The last word

EM speaks to Croke Park Stadium Director Peter Mc Kenna.

Achemical engineer, an Executive with the Smurfit Group, Publisher, Stadium Director – Peter McKenna is clearly a man who likes variety in his life. Still in his mid-forties Peter's CV would be the envy of the vast majority of his peers. And his current job makes him the envy of just about everyone.

As Stadium Director of Croke Park he is responsible for the smooth running of one of Europe's largest and most modern sports facilities and the focal point for the world's most successful amateur sporting organisation.

But how did a chemical engineer arrive in such a position? "I was always fascinated by chemical engineering while I was in school," he says. "It's one of those sciences that explores questions to which we still don't have the answer like what colour is exactly. I spent a tremendously interesting four years in UCD but when I graduated in 1985, back then the only real employment opportunities for chemical engineers were abroad."

He didn't have to take that route, however. "I was fortunate that one of the first things that came up was the opportunity to get on the Smurfit Graduate Development Programme. This was like a two year, on-the-job MBA and I was very fortunate to get on it. The programme meant that you got to move to a management position in the group very quickly, although you were very well mentored when you did."

His entry into the publishing division of the group came about in a somewhat strange fashion. "I had been writing speeches for some of the senior executives in the group during my early years and they thought that indicated I would make a good publisher," he recalls with a smile. "I don't necessarily agree that there is any connection between a writing ability and a publishing ability at all but I ended up in the publishing division nevertheless."

He quickly rose to become Managing Director of the division and was responsible for a wide range of household name magazines including Woman's Way, IT and U Magazine. He also led the company into contract publishing on behalf of other corporate clients and produced magazines such as Cara for Aer Lingus. Another contract publication was Electric Mail for ESB.

"Working on Electric Mail was great," Peter notes. "We built up really strong relationships with the team in ESB and I think we produced a really good magazine together. I have great memories of working with ESB people."

And then came the move to the GAA in 2002. It would be hard to imagine a sharper career turn than this one but Peter McKenna just sees it as meeting another challenge. "While the GAA is a national community based organisation it still has to run the Croke Park stadium as a business. It has to look at the customer and fan experience and strive to meet their expectations by giving them clean bathrooms, nice surroundings, reasonable prices for food and drink, excellent access for people with disabilities and so on. My training in the Smurfit Group had prepared me for taking on that sort of challenge."

The job opportunity arose through a chance meeting with former Smurfit Group president and member of the Croke Park Stadium Executive, Paddy Wright. "Paddy mentioned the Croke Park opportunity to me and I told him I'd enjoy the challenge. I had to go through an extremely tough interview process though. Peter Quinn chaired the interview panel and he's a man that can really put you through your paces. I was very pleased to come through it successfully."

In many ways the rest is history. He has presided over a period of unparalleled success for the stadium. The hotel has been added during his time, soccer and rugby have become temporary tenants, some of the most marvellous football and hurling in living memory has been played there over the past few years and it has been voted the world's number one concert venue by Billboard magazine.

In the search to make things even better McKenna and the GAA looked towards the environment and partnered with ESB in the highly innovative Cúl Green project. Cúl Green aims to create a net carbon neutral Croke Park by maximising energy efficiency and minimising energy usage. It is hoped to make the stadium carbon neutral by the end of 2009.

"Cúl Green is a very important statement of the philosophy of the GAA as a community based organisation," he says. "We have a responsibility not only to make statements but to lead the way in terms of our own behaviour. The level of energy consumption in the stadium was not sustainable and we simply had to do something about it."

A meeting with ESB Chief Executive, Padraig McManus set the project off on its current highly successful trajectory. "Padraig told us that ESB planned to make itself carbon neutral by 2020 and we almost laughed at the idea of an electricity company achieving this," Peter explains. "But he explained to us how they were doing it and told us that we needed to be a lot more ambitious with our own plans. That's how the partnership started and since then we have worked with a great bunch of people like Deirdre Newell who has been based here at the stadium in achieving our goal."

And success is not far off. "We are nearing carbon neutrality for the stadium but that's not enough. We are also encouraging the fans to reduce their environmental impact in travelling to and from the stadium as well as in their everyday lives. We are very concerned at getting children involved in initiatives. It is small incremental changes by everyone that can make a real difference in the long run. That's the definition of community."

"Of course our involvement with ESB doesn't end there. ESB are also the sponsors of our minor and hurling football championships and this sponsorship is now in its fifth year. In fact we have just launched the 2009 championships."

Perhaps the crowning glory in what has already been something of an annus mirabilus for Irish sport has been the GAA's 125th anniversary celebrations and the wonderful fireworks display and light show at Croke Park that marked it. "We engaged the same people who organise the St Patrick's Festival to run the event for us. It was very important to us that we gave the fans and the people who are the heartbeat of the GAA an evening to remember and I'm very proud of what we achieved."

As for the future, he has no plans for another sharp career turn just yet. "If you are not enjoying what you do at work the days can become very long. If you do enjoy it work is a pleasure. I have not enjoyed anything in my working life as much as my job here at Croke Park so I have no plans to move on just yet. If the day comes when I'm not enjoying it that may change, but thankfully that day isn't here yet."

EM