Episode 24 | CARMEL DOYLE | CEO, Jack & Jill Foundation

Welcome to Face Forward, the inspiring change podcast on all things internal communications, engagement, leadership, and change. Hi and welcome to this edition of Face Forward. It is a beautiful spring morning here in Ireland, and I'm down in County Kildare with the Jack and Jill Foundation. More on that in a second. When you look at Ireland as a country, it's amazing. We're so small, yet we are the most philanthropic country in Europe. We give more money per capita to charity than any other European country, and actually we give the fifth highest in the world. And it's amazing when you look at the charity sector, it's huge here. You know, some, some stats from the Wheel, which is Ireland's national association for charities, voluntary organizations, and nonprofits. There are 10,000 registered charities, a further 20,000 organisations in the wider nonprofit sector. All of them together have an annual turnover of €14.5 billion. They employ 190,000 staff. They've got 50,000 volunteer board members and directors. And actually, they employ 500,000 operational volunteers, which the Central Statistics Office interestingly have done a bit of sums on And they reckon that's worth about €2 billion a year of free hours of time that people are willing to give. So it's phenomenally important as a sector in the Irish economy, in the Irish psyche, and in the way people are in this country. So it's with great pleasure that I'm here today with the Jack and Jill Foundation, as I said, with Carmel Doyle, who is the CEO. Carmel, good morning.

Thank you very much, Scott. You're very welcome.

Thank you. And this is a charity which is very close to my heart. As I said before we came on air, I was chatting to Carmel and actually good friends of mine. Their son is a recipient of support from Jack and Jill, so I know well the amazing work that you and the team do. So, before we kick off, why don't you tell me, as we often do on these podcasts, a little bit, first of all, about you and where you've come from, and then give us the Jack and Jill background as well.

