JEREMY BERNARD

Jeremy Bernard

Jeremy Bernard is an author, political activist and served as White House Social Secretary and Special Assistant to the President from 2011-2015. He is co-author of Treating People Well: How to Master Social Skills and Thrive in Everything You Do. Jeremy has been interviewed on television and for print articles over the course of his White House tenure and was profiled in a recent article in Vogue magazine as the first male and first gay White House Social Secretary (March 2015). He was also profiled in the New York Times, “White Gloves Not Needed” (Sunday, April 20, 2012). He lived in Paris and worked as the senior advisor to the US Ambassador in France before becoming the White House Social Secretary. Prior to that, he was the White House Liaison to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). He had his own consulting firm in Los Angeles, worked as Director of Government Affairs for a cable television company, and worked for a family foundation. He has worked on various political campaigns, including the 1992 Clinton for President campaign, and on the 1993 Presidential Inaugural Committee, the 2009 Presidential Inaugural Committee and was appointed by President Clinton to the Presidential Advisory Committee for the Arts of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He was also appointed to the Democratic National Committee in 2001 and reappointed in 2005. He was an Obama Super Delegate in 2007-2008. He has given numerous speeches, including at the Meridian International Center.

Speech topics

Treating People Well: How Kindness Can Prevail

The New York Times Review of Books recently called Treating People Well “the first book we are all obliged to read in 2018.” Former White House social secretary Lea Berman, who worked for George and Laura Bush, and Jeremy Bernard, who worked for Michelle and Barack Obama, share the empowering lessons they learned about how to work productively with different people from many walks of life and points of view. They share what they’ve learned through personal examples of their own glamorous (and sometimes harrowing) moments with celebrities, foreign leaders and that most unpredictable of animals – the American politician.

Politely Correct: On Civility in Politics and Life

Authors Jeremy Bernard and Lea Berman show us how people from opposite ends of the political spectrum and all walks of life can build relationships, earn trust, and succeed by treating others with civility and respect. These former White House social secretaries give specific advice for how to exude confidence even when you don’t feel it, ways to establish your reputation as an individual whom people like, trust, and want to help, and lay out the specific social skills still essential to success - despite our increasingly digitized world. Jeremy and Lea prove that social skills are learned behavior that anyone can acquire, and tell the stories of their own unlikely paths to becoming the social arbiters of the White House, while providing tantalizing insights into the character of the first ladies and presidents they served.

Books

Treating People Well: How to Master Social Skills and Thrive in Everything You Do

A guide to personal and professional empowerment through civility and social skills, written by two White House Social Secretaries.

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