PRactically Speaking Houston

PRactically Speaking Houston with Laura Frnka-Davis, APR

• Veronica V. Sopher, PRSA Member and Host • Season 1 • Episode 6

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Welcome Laura Frnka-Davis, APR, to PRactically Speaking Houston – the official podcast of the Houston PRSA Chapter.

Before founding LFD Communications, Laura honed her expertise at some of Houston’s well-known nonprofits and businesses, including Texas Children’s Hospital, Pierpont Communications, and LifeGift. Her comprehensive understanding of multiple communications disciplines, from media relations to PR writing to internal and external communications, including crisis communications, instills confidence in her clients and collaborators.

In recognition of her outstanding contributions to the field, Laura was named the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) Houston Chapter Solo Practitioner of the Year in 2020. Her continued success was marked by silver Excalibur awards in integrated communications for campaigns associated with the Houston Botanic Garden in 2021 and 2022 and a bronze PRSA Houston Excalibur award in 2023 for her work with Teach For America Houston. In 2024, LFD Communications further solidified its reputation, bringing home two awards from PRSA Houston and one from the International Association of Business Communications (IABC) Houston. In 2025, she received a silver Excalibur Award in the integrated communications campaign category for her work on the Sugar Land Arts & Music Fest.

Laura is an instructor in the Leadership Institute for Nonprofit Executives in the Susan Glasscock School of Continuing Studies. 

Connect with Laura Frnka-Davis, APR at:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurafrnka-davis/

Connect with Veronica V. Sopher at:
Website: https://www.veronicavsopher.com/
Social:@VeronicaVSopher

Learn more about the PRSA Houston Chapter, our events and opportunities at www.prsahouston.org.

PRactically Speaking Houston is brought to you by Veronica V. Sopher, Public Relations.

Veronica Sopher:

Hello and welcome to practically speaking Houston. This is the Houston chapter of PRSA official podcast, and here on this podcast, we get an opportunity to talk to all of our members and talk about why our chapter is such a great investment in your communications career. We're going to talk about why PRSA brings value to you. And we're also going to be chatting with one of our amazing board members, who's going to bring some great tips and strategies to the conversation. But before we get started, let's take care of some housekeeping. If you are listening on the podcast, make sure you hit subscribe. We don't want you to miss any episodes of practically speaking Houston. And if you're watching on YouTube, LinkedIn or Facebook, drop us some comments, because we'd love to connect. So let's go ahead and get this episode started. Joining us now on the podcast is Laura Franka-Davis, joining us. Laura, great to have you back on the podcast.

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Yeah, it's great to be here. Thanks, Veronica.

Veronica Sopher:

Now let's go ahead and clarify a couple of different things. First of all, you are one of our active, very active members, and you've had several leadership positions on the board with us. Talk to us about what you're doing right now.

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Yeah, so I have been part of hearsay Houston for probably 20 years, and I've held a variety of different positions, and this past year, I was elected to serve as assembly delegate. And I'm excited to represent the chapter in Orlando next October. And yeah, just just happy to be involved again.

Veronica Sopher:

Yeah. So tell us a little bit what what assembly delegate means for those of us who have not really been involved in the national chapter or are still learning what prsa means and how it works when you are involved in a local chapter, talk to us about what that means and what your responsibilities are.

Laura Frnka-Davis:

So essentially, assembly delegates are voices for each of the chapters across the country that go to national and vote on various policies and things that help drive the national chapter. So it's a really important part of the organization and the board and how we operate, because, like I said, the assembly delegates represent everybody in our chapter, so we want to make sure that we have a really good reflection of what we believe in here in Houston, and how to best represent all of our members. Got it.

Veronica Sopher:

Got it. And what other roles have you served on before? I know you've been involved for a while, and you're a great mentor, and you've had been involved in lots of different programs, but what are some of the other things you've done for our chapter before?

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Let's see. I've served as secretary at one point. I've served as assembly delegate several times, been involved in Excalibur, both on planning the actual event and then serving as the awards chair. Have done that several times this year also, in addition to assembly delegate, I'm going to be helping CAMI hiza on the University Relations Committee, and I'm excited about that, because I think we need to continue to mentor these young people that want to come into the profession, and the only way to reach them is through the university. So I'm excited to help her with that.