Sure, okay. I am 51 years old. I started work a long time ago when I was 17, when I burst in the door of NCB Stockbrokers in Ferry House in Lower Mount Street, and I was very lucky to get the best start in any career with Dermot Desmond and the team. Now bearing in mind this was 1985, Scott, so this was a time where people like me, who decided that I didn't want to go to college, I wanted to be independent and earn money as quickly as possible. It was at a time where you weren't really thinking career, you were thinking, how do I get a good job? But I ended up in this phenomenal office with stockbrokers led by Dermot Desmond, who gave this sense of belief to people like me, that I walked in the door as a secretary and I was trained up in the research department and sponsored to do a marketing course at nighttime. To the point where I often say to people, if we could bottle what we had then in NCB in 1985 for 4 and a half years, the years I was there, I could really have made a lot of money in terms of HR because the drive, the energy, working with Dermot who was challenging the norm of stockbroking. Before then, I suppose it was seen as an old boys' club, but he very much put the value into research and our research department The finance department was there churning out reports and making recommendations, and it gave me a very good grounding in financial services, in investor relations, and just in the whole area of team and what motivates a team. And we had something very special then, to the point where, you know, 4 and a half years later, I thought— there was a change of management, and I thought, will I go, will I stay? And I think if I hadn't left at that stage, I probably would have never left NCB. And one of my best friends actually still works with Dermot to this day, and I often wonder what would have happened if I didn't go, because when I was leaving, Dermot actually said to me, well, would you not consider going on to the private client desk at this stage? But anyway, I had been told about— I started talking to a couple of journalists I know, and I said, look, I'm thinking about a move now from stockbroking, what do you think? And they said, well, you're writing reports and you understand how to read a balance sheet, you're dealing with the media anyway, why don't you consider going into 'PR,' which was a very small module on my marketing course. And I said, 'Well, who do you think is really good in the PR terms?' And somebody suggested I meet Pat Heanahan. And I went and met Pat Heanahan and Bill O'Herlihy at the time. And I remember Bill saying at the time, 'Well, we'll take you on because you can read a balance sheet and anyone can learn PR, but you're good at English.' So that's how— that was my first taster. So I was in with Pat Heanahan, who was fantastic. A guy to work with for 2 years, learning all about how to write a press release, how to set up a photo call, all the basics of PR. And then, as you do, and in my generation, there was this draw to travel, so I decided at the ripe old age of 24 to take time out and to go traveling around the world. So we did the Boston, San Francisco, Hawaii, Sydney, and I, again, I think I'm a very lucky person because my job at that stage, ended up working in the events section of the Sydney Opera House. Wow. Which was just fantastic. You talk about views today, I mean, no matter how down in the dumps you were on a Monday, to walk around the corner at the Harbour Bay and just to see the Sydney Opera House is a fantastic place to work. The geography of the whole place. And I got to go to the opera like other people go to the pictures with the free seats. There were 900 people working in the Sydney Opera House, which which people don't know. So then I came back after the year and I said, what do I do now? Do I go back into financial services or do I pick up where I left off in terms of PR? And I was lucky enough to meet Ronnie Simpson, who was in Edelman, Edelman PR. And again, he brought me into the corporate PR side, and I was 3 years there, but I got a whole range of experience with Edelman. Edelman was an international PR company, And what normally happens in PR around that time would be you'd get a phone call from somebody to say somebody has noticed what you're doing and might be looking. You get poached, you get a phone call from a journalist. So I basically ended up working in Keating and Associates then, Pat Keating. I have to say all along the way I'm a bit of a sponge, so I learned from so many people as I got through the PR mire and went from account executive to to account manager, to account director, to associate director, all of that. And then I went into Keating Associates, and they had a different way of working where they were much more strategic, and they would have outsourced a lot of the material, which I saw was a much faster way of doing things. So getting journalists to write up things quicker than a PR person could. So I appreciated what that was all about, and working with Pat Keating was a very good experience. And at that stage then, again, I got talking to Carla Crichton at the time, who was the European manager, had been the Irish for Text 100, and he said, well, what about at this stage skipping into the management side? We're looking for a general manager for the Dublin office of Text 100, and that was my first taste of management. So I worked with Text for 4 years, 3 of them managing the Dublin office, which I equate a bit like we were a very young team, very dynamic team, but it was fantastic experience actually working with account directors like Conor Dempsey and Joanne Coffey at the time, and, you know, building a business that we wanted to build. I found that really exciting.

And that was where you met Tom Murphy.

That's where I met Tom Murphy.

Oh, he's a friend of both of ours and an earlier podcast guest.

Tom Murphy, and thanks, Tom, for the shout out on that podcast. But, um, you know, Tom and I together were a great team. Tom, uh, was the knowledge manager, the technical side of things, knew his brief inside out. I was the person who came along and I'd question things and say, well, what does this client really want to do? And together, together, you know, Tom used to look at me sometimes and say, I can't believe that you actually said no to that client. You actually went into that meeting and you told that client that they didn't need us. And I said, well, Tom, the fact is they didn't need us. They actually needed somebody in-house for the short term, but I believe by giving them the right advice that they will actually come back to us in about 6 months, 10 months' time. And I think that's what Tom was saying, "Do you know something, that makes sense longer term." And one of the other things Tom would have said to me was when I took over as the general manager in Text 100, a lot of the texties would have done everything themselves. They would have done everything from the books to the consulting to the leadership, everything. And I just think, you know, there's a better way of doing things. If you surround yourself with people who are better than you at financial management, at IT, at HR, well then you can really play to your strengths. So I would be a great believer of hiring to your weakness and actually surrounding yourself with a team that is better than you and then knowing how to motivate them. I think that is something, and that's something I learned from Dermot Desmond very early on because he used to say that to me as well, that he went out and got the best people, and then his job was to be the pivot in the middle and just motivate them. But working with Tom Murphy was an absolute pleasure, and Joanne Coffey, great people there. And it kind of all went wrong then when I got a promotion and I worked on the international side, and I stuck that out for a year. I was going to London week in, week out, and the people were nice, but I found because going from the general manager of Tex100 Dublin with a very clear brief to going into a promotion that I think was Senior Vice President in charge of internal communications, but yet the job hadn't really been scoped out properly, the terms of reference weren't there. I just found that job was harder, the international side. Now I did work with some really good accounts in London, I worked with Deutsche Bank, I worked with Dell, but I found the internal mechanics of working in the European scene was just a little bit too laborious for me. So it was around that time, 2001, that I decided to get married and to settle down, and I wasn't going to get on that plane to London every week doing that. So I set up my own brand of consulting, Gemini Consulting, in 2001, and I had my first son in 2002. So I had this model of working from home as a consultant, as a trainer, and I had built up a lot of contacts through the Public Relations Institute because I'd got involved there. So I reckoned if I was in Dublin at home with a family, I could still identify a small group of 3 or 4 clients and work with them almost as an in-house person focusing on the training side and make enough money that I needed to make My accountant actually described it as a lifestyle company. He said it's a bit like a lifestyle company.

