Built Over Time: Stories of Enduring Growth

Carr Communications - Donal Cronin & Eimear Hurley

In an economy consumed with rapid growth, enduring growth is often misunderstood. The businesses that last are rarely those chasing momentum alone, but those built with patience, discipline and a clear sense of direction. Built Over Time looks beyond the startup narrative to examine how established companies grow in practice, expanding teams, deepening capability and adapting to change without losing what makes them work. Flexible workspaces provide the foundations for this kind of growth, offering the adaptability, infrastructure, and environment that allow teams to scale efficiently while maintaining focus. Through the experiences of organisations operating at scale, this series examines the decisions, structures, and long-term thinking required to build businesses designed to endure.

Carr Communications on bringing out the best in people

Communication is core to just about every human activity: we convince, we cajole, we influence and we impress, we prompt and we persuade. It’s a skill we can learn for ourselves or ask others to do for us. For over 50 years, Carr Communications has been helping people and organisations across Ireland, and increasingly beyond, to tell their stories.

If the name is familiar, that might be from Carr’s reputation as a classic public relations agency, but that’s just one of six arms to a surprisingly multifaceted business. Since it first opened its doors in 1973, Carr Communications has expanded and evolved with careful intention and with one organising principle as the connective tissue between the different divisions of the business.

“Communication is our core expertise,” says owner/director Donal Cronin, “whether that’s working with one person who wants to enhance their communication, working with an organisation on its communication internal or external, or working with Government departments and agencies, here and in Europe, looking at influencing population behaviour. 

To give a few examples: we might be coaching someone going for a promotional interview, or giving an important presentation in a high-pressure situation.  We could be working with a company on all aspects of its internal communication, or looking outwards at its communication to a range of external stakeholders.  And we could be working with a department or a state agency communicating to an entire population, on issues such as health, road safety, environment, energy efficiency and so on.

But  at the heart of everything we do is this: how does this person, or this team, or this company, or agency communicate more effectively with all key audiences and stakeholders. “

Seen in this light, it makes sense that Carr Communications built on its PR practice serving public and private sectors, across environment, sustainable energy, road safety, local government, aviation and more. It also designs and delivers training programmes in presentations, media skills, negotiation and management development. Its careers unit supports individuals at every stage of their professional journey.

The Behavioural Insights Team is the product of a deep engagement with behavioural science that began more than 15 years ago through a partnership with Professor Liam Delaney, then in UCD’s Geary Institute, now Head of Psychological and Behavioural Science at LSE, London School of Economics.  Drawing on psychology, neuroscience and the social sciences, this unit focuses on understanding human behaviour in order to influence it responsibly. That may mean designing interventions to improve road safety, or contributing to multi‑million‑euro projects aimed at changing population behaviour at national or EU level.

Expansion into Europe

Carr Communications has also spread its wings beyond these shores. Its thriving Horizon Europe practice is currently involved in 10 major research projects that receive millions of euro in EU funding. Each involves consortia that can run to 60 partners including universities, research institutes and companies spread across multiple member states. In these complex, multi‑year endeavours, Carr Communications’ role is to translate dense scientific work on climate change, cancer, digital transformation or biodiversity, into accessible narratives that policymakers, stakeholders and citizens across Europe can understand.

The most recent addition to the business is creative and digital services, established a decade ago. This team builds brands, supports integrated campaigns and provides the best in class creative layer that ties together Carr’s other offerings.

 A place to call home

Many of Carr Communications’ team spend time off site or delivering programmes in external facilities. Some work in Europe; others are embedded in client offices. The company’s hybrid working model allows people to work from home on flexible schedules and timelines. But having a central hub has always been important.

“We love having a place that we all call home, where people can come and congregate and mix and meet, and we’ve always had our own big central office somewhere that was ours. We recognise the value of meeting and interacting and sharing information, and sharing knowledge, the different parts of the business bumping into each other in the same space,” says Donal.

For 15 years, that home was a striking landmark building on Northumberland Road in Dublin. The historic building played a part in the 1916 uprising as a force of Irish Volunteers occupied buildings along the rRoad.  When, after 15 years, the lease came up for review during the Covid-19 pandemic, Carr’s leadership decided to swap a long-term lease for a top‑tier serviced environment that could match the firm’s standards while offering flexibility into the future. Today, the company is based in Glandore’s Fitzwilliam Square offices, preserving a sense of connection by giving the team a place to congregate and collaborate, sharing ideas while benefiting from the flexibility that today’s working environment demands. .

For such a significant change, Carr Communications involved the wider team in evaluating various locations – and there was one clear winner. “There were different styles on offer and different vibes on offer, and the team came back unanimously and said, ‘they’re all lovely, but the only one that seems to match our standard for excellence is Glandore’. It’s that simple. And the fact that it was Irish made a difference as well,” Donal says. “It gave us access to a number of things like lovely shared spaces and access to high quality meeting rooms and boardrooms that reflected: this is Carr Communications’ standard, because we could bring clients into a space and say, ‘this is ours’.”

Continuity has been the watchword, keeping Carr’s identity intact. For years, a key part of its former home was a library that it had converted from the original drawing room. Visitors to Carr’s offices, as well as Carr’s team, could take time to dip into the knowledge gathered in its extensive and well-stocked library, spanning subjects across all domains and disciplines including communications, management, leadership, and the environment.

A key factor in the final decision for the new office was Glandore’s willingness to accommodate the unique elements that define Carr Communications’ identity. When signing with Glandore, Carr  made sure there would not just be desks and meeting rooms, but a dedicated library area to pause and pore over those pages once more. Glandore was happy to accommodate. 

Flexibility fosters culture

Culture was another element that successfully transferred from the old office. In 2025, Carr Communications was named one of The Sunday Times ‘Best Places to Work in Ireland’, scoring 91% for employee engagement in an industry where the average is closer to 70%. “All of that came down to our culture, the focus we put on our people, providing a workplace that nurtures creativity and connection – flexibility is a huge part of that,” says Eimear Hurley, Carr’s Director of Strategic Communications. “Our industry is very transient by nature: people might spend 18-24 months in an agency before moving on, but our senior team have all been with us for almost a decade and others on the team have been here 20 years,” she adds. Eimear’s own story is proof: she joined 18 years ago as an entry-level Account Executive, became Head of PR 10 years ago and joined the board in 2022.

“Building relationships is at the heart of what we do, and many of our client partnerships span several years. We know the value of developing genuine, long-term relationships, so continuity within our teams is a key priority. Having people work with clients over time and across multiple campaigns is central to who we are and the long-term sustainability of the business,” she says.

Sustainability isn’t just a buzzword for Carr Communications: it can look back with pride on 50 years in business and face forward with confidence. Growth plans include deeper specialisation in its chosen fields, further expansion of the Horizon portfolio, and continued investment in its team.

Crucially, Glandore provides a long-term solution to the company’s evolving needs of a thriving SME. The current base gives it Carr Communications the room – literally and figuratively – to grow without sacrificing its sense of home. “If we become 50% bigger in the next five years, we wouldn’t see any need to have to move from where we are,” Eimear says. They will do this by doing what they do best: bringing out the best in people.