Chrissie
McHenry

Chrissie McHenry is a managing principal in Raben's Strategic Communications practice, joining the firm after having held senior positions with corporate, nonprofit, and media organizations. She brings a journalist’s eye to her work, coupled with robust experience supporting the communications efforts of hundreds of community development organizations.

Chrissie was previously senior vice president of public relations with NeighborWorks America, a national housing and community development organization chartered by Congress that leads a network of almost 250 independent, local nonprofits across the nation. Chrissie provided strategic communications counsel to the NeighborWorks CEO and to colleagues in four regional offices. She also provided high-level communications support to the leadership of network organizations around crisis communications and reputation management, nonprofit governance, and overall visibility, including politically sensitive stakeholder and funder messaging and outreach.

Prior to joining NeighborWorks, Chrissie was director of communications, community, and corporate responsibility for Fannie Mae, working extensively in crisis communications, reputational risk, community relations, and managing diversity communications for the company. Throughout the foreclosure crisis of the late 2000s, Chrissie worked to help homeowners facing foreclosure and the communities where they lived weather the financial storm of the Great Recession.

For a large part of her career, Chrissie was a broadcast journalist covering politics for a number of leading news organizations, including as the senior producer of Washington Week with Gwen Ifill on PBS and through a variety of roles with CBS News, ABC News Nightline, and PBS’s NewsHour.

Chrissie sits on the board of Solar United Neighbors and the Nantucket Boys and Girls Club. In her spare time, she loves to needlepoint and is planning an eventual Appalachian Trail through walk (despite the skepticism of her three children). Chrissie holds a bachelor’s degree from Tufts University in Political Science and French.