My Business Life: Shelah McMahon, Ergo

Shelah McMahon, head of Public Sector at Ergo, shares her life and business lessons.

McMahon is overseeing Ergo’s Public Sector Centre of Excellence across its Dublin, Cork, and Limerick offices.

In her role she is focused on consolidating key service offerings across Digital, Cloud & Managed Services.

Prior to joining Ergo, Shelah spent five years as Head of Public Sector Sales at Vodafone Ireland, where she worked closely with Government on the delivery of digital infrastructure and services. 

Tell us about your background, what journey did you take to arrive at where you are?

I have been extremely fortunate in my career to have worked across a range of industries including financial services, telecoms and now IT services.  

After my undergrad in Social Sciences from UCD I studied Business at the Smurfit Business School.  After a couple of years in the EBS Building Society, I joined Ulster Bank and spent eight years in corporate and business banking sales before moving to operations, where I was looking after Operations for Corporate and Business Banking and Financial Markets.

Both financial institutes had similar cultures, enabling people to develop their potential, contribute ideas, demonstrate their value and earn rewards based on outcome and impact.  This enabled and encouraged me to thrive – teaching me about the importance of collaboration, adaptability, and resilience.

In 2009 I took a four-year career break to focus on my family. When I was ready to resume my career, the financial sector had undergone major changes after the crash and I was unsure of my next steps. A friend of mine introduced me to a ‘Return to Technology’ programme in Vodafone Ireland, which was designed to help professionals who had left the workforce for 18 months or more to re-enter the field. I decided to join the programme in 2013 and it was one of the best decisions I ever made.

At Vodafone, I had the opportunity to work with large public sector clients and I enjoyed the challenge of bringing excellent service to my clients. After two years as the Enterprise Service Manager, I moved into sales and then to Head of Public Sector Business, where I was responsible for leading a team of talented and passionate people, managing key accounts and driving growth and innovation in the sector.

After working in telcoms for over a decade, I felt ready for a new challenge and I was interested in exploring how IT professional and managed services could benefit and supplement public sector services across service delivery, efficiency and innovation. I wanted to join a company that had a strong vision and commitment to help public sector clients transform their organisations and deliver better outcomes for citizens. That’s why I was delighted to join Ergo in 2023 as Director of Public Sector.

Ergo is Ireland’s leading indigenous IT solutions provider with a growing global footprint. With a strong focus on IT Managed Services, we also advise CIOs and their teams on Cloud and Infrastructure, Productivity, Digital Solutions, Software Licensing and Security. Ergo has a proven track record of delivering innovative and impactful projects for public sector clients across various domains, such as Health, Higher Education, and central and local government.

I’m proud to be celebrating my first anniversary this month!

Why are you doing what you are doing? What need are you meeting? What’s your USP?

My focus is always on my clients. I am immensely proud of my enduring relationships across public sector bodies, including health, central and local government and higher education. I believe you “earn the right” to do business by building trust and delivering value consistently. The key to earning this right is listening to clients and understanding their unique needs and requirements and delivering consistently.

Ergo’s ethos of being client-first is one of the key drivers that attracted me to join the organisation.  Ensuring our customers are prepared for today while planning for tomorrow and helping them to ultimately become more agile, efficient, and compliant while capitalising on their IT investments over the long term is fundamental.   

Ergo is a trusted indigenous Irish company privileged to have a 30-year history of partnering with the public sector.  We deeply understand the challenges that State bodies face as they look to redefine governance and efficient delivery of public services with the power of digital.

What are your key skills and qualities that set you apart?

My biggest assets are my work ethic, collaboration and communication skills.

Throughout my career, I have had the opportunity to work with some very inspirational colleagues. They instilled in me the power and importance of collaboration. Whether leading or supporting, collaboration is the key to success,  and business leaders understand that collective success is paramount.  Great collaboration earns you the trust of your colleagues, peers, and leaders and helps you build your success personally and professionally.

Communication goes hand in hand with collaboration. Clear and open communication forms the bedrock of any successful business relationship. Regular dialogue ensures alignment, resolves issues and fosters trust. Through these two assets, we earn the right to do business with our customers, partners, vendors and colleagues, laying the foundations for long-lasting enduring relationships that build over time, benefitting everyone.

What (or whom) has helped you most along the way? Who was your greatest mentor/inspiration?

My Mum was without a doubt my greatest mentor and inspiration. She was a formidable, independent and inspirational woman who raised me while forging a very successful career in media.

My Mum’s drive and work ethic were hugely inspiring to me, along with her passion for Irish Rugby!

Aside from my wonderful Mum, I have been truly fortunate to work alongside great leaders from the very beginning of my career to today – all of whom nurtured talent, supported me in every role and pushed me towards opportunities that I wasn’t sure I was ready for!

What was the greatest piece of business advice you ever received?

The best business advice I ever got came from Jackie Gilroy, a former leader in the EBS Building Society. She taught me two things: always read what you sign, and never come back from your holidays on a Monday. She has been proven 100% correct on both!

My advice is to ‘earn the right’ to do business by showing your work ethic, integrity and credibility. Clients are not owed to us they are earned, as is trust. 

Approaching business with this mindset whether internally within an organisation or externally with clients and partners helps to  gain trust and respect, and helps with both forgiveness and permission

What circumstances/qualities/events can mark the difference between success or failure in life or business?

I believe that integrity, credibility, resilience and empathy are key qualities in both life and business and can certainly mark the difference between success and failure.  

