Sheila Brooks, Ph.D.
Dr. Sheila Brooks is an accomplished entrepreneur, author, Emmy-award winning journalist and expert in multicultural marketing, energy and utilities, public health communications and entrepreneurial education. She is founder, president and CEO of SRB Communications, a full-service advertising, marketing and public relations agency that specializes in multicultural markets and video production. Her more than four decades of trailblazing leadership in media and communications reflects the long track record of success in and commitment to Washington, D.C.’s creative and entrepreneurial economy. The boutique agency has headquarters in Washington, D.C. with a satellite office in Baltimore, Md.
A former TV anchor, reporter, executive producer and news director, she has received more than 250 journalism and entrepreneurial awards and honors. Among them are a Minority Business Lifetime Achievement Award and induction into the Hall of Fame from the Capital Region Minority Supplier Development Council (CRMSDC), two Emmy-Awards, induction into the Mid-Atlantic region’s Emmy Award Hall of Fame, NABJ’s 2019 Ida B. Wells Award and a 2019 NAACP Image Award Nomination for her first book, Lucile H. Bluford and the Kansas City Call: Activist Voice for Social Justice. She wrote a chapter in the 2020 book, Meeting at the Table: Race, African-American Women Write on Race, Culture and Community.
Brooks is a dedicated advocate for minority and women entrepreneurs and small business. She is a thought leader who strongly supports meaningful change in diversity, equity and inclusion. Throughout her career, she has served on numerous national and local nonprofit and university boards. Most notably are the Federal City Council as a board trustee, Jim Vance Media Institute at Archbishop Carroll High School and Morgan State University’s School of Journalism and Communications, where she serves as Chair of the Board of Visitors. In her role as Chair of the President’s Club of DC, an organization of legacy African American entrepreneurs, she serves as a member of the advisory council on the Pepco Supplier Diversity Roundtable.
Brooks teaches multicultural marketing in The George Washington University’s graduate school’s Strategic Public Relations Program. She has a Ph.D. and Master of Arts degrees from Howard University, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in communications from the University of Washington in Seattle, where she was inducted in the department’s 2018 Hall of Fame.
