John Onoda on advancing communications at the board level

Catch up quick: Over his 40-year career, Onoda has led communications at General Motors, Levi Strauss, Charles Schwab and Visa USA.

• He also managed global media relations at McDonald's and external communications for Holiday Inns and Harrah's Casinos.
• Now, Onoda serves as a principal at strategic consulting firm iQ360.

Here are key ways Onoda builds talent, according to his mentees:

• Be businesspeople first, with an expertise in communications.
• "He was the one who taught me to understand the business, follow the money, and be able to speak in business language," says Donna Uchida, former chief communications officer at Kaiser Permanente and C-suite strategist.
• "From then on, I wasn't seen as a communicator, per se, but as somebody who was a business leader, who happened to bring communications to the table," she says.
• "When I first took over leading communications for Levi Strauss Japan, John gave me two pieces of advice," says Hiromi Horie, former head of marketing for Levi Strauss and Starbucks Japan. "One is you have to know about the business more than anyone. Don't think that your communication job is just to deal with the media. And the second was, you have to be fun to work with."
• Reinvention is a requirement if you hope to be viewed as a trusted advisor.
• "One of the things he said to me was, every year you should let go of 20% of what you do and learn 20% of something new," says Dave Samson, former chief communications officer at Levi Strauss and Chevron.
• "The 20% that you give up doesn't necessarily go away, but it becomes opportunity for somebody else on your team. If you do that, every five years, you're going to be completely reinventing yourself," he adds.
• "Be strategic. Think about what's next. Think about what's around the corner," says Morgan Crinklaw, head of communications at Chevron. "My conversations with John really remind me of the importance of doing that in a role like this."
• Remember what matters. Onoda has a reputation for "guiding the whole person, not just the professional," says Suzanne Skyvara, former head of communications and marketing for Goodreads.
• "He defined a lot of people's careers, including mine," says Samson. "But he never let his career define him. He was always defined by things outside the workplace — namely his family."

• "His most frequently given advice is to invest in relationships and stay connected. He believes that a strong network creates a 'brain trust' that helps communicators solve complex challenges," Skyvara adds.

What they're saying: Communicators can't solely focus on press releases or product launches, because that's not what's discussed at the board level or in the C-suite, says Onoda.

• "One of the things I learned to do was to become responsible for communicating the strategic plan," he said.
• "Throughout all my jobs, there were two people I tended to try to build relationships with early on, and that was the head of strategic planning and the head of marketing research, because those were people who understood the demographics, had a mindset of two to five years out, and were developing the information that eventually would drive board-level decisions."
• "The mindset must be: What is the greatest value we make to the enterprise based on its strategic goals? And what are the business levers for achieving those goals?"

🧠 Best advice from Onoda: Pass it on.

• "I want to help anyone who comes across, but I'm especially gratified when I see that I've touched generous spirits who are, in turn, trying to pass it on," he said.

More on Axios:

• Google Cloud's Jane Hynes on mentoring communications talent