Ep 22: Jim O'Leary, Penta Group chief executive

[MUSIC] There's definitely an increased expectation of the CEO to be a geopolitical actor in today's world. And the reason for that is not because most of them want to, it's because they have to. [MUSIC] >> Hello and welcome to the BusinessPulse podcast with me, Danny McConnell and Meepy, to Road War. >> Now we have been very lucky with the caliber of guests that we've had here in terms of Irish level chief executive country heads. But this week we have a global chief executive, Jim Boleri, who is the chief executive of Penta, which is a newly formed, relatively newly formed, POR and communications and espouse intelligence agency as they've built themselves. This guy has a track record, four generation Irish as he described himself. But came from Edelman, which is probably the biggest peer agency, which has a presence here in Ireland as well. But he was courted into Penta and I think his point was only announced in May of this year, but he's been on a sort of a whistle stop tour of the world since taking office. But Ireland being on the list, I suppose it's tied in with the presidency, but he was in town in the last few days, our aviation and business correspondent, Ellie Donnelly sat down with them. But Pilar, this is a very interesting interview. This is a very interesting guest for us to have someone who not only has an espouse in Irish perspective, but this global perspective, you know, and he's mixing with the biggest and the best regeries talking about being at Davos and all these kind of places. This is a fascinating kind of guy to get for us, isn't he? Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, like they're operating at that very top level corporate in terms of who they who they advise. It's the likes of JP Morgan and Microsoft, Google, like the real big hitters of the US corporate world. And what it was interesting was that he's a new integral, as we'll hear in the interview, just an awful lot to talk about AI and data and what they want to do with like being a company of the future. Yet the very first thing he does when he comes into the role is he's on a, that whistle stop tour that you, that you describe, including Ireland. It's that kind of marrying as they talk about the modern AI data, leds driven insights as they say, but also it's present of flesh. It's getting to know people, it's getting to know his own teams, but also getting to know existing. And as he says, perspective clients. And I suppose in that job in the pure worlds, that's a huge amount of it. It always will be no matter how kind of technologically advanced it becomes. Yeah. And in terms of Ireland, I suppose, Pente took over up on a human brophy, which was a very famous PR agency here in town. Yeah. And they have added Leo Veracher to their ranks as well. And I think he was alluding to the fact that they haven't spent time. But the value of having a former prime minister in Leo Veracher on their books, obviously, shows at the level with which they're looking to aim at. Yeah. So he touches on that and that kind of model in the interview with Ellie, where he talks about not only wanting that kind of tech first platform that they can utilize, but also having experts and advisors who have actually kind of walked the walk, who have been in the middle of it, not just in advisory capacity, right to it through their career. They want people who have been decision-makers, who have been at the forefront of regulation or policy or politics or whatever. And you can see that for somebody like Leo Veracher. So he talks a big game about wanting to grow the business. And I think- Lots of double it. Lots of double it, which seems pretty incredible. He says there's scope in Ireland to grow as well. Not everybody's obviously going to be in the over-eager type hire, but they seem to want to have these kind of flagship individuals in each of their markets and you know, as well as the one here. And interesting, I suppose Ellie was very good and listens will hear about this, you know, in terms of asking around AI. AI is everywhere. And we're hearing in recent days about its impact in jobs that seem Microsoft and elsewhere. And he says, like he's very honest in terms of saying it will have a huge impact. Like there will be more change in the next five years than we've seen in the last five decades. And when someone of his caliber is saying that, you have to sort of sit back and take notice. Yeah, that was the line that jumped out to me as well. I kind of find it hard to envisage it. You know, like that is such seismic change. And when you think about what that sector and job is, you can certainly see an evolution of it. You can see a lot of change. It's kind of hard to see the fundamentals of it changing to the extent to which it is. Such a people-to-people business. Yeah, and it ultimately is. It's, you know, crisis management as he discusses. It's lobbying. It's dealing with policy. You know, that isn't going to change. I think the pace is going to change. And what he talks about in the interview, which is interesting as well. The idea is seeing around corners. Like, not only he talks about the model of pure and advisory, being a reactive model that has been built and that that's a relic of times gone past now, that everything's moving so quickly. The stakes are higher. The risks are greater. That they