Empathy allows you to understand your colleagues, collaborators, clients and competition while acting responsibly while resilience allows you to learn from failure and thrive.  Acting with integrity and credibility both personally and professionally has helped to build some of my longest and most valued relationships.

Finally, some of my greatest lessons have been from my mistakes or failures which have in turn helped to achieve my largest successes. 

I have learned that failure is an opportunity for improvement based on how you respond and move forward together with the lessons you take with you.

How did you navigate your business through the pandemic and what lessons did you learn?  

When the pandemic hit, I was working closely with the central government and healthcare bodies within the public sector.  The challenges that our public sector bodies faced, and how they (with the support of partners across the state)  rose to the challenge by pivoting to deliver critical services, should never be forgotten.

My team and I worked closely with our customers to ensure they could move their communications and operations remotely. This meant that we could keep all government services open while continuing to deliver critical services to the public – across health, local and central government and education.

I learned a lot from the pandemic, about myself and business, but two of the most important lessons for me are:

Organisational agility begins with culture. It is so important to foster a culture that embraces changes and encourages asking “why.” This mindset allows for the agile transactions and transformations that were vital during the pandemic.

Employee wellbeing must be prioritised. Recognising the impact of stress and uncertainty on employees is so important. Supporting mental health, promoting a work-life balance, encouraging empathy and fostering a sense of community are all essential for maintaining productivity and morale. An organisation cannot thrive without this.

How has digital transformation been a factor in your scaling journey and do you believe Irish firms are utilising digital technologies sufficiently?

Ergo was an early adopter of digital transformation and it has played a key factor in the company’s impressive growth story. Early on, Ergo recognised and understood the impact of cloud and data technologies, and how these technologies would enable scalability and agility, while also improving decision-making. This, in turn, has allowed businesses to innovate, optimise their processes and enhance the customer experience.

This focus on digital transformation informed Ergo’s rapid expansion over the last few years, with major acquisitions of important strategic businesses, including iSite, Micromail, Asystec and most recently,  BoatyardX.

We have seen in recent years that digital transformation has significantly impacted the Irish public sector, driving changes in how services are delivered and experienced. As laid out in the government’s Connecting Government 2030 strategy, the goal is to modernise and streamline public services, making them more accessible and efficient. While progress has been made, many challenges remain.  Citizens expect digital and omni-channel access to services.  The Public Sector and departments within it, are expected to manage large and complex infrastructure optimising data, security, cost, user experience and compliance.  The government must continue to invest in digital capabilities, ensuring security, inclusivity, and effective governance.

By leveraging digital technologies, Ireland can unlock benefits such as flexible working, and improved public services, leading to better outcomes for Irish citizens and economic growth.

If you were to do it all over again, what would you do differently?

Slow down! I feel like the last couple of decades have evaporated! Early in my career, I often hesitated to ask for help, aiming to prove myself.  I’ve learned that seeking advice often leads to better results.  I actively seek mentorship and collaboration today.  Finally, I would like to have learned earlier that failure is an opportunity to improve!

What technologies/tools do you use personally to keep you on track?

I was lucky enough to participate in the early adoption of Microsoft Copilot within Ergo – and it has proven to be an absolute game changer in terms of efficiency and productivity! 

I am hugely optimistic about the potential of AI driven products – once we ensure we have the necessary frameworks around privacy, security, safety, transparency and accountability. Few can deny the huge potential it possesses for Irish companies, irrespective of size, scale and sector.

One area that might not be highlighted often enough is how AI will help with accessibility. Just recently, I was speaking with a colleague with dyslexia who found the summarising and content creation features in Copilot incredibly useful. Copilot is an incredible tool that will democratise the use of AI for all users. I look forward to seeing AI work to make our lives a little easier, a little more efficient, by taking care of the more mundane tasks and freeing up time for the things we love and enjoy.

What social media platforms do you prefer and why?

I’m not a hugely active social media user– unless I’m supporting the Leinster and Irish Rugby Teams!

LinkedIn is great for updates on what my peers are thinking about or up to, as well as some great thought leadership pieces.

What are your thoughts on where technology overall is heading and how it will apply to business generally and your business particularly?

Technology trends are evolving rapidly, driven by factors like granularity, speed and scale. The magnitude of these changes is opening doors to innovations and business models and these trends are revolutionising business operations across the private and public sectors.

At Ergo, the key trends we are seeing across data, AI and cloud computing include: hybrid and multi-cloud management, AI augmentation, data explosion and low-code development. Irish businesses and the public sector are increasingly adopting digital technologies to streamline operations, improve efficiency and enhance service, for which cloud computing, big data analytics and automation solutions are required.

Technology is a powerful driver of change and innovation, but also a source of challenges and risks. Businesses and the public sector need to embrace the technology trends and leverage them effectively to achieve their goals and objectives, as well as to meet the needs and expectations of their customers, citizens and stakeholders. At Ergo, we are committed to helping our clients to navigate the technology landscape and to deliver the best solutions for their digital transformation. We have the expertise, experience and passion to help our clients harness the power of technology and create a better future for themselves and their communities.

Finally, if you had advice for your 21-year-old self – knowing what you know now – what would it be?

My advice to my 21-year-old self would be to avoid shellfish – you are allergic! On a professional level it would be to trust yourself to make the best decision you can with the information available to you – and not to focus on perfection it can be the enemy of progress.

Finally, failure can bring opportunity for improvement and growth  – don’t be so tough on yourself!

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