When Rick Lenarcic left ARN in late January and said he wanted to look after his health, he didn’t just mean his own.
Rick has landed a new marketing role at Fortem Australia, a not-for-profit that supports the mental health and wellbeing of first responders and their families.
Here’s the official announcement from the organisation’s CEO, John Bale:
Rick Lenarcic has accepted a newly created position as Director of Marketing and Communications with Fortem Australia.
Rick joins Fortem with nearly 30 years of media experience and up to January this year had held several Executive roles at Grant Broadcasters and Southern Cross Austereo as COO and Head of Regional Media for both TV and Radio across majority of Regional Australia.
John says, ‘Not-for-profits rarely get the opportunity to have such senior and talented executives join their team. Rick is an incredibly well-known leader in Australia’s commercial media landscape, especially in regional Australia.
‘Rick has always had a very strong sense of community, something I found in working with him in my previous role as CEO of Soldier On, and most recently through the support of Grant Broadcasters for Fortem’s ‘Thank a First Responder Day’ campaign. So, when Rick identified that he would like to work directly with a community organisation to further give back, we jumped at the opportunity!
‘Despite having delivered evidence informed mental health programs across much of the East Coast of Australia, Fortem’s brand has yet to engage with people outside of first responder agencies. Rick’s experience and our recent government funding will allow Fortem to further connect the community to first responders and their families, and collectively support their mental health.’
Rick says, ‘I am very excited to be joining the Fortem team. After a four-month break, I am really looking forward to getting back to what I have enjoyed most in my previous media roles. To help Fortem gain brand and market awareness across Australia is a fantastic challenge and being part of the community and supporting first responders and their families ticks so many boxes in my passion for localism and community engagement.’
About Fortem Australia
Fortem Australia supports the mental health and wellbeing of first responders and their families. Fortem recently announced that the Federal Government had provided a $10 million grant to support first responders and their families across Australia. Fortem launched in October 2019 and has already supported over 13,000 first responders and their families in their first two years through a holistic model encompassing social connection activities, preventative resilience training, clinical support and employment transition. Fortem is now preparing to expand their services across Australia thanks to the Federal Government support.
For more information contact [email protected] or visit www.fortemaustralia.org.au.