We are very excited to announce that we have secured Dr. Frank Luntz as the speaker for our Lincoln Chamber of Commerce Annual Lunch.  The annual event is scheduled for Feb. 9 at the Cornhusker Marriott Hotel.

Frank Luntz is one of the most honored communication professionals in America today. Sir David Frost calls him “the Nostradamus of pollsters,” and Time magazine named him one of “50 of America’s most promising leaders aged 40 and under.” He is the “hottest pollster” in America according to the Boston Globe, one of the four “Top Research Minds” according to BusinessWeek, and a winner of the coveted Washington Post “Crystal Ball” award for being the most accurate pundit. Luntz’s focus groups have become so influential that presidential candidate Barack Obama had this to say following the PBS presidential debate: “When Frank Luntz invites you to talk to his focus group, you talk to his focus group.”

Luntz has written, supervised, and conducted more than 2,000 surveys, focus groups, ad tests, and dial sessions in over two dozen countries and four continents over the past decade. He has become the go-to consultant when Fortune 100 companies and their CEOs need communication and language guidance, from General Motors to Federal Express, as well as for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and the Business Roundtable. In some capacity he has helped almost 30 Fortune 100 companies navigate the economic climate and connect more closely with consumers.

The “Instant Response” focus group technique pioneered by Luntz has been profiled on 60 Minutes, Good Morning America (on Election Day 2008) and on the award-winning PBS show Frontline.  He has been a guest on virtually every talk show in America, including Meet the Press, Nightline, The Today Show, Charlie Rose, The Jim Lehrer News Hour, The O’Reilly Factor, Tavis Smiley, Montel Williams, and Hardball.  He also served as a consultant to the award-winning NBC hit show The West Wing.

More media outlets have turned to Luntz to understand the hopes and fears of Americans than to any other political pollster. In 2008, he was the “Focus Group Czar” for Fox News, conducting over 40 sessions in 14 states, as well as co-hosting four live hour-long prime time specials and dial sessions during every debate. Luntz was a primary night and election night commentator for The News with Brian Williams on MSNBC in 2000 and for Hardball in 2004.  His reoccurring segments on MSNBC/CNBC, “100 Days, 1,000 Voices” won the Emmy Award in 2001. Luntz has conducted focus group sessions for all three major television networks, two of the three cable news channels, PBS and the BBC, as well as for The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, The New Yorker, and U.S. News & World Report.

Frank is the author of three New York Times bestsellers in a row: Words that Work: It’s Not What You Say it’s What People Hear (2007), What Americans Really Want…Really (2009) and WIN: The Principles to take Your Business From Ordinary to Extraordinary (2011) – which hit the New York Times and Wall Street Journal lists in its very first week of release. He has also written about language for The Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Financial Times, The Times of London, and the Washington Post.

Frank graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with honors and a Bachelor of Arts degree in history and political science, and was awarded a Thouron Fellowship. He received his Doctorate in Politics at the age of 25 from Oxford University. In the spring of 1993, Frank was named a Fellow at Harvard University’s Institute of Politics, the second youngest individual ever to receive this honor.

The chamber’s annual lunch is always one of the hottest tickets of the year with a number of years consecutively sold out.  I would anticipate that this year won’t be different.  Get your reservation early at www.LCOC.com.

The Lincoln Chamber of Commerce’s mission is to improve the lives of Lincoln residents by providing increased economic opportunity and can only be accomplished together.  Networking opportunities, business advocacy, and creating economic viability are critical to our success.  We encourage you to become a member and help us achieve these goals for Lincoln.  For more information, please contact either Paul Miloni at 402-436-2350, email at pmiloni@lcoc.com or visit us online at http://www.lcoc.com/