want to be more proactive with their clients, which is where all that and stuff comes in. So you can certainly see change in it. But because of the nature of the business, I personally find it hard to envisage that degree of change. Indeed, well listen, let's get into the interview. But before we do, as always, I want to just remind you of our leadership awards, which are happening in November in the mansion house. Nominations are open. We've had a huge number of nominations already in. But if you feel like you want to nominate your boss or someone who you think has done a great job, either as a chief executive or a chief information officer, you can go to leadership-awards.ie. That's leadership-awards.ie. Get your entries in and we look forward to seeing you in the mansion, on November the 12th. But now it's time for our interview with Ellie Donnelly, and Jim O'Leary of Penta, and we'll be back for the post-match analysis after this. Jim O'Leary, you are very welcome to the Business Post podcast. Thank you for joining us today. Thank you so much for having me. I am delighted to be here. Now you took over as chief executive of Penta in May. So you're so quite new in the role. We're here to discuss that and much more over the next while. Indeed, I'm a veteran of an entire month on the job. Super. Not bad to go. First of all, you're American. But would a name like that? I'm assuming there's an Irish connection. There is indeed an Irish connection. I am a proud fourth generation Irish American. I am married to an Aaron McCarthy. I have a son named Aiden and a daughter named Maeve. So we're proudly Irish. Very good. And do you get over here much at all? Larissa, for a second? No, no. I've been over here a number of times. And thank my wife and I got engaged here in the homeland. Fantastic. That's great. I suppose you're background then. How did you get into the top job at Penta? Tell me. Yeah, sure. So I've been doing this for a long time now. And most recently, I was a global president. So I was running Weber-Shantwick's business units around the world. Weber-Shantwick is one of the largest global agencies. And I started off as the CEO for the North America business and then ultimately ended up running North America and had oversight for Europe and Asia and Latin America and all the regions. Prior to that, I was running Edelman's US business. Edelman being the largest PR agency in the world in Weber-Shantwick being the second. So it's been a great journey to get here. And I am very excited to be here because the thing about Penta that is so unique and remarkable is that about half of our company is an intelligence business, an addition to an advisory business. And that's something that in our industry and in our profession, nobody else has. So that's why I'm so excited to be here. I said, we'll touch on intelligence a bit later on. But I suppose how does this role now differ from previous roles that you have? I mean, your CEO and I have Bunkstuff for you. Yeah. Talk me through that. Sure. Well, I feel like for my last couple of roles, the Bucks has probably stopped with me. As a global president of Weber-Shantwick, and similarly, prior to that running the North America business, I think the main shift right now is that I'm very much focused on doubling the size of this business. And I'm doing so based on the fact that the world today and tomorrow is just so much different than it was in decades past. And so what does that mean more simply? It means that in our profession, Penta is a leading modern corporate advisory company. And so what that means is we help our clients navigate through the most high stakes issues. And typically, those issues are at the intersection of reputation and culture or reputation. And policy and politics or reputation and technological developments or reputation and business, obviously, right? And in the past, the way that many agencies help clients navigate high stakes situations in those areas was very reactive, right? And it was, frankly, the model that has been built to service that type of reactive work is kind of like a remnant of an era that was an old era. We're in a new era. And in this new era, our clients expect much more and different than they did in the past, right? And so if Penta is helping a CEO of one of the largest companies in the world navigate high stakes political issue, a high stakes financial issue, right? A high stakes crisis. The reason that our clients increasingly are choosing us over the more legacy oriented agencies is because not only do we have people with decades of experience navigating the various situations that they are dealing with, you know, a situation with labor, a situation with a cyber attack, a situation with an activist investor, right? A situation with political ramifications across borders. We have those experts and advisors here at Penta. And we also have the experts and advisors and whatever sector of the client that we're working for is in, whether that's healthcare or technology or defense or energy or financial services, typically the highly regulated industry sectors. But in addition to all of that, which, you know, we're not alone in having. What we are very unique in having is, as I said, half of our business is an intelligence business. And so we have the most sophisticated tools, technology, and data that's powering all of our advisory work in