Do you find that description disrespectful?

I think it's true. I think some men find it a little bit— afterwards, some people would have said to me, okay, so you took time out to have a family then, Carmel, and they would try to pigeonhole you into that. And I'd say, no, actually, I took time out to have a family, but I continued working completely through that time. But I just didn't have the commute in and out of the office, and I was able to do 3 hours of work in the morning, take a break, collect the kids from school, another 3 hours in the afternoon, and then I would, when the kids went to bed, I would work between 8 and 10 as well. So it was— somebody interviewed me once about it and said, where's the work-life balance here? And I said, actually, there is none. It's a work-life blend I've got now. But I think women are really good at doing that. I think if you're disciplined and you have the project mind and you say, I can do this, I got some of my best work done from home, very focused, and would have been ahead of my brief. So I was working at that stage, I was working with the Fitzwilliam Institute, so I was training in PR. I was working with the Marine Institute, so I often used to go down there every Tuesday on the train. I had good childcare in that I had my mum to help and I was able to do that. And I was also working with Bank of Scotland Ireland. I also had plugged back into Edelman and I was doing some extra work there. I was working with some friends of mine in Regan Lowey at the time. So I was able to connect to the consultancy model but get the work I needed to do that was very defined and focused and just work, as I said, 4 or 5 clients and spend time with my children, which was great.

So let's fast forward to today and let's talk a little bit about Jack and Jill and your role here.

So what happened was, it really in Gemini came down to two clients: Early Childhood Ireland and Jack and Jill. So I was introduced to Early Childhood Ireland in 2006 when I had my third child, Rose. And the great thing about Early Childhood Ireland, just before we go on to Jack and Jill, was my children grew up on that account. Early Childhood Ireland was all about promoting play-based curriculum for the early years. What was just fantastic was to be able to do their PR, to train them in PR, to look at the media side, but to use— to be able to have that case study of my own children living that. It was just fantastic, and I really enjoyed working there as well. And at that time, it was around 2007, I was introduced to Jonathan Irwin through a very good friend of mine, Annette Kinney, who had a child, Alex, Alexander the Great, they call him, who was born with some challenges and was diagnosed with Mowat-Wilson syndrome. So she'd had a lot of help through the Jack and Jill Foundation, and she said to me, look, Carmel, I think it's time you met Jonathan Irwin. He has a great story to tell. He'd really do with a strategist like you around helping with the planning side and the media side. And I met Jonathan, and I was just blown away by this man. Who hadn't just lost one child, but had lost three boys in his life and had used and turned around his grief to set up this really simple, effective Irish charity that has reach out there into every community and is all about providing home nursing care to children like Alex, like my friend. So I was just— I came into Jack and Jill and I met the nursing team and I knew if ever in life I wanted a sense of purpose in terms of PR, I got it through this place. And Jonathan, in his usual style, said, look, we'll take you on, we might need you, you know, 4 days a month, something like that. But sure, the thing just blew out of all proportions, and I would have worked with Jack and Jill 7 days a week if I could. Jonathan often laughs now and says the only reason he really took me on is we share the same birthday, the 21st of June, but that's a typical job.

