NEW YORK—Mindy Gikas has joined Porter Novelli as executive vice president and North American talent leader, be responsible for leading the firm’s employee engagement practices and career planning. She will report to Joseph Russo, Porter Novelli's chief operating officer. Prior to joining Porter Novelli, Gikas spent three-and-a-half years at Ruder Finn, as senior vice president, human resources and recruiting and nine years with Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide in various roles.

LOS ANGELES—Max Martens has joined CRT/tanaka as vice president of the firm’s Los Angeles office. Before joining CRT/tanaka, Martens worked as vice president at Porter Novelli, vice president at EvansHardy + Young in Santa Barbara, Cal., and as client services manager for Douglas Consulting Group, now Cohn & Wolfe Los Angeles. He brings experience in food and beverage, food service, health, consumer products and business-to-business marketing.

NEW YORK—Henry Engleka has joined Porter Novelli as a senior vice president in its global health and wellness practice. Prior to joining Porter Novelli, Engleka was CEO at P4 Strategy Group, a health communications agency in New York City. He also had been co-founder of Zibbel, which offers mobile health solutions to providers of health services and before that spent nine years with Widmeyer Communications, ultimately serving as principal and managing director of the New York office.

EAST RUTHERFORD, NJ—Angela Calzone has joined MWW as senior vice president, talent resources and organizational development. She will lead the agency’s staff training and employee development efforts, as well as serve as a senior member of the firm’s executive committee and oversee the agency’s human resources functions. Calzone most recently served for 10 years as a co-managing member of Change & Response Strategies, a consortium of leadership, management, human resources, marketing strategists and corporate trainers.

RALEIGH, NC—French/West/Vaughan has hired Dan Strickford as group account director. Strickford comes to FWV from ID Public Relations in Los Angeles, where clients included Netflix, Neutrogena, Darden, Spanx and Mercedes-Benz. In addition, the firm has hired Spencer Harrison as account supervisor and Liz Moy as account executive. It has promoted Jay Wisse, who leads the sports and entertainment practice, to senior vice president and Leah Knepper and Shannon Burton to group account director.

TORONTO—Joseph Peters has been promoted to senior vice president and national practice lead for social, digital and public engagement at Hill+Knowlton Strategies Canada. He takes over from Boyd Neil, who will continue to be an active member of the firm as a senior digital strategist. Peterscame to H+K with a strong research and analytical background as a co-founder of Ascentum, a public participation and stakeholder engagement firm.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fl—The O’Donnell Agency has added Tony Theissen as senior brand manager and media strategist; Armando Lazo to head the design team as art director; German Blanco as senior graphic designer; and Maycee Duke is the firm’s accounts coordinator. Theissen brings 25 years of experience in major-market television news, most recently as managing editor at WPEC-TV (CBS12) where he supervised all aspects of news gathering and reporting.