North Richmond Community Health
For decades, North Richmond Community Health has tackled some of Victoria’s toughest health challenges head-on, from operating Victoria’s first Medically Supervised Injecting Room to providing essential healthcare for more than 3000 residents of the largest public housing estate in Australia.
Projects delivered:
Communications leadership for Australia's highest profile community health organisation.
When every leader knows their story, the organisation has a stronger voice.
“From the start, Fireside’s ethical, respectful and caring approach set them apart from others in the communications landscape. This team has been transformative.”
– Simone Heald, CEO, North Richmond Community Health
The challenge
Even passionate leaders can struggle to articulate their personal leadership journey in ways that strengthen their organisation's story. NRCH's executive team was doing transformative work in one of Melbourne's most challenging environments, but they needed help crafting individual narratives that showcased their unique expertise while reinforcing NRCH's mission.
The task? How do you help each executive develop authentic personal stories that feel genuinely theirs? How do you ensure these individual narratives strengthen rather than fragment NRCH's broader story? And how do you give leaders practical tools they can deploy confidently in meetings, conferences, and public forums while creating content that elevates the entire leadership team's profile in the sector?
How we solved it
We started with a three-hour intensive Leadership Narrative Workshop that sparked real vulnerability. Every executive team member showed up authentically, sharing vulnerable stories about the journeys that brought them to their roles – there were tears, laughter, and genuine connection as leaders discovered the power of their own experiences.
Building on that foundation, we conducted individual follow-up sessions with each executive, refining their workshop insights into polished personal narratives that captured their unique expertise while connecting seamlessly to NRCH's mission.
These narratives have been deployed across multiple platforms and contexts. NRCH transformed them into a LinkedIn campaign featuring each leader's story – posts that became some of their most successful social media content ever, generating significant sector engagement and recognition.
The impact went beyond any single application: leaders reported feeling more deeply connected to both the NRCH story and their own career purpose, with authentic, compelling stories they could confidently share in any professional setting.
What we learned:
What we learned:
- Workshops generate the raw material, but one-on-ones are where you find each leader's distinctive voice
- Get leaders telling their own stories first, and they'll champion the whole storytelling approach. Personal buy-in beats organisational mandate every time.