these teams!), I’ve been lucky over the last decade-plus. I’ve had a few jobs in various industries and have learned a lot, and grew up quite a bit. I now know more than I ever wanted to know about mundane, but important things, like buying a car and cell phone plans, construction, etc.

It’s been a long, winding road and I wouldn’t change a thing.