It's a good a reason as any to take somebody on, I guess.

But, um, no, so I'm now 10 years with Jack and Jill, uh, I worked very much on the communication side, and then the role of interim CEO came up, um, last May, June, and I jumped into that, and I went for the, I went for the job, and I'm officially the CEO since the 1st of January. So still early days, but I'm working with a team that I know, with a charity that I love, with a purpose that's so clear. It's a communication person's dream. The other side though of Jack and Jill is we have a big ask every year. We have to raise over €3 million to do what we do. Wow. But I'm here. I'm very proud to work with Jack and Jill, and it's what gets me up every day. And I say, what difference are we going to make today in terms of funding this fantastic home nursing care service? And getting the money to do that.

And it must be amazing, and you touched on purpose yourself there, knowing that every single day you are doing something, the team is doing something, the team here in the office is doing something, or your nursing team is doing something that is making a difference, however small. Covering somebody to go out of the house for an hour for a cup of coffee, or dealing with something much, much more serious, that, that can make a real difference. That sense of purpose is so palpable.

Yeah, absolutely. And we get it every day. We have 350 families we port around the country, um, 85 in Dublin, 18 in Kildare, but you know, I got to know an awful lot of those families over the years and every one of them has their own story and every one of them will describe slightly differently what the Jack and Jill Foundation means to them, but what it really comes down to is it gives them a break from the caring side of things because parents are warriors, they can go to the ends of the earth for their child, but sleep deprivation and been unable to maybe catch up with a friend or go for a walk or just sit in your car and listen to your radio. You know, our nurses go in, we pick up the child usually in the maternity unit, and our service is all about child and family-based care. It's child and family-centered care. So our nurses will go in and they'll design a care plan around the child and they'll mobilize the nursing team in the community for that care plan. And it works, and it's simple. And the other thing about it is that every €16 funds 1 hour of home nursing care, so people like that too. I mean, you started at the top of the interview talking about why are Irish people so good in charity. I think it's all about family. Irish people are all about connections, and what keeps Jack and Jill going is that You know, people like to support an Irish children's charity, but we can tell people in Carlow how many people, how many children we support in Carlow. And having that connection and knowing that my money is going into a home and it's actually making that difference to the family, that's what really counts. You know, and I've had the honor of getting to know a lot of these families over the years. And, you know, one of the questions, and people say, well, how do you do it? And they don't like that question because they'll turn it back on you and say, well, I'm a parent, you're a parent. How do you think I did it? I didn't choose this. My child has neurological developmental delay. I may not even be able to pronounce the, the actual diagnosis he has. It's so rare, he's the only child in Ireland who has it. The doctors can't tell me what the prognosis is, but the one thing I know is my child will do better at home where we want him, where his siblings want him, where he's part of the family. So Jack and Jill can actually help a family to do that. Which is very practical, but I would say these parents are what keep Jack and Jill going as well, because, you know, over the years since 1997, since that day that Jonathan Irwin would have set up Jack and Jill in terms of his child, because he had his own bereavement, you know, with Jack. And at that time when Jack was born in 1996, there were no supports outside the hospital wall, but him and his wife Maryanne O'Brien decided, look, let's have a go. They knew a nurse, a local nurse. She cobbled together a care plan, but the actual— I suppose the actual formula for Jack and Jill Scott hasn't actually changed that much. It's about child and family-centered care and giving parents a break in the home and allowing them as the primary carers to do their best. Now, you know, we also look after children who are end of life, so we look after children from birth to 5 years old with neurological delay. Neurological meaning the brain. These children typically wouldn't walk, may never walk or talk. They could be tube-fed, oxygen-dependent, heavy meds, take a lot of seizures. But underneath all of this, these are very special children who'll melt your heart.

They're still somebody's daughter or son.

