Angela Mak

Dr Angela Mak is the first Hong Kong native received a PhD specialized in Public Relations from the United States (University of Oregon). Throughout her whole education and career life, her area of focus is all about public relations and most of her scholarly works involved partnerships with organizations across different sectors in the US, Singapore, Hong Kong and Australia. During her doctoral study, Dr Mak was appointed as Chair of Research Committee of the International Association of Business Communicators’ Research Foundation, headquartered in San Francisco. Her PhD dissertation was funded by PeaceHealth, one of the largest nonprofit medical groups in Pacific Northwest, and her recommendations on social responsibility were adopted by the top management.

Dr Mak’s research areas of expertise include social responsibility, community engagement and cancer survivorship. She has published over 20 research articles in international peer-reviewed journals and book chapters, including the Journal of Public Relations Research, Public Relations Review, Journal of Brand Management, Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation, Journal of Cancer Survivorship, Journalism and Mass Communication Educator, Australian Journalism Review and Journal of Nonprofit and Public Sector Marketing among others. She has also won 4 best research paper awards in top communication and public relations international conferences (i.e. ICA, AEJMC and IPRRC). Dr Mak has a special interest in using her communication expertise in solving health-related issues to form a larger stakeholder policy community.

During her last posting in the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication & Information at Nanyang Technological University, she has supervised half a dozen of student-led nationwide campaigns. Notably, the inaugural cyber wellness summit in 2008 (co-organized with government agencies and NPOs), Sharing Plates cookbook launch in 2011 (with the National Cancer Centre Singapore) and Youth Hawkerprise campaign in 2013 (with a mention by the Prime Minister Office and his personal congratulating note) were well received by the media and local community.

In 2010, Dr Mak won a competitive grant from the Singapore Cancer Society, the only awarded team at NTU. Since then, she continues to lead this only team in Asia examining cancer survivors and work issues through doing research with medical professionals to develop evidence-based interventions for the cancer community. With her expertise in community engagement, health promotion and strategic communication, Dr Mak believes that at the end of the day, ideas without action do not make a difference.

Research Interest

Social responsibility, Community engagement, Cancer survivorship, Health communication, Identity and reputation management, Public relations education and pedagogy