a way that is fully integrated so that when our clients come to us and say, we need help doing an IPO or, you know, we need help with this trans-adliance Atlantic situation or cross-border trade situation. Not only can we bring to the table advisors with the case of experience doing just that, but those advisors are powered by the most sophisticated AI platform in the business. And in addition to that, they're armed with more data and intelligence as our clients than they can get anywhere else. And it's that combination that that's why so many of our clients come to us to help them deal with kind of the highest stakes, situations of the day. >>Chaped me a bit more about the AI side of the business. Like how is Penteusing it, what for, and what kind of impact do you see AI having on the PR world going forwards? >>Yes. So I think it's safe to say that in the call it PR industry, we are going to see more change in the next five years than we saw in the previous five decades. And I say that without exaggeration or hyperbole, and it's not going to be driven entirely by AI, but it's going to be driven a lot by AI. And so what we're going to see and are already seeing is that what our clients expect from us, again, is much more proactive than reactive, is much more data-driven and technology enabled. And for specific examples of that, I can have, I'll give you three. Now increasingly, you're probably familiar with the term like SEO search optimization. Well, now with AI models being the place that many people go to get their information even before going to do a Google search, there's the concept of generative engine optimization, GEO. But even that is a bit more narrow. What I would say is the desire for information to need to be machinery to pull. Essentially, if everyone's going to go to chat GPT or a quad or one of those first to get information, then as a company or as a brand or give it as a political leader, you need to make sure that whatever is coming up about you in those searches is reflective of the truth and what you and your and the reality. And so we have an entire business unit that is built around helping clients do exactly that. Right? Helping our fortune 100 companies do that. That would be one example. Another example would be the demand for what a lot of our clients are calling an active intelligence platform of their own, which essentially means, you know, if you're one of the world's largest companies and you want to know what's going on around the world related to your company, your competitors and the key issues that are kind of maybe even battlegrounds or competitive areas between you and those companies, you want to know in real time what's being said in traditional media, what's being said in social media, and then you want to take all of that and model it so that you can predict what's going to happen in the future before it happens so that you can either get ahead of issues or you can capitalize on opportunities. Right? And those are just a few examples of, you know, very specific things that AI is already helping our clients do. But the fundamental piece that is maybe even more important to think about is that right now most traditional agencies and firms, including, you know, our competitors here in Dublin and Europe and across the world, they typically will rely much more on people and people's relationships than they will on people and people's relationships combined with the AI. And so I am not by any means downplaying of the importance of people and their relationships in our business because that is important. And you know, the role of judgment and instinct and creativity and all of these things are only going to be at a premium. But you need though that and you need an AI spine that powers that in a way that increases speed scale precision sophistication to a degree that previously was just impossible. Right? And the reason that you need all of this is because the world is arguably more complex than it's been in a long time. And the role of being a leader, whether that's a business leader or a head of state, is arguably more challenging. The data reinforces this. We've seen, you know, the turnover of CEOs increasing in previous years. Expect that to be the case this year. And the reason for that is because as a leader, you have to do everything you always had to do. You know, manage supply chain or capital allocation or business operations. But in addition to that, you have to navigate the main challenges of the moment. In this moment, I think the big two that people often will talk about are AI transformation in the backlash against that, especially in the United States, as well as, you know, the geopolitical tension that exists around the world, including, you know, in the transatlantic relationship and the fact that many CEOs now feel like they have to effectively act as geopolitical actors, almost in the same way that heads in state would have historically only had to do, CEOs feel that they had to do similar. And so in a world that were these things are occurring. And in a world where we're seeing more risk, the intersection of business and culture, the intersection of politics and business, the intersection of business and technology, the degree of risk that companies face and the volume of threats that they face and the ability for those threats to force multiply across the different