Absolutely. And on top of that, our nurses also look after end-of-life children. Regardless of the diagnosis, so cancer patients as well, and they will help and empower the parents to take that child home to pass away. And we have— we mobilise— I just want to give a shout out to all the nurses out there. We have 13 core nurses here. They are like the case managers, but we mobilise an army of about 600 nurses around the country, and they go into the home very discreetly They get to know the family really well, and families often describe them as a lifeline, a friend, somebody they trust. And the connection goes on even beyond when the child has passed away. We have parents who come back to us and said, you know, it was a bit like walking through a fog. I knew Jack and Jill was helping me, and then when my child passed, I wanted to actually get involved and help Jack and Jill. I understood the difference you had made. One dad from Galway said to me, you know, when Kathy came in and she said, well, why don't we have the christening tomorrow? She said, he said, I didn't know if my child was going to live for the next 2 days. She said, christening, and I never thought about that, but to get the family together for a happy occasion. Now she passed away 2 days later, but they have the photos, they have the recognition, that child got to meet his extended family. I just think as a parent myself, you know, if you want to work for If you're looking for a charity that makes a real difference, come and work for Jack and Jill.

There you go, that's an open job offer.

Yes.

And you know, for me as an outsider, and I know of the work you do, as I said, through my friend's son, it's just massively humbling. Even to be sitting here and listening to the stories is massively humbling. It kind of, it almost makes the rest of work and all that stuff seem largely irrelevant when it boils down to looking after somebody's child, you know, in the end of their days.

It does, yeah. But at the end of the day as well, Scott, you've got to remember in Jack and Jill there are two branches of people. You're either a nurse in there in the home making a difference, or you're a fundraiser. Whether you're a communicator in the communications department or you're the CEO, you're out there getting the money to enable the nurses to do what they do. So, you know—

Which is a business.

It's a business.

So we have to have a fundraising core here that is always waking up and saying, what 'What are we going to do today to raise the £3 million we need to keep going?' So talk to me a little bit about how you as a leader balance those two things, because as I see it, you've got your fundraising staff, the business side of things, you've got your nursing staff, the caring side of things, and then of course you've got, as you say, your 600 nursing team out there, many of whom you may not have, I guess, direct contact with. How do you— what is it you need to be, how do you need to live as a leader in order to motivate all of those groups of people?

I have to trust my people around me. I have a nursing team that come in here the first Tuesday of every month, and they sit around this table in this chaotic environment, and they talk about their families and the needs and what's happening. And I come in and I meet them and I say, where do you need my support in terms of the nursing model? Where do you need my support? Do we need to hire more nurses? What do we need to do? And a lot of what our nurses would end up doing, Scott, as well, is advocating on behalf of families. So you go into a home, it's a very stressful environment, maybe they've just received the diagnosis, and we're helping them to fill in the forms they need to get the support they need. So our nurses would be great advocates as well. So they do it at a mini micro level, and I might have to do do it at a national level. For example, the discretionary medical cards a couple of years ago, Jack and Jill would have led out on that and said we need to change the policy there, people need to get automatic medical cards when they have a child like a Jack and Jill child.

So there's a lobbying angle as well?

There's a lobbying angle there, but also the fundraising team, how I would assist and help there is I would just be in the middle of it. I'm a fundraiser too, and I'd say, right guys, what can we do? And, you know, and with Jack and Jill, We can't do everything, we can't accept every single fundraiser we get, so we're always trying to make a connection with people. Jack and Jill is all about connection, so the one thing we want is we want people to sign up to Jack and Jill and to sign up to Jack and Jill in their county and maybe to set up a standing order so that that connection is there, and we can certainly share the stories with them, they can— we can show the difference they make, but we want a long-term connection with our donors. And then a big part of what I do as well is I negotiate negotiate and I meet with the HSE, who are a key funder of ours, who give us €600,000 per year, but it's still far short of what we should be getting. So we are making the business case to the HSE to say, pay more to Jack and Jill because we keep these children out of hospital. Sometimes I think, you know, because Jonathan was so good at fundraising, we became a victim of our own success. If you keep pulling white rabbits out and you keep, you know, raising €3 million year in, year out, people expect you to do it, but I would never take it for granted, Scott. You know, we never take for granted every €16 that's donated to Jack and Jill and the people power we have on the ground through those extended families or through the corporates in Ireland who step up and say, you know, the likes of Ryanair and the scratchcards, and people will sometimes say, well, what does happen to that money in the scratchcards? Well, we're one of the big recipient charities. I was in Dublin last week and I got a cheque for €100,000. I met 3 people from across Europe who'd won cars, and I also met the guy who'd scratched and had the potential of winning a million, but he got €100,000 on the day.

