Chair and CEO
Lynn’s reputation for creating successful brand-building programs grows from her ability to listen, to strategize and to shoot straight. She works with Padilla Speer Beardsley clients in a variety of industries and is only the third chief executive officer to lead our employee-owned firm since its founding in 1961.
Prior to joining a predecessor firm in 1983, Lynn was marketing communications manager for Burlington Northern. While there, she coordinated a diverse program to expand awareness of company services following railroad deregulation. She also developed Minnesota’s first public relations campaign for foster care home recruitment.
Lynn is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of North Dakota. In addition, she holds a master’s degree in mass communications from the University of Minnesota and a master’s degree in business administration from the University of St. Thomas.
An accredited member of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), Lynn has served on the Minnesota chapter’s board of directors. At the national level, she chaired the PRSA Counselors Academy, served on the board of the Council of Public Relations Firms and is a member of the Arthur Page Society
In Padilla’s headquarters community, Lynn chairs the board of Meet Minneapolis and is vice chair of The Minneapolis Foundation. She is a board member of Capital City Partnership and the Minneapolis Club, an executive committee member of the Minneapolis Downtown Council, and a member of the Minnesota Women’s Economic Roundtable and of the Itasca Project. She retired in 2008 from the boards of the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce and the University of Minnesota Alumni Association, and will rejoin the Greater Twin Cities United Way board in 2011.