risk areas. It's only greater than it's ever been. And so if you're a company and you want to get ahead of all that, you need to be able to see your own corners. You need to be proactive. And you need to do that through a combination of both expert advisors who can help you navigate that, but also through using technology in a way that previously was impossible. And that is what we do at Penta in a way that no one else can do. And you know, when I think about what that means in terms of our local connection, right? And we haven't talked about this, but you know, our roots and I go back, right, we're Hume Brophy, you know, we still have John Hume, Jr., as a senior advisor, as well as Leo, right, former T-Shock. And we're really proud of our heritage here. And I think in this exact moment right now, with as you said, you know, kind of Dublin and Ireland becoming the center of European political universe for the next six months, right? I think it's going to create real opportunities for corporations and for our clients to be engaging here. And so both our heritage as Hume Brophy and then the kind of technological savvy that we bring to the table is why I think so many of our clients are coming to us with their, with high stakes problems. A couple of things that you mentioned there that I'd like to touch on. One, you expect high turnover of CEOs this year. Our CEOs almost haven't become political actors then in the current climate. And how do you navigate that as a CEO? How do you advise your CEOs in navigating this? Because a lot of them would have very, you know, financed backgrounds, they're not politicians. That's right. So, this is a great question. And it's one that was, at the most recent World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, hotly debated by CEOs. So there's definitely an increased expectation of the CEO to be a geopolitical actor in today's world. Right? And they have to because things have gotten so much more political. And so if you're doing business across multiple markets and you're not mindful of the macroeconomic and geopolitical context within which you're operating, right? One that in today's world is arguably more volatile than it's been in previous years. and you're not doing your job. CEO. And so, you know, Jamie Diamond is kind of like a famous example. You know, he's the CEO of JP Morgan, you know, who, you know, he's effectively playing the role that some PMs, you know, might have played in previous years. Many CEOs do this reluctantly because to your point, they weren't trained for this, right? You know, if you say you went to business school, like there's no, there's no class in business school about corporate diplomacy. I mean, maybe, maybe nowadays there is, but certainly not, you know, historically. And so the idea of the CEO having to be a geopolitical actor is not something that most of them, you know, embrace willingly, they embrace because they need to. And many of them are not trained for it. And that was one of the kind of complaints that I was hearing from CEOs when I was in Davos, which is that, you know, we have to do this and we will, but we don't necessarily like it. Can I ask you've touched on already, you were brought in to drive Panta's growth going forwards. How are you going about that and what would you like Panta to look like in five years time? Yes. So we'll look, first, like I said, I think in the next five years, it's going to be a normal amount of change. And I think that that change, there's going to be some clear winners and losers as a result of that change. And I think that many of our clients, they're already worried that they are ill-equipped to deal with the change that is coming. And so they look to firms like ours to help them navigate and get out ahead of that change. And I think that the firms that are able to help them do that, like ours are going to be the ones that succeed and the ones that can't want. What success looks like in my mind is one, I want Panta to be the first call for every single CEO or business leader in Ireland in Europe, in the United States or around the world when they are dealing with the highest stakes issue related to their reputation related to their political agenda, policy agenda, related to their financial strategy. And I want to have as a result of that, a team of people that can navigate the most high stakes issues, help plants navigate most high stakes issues. And I want that team of people to be powered by the most sophisticated intelligence platform on the planet. And as part of that intelligence platform, I want to have an unrivaled AI spine, where we where our AI is built in a way that is able to help companies, seer on corners, be proactive, navigate all of those issues before they even become issues, and do so in a way that seamlessly integrated with the advisory business. And I, as a result of all of that, I'd love to more than double the size of the company. I'd love to expand our presence here locally even more. I'd love to expand our presence in Europe even more. I'd love to expand our presence outside the US, other places even more. But my first priority in terms of expansion is going to probably be capital markets, building on the success we already have in regulatory capitals. Right. And so the two capital markets that I'm going to, we will be prioritizing, first will be New York and London. And