I'm Hollie Geitner, APR. I've spent nearly 30 years in communications, most of it in-house.

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I began my career at Highmark Blue Shield, where I was a company spokesperson, and worked my way up through a PR agency, two utilities and the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership. My last role before starting my consulting firm was chief marketing and communications officer at the Allegheny Conference on Community Development.

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The utility years taught me the most. Everyone relies on power, and it's people who make it possible. When an outage drags on, you're talking to frustrated customers and exhausted crews at the same time, and they're all listening. That takes empathy. It also takes being honest and saying the same thing to everyone, even when the news isn't good. I learned to keep people at the center of every message, and I still do.

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The reality? That matters even more now than it did then. Something has shifted in how people decide who to trust. Between misinformation, AI, how divided we are and the sheer amount of information coming at us every day, a lot of people have stopped taking what they hear at face value. I understand why. Leaders can't count on the benefit of the doubt the way they once could. Today, they have to earn it.

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That's a big part of why, in October 2025, at 50, I left the corporate environment and started Anchored Voice Consulting. I wanted to spend my time helping leaders figure out what they stand for and say it in a way people believe, especially when things are hard.

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I'm based in Pittsburgh. If any of this sounds familiar, I'd like to hear what you're working on and the challenges you're facing.