Still okay.

Still okay.

You would take that?

Yeah, still okay, I'd take that. You know, Bank of Ireland was one of our corporates, and they raised and they did Malin to Mizenhead. Their staff really engaged on that. The Bank of Ireland was a It was a great case study, so much so we put it into our annual report. But, you know, that was again about people, pedal power from Malin to Mizenhead. They got in, they got stuck in, and they funded 20,000 hours of home nursing care over 2 years. Amazing. You know, but again, I would say that connection is still there. 2 years, we're not their corporate charity partner anymore, but we have a lot of friends in Bank of Ireland in the community who will continue to help out with Jack and Jill. Circle K, you go into a service station, Circle K have been behind Jack and Jill as well, but I would never take any of this for granted because as soon as we stop talking about our stories out there, people will forget Jack and Jill, because as you said, there's so many fantastic charities out there, who do you choose? Yeah, it's hard. Who do you choose?

When, you know, you touched off stories there, and obviously for you and I as communicators, stories are our bread and butter.

Yes.

They're almost what makes the world go round. And I wonder, I think you have such amazing positive stories of the work that you're doing, but of course many of those stories end up with what might be perceived to be a very sad ending for many of the people that receive support from Jack and Jill. And I just wonder, as a leader in the organisation in Jack and Jill with a team of people around you, How do you balance that? How do you balance those really positive stories with the more harrowing ones that maybe those positive stories end up being?

It can be very difficult. You know, I would be in a house maybe doing a story. I remember with Esther McCarthy one day we went into the home and within 2 weeks that child had passed away. Now it wasn't just me was impacted impacted there, the journalist was impacted, the photographer was impacted, but this is, as you say, a fact of life. So what do we do? Well, first of all, you know, we put our arms around the parents and the families, and our nurses would be there for bereavement support. Secondly, in terms of the nurses themselves, nurses need support, so we would have a lady called Breda Carroll who comes into our offices every, maybe twice a month, something like that, and she would do supervision with the nurses because the carer needs to be supported because when the journey ends, people need to recognize the bereavement, people need to recognize the life, celebrate the life, and but that's why I suppose the positive thing is, for going back to that, that the man who had the christening for his child, he has memories there, and it's very hard to build up a memory box from a hospital. Landing, you know, versus getting these children home. So what we find is the parents are very thankful for whatever little time they had, whether it be 2 days, 2 weeks, 2 months, 2 years. We have to pick ourselves back up. Our nurses are professionals and they go in and they do the caring, but we have to mind, we have to care for our carers, and we also have to care for our fundraising team here as well. We have a fantastic fundraising team and Regardless of how professional you are, you get to know people through a story. When that child, or if that child passes away, and a lot of our children would pass away in the first 2 years of life, it is very difficult. So we just help people, we talk. Talk, talk is a great therapy. Talk is a very good therapy. And maybe at this stage I would just like to, to acknowledge one person who was a really fantastic champion for Jack and Jill, and that was Tracy Marsden, who set up the nursing system for Jack and Jill 18 years ago. Now Tracy herself passed away suddenly just a couple of weeks ago, and like, we're here talking about leadership, but people like Tracy in an organization like Jack and Jill, they just show up. Tracy set up a fantastic system. She worked here for 18 years She was the person who was emailing the families, and she organised our family fun day in Kilmainham, Royal Hospital Kilmainham, every year. And Tracy was a big part of our team. So we've not only, like, just within the last couple of weeks, we're not just dealing with when our fam— when our children pass away, but one of our colleagues passed away. And no matter what sort of leader you are, I think the first thing you have to do is to acknowledge that. Acknowledge the loss, acknowledge the life, acknowledge what this person meant, whether it would be Tracey or one of our children who's passed away, and then get the support for the team you need. But that is part of life. Dying is part of living. And, you know, again, we are going to miss Tracey dearly, but I know that if Tracey was here this week, she'd be saying to me, go on, do that interview.

