In 2001, Peter McKenna was on the corporate fast track at Smurfit in the publishing business. But a conversation with mentor Paddy Wright planted the seed for a dramatic career pivot as stadium director of Croke Park. When he took over, the stadium was under construction and loss-making. Last year, it had annual revenues of €132 million and paid a €16 million dividend to the GAA.
McKenna still serves as stadium director but he is also in charge of the GAA’s commercial arrangements and corporate partnerships.
In this episode of Sports Matters, he talks about making the stadium as a financial contributor to the GAA, the decision to take control of the association’s streaming service, and the lessons from his career.
Sports Matters is sponsored by the law firm Whitney Moore.
Having risen the ranks at JP Morgan and HSBC, Sligo native Deirdre McGettrick assumed she would eventually take a job with one of the companies that she advised. Instead, based on her experience of furnishing her own house, she became an unlikely entrepreneur in 2019. Today, Ufurnish.com is the UK’s largest home furnishing and comparison website. The company has just appointed Pat McCann, the founder of hotel group Dalata, as chair, and is currently in the process of raising up to £10 million to fuel expansion. In this podcast with Cait Caden, McGettrick talks about her journey from investment banking to running a start-up and outlines the company’s ambitious plans for the future.
Lisa Fallon just wants to do her job. As a female head coach in men's football that hasn't always been as easy as it should have been. She is now first team head coach at Galway United but as a child, she didn't know what opportunities were available to her. But her talent and coaching ability ensured that she would take them.
Longford native Anne-Marie Tomchak has worked for Mashable and was digital director of British Vogue. Now, she has launched the sustainable fashion business ShareJoy. The venture was founded to nurture and support young people during the pandemic following the loss of 23-year-old Irish woman Arwen Sullivan. It launched on ‘Blue Monday’ in January 2021 to highlight ShareJoy’s core value of promoting mental health awareness. In this podcast, she talks about the phone call she will never forget that inspired her to create ShareJoy, her career in the media and why what she is doing now is not so different from journalism.
Liam Cunningham gave up his career as an electrician with the ESB to become an actor in his twenties. It was in recent years, however, that he rose to worldwide fame for his role as Ser Davos Seaworth in Game of Thrones. Cunningham’s take on the impact the pandemic has had on the film and television industry is worth listening to but he is not shy about discussing politics, gender pay gap and lockdown, as well as turning down a role in Titanic.
Four years ago, Ken Cahill, the co-founder and CEO of SilverCloud asked his board for permission to move to Boston. The company, which provides online mental health programmes to health services, insurers and corporates, had expanded rapidly in Ireland and the UK, but to break into the US, Cahill felt he needed to be on the ground. The move has paid off, with the company securing new clients and, last year, some $16m in new investment from blue-chip backers. In this podcast with Ian Kehoe, Cahill, talks about the SilverCloud journey, and outlines its ambitious expansion plans, which includes entering the Australian and German markets. He talks about the key milestones since co-founding the business in 2012, including its first contract with the NHS and growing headcount from four to 90. Cahill talks about the company’s B2B business model, the importance of sales and gives his take on entrepreneurship, management and success. He also talks about his own entrepreneurial journey, including what he learned from a previous business failure.
Two years ago, Goodbody Stockbrokers launched Best 8, an equal-weighted stock list that represented the firm’s top global equity ideas. The idea was to introduce investors to a select number of blue-chip international stocks that were liquid. And, every day, the team at the Active Trading Desk at Goodbody sit down and assess the composition of the list. In this sponsored podcast, Padraig Rourke, head of the Active Trading Desk, talks about the strategy and tactics of the Best 8 – how investors can buy-in, the anticipated return, and the decision-making process behind the stocks that are picked. Rourke also talks through a range of stocks that have been included in the Best 8, including its successful investment in Southwest Airlines and its less successful holding in Walmart. He also talks about Allianz, Disney, and Visa, and explains why his team is always looking for a theme behind each investment.
In his 30-year career in journalism, Des Gibson has edited four different national newspapers – The Irish Daily Star, The Herald, The Sunday World and the Star on Sunday. As he launches a new boutique media and communications consultancy firm, Gibson reflects on his career in media and the challenges facing the sector. He provides the inside story of the rise and fall of the Star on Sunday, and how the experience taught him to take a hands-on role on the finances of all the newspapers he edited after its collapse. He talks about the culture of mistrust that existed within INM in the past and outlines how he restructured The Herald and dealt with legacy legal issues at The Sunday World. He talks about the business figures he most admires, and gives the elevator pitch for his new business.
Sarah Keane's time as CEO at Swim Ireland has involved managing crises. When she took over in 2004, the sport was dealing with the consequences of the George Gibney and Derry O'Rourke scandals. This is a past, she says, the sport must always be aware of, especially as many are reminded of it through the 'Where is George Gibney?' podcast. The sport is currently living through a different kind of crisis and it doesn't know what kind of sport will emerge when the pandemic is over or how many people, young people in particular, will be lost to the sport.
Pat Kiely was part of the executive team that launched TV3 in 1998 and stayed with the television channel for 22 years – first as commercial director and then as managing director. Having worked under five different owners and overseen the rebrand of TV3 to Virgin Media Television, he stepped down from the role last year. This week, he unveiled his new media business, BiggerStage, which aims to create content for international markets, deepen commercial partnerships and develop talent.
In this podcast with Ian Kehoe, Kiely talks about the BiggerStage business model, the mechanics of launching a company in the midst of a pandemic, and how ‘purpose’ helped him convince three industry heavy hitters to join his company. Kiely also talks about his journey in TV3 - from launching the channel to helping steer it through the financial crash to selling it to Liberty Global. He also reveals why he did not apply for the CEO role at the FAI, explains his business philosophies, and talks about his time as an adman with Saatchi & Saatchi and DDFH&B.
The madness can spread. Eliot Higgins is the founder of Bellingcat and in his new book he traces the origins of "an intelligence agency for the people" and the challenges the world faces in an age of disinformation
