Joe Phelps

Getting Better Foundation: In the early 1990’s, Joe became interested in a perception gap that contributes to a rise in anxiety, depression, substance abuse and other challenges. Although we live in the greatest time to be alive, as war, famine, crime and poverty are on the decline, many perceive the world as getting worse. Joe believes “If people can see beyond the headlines to the truth of the trendlines, they’ll fear each other less, trust one another more, and therefore, help one another more.” In 2015, he founded the Getting Better Foundation. The Foundation has adopted media literacy as its weapon of choice to treat this perception gap. It’s helping to launch media literacy curriculum in schools. It’s first major project is “Trust Me”, the documentary.

The Phelps Group: Joe was CEO of The Phelps Group, a renowned marketing communications agency in Los Angeles. He founded the agency in 1981. As the longest-running CEO of a significantly-sized agency in LA, he sold it to the 9thWonder agency network in 2018. Prior to that he was named “Entrepreneur Leader of the Year” by Western States Advertising Association, is a Belding Award-winning writer, was featured on the cover of Inc Magazine, and served on numerous non-profit boards. Joe’s client-based-team model has been used as a case study at Northwestern, University of Colorado, Pepperdine and USC. He authored “Pyramids are Tombs”, an organizational design book, which instructs business leaders how to empower workforces.

Prior to the agency Joe was a musician, band manager and studio engineer in the Ozarks. He now resides at his Rancho Relaxo on the Yellowstone, just north of The Park.