Bob Dirkes is the Account Director for Tech Image, Chicago’s leading independent high-tech public relations firm.  His primary mission is ensuring clients see their marketing goals and objectives translated into public relations results.  As the leader of an account team, Dirkes serves as the client’s chief program strategist, project manager and day-to-day relationship manager.

Since joining Tech Image in 2000, Dirkes has accumulated experience designing and implementing a diverse array of campaigns.  His clients have included: software companies specializing in analytics, customer relationship management, data integration, identity access, security and supply-chain optimization; IT consulting organizations concentrating on business intelligence, contact centers, technical support, enterprise systems and Web services solutions; and, insurance and financial services firms focusing on technology products or markets.  He is the firm’s primary Communications Coach, having conducted customized sessions for several hundred executives and managers.  In 2007, journalists from technology trade publications responding to PRSourceCode’s annual “Top Tech Communicators” survey cited Dirkes as one PR practitioner who “makes their life easier.”

Before coming to Tech Image, Dirkes was a Marketing Consultant to small technology companies, technology-focused advertising firms and entrepreneurs.  In the corporate arena, he was a Product Marketing Manager for start-up Isix software, the Director of Public Relations for luxury chain Preferred Hotels & Resorts, and the Director of Corporate Communications for global travel company BTI Americas – a subsidiary of EDS.  He also has worked as a Sports Reporter, Syndicated Radio Writer and Producer of more than 20 corporate videos.  In his spare time, he enjoys games of strategy such as chess and is a novelist in training.

Dirkes holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.  An Academic All-American NCAA football player and winner of the 1987 Big Ten Medal of Honor, he lives with his wife and two children in Wheeling, Illinois, and strives to restrict reliving past glories to cheering for his alma mater 12 Saturdays every fall.