Rethink Ireland gears up for further social enterprise projects
Social innovation charity Rethink Ireland has strengthened its team with the appointments of a new chair, board member and two directors.
John Higgins, founding board director, has been announced as new chair, succeeding Dalton Philips. John is former CEO of the Retirement Planning Council of Ireland. He now manages his own company, Retirement Life, and he chairs JH Public Affairs.
He is the author of many publications on the subject of social enterprise development. He also chairs the €8m Bealach Nua project, and is establishing a design and studio facility in Ballaghaderreen to serve the digital creative sector in the Western Region.
Adam Harris has joined the board. He is founder and CEO of the autism charity AsIAm, which he founded based on his own experiences growing up on the autism spectrum.
AsIAm provides support to people with autism and their families, advocates on behalf of the community, and works to support public and private sector organisations and communities in becoming inclusive and accessible. From Greystones in Co Wicklow, Adam was appointed to the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission in July 2020.
Stephanie Walsh has been promoted to business development director, while Ciara O’Neill has joined as finance director.
Stephanie first joined Rethink Ireland five years ago as marketing and communications manager. She previously worked as senior account manager with advertising agency Language, managing accounts for clients in the public, private and public sector.
Ciara is a qualified chartered accountant and also has an MSc in the Management and Application of IT in Accounting. Having trained in Deloitte, Ciara has worked with a number of organisations across the private, commercial semi-state and not-for-profit sectors including Irish Intercontinental Bank, National Learning Network Ltd, An Post and Concern Worldwide.
Over the past six years, Rethink Ireland has created an €85m social innovation fund for Ireland, supporting more than 330 organisations to achieve groundbreaking impact across every county.
They have enabled these organisations to support over 1,500 people into employment, and have directly supported 677 jobs in the not-for-profit sector.
Reporting: The Irish Examiner