from there, we'll continue to drive more growth. It's funny here, and you talk about dealing with clients and wanting them to come to you to navigate problems or come to you before they have a problem. From my side of the desk, I think we're calling you guys when we hear there's a problem. So it's just got to be interesting to hear that side. Of course, can you chop me through what kind of industries your clients are in at the moment? And, you know, are there any common themes of advice that you're giving your CEOs at the moment? Yes. So I would say that the industries right now that we have the largest proportion of clients in are the more highly regulated ones. And those include financial services, energy, health and technology. We have clients across all of the industry sectors beyond those two, but you know, those are maybe a few examples. We typically will work for, you know, the largest tech companies, the largest healthcare companies, like the largest energy companies, though it will also work for, you know, more local options to more local players too. I think when it comes to the type of work that we're doing for our clients, I think it breaks down into a couple different categories. So the largest one is is helping influence policy, helping navigate politics. A few others include helping clients navigate either high stakes issues or in some cases crises related to litigation related to cyber security related to labor. I think many clients come to us to help enhance their corporate reputation. I know that many clients also come to us when they have a very high stakes issue that they need to build a comprehensive campaign around. And so, you know, maybe you're calling them on the phone about, you know, something that you're seeing happen out in the marketplace and maybe they're desiring to build an entire coalition around a specific issue to influence both the policy agenda as well as the cultural agenda as well as even a business agenda. Is it difficult at the moment helping clients navigate around political issues and the current climate? Yes, and that's good. So, you know, some people will see all of the challenge in the world and they'll be pessimistic as a result of it. I see all of the challenge in the world and I see opportunity as a result of it, right? Because the firm that's able to help clients navigate all of those challenges is, which, of course, is Penta, is the firm that benefits as a result of all of that challenge. And so, in a world where there's arguably more risk and where the risk can collide across different areas of risk, where there's arguably, you know, where things are heightened in terms of political pressure, in terms of political, in terms of overall volatility, whether it's economic volatility or political volatility, you know, this is a complex world and, you know, one where our clients need, obviously, arguably more help than ever before. And certainly, when you can bring solutions to the table for them that are both a combination of the way that more traditional advisory firms might do it, but then also power that by, you know, technology data and AI in a way that is unrivaled, that's when you can really make an impact. And there's nothing better than being able to make a material impact for your clients or have a half of your clients, which is, you know, what we always focus on. You're here in Dublin as our own suits EU presidency. Any thoughts, Jim, on relations between the EU and the US at the moment? Well, certainly, Trans-Atlantic relations are complicated in this environment. Some may say a bit strained. I think it'll be really interesting to see what the next six months bring. I'm delighted, frankly, that, you know, that you presidency is now going to be here in Ireland. I think Ireland has just a unique place as kind of the US portal to Europe more broadly. And such a history of frankly the innovation and technology innovation too. To get back to your role, like, as you're only in it since May, I appreciate it's relatively new, but what does a typical day look like for you at the moment? Yeah, well, right now, a typical day looks like me being on the road. So, you know, my first week in the role I spent in Washington, my second week I spent in New York. My third week I spent in the South of France at an industry event in Cannes, that was last week, and this week I'm here. So right now when I'm really focused on doing, I'm really focused on spending time to get to know our teams, to get to know our clients, to meet with prospective clients, to talk to people like you about why I'm so excited to be at Penta and why it shows to come here. The other things that I'm very focused on is building a strategy to realize the vision that I've already shared with you about being kind of the most you know, technology enabled AI native firm, full stop. Do you think there's room for the business to grow in Ireland, growths, client base, growth personnel? Yeah, oh, absolutely. Ireland, you know, is central to our heritage, and you know, will continue to be central to our plans for the future. How have you found moving from a larger company to a smaller private equity backed firm and why that decision? It's been great. So our private equity backed, Shamrock Capital is our private equity, and they are great and have been really terrific to work with. They share my ambition, which is really