An Cosantóir

An Cosantóir September / October 2023 www.military.ie/magazine 20 | INTERVIEW WITH HEAD OF TRANSFORMATION MR BRIAN MOLLOY What is your job title in the Defence Forces? Head of Transformation What was your first job and outline your career path to date? My first job that I received a "pay packet" for would have been way back when I was 12/13 years of age and I worked over the summer picking tomatoes I worked with a number of banks and insurance companies in Dublin from leaving school until 2006 when I moved to Galway, and then in 2019 I joined the Public Sector. I worked as Principal Officer in the Department of Social Protection (DSP), got promoted to Chief Appeals Officer and then was promoted to my current role in the Defence Forces. What job did you leave to join us and what is the one major change? I moved from the DSP – I think the biggest change is operating in an environment where there is such a reliance on a separate management team for some high level decisions. I know our symbiotic relationship with the department has a grounding in the constitution and provides us with access to an additional excellent source of knowledge and expertise... but it takes a bit of getting used to!!. What was your knowledge of the Defence Forces before you joined? Very little to be very honest. I don't come from a military family. I do have some military connections in my ancestors – my grandfather was a captain in the Army Reserve in the 1940's and two of his brother's fought in WWI. One of them was killed in action in Cuichy in Feb 1915 and the other served as chaplain in the 5th Battalion of Royal Irish Regiment and was decorated with the Military Cross for bravery in July 1917 while on the Salonika front. What do you think is our greatest opportunity? It is something of a cliché but ultimately I think it is our personnel and the willingness of those women and men to embrace meaningful change. Of course, in order to maximise the potential of this opportunity we need to resolve the current retention issues. We need to convey to current personnel that the issues that are currently leading them to consider an early exit are going to be addressed in the coming period and that they should strongly consider giving the transformation programme a bit more time before deciding to exit from the Defence Forces. What is the biggest challenge facing us, in your opinion? We have many challenges, let's be honest. There is a lot of negative coverage in the media which doesn't help us build our morale and our feeling of self-worth. We have to face up to that and implement comprehensive changes to how we operate and how we behave individually and collectively to ensure that the Defence Forces is a safe, respectful and equal opportunity environment for everyone. Achieving this in a rapidly changing geo-political environment and coming from the position of being so significantly under resourced makes this an even greater challenge. However – to remain positive – I firmly believe we can and will overcome these challenges and will transform the Defence Forces over the next few years. What leader, historical or current, inspires you and why? I was very impressed by our two female presidents (McAleese and Robinson) – who demonstrated with very different approaches that gender has no impact on ability to deliver. I like the concept of quiet unassuming leadership – people who achieve a huge amount quietly in the background and I think in T K Whitaker we have one such example. A civil servant who received numerous accolades including being named as the "Greatest living Irish Person" in 2002. Ultimately we all have the capacity to show leadership – in work and outside work – whether it is by doing something, deciding not to do something, saying something or deciding not to say something – we can all demonstrate leadership no matter our age, rank or background. Chief of Staff Lt Gen Seán Clancy welcoming the Head of Transformation Mr. Brian Molloy

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