Greg Henricks has retired from his job as News Editor at Macquarie Southern Cross’ Gold Coast radio centre. He spoke to radioinfo conveying thanks for all the good wishes from readers and telling us about his health: “I’m doing really well, while I’m not able to continue with work at the moment, I have essentially retired and will have a bit of a rest and time with the family over Christmas.”
Hendo has been in radio for 35 years, almost to the day. He says his greatest joy in the radio industry has been to help young people learn their craft. Hendo is well respected by colleagues and rivals alike because of his positive outlook and genuine warmth. He talks to us about his career and, most importantly, sends “a huge thanks to everyone for all their messages. It felt like Team Hendo was a national organisation supporting me…. and I’m going to be around for a while yet! Guaranteed!”
His 35 year career – with 20 of them at 2WS – took the path below…
1973: Office Boy 2GB.
74-75: Announcer 2PK Parkes.
75-76: B’fast jock 2AD Armidale.
76-78: B’fast jock 2KM Kempsey.
1979: PD/NEWS/Assistant Manager 2MO Gunnedah.
79-81: Reporter/News Presenter 2SM.
81-2001: All news roles incl News Director A.R.N. Sydney.(WS-MIX-96.1)
01-05: News Director WIN Radio.
05-08 News Director Macquarie-Sthn Cross Gold Coast.
Reminiscing about his career Hendo told radioinfo:
“The thing about the radio business really is the people. I have met so many really great people and so many great characters. It’s the industry that just attracts terrific, creative and fun people, many of whom I have made life long friends. It’s an amazing business really and it continues to carry on, even now with the challenges of striking that balance between picking up and grooming young and new staff and meeting the demands of shareholders.”
Hendo is not a fan of networking, when he started out, one of his early jobs was at 2AD. ”We had an announcer for every shift and now there aren’t opportunities, but those young people still manage to find a way. I don’t mind the celebrity thing, even though it does make it harder for young rookies to grow into announcer celebrities, but there are still great opportunities in the industry for those who work at it.”
From a news point of view, he is disappointed there are not enough older mentors around: “we’ve got young people leading young kids and it’s so much harder to ensure that we maintain our credibility in our newsrooms.”
Being up on the Gold Coast the last three years has been “fantastic,” according to Hendo, but has was disappointed at the attacks on my Macquarie Southern Cross bosses being seen as corporate entity:
“From my personal experience Rhys Holleran, Rod Brice and Nick Scott have backed me to the hilt, supporting me, keeping me involved in every aspect of the business. It’s a great organisation and I can’t speak highly enough of them all.
“The biggest disappointment in my career was the attack in 2006 by Media Watch for networking into south western WA from the Gold Coast office, while at the very same time the ABC was doing it’s news from Perth into Sydney! It was so disappointing to be attacked, especially by someone I thought was a friend, Monica Attard. Eventually we got a laugh about of it.. and our newsroom contacts developed 10 fold. People who wanted to let us know about something, or find out about what was happening, in the WA region would call us direct .. so it backfired on poor old Monica.”
Hendo says he’s had a great career, with so much fun travelling and meeting all kinds of characters. “I just got lucky to land this job!”