exciting. I think the transition overall has been excellent. I really have enjoyed it. There's an energy here and there's so much demand from clients in a way where it's very, what clients want is so much different than what clients wanted in the past. And firms like Penta, those where if you were to literally just draw up what the firm of the future would look like on a piece of paper, you would draw Penta, the Penta is the building black for what you would draw, right? And that's really exciting and refreshing. You know, I think there are other more legacy organizations that are just going to struggle given where the world is going and their inability to meet the new changing needs of clients. And what is that biggest difference between what they want now, what they want in the past, is it the data driven insights? Data driven insights, technology enabled teams highly sophisticated and specialized senior advisors who are powered by the data insights and technology enabled teams. All integrated in one place with the speed scale precision ability to operate in real time, it kind of speed of real time, proactively versus reactively. And all of these things together are the oftentimes the reason why our clients choose us. You touched on a brief, you've got a former T-Shickly or Radcar on the board of the company. Why is it important to somebody like him on the board and what does he bring to the group? Yeah, he's great. I spent the day with him so far. He's, you know, such a compelling part of our team here. I think, look, as I said, in addition to all of the tool tech data analytics, AI, everything on the tech side, you need to pair that with people who are operating at the highest levels of business and government. And that's why he's part of our team because that's of course what he does. And as much as I am a massive proponent of technological innovation, it is also equally clear to me that if it's not paired with, you know, people who have judgment, instinct, creativity, networks, decades of experience, navigating complex issues on the run, that it won't work in the same way. In the same way that if you only had the expertise minus the technology, it wouldn't work the same way. When you bring them together, it's not just like a OnePlus 1 equals two, it's a force multiplying effect. So maybe it's like OnePlus 1 equals four. You mentioned there earlier that Penta had acquired Hume Brophy back in 2023. What was it that made you guys want to have a presence in the Irish markets? Yeah, well, so, you know, we were so, I wasn't around that of course. But speaking on behalf of Penta, you know, we have always desire to bring on the best talent in the markets that we serve. And when we looked at, you know, the Irish market, when we looked at the European market, it was very clear to us that Hume Brophy was, you know, connected at the highest levels and had the same degree of ambition that we did. And the the desire to embed the tech side into the work in a way that not every firm does. And so it was a clear choice for us. Maybe away from work, Jim, you're on the board of the Larry Children's Hospital in Chicago. Yes. What was behind that? Can I ask decisions going to board there? Yeah, sure. So, you know, Laurie's is like the, it's one of the best hospitals in the United States. So I'm really proud to be on the foundation board there. My son is a patient of the hospital. He has a rare disease. It's called cystinosis. And it's a disease that he requires a lot of care for as a result of having. And so he was diagnosed at, Laurie's, you know, at one year of age. He's doing great right now. Good. And so it was really important to me to play a bigger role in support of the hospital given everything that the hospital had done for my family. And so in addition to that, I raised money for rare disease research. And I also have created a patient advocacy organization called the CP4C to that end too. And he's doing well. Nice. Yeah, he's doing great. Yeah. Fantastic. Yeah, he's 10. And you know, most people would would never notice. Despite the fact that he's got a, you know, severe rare disease. And so I credit, you know, the hospital with an end to see more broadly with a lot of that. And last question, do you want to switch off? I mean, when you're not working with it? Well, I don't know if there is a switch off. In the morning, I certainly like to go for a, get some exercise, whether it's a nice long run along the river like I did this morning here or something along those lines. Though that may be considered more of a switch on than off. I guess maybe at the end of the day, a nice dinner with good company or my family could be a good switch off. But I don't really do too much switching off these days. So if I'm being honest, ask me again in a year. I'll come back in a year and then we'll see. But as of right now, there's not too much switching off. We'll take this up again in 12 months time. Jim. Brilliant. Lovely to talk to you. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. It's been great. Take care. Welcome back. Peter, I talked to get that, as I said in the intro, to get that character of speaker. And I thought he was very open in terms of his approach. I mean, as you say, as we talked in the intro, the demand or desire to grow the business by doubling it in size. But for me, the standard line was the turnover of chief executives that he referred to and how they're advising all of that. But also some chief executives are now having to act like prime ministers. And they are seeing that having that level of power and influence on a world stage, to me, that was super really, really interesting. Yeah. And not only in the fact that that's the case, but also it feels like that's the gap that CEO, a lot of CEOs actually see in their skill sets. That is, Elliot thinks says actually in the piece, a lot of CEOs would have come through the, you know, CFO route that they would be more financial in terms of their background. And suddenly, they find themselves in this era where everything, as he says, is political and geopolitical ramifications. They're not comfortable in the space. They're not comfortable. So that's where they need a penta or they need in an Irish context, Elliot Varadkar, back to the thing we said at the start of, they need somebody who understands how the sausage is made, how policy formation happens, how regulation happens, and who can open doors to try and emitterate whatever problems that they have basically. So not only the fact that it is an overriding issue for CEOs, but also I got the sense it's where a lot of them feel like they have a weakness as well. And a lot of them obviously fall down because he spoke about the number of chief executives changing. So obviously they're not meeting that new demand that these roles are placing on them. Yeah, absolutely. And you can see the range, so like the geopolitical stuff hung over everything, but he mentions the range of issues that they deal with, everything from labor, issues to cyber, attacks to policy formation to activists, investors. I mean, it's a huge range of things that any organization, any CEO has to deal with. So you can see why these advisory firms and pure firms are so popular, even bringing it back to an Irish context, I don't have the numbers, but I feel like since over the course of my career, there's been a proliferation of new pure firms. They only seem to get bigger, greater in number and grow in size as well. And is that a body product of supposed government regulation becoming more complex? Is it the fact that you have, like you say, probably people who are very technically good at being a chief financial officer or being a good chief information officer, but don't have the requisite skill set to be that number one leader? It's that and journalists getting out of journalists more. But yes, I think so. The world probably has become more complex. I mean, everything from workers' rights to environmental regulation, to, you know, we've had guests on this podcast for the last couple of weeks and months, who say, you could almost year by year, every 24 months, something, some big new shiny thing happens. So it's kind of AI now. It was ESG a couple of years ago. It was defense. It probably still defense. It was structured. And so like to be able to move, you'd always get yourself up to a relative degree of expertise on the topic of 2023 and then suddenly in 2024 and it has moved on. So I think with the pace of change and these big, it's like a permacristoes we've had as well since, you know, you go back to the financial crash, Brexit, COVID, you know, environmental issues you pray. So I think that's for the PR and the advisors community. They help plug some of those gaps quicker than I think an organization would be able to bring up their own capacity on that. I think one of the most revealing aspects of the interview is when Ellie asked her, okay, to switch off. And, you know, he kind of admitted in this job, there really isn't one. And one and one there then about the staying power of like, I mean, how, like at that level and that pace, I mean, how sustainably is that over a long period of time? Particularly for someone who's a family and all that kind of stuff. I mean, and somebody who sets themselves to target straight out the gap of someone who wants to emphasize the business. So he's not giving himself any cushy targets to meet in the first year or so of his business. You could imagine like the job of being this advisor is that you are at the back and call of your clients. So I mean, I think we see it again domestically with some of the PRs here that even very, very senior people at the top of the organizations. They are having to be super responsive at all sorts of unusual time. And you were asking queries from Sunday journalists. Do you think they're basically, but it's like I always have a degree of sympathy for PR people. They're stuck in the middle of the client who might get on to the anywhere the day or week. And then they've got us on the other side looking for answers as well. So it's a tough business in that sense in that it's kind of incestant. And as you say, tough to switch off, I think. Very good. Well, listen, that was our interview with Jim O'Leary of Pentegroupe, the global chief executive, a great get-away Ellie Donnelly, our colleague here. But we'll have more and fascinating guests between now and the end of the summer for you to devint. And I'm taking a little bit of a holiday, but I think we're with Sabine Goodnick, we'll make sure that the podcast doesn't waver or want to survive without you. Well, hopefully now. Much less than the podcast. Very good. But listen, until next time, for me, Daniel MacKal, and me, Peter O'Dwar. Bye-bye for live.