Newhouse, Delta Partnership Takes Off with Intensive Executive Education Program 

The Newhouse School has launched a partnership with Delta Air Lines through an intensive program for the air carrier’s corporate communicators that focuses on professional development, communications and brand strategy. 

The new initiative with Atlanta-based Delta took off in December 2022 when members of the company’s corporate communications team traveled to Syracuse in separate cohorts for the four-day program encompassing strategic planning, writing and organizational narrative development. Subsequent gatherings took place in March and April of 2023 and plans call for additional engagements on other topics in the fall.

For Delta, the collaboration has its roots to the COVID-19 pandemic, when the airline saw an opportunity to restructure its communications team, said Gina Laughlin, Delta’s vice president of global communications. At one point, more than half of the team was new to the company. 

“Our new team ranges in experience from their first or second job after graduation to more than 15 years, so we wanted to make sure everyone had the same baseline understanding of communications strategy, as well as Delta’s tone and voice,” she said.  

In summer 2022, Delta inquired with various communications firms and institutions about the potential to create a strategic planning and communications program for professionals.  

Newhouse, which had already delivered a variety of mid-career training programs for organizations such as the U.S. Department of Defense’s Defense Information School and ABERJE, a Brazilian association for professional communicators, emerged as Delta’s selection.

“We chose Newhouse because of its phenomenal programs in strategic communications and writing, as well as its solid faculty,” Laughlin said.  

Newhouse gets to work 

Once Newhouse and Delta made their connection, the goal was to create a program that would provide a strong understanding of skills and strategy, said Brad Horn, associate dean of strategic initiatives and a professor of practice in public relations.  

According to Laughlin, Delta didn’t want a program during which attendees would just write for four days, but an experience that would allow staffers to work on strategic plans and connect with each other while learning from industry professionals.  

Newhouse held one session in December and two sessions in March and April, with each four-day immersion program attended by about 12-20 Delta staffers. Four members of the public relations faculty, Gary Grates, Anthony D’Angelo, Kelly Gaggin and Caroline Reff, led the program.  

The first two days of each session focused on strategic planning and making sure that communications initiatives and messaging fit desired business outcomes and audiences, Horn said. The next two days looked at strategic writing, including ways to focus on a target audience, such as Generation Z, or those born between about the late 1990s and early 2010s.  

Horn said he made sure that Delta employees got to know each other and understand each other’s roles, as many were new and hadn’t had the opportunity to work together. The immersion’s workshops, lectures and classes were structured around groups of four or five people to encourage collaboration and teamwork.

Leveling the playing field

Lecture topics included how to use artificial intelligence to improve search engine optimization and understanding best practices for conveying a message. Attendees worked on developing plans that would support the company’s strategic programs, as well as internal and external communications strategies with the Newhouse faculty, ranging from employee communications and press releases to technical areas like pilot communications.  

“Our team was able to bring real communications plans or writing they were working on to Newhouse while also practicing on case studies or examples created by the professors,” Laughlin said. 

Faculty also tested attendees on AP style, informed them about trends for the next generation of consumers, had them analyze how other corporations navigate challenges and coached them on setting strategic planning goals. 

One communications exercise had the result of allowing “Delta to emerge from the executive education experience knowing that the majority of their communications team is acting from the same playbook,” Horn said.  

Laughlin said she hopes that Delta can return to Newhouse and expand the partnership over time, not just for staff development but with recruiting the next generation of communicators to the company. 

“I am looking forward to seeing our partnership evolve,” she said.