Edward A. Orgon
President and Chief Operating Officer

Edward A. Orgon is president, chief operating officer and a founding partner of The Torrenzano Group, a strategic communications and critical issues management firm specializing in building and protecting corporate reputations, enhancing shareholder value and helping clients grow their businesses.

The Torrenzano Group helps organizations take control of how they are perceived^™.

The firm specializes in strategic communications and critical issues management, media relations, investor relations and financial communications, crisis communications and special situations, M&A and transaction communications, as well as business-to-business communications and economic development.

Ed is the senior executive responsible for all firm business and client activities, including managing account teams, developing client communications strategies and directing the implementation of supporting communications programs.

In this capacity, he has worked with such clients as the NASDAQ Stock Market, including its demutualization and the launching of its exchange traded fund (ETF), the QQQ; the NASD and its acquisition of The American Stock Exchange (Amex), and the Amex on its entire portfolio of ETFs. Additionally, Ed has provided strategic communication planning and program management for Lloyd's of London, Liberty Financial, Towers Perrin, the Philadelphia Stock Exchange, and four of the nation's top thrift institutions, as well as leading a highly successful thought leadership campaign for the accounting firm Grant Thornton. In financial communications his client experience includes many of the above, as well as Seagate Technologies, GTECH, GenRad, American Management Systems, Smuckers, and i-Stat Corporation, among others.

Prior to co-founding the firm with Richard Torrenzano, Ed was responsible for the business-to business, technology and corporate/financial practices at the then top ten public relations firm, Creamer Dickson Basford (CDB), where he was a member of the executive committee. At CDB, he developed and implemented corporate communications and marketing public relations programs for such nationally known companies as A&P, Air Products and Chemicals, Exide Electronics, Hoechst Celanese, Monsanto, M.A. Hanna, NYNEX (Verizon), and Panasonic, as well as several professional services firms and technology associations, including the Business Technology Association, the leading computer reseller he renamed and repositioned.

Prior to joining CDB in early 1991, Ed served in corporate positions as the senior communications officer for several nationally prominent institutions.

At Cushman & Wakefield, the international real estate services leader, he was corporate vice president of communications and a member of the management committee. Ed successfully positioned the firm as "Business America's Real Estate Firm," launched its first international strategic communications initiatives and created the oft-quoted "Best Cities for Business" poll, which still stands 20 years later as a perennial cover feature of Fortune Magazine and a highly respected barometer of business climate in cities worldwide.

At Metropolitan Life Insurance Company (MetLife), he was director of communications and responsible for external and employee communications, crisis management and litigation support, sports marketing and agency relationships. Reporting to the chief executive officer and responsible for a staff of more than 50, he was corporate spokesperson and provided public relations and public affairs management for all MetLife businesses: personal insurance, group life and health, reinsurance, property and casualty as well as corporate and real estate investments.

Prior to joining Met Life, Ed developed and managed multi-million dollar consumer and business to-business advertising and marketing communications programs at the National Bank of North America (NatWest/Fleet) and the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, among others.

His extensive crisis communications experience has focused on labor issues and complex litigation matters. These include downsizings, layoffs, plant closings, and sexual abuse/ harassment and plant disasters. He has significant expertise in the early identification of negative press situations leading to corporate crisis --- illustrated by The Torrenzano Group's "Crisis Predictability Arrow^®" --- and significant experience counseling management before and after such crises occur. Following the September 11th attacks he worked with clients Lloyds of London, NASDAQ and The American Stock Exchange on rebuilding their public posture and communications.

He is skilled in the development of employee communications feedback systems and their use in furthering cultural change. Early in his career, Ed conducted a nationally cited groundbreaking study of work motivation of differing employee constituencies and the effects various communications had on organizational and individual worker morale. His study led to the development of new internal communications techniques and a changed culture. Many of his internal communications programs and products earned numerous awards.

A decorated Vietnam veteran, Ed began his career as a public affairs officer in the United States Air Force. In service from 1967-73, he earned numerous awards for outstanding achievement, including the Aerospace Defense Command's Junior Officer of the Year and, as a junior captain, the U.S. military's third highest award for achievement, the Meritorious Service Medal.

During the Vietnam War, he served as primary spokesperson for the Air Force's Strategic Air Command (SAC) operations in Southeast Asia, where he earned the Bronze Star with V Device and Air Medal for voluntarily flying B-52 bombing missions over North and South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. He holds the distinction of participating in the last bombing mission over Vietnam. He also served as SAC's spokesman during "Operation Homecoming," the Prisoner of War release, where he organized and accompanied press pools to Hanoi, North Vietnam.

Active in the POW/MIA issue for many years, he was instrumental in a nationwide program that generated over one million letters demanding an account of Americans held in captivity. During that time, Ed authored a number of news features and produced several television segments on the tragic issue, twice winning Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge awards. In 2000, he was the driving force behind the creation of a Vietnam Veterans Memorial at his alma mater, Manhattan College, and spoke on behalf of alumni at its dedication ceremony.

He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Manhattan and studied for his Master's degree in management at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va. He also completed Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management Integrated Marketing program.

At age 28, he was one of the youngest of its members to gain the Accreditation of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA). He is a past executive officer and director of PRSA's largest chapter, New York, and served on the national Society's Accreditation Board and its Special Task Force on the "Study of Ethical Issues for the Public Relations Profession." Ed has conducted educational efforts in public relations and media with the New York City Police Department, St. John's and Hofstra universities, and New York University's School of Business.

An avid sportsman, Ed enjoys saltwater fishing in the waters off the North Fork of Long Island. For many years he coached competitive young-adult baseball, bringing several regional, metro-New York and Long Island championships to his hometown of Syosset.

Ed and his wife Jeanne have four adult children.