Off the Fence with Purpose

The guest in this episode is Mac O’Brien an 18 year old entrepreneur who began building businesses when he was just 13. If you listen once you will want to go back and listen again and again. His stories and the lessons learned for someone so young in business will keep you enthralled.He comes from an entrepreneurial family, his grandfather was the founder of Funderland which is said to be possibly the largest travelling Amusement Park event in Europe.  Mac began his business career at 13 by reselling sneakers and clothing, eventually moving into bulk buying and wholesaling. Then he moved into door-to-door window cleaning, where he knocked on approximately 4,500 doors and built a team of eight friends. He focused heavily on efficiency, reducing cleaning times from around 45 minutes to roughly 20 minutes and generating significant weekly revenue.Website development, came next offering local businesses free websites in exchange for recurring monthly fees. This evolved into his current AI-focused company, ACMR, which helps SMEs identify opportunities to use AI, automate processes and improve operational efficiency. Rather than relying on subscription software, Mac's approach emphasises building customised systems that businesses own as assets. He estimates that the business will hit its first million euros in sales shortly.A major theme is Mac's ability to identify knowledge gaps and turn them into business opportunities. He secured an early €3,000 AI consulting deal after meeting a group of solicitors and explaining how AI could improve their businesses. He subsequently built a team, including a technical co-founder, and expanded internationally to recruit talent.Mac is strongly focused on bootstrapping rather than venture capital, preferring experienced advisers and sustainable growth. He aims to build an Irish-native technology company before potentially expanding internationally. His ambitions extend beyond business, including robotics and eventually entering politics and going for the Irish presidency.Some of the lessons you will hear from Mac’s short but extensive careers are:Start early and learn by doing: Practical experience can develop valuable skills faster than theory alone.Turn skills into scalable systems: Mac repeatedly looked for ways to improve efficiency and create recurring revenue.Listen to experienced people: He believes conversations should be roughly 80% listening and 20% speaking, with strong follow-up questions.Identify genuine market gaps: His AI business grew from recognising that companies knew they needed AI but lacked the knowledge to implement it.Ambition requires focus—but balance matters: His intense commitment has driven rapid progress, though his 16–18-hour workdays also highlight the importance of considering sustainability and personal wellbeing.Mac’s enthusiasm is infectious

Coming from a family with a strong work ethic provided Sarah Carey with the necessary strength to overcome adversity and learn many life lessons which benefitted her in her business career. Her family business encompassed auctioneering, retail, teaching, farming as well as a strong involvement in local politics, her father William was a councillor on Meath County Council for 47 years.These life lessons stood her well through a range of careers which included: marketing roles with Esat Telecom and Cape Clear, strategic consultant and writer with Cuil, the internet search engine, radio presenter with national station Newstalk, newspaper columnist with Irish Times, Sunday Times and Irish Independent, a Director of Strategic Communications with Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) as well as chair, MC, facilitator and speaker at many national conferences and events.In this conversation with Jim and Ellen she discusses the ups and downs of this varied career. She entered Trinity College to study history aged 17 and although always wanting to be a journalist, immediately on graduating she went to work with the Education Building Society (EBS).On advice from a friend, she wrote to entrepreneur Denis O’Brien seeking work with the newly formed Esat Telecom. She went through some intense interviews and was given the choice of three jobs; she chose one in marketing. When she told her boss in the EBS he told her that if it didn’t work out there would always be a place for her at the EBS. Although she later saw examples of misogyny in various workplaces this was one of the many men, she worked with who had no such attitude towards woman.Describing her career, she said that there were lots of bumps along the way but also events that energised her. Writing a blog while at home following the birth of two of her children led to becoming a columnist with the Sunday Times. It was something she was reluctant to take but the Irish Editor at the time would not take no for an answer, say that as she was writing a daily blog called GUBU- “An Irish woman’s social, political and domestic commentary” she would be well capable of writing a weekly column.Her lessons and advice from what she terms her portfolio career included:*Get involved. Her involvement in debating, research and networking in Trinity College stood to her in her working career, particularly now when chairing, MCing and facilitating at conferences and events.* If you are facing adversary, keep going, you have no choice.* Understand what’s on social media is only a tiny tiny part of life.* Don’t stay in a negative environment.* For management. If having an issue with staff, listen to them.* Stay calm under pressure.This is an energetic conversation covering a whirlwind of a career._________________________________#Career tips #Trinity College #Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School #Marketing #Overcoming adversary #Irish Independent #Irish Times #Sunday Times #Newstalk #Appeals Board of the Architects and Chartered Surveyors #Denis O’Brien #Philip Boucher-Hayes #Tom McEnaney #Fiona McHugh #Terry Prone #Enda Kenny