Veronica Sopher:

Yeah, I think that that's a great it's a great segue into what we're doing, whether it's marketing and public relations, crisis communications, sometimes folks don't even know that certain niches exist. They assume maybe oil and gas or health care or but they don't know that there's other areas. And so working with our university students is going to be huge for our chapter, especially as we grow. So tell us a little bit about your career path and the different areas you've worked in, because I think that brings a lot of insight as you're working with some of our university students.

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Sure. So I actually started my career in advertising. I don't know if many people know that, and I quickly decided that that wasn't really what I wanted to do, because I wasn't able to utilize my writing skills. I've always been a writer. As a little girl, I'd sit down with a typewriter and write stories and whatnot. So from there, I transitioned into agency life. Worked for a PR agency that focused solely on high tech, and that was great when there was a big high tech boom, but when it went bust, I lost my job. So from there, I utilized my contacts to get a job at Texas Children's Hospital and. And I was in media relations there for several years. Absolutely love that job. That job really helped me, I think, in what I'm doing now, even it gave me a lot of the foundational stuff and just the contacts and the networking. And then from there, I went back to agency life, worked at Pierpont communications for about five years, then took a job at a nonprofit here in Houston, life gift, the Oregon eye and tissue recovery agency, was director of comms for almost a decade, and then transitioned to be on my own, and I've had my company, Lfd communications for almost seven years now, which is hard, wow.

Veronica Sopher:

Yeah, congratulations, and thank you. Yeah, I love and I'm very familiar with your work. I live in one of the communities that you serve, and so I've had an opportunity to read some of the things that you've put out and and some of the different groups you work with, but tell us about some of the clients you work with, and what that's like, and maybe how you tap into prsa to help you grow your your own business, your own agency.

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Yeah, so I, I represent lots of different types of clients. I feel like at this point in my career that a lot of my skills are transferable. So I work with school districts. I work with just like you. I work with nonprofits, I work with some hotels. I mean, I just and that's one of the things I absolutely love about what I'm doing now, is that I'm not pigeonholed until one particular topic, and I'm not pitching the same topic over and over again. I thrive on that variety. And so, you know, that's I just have a really interesting portfolio of clients. And as a solo entrepreneur, you know, different things come in every year. And I just wrote on LinkedIn yesterday that this year has been full of amazing opportunities and great people to collaborate with that I didn't even see coming. So it's, you know, that's what's really fun about it, is I haven't had to pigeonhole myself into one thing.

Veronica Sopher:

Mm, hmm, yeah, no, that's, that's so true. And I think the fact that you can pull from the different experiences you've had make it really exciting for someone considering working working, to contract someone out, and they can look at you and look at your portfolio of work and say, Oh, she's done this, or she's done in profits, or she's got those relationships. What do you think the Ben the biggest benefit is to communication professionals that are looking at our membership. I know you talked a lot about opportunities and realizing them in 2025 How do you think that translates to your membership with prsa?

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Yeah. I mean, I think it's important to be to be part of a professional organization like prsa. I think that our local chapter brings a lot in terms of the different types of programming and just the different people that you get to meet over the years. I mean, I've been involved in this organization, like I said at the beginning, for 20 years, and I have met so many people. I've stayed in touch with them. Some of them have become my best friends, which I love. So I think there are a lot of benefits to being a part of the chapter, and I think that just being involved and being a face can bring you business opportunities and as an opportunity to showcase what you can bring to someone as a potential business partner.

Veronica Sopher:

Yeah, no, absolutely, I would totally agree. And like you, I've transitioned on my own as well, and that makes it really it creates a lot of opportunities, but you also need to keep your network fresh and know what people are up to, and know who does what, really, really well. And I think our networking events give us an opportunity to share some of those things, some of those insights with with other members. What do you feel like is the newest trend that that you're seeing with the clients that you work with? Do Are you seeing some of your clients wanting more copywriting? Do you see them wanting to tap into paid, paid media placement? What do you see with the clients that you're working with?

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Well, I think, I think the the earned media landscape has gotten a little bit more challenging since the pandemic. I mean, I think, I think every communicator pretty much agrees with that, so I see more clients being open to paid things because they understand that there's no longer that separation of church and city. Eight, right? We used to say that all the time, and there's just it's not there anymore. It doesn't right. So I'm always advising my clients to invest a little bit in some paid opportunities, because otherwise, you know, we're going to miss the boat and earned media. When you get it right now, I think it's a big deal. Yeah, it's just become, you know, like I said, it's just become more and more challenging. And so I think it's kind of that mix of sponsored content and earned content. And also, I was, I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday who's planning to take the leap into being a solo entrepreneur. And, you know, I said people don't like to write, that's one thing that we can bring to the table, to the table that organizations don't necessarily want to do. So I think there, you know, continues to be a lot of opportunities for us out there. And I think, I think the trend is a lot of the content creation and

Veronica Sopher:

the paid content, yeah, no, absolutely, I would agree with that. And then there comes some natural challenges with the writing too. As drafts get presented to you to be refined or fine tuned, and you realize they're AI generated. And there, there's a formula to it. It makes it really challenging. How are you working with clients to, you know, balance that fine line between them wanting to be efficient with their staff and them wanting to be be creative.

