Julie Henderson to join Pinterest as chief communications officer

LOS ANGELES: Seven years at Snap Inc, one of the toughest calls of her career, and now a fresh start at Pinterest. Julie Henderson has announced she is leaving her post as chief communications officer at Snap to take up the same title at Pinterest, capping off a run that saw her steer the company’s narrative through AI, augmented reality and the Spectacles hardware push.

Henderson didn’t mince words about the exit. “Leaving Snap was one of the hardest decisions of my life,” she said, thanking chief executive Evan Spiegel and her team for “an unforgettable seven years.” Stepping into her old seat at Snap is Russ Caditz-Peck, who Henderson congratulated as he “takes the reins.”

At Snap since 2019, Henderson ran global communications spanning product innovation, corporate strategy, financial markets and policy engagement, shaping how investors, policymakers and the public understood the company’s bets on immersive computing and camera-first technology. Her brief stretched from AI and AR advancements to creator tools, the advertising platform, and the evolving Spectacles line, working closely with product and engineering teams to translate the roadmap into a credible growth story.

Pinterest, evidently, made the pitch worth taking. “What drew me to Pinterest was the people, the ambition and the huge opportunity ahead,” Henderson said, adding that the more she got to know the company, “the more convinced I became that they’re building something very special.”

Henderson’s résumé reads like a masterclass in corporate messaging under pressure. Before Snap, she spent six years as chief communications officer at Twenty-First Century Fox, and prior to that held senior roles at News Corp across corporate affairs, communications and corporate strategy, having cut her teeth over 13 years at MPRM Communications.

Pinterest now has a communications veteran steeped in AI storytelling, capital markets and crisis management at the helm, just as the platform leans harder into its own AI ambitions. For a company chasing relevance in an increasingly crowded social landscape, that’s a hire that could shape the narrative for years to come.