For Denis Donohoe being bi-lingual paved the way for a career that brought him from Ireland to Asia through the UK and Eastern Europe and back to Ireland. It is a career that involved various management and marketing roles in the world of cosmetics, confectionary, football and charities. To land his first major work placement he used his love and fluency in French to target French companies in Ireland and found himself in Vichy, a brand  the International company L’Oréal. He rose through the ranks as Deputy General Manager Ireland, General Manager Poland, Deputy Regional Director-East Europe and Nordic Countries, Regional Director-Asia and Managing Director -UK & Ireland. However as the final logical move was a senior role in head office in Paris, probably the first non-French person to achieve that status he decided to return to Ireland, mainly as he had a young family at the time.Before returning he had a short stint as Global Head – Wholesale and Distribution with Crabtree and Evelyn in London where he helped develop the company’s international network of distributors. Back in Ireland he did an MBA and was the lured by an Executive Search person to apply for a job as Commercial Director of Lir Chocolates. Helping to double  Lir’s export sales in two years earned the company nominations in every Irish export awards  in 2019. However spending three hours every day driving from Dublin to Navan and back was a key issue in making another career change when an Executive Seach person entered his life again. Knowing that he was a lifelong supporter of Shamrock Rovers FC he was brought in as CEO of the football club and there  learned to the intricacies of event management. The benefit of becoming known and networking then led to a place on the board of a charity, Village Counselling Service in Tallaght, County Dublin.In between he bought and then sold a beauty salon in Dalkey, Co. Dublin.. One key lesson Denis has learned in his career is to under promise and over-deliver. If you don’t perform the consequences cascade everywhere, he says. You are adding pressure on those you report to who may have to report to someone further up the management ladder and perhaps your peers/colleagues who may have to have to take on additional work to put right the non-delivery. As he says that the closer you get to the top of an organisation the greater the pressure to deliver.A great example from Denis in how to have respect for your colleagues came in his move to Poland where his Polish was non-existent. But to ensure that his Polish colleagues who had no English or French were not at a disadvantage he did an intensive course in Polish.This episode provides an intriguing look into the workings of a global organisation and how how being adaptable  can help you move up the corporate ladder and switch careers if circumstances change or luck comes calling.

If there was one word to describe Brid O’Connell it is energetic. Her energy is palpable in this episode of Off the Fence with Purpose as she describes her career and the many lessons learned upon the way.Having studied Applied Chemistry at the University of Limerick and working as a Biochemist for two years she pivoted into marketing and brand development as CEO of Meath Tourism. This was followed by a period running her own company called Welcome Marketing, working primarily in the area of Strategic and Economic Development and delivering marketing and PR services in the tourism and retail sector for private and public bodies.Then she became CEO and Executive Director of Guaranteed Irish where she says she has worked hard at punching holes in people’s perception of the organisation.In a free-flowing conversation Brid speaks energetically and enthusiastically about her learnings in business throughout her career. Some highlights:·     Celebrating people around you is an investment in yourself.·     Be generous in spirit when dealing with people·     Studying is not necessarily learning.·     Either you are all in or you are not in.·     Leadership is about purpose.·     There is more to life than a job and a pay packet·     If you are happy in your work success is around the corner·     If you are searching for a career look for something that you have a real interest in·     And if you fail, fail fast, learn from it and move on.She has great admiration for Irish companies seeking to break into new markets, particularly the US. She saw this at first hand earlier this year spending St. Patrick’s Day in Washington. There she witnessed the strength of the Irish–American relationship and the extraordinary goodwill that exists for Ireland. Brid was particularly impressed with the input of An Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Irish public representatives who put in a gruelling itinerary on behalf of Ireland. The conversation also covered change in the Irish public service and the need to move away from the ‘blame’ culture.If you want to learn from someone who brings energy, enthusiasm and a get it done attitude to their career this episode is for you.