Get on with it.

Get on with it. Get the story out there and get the money in for Jack and Jill, because I run the system in here and I'm just as proud as you.

Yeah, yeah, no, and I can absolutely see that. I mean, just having even met the team here, you can see that that oozes out of them, out of every pore. I think it's, you know, I think a very sudden bereavement on a team is hard, and lots of leaders would shy away from even dealing with that, partly because they're hurting as well. And I've probably said it a million times times now that, you know, in organisations we very quickly talk about people leaders, people leaders do this, people leaders do that, people leaders do the other, and we don't often remember the fact that they're also people.

Absolutely.

They are a person themselves with feelings and worries and emotions, and they're going through exactly the same thing as the team, yet at the same time, as you were in the past couple of weeks, you know, expected to stand up and kind of lead the way.

And my granny used to say years ago, if we could all put our worries and our troubles into a hat, he'd be very happy to take your own back out. You know, so yeah, you know, being a leader, but like again, being a leader, and maybe it's a female thing to say, but I'm surrounded by a fantastic management team. So, you know, with any urgent crisis or situation we have to deal with, I have two fantastic nurse managers, Sinead and Sandra, I go to. I've got Jean Young, who's on our communication side, who, who's just a fantastic sounding board for me. You met Deirdre, who's head of fundraising, and she's been with us for 11 years. They just turn up and keep going. And Jane heads up the finance side. So, you know, it's the people. For me, the key thing to being a good leader, going back to Dermot Desmond's advice, is to surround yourself with a strong team, to give them the trust and the wherewithal to do what they need to do, and then to back them up to the hilt. That's what being a good leader is, and I'm very privileged to be here.

And I think you touched off one thing earlier on when you were talking about being in text, and I think you had that whole play to your strengths kind of moment. And I think for me, in order to do that, that means a leader actually saying, I'm not good at X, and actually having that vulnerability and that ability to say, I'm not great at this. And again, that's something that I'm not sure that many leaders are particularly good at.

Well, look, you know, being a leader, people will look to you, but I would often say to people, look, I don't have all the answers, but I probably know where to find them, or where to hire people in, or advise people, get people to advise me, or the question to ask. I just think it's refreshing if you say to people, look, I don't I don't know the answer to that question.

It is refreshing. That's a great way to describe it.

I don't know. I don't think we're going to be able to help you. Going back to Tom, where we talked ourselves out of that account, and I said, "No, they don't need us at this point in time." Yes, our boss back in HQ is saying, "Get the money in, get more accounts in," whatever. But, you know, if it's not the right thing to do, I think people like that honesty. And when you say, "No, that's not my field." I mean, I would look to my team to support me, and they know what my strengths are. They know what my strengths are, and they also know what my weaknesses are, and they know that when it comes to, you know, producing an annual report, I'll be good at writing the intro, looking at what should be in the content, but you are not going to put me onto some sort of program and start designing infographics because that's not my strength. That's where I say to Deirdre, 'Deirdre, I need your help here. Let's get this done.' And she'll say, 'Don't worry, we can do this.' You know, so you play to people's strengths. And if everybody was to admit their vulnerabilities on a team, I think we'd have a stronger team.

Yeah, I agree. I couldn't agree more. Tell me, just, just in closing up, last couple of questions. Who are your leadership role models? You've worked with lots of the who's who, certainly the PR industry. Dermot Desmond. You know, I'm looking at Jonathan's book here. You know, who are some of the people that you look up to, particularly from a leadership perspective, that have shown you what a great leader is and can be?

