Every March, St Patrick’s Day transforms Dublin — but few people know the man helping to turn a single parade into one of Ireland’s biggest cultural and economic events.
Richard Tierney is the CEO of St Patrick’s Festival, the organisation behind Ireland’s national celebration. In thispodcast with Ian Kehoe, Tierney explains how the festival has evolved into a multi-day, citywide programme — with free daytime events, night-time culture and thousands of participants — while still carrying the weight of national identity at home and abroad.
Coming from a background in live entertainment and major commercial deals, Tierney was brought in with a clear brief: make the festival financially sustainable without losing its cultural soul.
Scurri, the delivery management software company founded by Wexford entrepreneur Rory O’Connor, was growing impressively before the crisis. The pandemic, however, accelerated that growth exponentially with an increasing number of retailers looking to improve their online footprint. And to capitalise on “being in the right place at the right time”, Scurri has just raised €9 million in funding to expand its offer and triple its workforce. In this podcast with Ian Kehoe, O’Connor talks about the genesis of the business, and how a decision to pivot from B2C to a B2B model transformed the company. He also talks about dealing with Brexit, the future of the high street, and raising funds during a pandemic. O'Connor also reflects on his own career journey – from his time as an executive with Waterford Crystal to working as a consultant with Intel and Heineken. And he explains the advantages of running a business from Wexford.
As a National Hunt jockey, Richard Dunwoody's life was defined by his obsession: obsession to win and, more importantly, an obsession not to lose. Since retiring more than 20 years ago, he has set himself different challenges, travelling to the North and South Pole among other places. But he has had a smaller world since the pandemic hit and that has caused him to reflect as well.
One year on from her first interview with The Currency, the founder of Tour America and Cruise Holidays looks back on a pandemic she then expected to be an “emergency” and later turned into a protracted crisis. Mary McKenna says what has saved her travel agency was the retained profits she had left in the business – along with a mighty team effort to “do the right thing” for customers forced to cancel their holidays. With fresh bookings now flowing in, the only infectious thing in McKenna’s interview with Thomas Hubert is her optimism.
The economist Colm McCarthy has a wide range of views across a wide range of subjects – and he is not afraid to share them. In this podcast with Alison Cowzer, McCarthy assesses the state’s wartime response to Covid-19, explains why tax increases are unavoidable, and interrogates the structural malfunction linking Irish banks to the housing crisis. McCarthy, who has authored two major government reports on cost-cutting in the public sector, also talks about the attitude of policymakers to fiscal responsibility, the contradiction of Ireland’s emissions policy, and what he would like to see included in the forthcoming National Development Plan. A lifelong football fan, he also talks about the economics of the ill-fated European Super League, why the European Commission allows anti-competitive rules in football, and argues for more state involvement in the FAI.
As an equity analyst with Susquehanna, Gareth Hickey found he had a large reading list, and not enough time to get through it. While The Economist offered a narrated audio service of its content, there was no one place that offered narrated journalism from a selection of publications. So, in 2015, he decided to build one. Today, the company he leads, Noa, is nearing 50,000 monthly active listeners and has commercial relationships with The New York Times, The Economist, the Washington Post and the Irish Times. In this podcast with Ian Kehoe, he talks about Noa's struggles to land its first customers, the rise of narrated content and how he signed up the Harvard Business Review. Hickey also talks about the company’s business model, and explains why publishers need to embrace new methods of delivery to attract a younger audience. He reveals the company’s international expansion plans, and how, having already raised €1.2m, it will launch its Series A funding round later this year.
Andy Reid's career became a symbol for the debate that still surrounds Irish football when he was exiled from Giovanni Trapattoni's Ireland squad following a late night argument with the manager in a hotel bar. As he makes a career as a coach, he says Ireland needs to accept that it has talented players and why the media and social media today can be so damaging for young sportspeople.
Tommie Gorman's analysis and expertise made him one of the most trusted journalists in Ireland. As he prepares to begin contributing to The Currency, he analyses the state of Irish political life, north and south of the border.
In 1983, Ciaran Rowsome quit his job with the IDA to launch Flextime, a Dublin company that helps businesses manage their employee time and attendance. Today, 400 customers and 200,000 users across Europe use Flextime to manage the time and attendance of staff. The company's solution is used by the Oireachtas in Ireland and the UK passport office. In this podcast with Cait Caden, Rowsome talks about his entrepreneurial journey and how he got it off the ground through “hard graft and an overdraft”. Rowsome spoke about the company's expansion into Britain, where it trades as Multitime, and his plan to open a new office in Manchester in the coming months. He also reveals how he is working with Enterprise Ireland to develop a new product to export into new markets. Rowsome talks about the rise of flexible working, the future of the office, and how Covid-19 has changed the relationship between employers and employees.
Rebecca Moynihan has made important interventions in the housing debate but can the Labour party be heard above the noise? She talks to Dion Fanning about why the state must take control of the housing crisis, the Dublin Bay South by-election and why the Labour Party still has to deal with the austerity legacy.
Ursula Von der Leyen called it a "state hijacking", President Biden condemned it and Ryanair called it "aviation piracy". Belarus's decision to divert a plane carrying the opposition leader Roman Protesavich and his girlfriend Sofia Sapega and force it to land in Minsk has been condemned around the world. But who is the president Alexander Lukashenko and is this the death rattle from Europe's last dictator or can he hold onto power. Andrew Wilson has written the definitive book on Lukashenko and in this podcast he talks to Dion Fanning about his rise and how his handling of Covid led to the mobilisation of a new opposition.
