The Real Deal Conference 2024 - back at Goffs

The Real Deal Conference 2024 – back at Goffs

On Thursday 16th of May, The Real Deal Conference was back on at Goffs, Co. Kildare. The Panel was delighted to once again partner with Renatus, Fitzgerald Power, and Bank of Ireland, and co-sponsor with The Currency, LK Shields, Interpath Advisory and Davy.

It was a full house at Goffs from early morning to late afternoon, as The Real Deal returned to the venue, for yet another excellent conference.

Moderator for the event, Broadcaster & Journalist Matt Cooper welcomed attendees, before introducing the people behind this SME event of the year, Stuart Fitzgerald (CEO at Fitzgerald Powers) and Mark Flood (Director at Renatus Capital Partners). This year The Real Deal is making a €6k donation (€1k each) to a chosen charity for each speaker.

This year’s ‘Deal of the Year’ fireside chat featured Niall Molloy (CEO & Founder of Echelon Data Centres).

Niall gave the audience insight into his journey from being a young entrepreneur cutting grass in South Dublin to becoming the owner of a multi-billion-euro business. He explained how they grew the company, went into partnership, and proceeded through many rounds of investors to reach their current state. He also spoke of the growth of data centres in general, both here in Ireland and globally, and what is required to support the levels of power required for AI.

The day’s first panel was the ‘People & Deals’ with Aisling Teillard (Chief Customer Officer at beqom) and Jarlath Dooley (Chairman & Board Adviser ex Version1 & now Volpi), a fascinating discussion on the role of people, culture, and the importance of Human Resources to all businesses. Some of the takeaways from their conversation were that in a redundancy situation, the people who stay are watching how the company treats the people on the way out! It is essential to treat everyone with dignity, especially those leaving the organisation.

Jarlath spoke of the importance of enjoying the journey, and the need for cultural due diligence, especially in an acquisition situation. Aisling spoke about using performance management to motivate and help drive a business forward.

“Culture is as important as sales in any business and not having HR at the top table is a mistake as people drive all these departments and activities” – Aisling Teillard –

After a well-appreciated lunch break courtesy of the people at Lily & Wild, attendees were treated to an ice-cream networking opportunity outside in the sun.

John Purdy (Co-Founder & now Non-Executive Chairman at Ergo) kick started the afternoon, with his frank and honest fireside chat, speaking about ‘growth, succession and exit”. He told the story of how he co-founded Ergo and how the company over the years grew into Fenergo and FlowForma. His humoristic take on the good and the bad, all being a part of the process. He left the audience with parting words on how he wants to be remembered at the end of the day – “He was a tough b*****d, but he was good”.”

The final panel discussion of the day saw Sharon McCabe (CEO at McCabes Pharmacy) and David Maxwell (Managing Director at Boojum) tell the audience of how they have prepared for their exits and expansions, and how they both steered their organisations through challenges such as Covid. Sharon having been at the helm of McCabes Pharmacy for over 40 years shared her feelings about handing over the business under the right terms and David explained why he decided to exit Boojum whilst still staying on as Managing Director growing new markets and still leading the business he helped build into the future.

Keywords mentioned by almost all the speakers were resilience and agile attitude.

Many thanks to Mark Flood, Stuart Fitzgerald, and Adrian Stackpoole for all their hard work in making this event happen, until 2025.

The Panel was delighted to support the conference, and our team was busy networking and connecting with new and existing contacts. If you attended and managed to secure one of our pink guide brochures – “The SME owner’s guide to recruiting the right people“, we hope it will be helpful to you. If you would like a copy, feel free to contact Paul McArdle at paul@thepanel.com.

Many thanks to our team on the day: Anne Keys (Joint Managing Partner), Fergal Keys (Senior Partner), Sarah Kelly (Partner), Andrew Ganly (Director), Ailbhe Mullen (Senior Consultant), Darina Heavey (Senior Consultant), Olivia Wallace (Trainee Consultant), Mal Convery (Marketing Manager), and Deborah Bradshaw (Office Manager).