Recruitment firm O'Grady-Peyton Recruitment, which specialises in the global recruitment and placement of nurses, can justifiably claim to be a product of the Irish diaspora. Ms Teresa O'Grady-Peyton, chief executive and half of this husband-and-wife firm, says that the company would not have been able to establish its 15 offices throughout the world without the support of their large and widely dispersed family network. "I have six sisters, all strategically placed," she laughs.
Indeed, the company has the distinction of being a strong family-run business, while also being a truly global operation. They have offices in the US, Britain, South Africa, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand and Malaysia. "Our network of offices tended to be placed where our family members were positioned," she explains. One of her sisters established the first of three offices in Britain, while another opened the first of two in Capetown, South Africa. She says that O'Grady-Peyton Recruitment is very lucky to have a low staff turnover, which she attributes partly to the dynamics of being a family business. "We've got lots of people coming and going but we've also got a core team that is like an extended family. "
Ms O'Grady-Peyton (46), who has an MBA from Boston College, says she would love to do an academic thesis on the workings and cultures of family businesses and how they contrast with those of big corporations. "How else could you get somebody to start up an office in Capetown with no money whatsoever?"
Appropriately enough, both Ms O'Grady-Peyton, who was born and raised in Birmingham, and her husband, Joseph O'Grady, from Co Sligo, come from big families. Her parents are from Co Mayo and, as a child, she spent every summer there visiting cousins. "We had a very Irish upbringing, with lots of Irish dancing and Irish singing."
Her Irish roots took an even stronger hold once she met Joseph in Dublin while on Easter holidays from the Birmingham school where she was a remedial teacher. After marrying Joseph, she went to live in Dublin and found that she couldn't work as a teacher because she had no Irish. However, she says that she didn't miss the teaching. "The hours were so short but the days were very long." The couple have one son, TJ (16).
She worked for the National Rehabilitation Board as a youth employment adviser for several years before becoming involved full-time with O'Grady-Peyton Recruitment, which she and Joseph established in 1981. It seems that Joseph was much more the entrepreneur than she was. "We always say that we would never have started without Joe but we would have gone bust without me," she jokes. Their core business is recruiting nurses from Ireland and other English-speaking countries to the US, although not exclusively. Today, its corporate headquarters is in Savannah, Georgia, rather than Dublin, and the company's network of 15 offices means that Ms O'Grady-Peyton is often out of the country on business.
However, the last couple of years have seen the demand for nurses come full circle, from a situation where the company was exporting nurses to other counties to one where it is bringing in nurses from abroad to help alleviate chronic hospital staff shortages in this country, mainly in the Dublin hospitals. When I arrived at the firm's offices in Dame Street to meet Ms O'Grady-Peyton, she immediately apologised for the large piles of forms and documents that were strewn all over the floor - the paperwork for the latest batch of Filipino nurses who will be arriving in Dublin over the next couple of weeks to fill nursing vacancies here.
"It's a different process, particularly for those coming into Ireland. It's just amazing to me to see the full circle." People had told her that changes in demand tended to happen in seven-year cycles, so the suddenness of the demand for nurses here took the firm by surprise. "I think probably the fact that there wasn't a lead-in to it meant that structures like the nursing board and the Department of Enterprise (for the visas) were hit by the suddenness, but I don't think it's just a nursing thing. I think everybody had to adjust their manpower levels very quickly." The sudden transition from exporting nurses to importing nurses has seen the firm's services evolve to include a range of services that, even two years ago, few envisaged it would be providing, particularly for the Filipino recruits. "We have a meet-and-greet service, where we meet them at the airport and bring them to their accommodation, and we'd do an orientation to living in Ireland, bringing them around on the bus, showing them the DART and Dunnes Stores." Dunnes Stores?
Strangely enough, it turns out that Dunnes have branches in the Philippines, so many of the new recruits may find the Irish chain a welcome haven of brand familiarity during their first days in a strange country. She says the new "Harney" visas - work visas for foreign nationals to help fill urgent nursing, IT, and construction work vacancies here - have made a tremendous difference, enabling the business to deal with as many foreign nursing recruits as they can handle. It's now well known here that the Philippines deliberately educate nurses for export, churning out more nurses than the country actually needs. There is a strong culture of emigration in the Philippines, forced by the lack of opportunities and low pay.
Last month, there was a story on RTE about Filipino workers, including nurses, being charged exorbitant fees by recruitment agencies in the Philippines to come to work in Ireland. Some of those interviewed claimed that they were charged up to £1,600. However, Ms O'Grady-Peyton believes the story was "over-sensationalised". She says that, although they have an office in Manila to recruit from the Philippines, they have to use a licensed agency there, who are entitled to charge up to one month's salary in fees. They interviewed several recruitment firms before settling on one that charged an overall fee of $500, which they considered a "realistic" sum. It is firms such as O'Grady-Peyton Recruitment that have helped smooth the path for nurses wanting to work and travel. "If they want to, we can help them through the steps. Very few people do it independently because of the paperwork and the bureaucracy involved. I think very few nurses would do it on their own."
Allowing nurses to travel with the help of an agency is also a good retention tool, she says. Several hospitals give their nurses career breaks to travel with her firm, which sets up temporary placements for them abroad but keeps in touch with them. Emigration has clearly been and continues to be a big theme in both her family and working life. So much so, in fact, that Ms O'Grady-Peyton is planning a project of a musical variety, inspired by the experiences and stories of the Irish abroad.
"I like singing. I'm going to cut a CD of Irish emigrant songs," she says, gushing with anticipation of the enjoyment to be had. She will be helped by a colleague who has access to a recording studio. She also plays the accordion. Although the songs that will comprise the CD play list have yet to be decided, she says that numbers like The Close of an Irish Day and The Shores of America will probably find their way onto it. It's possible that those members of the O'Grady-Peyton clan scattered around the world could soon find a CD-shaped package from home in their mailboxes.