From teaching English in Japan to founding a corporate financial services businessBrian McDonald chats about how he discovered that the career he thought he would love was not for himTo please his father who believed he should get a career which guaranteed a steady income, Brian McDonald qualified as a Chartered Accountant.However, he believed that teaching was the career for him, so following his graduation he traveled to Japan to teach English in a rural area of the country.After two years he realised that teaching wasn’t for him.His business career then progressed in earnest working in Ireland, France and the UK with a variety of organisations.  First it was with a small chartered accountancy firm in Dublin, Duignan Carthy O’Neill, That was followed by a number of senior management roles which included : a manager in PWC, senior Manager in AIB Bank, executive director at GE Corporate Finance Bank, executive roles with Paragon Group UK Limited, a director at Beatha Technology and in 2018 establishing Bay Advisory.Bay Advisory is a provider of corporate finance services, offering guidance on mergers and acquisitions, financial restructuring and capital raising.In this chat with Jim and Ellen Brian recounts the many lessons learned during his varied career: his thoughts on leadership; entrepreneurship; remote working against office based; adjusting to different cultures and his admiration for people who work in and volunteer with charities.His advice for those  seeking to move up in your career: listen twice as much as you should speak; if you make a mistake, admit it, learn from it and move on  If you are in a management role Brian says that it is important to encourage people to challenge or disagree with you and focus on people management as much as process management As someone with a very keen interest in sport Brian equates a team in sport with a business team in that no matter how good an individual team member is the team must perform.The conversation inevitably turned to AI with Brian explaining why he is positive about it with a human in the link.It’s another must listen-to episode

A wealth of common-sense thinking grounded on life experience.Catherine Corcoran Gearty on a career journey which should reassure and encourage anyone who is not sure about what lies aheadCatherine Corcoran Gearty was former head of consulting, partner and shareholder of top accounting firm RSM Ireland before the successful sale/merger with RSM UK in 2023. She built a substantial consulting practice specialising in People, Organisational Change and Transformation advisory.Catherine’s career was anything but linear and here she takes us through that journey which should reassure and encourage anyone who is not sure about what lies ahead.Listen here to find out what it was like working in two iconic Irish retailers, being head of HR and an early job-sharing practitioner in a maternity hospital, becoming a radio presenter interviewing a Governor of New York along with Boyzone and reading the news, all before becoming business consultant with a leading global provider of audit, tax and consulting services and now self employed as a business consultant advising CEOs and Boards.That is the career path of Catherine Corcoran Gearty the guest on this episode.Catherine has a great deal to offer both those who work in those sectors and those who aspire to finding a career in them.In this conversation with Jim and Ellen she describes her early days in Dunnes Stores and Arnotts, two iconic retailers. Although they had somewhat different cultures she found working in both exciting and great learning experiences.Moving into a more public service role as head of HR in a maternity hospital she was among one of the first people to have a job-share role. Her work in a local radio station in Dublin brought a renewed boost of confidence before moving into consultancy.Sharing her learnings Catherine recommends taking short breaks if you are considering a change of career and bringing your whole self to work in a career that suits your personal circumstances. She also encourages job seekers to be true to themselves.For HR and people managers Catherine’s experience has led her to the view that while policies are necessary to create order in the workplace it is equally important to balance policies with an awareness of people. The modern working environment is not just about skills but also about relationships. It is no longer just about command and control. She also talks about trying not to sweat the inherent unfairness often found in a workplace.In her consultancy role working with CEOs and Boards she says that governance and risk management are crucial. It is no longer enough for business leaders to say that they didn’t know when facing a crisis to the organisation’s reputation. The greatest risk is what you don’t know, she says.Catherine brings a wealth of common-sense thinking grounded on her life experience. It’s a great listen if you are reflecting on your career either where you are currently or looking for pastures new._______________________