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Yeah. I mean, I think AI has this place. I think everyone agrees with that. I mean, I would think most of us would agree with that, that comment, um, I think it can make you more efficient. And as solo entrepreneurs, we're always looking for time in our day, but we have to put that, that humanization on it. We can't just rely completely on AI to draft something for us, it's got to be something that we touch, and we can be creative and adding that personalization to it. So I think it does have its place, and I think we have to embrace it as communicators, or we're going to be left out. But we just have to be wise about how we're using it.

Veronica Sopher:

Yeah, absolutely. And I know that something that our PRSSA student members are learning in school, I was talking to a young lady this last semester, and she was talking a lot about how they've implemented that into the curriculum, and she was curious as to what I'm actually seeing out in the field. And so I think we've had several webinars, not only from the National chapter or the national organization, but some our local chapter too. We've had some great conversations about that. And so I think encouraging our members to listen to what their clients are needing, and then making sure that we can all pivot is going to be really important going into 2026 especially in this first and second quarter. So Laura, what are some projects you're working on right now that you want to brag on, and some things you want to celebrate?

Laura Frnka-Davis:

So kind of a cool project, and I think you'll appreciate it because you work with schools. So I was contracted by a PR agency out of New York to help with a project where a credit union was coming into Houston. And so I've been serving as kind of the local boots on the ground, actually, there at Pearland, which is where I am. And so it just made perfect sense for me to represent them and be their kind of local face. And so two weeks before or week before Christmas, we worked with the two ISDS here, Pearland and Alvin ISD the credit union UFCU donated$20,000 to eliminate school lunch debt. Oh, I love that. Yeah, isn't that great? It was such a great, a great community event. And you know, I've loved partnering with trail runner, their their PR agency. I've been an extension of their team. And you know, we have media cover the event. We had cheerleaders come out. We had the mascots. They made time to come out and be part of our event a couple weeks ago. And so it just to me, I loved it because I'm from this area, and so it just felt good to see that happening right where I live. And so that was one, one project that recently I've been really proud of, and I'm really happy to have been part of it. Oh, kudos

Veronica Sopher:

to you. I love that. Anything that supports K 12, it just pulls at my heartstrings, and I think it's so very. Important, and I love that brand responsibility within you, credit union coming in and recognizing that there's something we can do that helps our community, that also brings recognition. So great job of pitching pitching that out. So Laura, how can people connect with you if you wanted to get two or three new professional connections from our members. How's the best way for them to connect with you?

Laura Frnka-Davis:

Pretty easy. Just send me an email. Laura at Lfd communications.com, I will be on vacation for the next week, so don't expect a response until the week of the 12th, when I'm back. And of course, always LinkedIn is a great place, but, yeah, I mean, I'm always open. Like you said, as solar entrepreneurs, we have to keep those connections going. We have to create new ones all the time, and have to just keep that networking going and add people and meet people. It's just something we have to do. Is what? Given what we do?

Veronica Sopher:

Yeah, no, absolutely. I agree, and I look forward to the day when we can connect on a project, because I know it's right around the corner somewhere. Absolutely, absolutely okay, guys, well, I will make sure that Laura's LinkedIn and her contact information are in the show notes. Be sure to connect with her. She is a wonderful asset, especially here in Houston. She knows lots of people, and she can definitely point you in the right direction. Laura, thank you so much for being on practically speaking Houston.

Laura Frnka-Davis:

That's my pleasure. I appreciate the opportunity.

Veronica Sopher:

You bet. All right, that wraps up this episode of practically speaking Houston. I'm your host, Veronica viso for I have the opportunity to come to you and introduce you to some of our fantastic members in our Houston chapter. So if you are listening on the podcast, make sure you hit subscribe. We don't want you to miss any episodes. And if you are watching on Facebook, Youtube or LinkedIn, drop us some comments. We would love to connect and we will catch you next time on the next episode you.