Fremantle Press CEO welcomes new faces and farewells old

This will be a bit of a breathless post! I’m taking a big gulp of air between the Fremantle Press Annual General Meeting (AGM), Easter and my flight to the Sydney Writers’ Festival for some intense pitching sessions with visiting international publishers later this week.

But first, our AGM. Fremantle Press is supported by a seven-person voluntary board who give up time and energy to help me provide good governance across all our operations. They are also essential to us as ambassadors for our brand and as people who can help connect us with the broader business community.

At our last meeting we said goodbye to two members of the board while welcoming three new people to our ranks. We are very pleased to introduce new board members Louise Jones, Paul Beeson and Deborah Leavitt, who all joined the Fremantle Press team in April 2019.

Louise Jones was a qualified lawyer who worked as a barrister before a sea change led her to set up The Write Business with a colleague, providing writing services to businesses, government departments and not-for-profit organisations. Louise has been part of significant fundraising initiatives for Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and Asthma Foundation WA.

Paul Beeson was the CEO of the Perth Convention Bureau where he won a Western Australian Industry and Export Award for Marketing Excellence in 2011. He is an experienced board member with extensive experience in business development and stakeholder engagement in both the not-for-profit, corporate and government sectors nationally and internationally.

Deborah Leavitt is an award-winning broadcaster and leading media executive whose most recent role was as the Manager of ABC Radio National, where she successfully oversaw the drive to capture digital-first audiences. During her 25 years in public broadcasting, she proved highly skilled at developing new partnerships, initiatives and revenue streams.

On a sad note, in April we also said goodbye to Chris Lewis, a long-serving board member who first joined us in 2010 and was chairperson between 2012 and 2014, and Colin Campbell-Fraser, who joined the board in 2014 and helped make our 40-year anniversary a success. We hope you will join us in thanking them both for all their efforts on behalf of Fremantle Press.

Till next month!

Jane