I would look up to Dermot because he would make people on his team around him believe we can do it. And going back to 1985, that was a time when, you know, the old boys' club was running stockbroking, but Dermot was able to say, no, if we set up the 'Right, research department here, we're going to convince the fund managers to do the dealing through us.' And he set the tone and he was the man, he was a visionary, and I think that positivity is infectious. We would have gone to the end of the earth for Dermot. He was a great leader like that. Jonathan Irwin, I'd have to say, is again an inspiring leader because he's a man who lost Jack. Jack, they had him for 22 months at home But after Jack, he also lost another son, Sam, who had an accident in Portugal and he was 18 years old and he died instantly. And for a man to pick himself back up and to use grief to set up something as positive as Jack and Jill, hats off to Jonathan Irwin. This guy is inspiring and he keeps going. He's down in Kilkenny now. I hope he's listening to this podcast. Podcast, and I hope he realizes that that was a lucky day where I told him my birthday was the same as his and he took me on. He is a storyteller, you know, and he would be somebody who'd show his vulnerability and say, 'Carmel, I'm not very good at this, you know, you can do the planning side, you can do this, this, and this, and you just send me into the interview and I'll do the talk.' So Jonathan and I got on so well because we knew each other's strengths. As Geminis, we worked very well together. The other person I would say would be Annette Kinney, whose son brought me to Jack and Jill. Annette runs her own training company, and Annette is somebody who just— she's like the Duracell Bunny in life, she just keeps going. She introduced me to Jonathan, she's so generous with the introductions that she gives out there, and her husband Declan They are a phenomenal team together, but I think, Scott, it all comes back to what we started talking about, to family, you know. I mean, my dad was the guy who set me off, and I remember when I got that job, age 17, in NCB, and I was in the typing pool, and then they were saying, look, we might promote you because you're good at English and you're reading all those reports into the research side of things. My mum's initial reaction was, well, why would you want to do that? 'You know, you're a secretary, you're doing really well, you've got your money out and you know you're having a great time.' And Dad would say, 'No, go for it. Always remember you're as good or as bad as anybody else, so have a go and never be afraid to do that. What's the worst thing that can happen? You don't like it? You can always go back to being a secretary.' Brilliant.

Last question, and this is one I ask to everybody on the podcast. What's the one piece of leadership advice you would give to yourself at the beginning of the career? Now that you're looking back, what's the one thing you would suggest to yourself that you do differently or do?

Yeah, well, one of the things, and it's a very practical thing, if I was 20 at the start, I started out studying marketing. I think I would have backed that up and studied law as well, because when I look around tables now, particularly in terms of advocacy and where Jack and Jill is, I have huge admiration for the lawyers around the table as well, the way they're able to— I tell the story, but they set out the case, you know. I would like, I think I'd like my 20-year-old self to consider studying law, and I'd also, you know, and I often ask myself, well, had I taken that job on the private client desk with Dermot Desmond, maybe I should have stuck with Dermot there and just seen. I'd like to have that other dual life and see what would have happened if I stayed in NCB Stockbrokers with Desmond all those years ago.

Interesting, interesting times. Listen, we're going to wrap it up there. It's been really interesting, it's been humbling. I've loved the stories. I'm so grateful that we got a chance to have this chat and really appreciate you taking the time. I know that with, with Tracy passing away, it's been a difficult couple of weeks, but hopefully this will, this will stand to her as well. And it was great that she got the mention. If people want more information on Jack and Jill, where should they go?

Just check out our website, www.jackandjill.ie, and have a look at our county breakdown. And remember that every €16 funds 1 hour of home nursing care for a sick child. And thank you to everybody for continuing to support Jack and Jill, and thank you, Scott McInnes, for giving us this airtime. Thank you so much.

You're more than welcome. Thanks, Emily, for coming on. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this podcast, please take a minute to rate it, and maybe even leave a comment. To learn more about Inspiring Change, to read our blog, and to hear more podcasts, please visit our website at inspiringchange.ie.