197 - Rico Ricketson - Representation And Human-Centered Healing In Corporate America
“When my mom passed her last breath, I said to her, I am your legacy; I will provide healing. I am your legacy.” - Rico Ricketson
Dropping this convo alongside recent pop culture reminders (hello, little mermaids and Emmy Award-winners!) that representation matters because it heals. Rico Ricketson created an entire platform around that idea. He’s the founder and CEO of MH3, a subscription-based resource that partners with corporations to provide mental health education featuring the voices and experiences of diverse health and wellness experts. In addition to over 2000 hours of online information, MH3 provides immersive mental health workshops and mental wellness campaigns tailored to an organization’s needs.
“We provide credible mental health education so that employees can learn how to catch changes in mood, energy levels, and sleeping patterns before they become something more serious,” Rico says of the company he founded in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Like many, he watched in horror as the virus raged across Italy. Desperate to help save lives, even as he sheltered in place, Rico mined his 20 years of healthcare advertising experience, his expertise in human-centered design, and his Master's in Biology/Neuroscience for a meaningful solution.
While Rico’s professional credentials are massively impressive, it’s his personal motivations for creating MH3 that I find so profoundly moving. As a minority, a survivor of domestic violence, and a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, finding credible mental health information from experts with whom he shares similar lived experiences isn’t easy. He designed MH3 to deliver that vital life-saving mental wellness support through engaging interviews featuring voices not often represented in corporate wellness programs. “The only thing capitalistic about MH3 is that I hope millions and billions of people get to heal from stories.”
The platform’s narrative format is unlike anything out of the current corporate wellness playbook. That methodology is thanks in large part to Rico’s mother, a woman who shared the details of her complex journey with others, inspiring them to chart their own healing path. “Being her legacy meant listening, healing. I'm in corporate America; there's not a lot of that going on,” Rico says. “So, I led with that, and I was known for that. And that was because of her.”
Representation does matter. And stories do heal.
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Rico Ricketson is the Founder & CEO of MH3, Mental Health Education for the Mind, Body, and Spirit. When Rico learned of Covid-19's spread throughout Italy in March of 2021, he used his passion and desire to help and save lives. Rico took his 20 years of healthcare advertising experience and combined it with his expertise in human-centered design and his Master's in Biology/Neuroscience to create MH3 so he could do something to help.