The Jeffrey Group has promoted Mike Valdés-Fauli to President following the resignation of Jorge Ortega who had been president of the firm since 2005 and has resigned to pursue other interests. Jeffrey Sharlach, founder and CEO of the firm, also announced that Juan Sanchez, a former Vice President at the agency from 1993 until 2002, will be rejoining as Senior Counselor. Brian Burlingame, Chief Operating Officer, who has been at the agency for more than 10 years, will continue to manage The Jeffrey Group’s day-to-day operations.
“Mike has been instrumental to our growth over the past six years with the firm, leading our U.S. Hispanic Practice and opening the agency’s New York office in 2007,” said Sharlach. “Juan Sanchez was the second employee of the agency when we first opened in 1993 and assisted in the development of many of the best practices we still use for successful execution of our programs across Latin America.”
With nearly 100 employees at offices in Miami, New York, Buenos Aires, Mexico City and São Paulo and five wholly-owned offices in four countries, The Jeffrey Group provides a full range of marketing, public relations and communications services to top global companies and brands targeting Latin audiences throughout the Americas including Abbott Laboratories, Airbus, American Airlines, Bayer, Ciena, Coca-Cola, Diageo, FOX, Hasbro, Johnson & Johnson, Kaspersky Lab, T-Mobile, Volkswagen, and Xerox, among others.
“We appreciate the significant contributions made by Jorge Ortega to our firm’s growth,” Sharlach said. “His creativity, passion and dedication were appreciated by our staff and our clients.”
Valdés-Fauli, a graduate of Tulane University, previously held corporate and agency positions in Miami, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., including Arenas Entertainment, Conexión PR and Fleishman-Hillard before joining The Jeffrey Group in 2004. Based at the firm’s Miami headquarters, he was named by the industry trade magazine PRWeek as one of its “Forty Stars under Forty.”
“The Jeffrey Group has continued to evolve over the past 18 years along with the needs of our clients,” Sharlach said. “We are making strategic investments in client service expanding our experiential marketing, social networking, creative services and digital communications.”
“We’re also committing significant resources to Brazil, where the economic growth as well as the upcoming World Cup and Olympics are expected to generate increased business from our multinational clients,” Sharlach added, noting that São Paulo is currently the largest and fastest-growing office of The Jeffrey Group.