As a company adept at empowering their clients to elevate their communications, PublicRelay know a thing or two about making an impact. A US communications analytics and advisory firm, PublicRelay opened their first office in Ireland in 2018 and have enjoyed great success since making the move into the European market. With 50 people now based in here they didn’t hesitate to grow beyond their Dublin base once established in Ireland.

‘It was really important to us that we expanded our presence in Ireland, particularly for recruitment,’ Karl Finn, Director of the company’s Irish operations, explains. ‘And from a cost efficiency perspective, it makes sense to have offices outside of Dublin as well.’

Now based in Cavan Digital Hub and Waterford’s workLAB, Karl says that making the move beyond the city-centre has opened the company up to new pools of talent.

‘When we launched in Cavan, the local community gave us such a warm welcome, it was unbelievable. In Dublin, we’re competing with the likes of Google and Meta to hire talent and similarly in Cork, Apple really have a keen hold on the market there. Whereas in Cavan, we’re offering a type of role that isn’t typically available locally - which is one of the reasons why people were very excited to see us open a presence there.’

Along with the benefits the move has offered for recruitment, Karl credits the team behind the local hub as being a huge help. With PublicRelay now based in two regional Connected Hubs where their teams work from their own office space within the Hub environment, he notes: ‘When you have the option to be based somewhere like a Hub, it means if anything happens, from wi-fi going down to something needing to be fixed, we can just reach out to the Hub Manager and they’ll sort that out for us.’

Not only that, but having a link directly into the local community is a big bonus. ‘In particular, Leanne, who runs the Cavan hub, has linked us into the community around us and helps us with any queries we might have,’ he explains. ‘And for our teams based in the Hub, it’s really reassuring that they have a wider network around them with the different businesses based there, so they’re not just working on their own.’ ‘In fact, when we started looking around Waterford, we considered getting a standalone premises initially, but we were really attracted to the Hub set-up, again for all the facilities that it offered us. ‘

With teams now based across the country, PublicRelay’s culture is maintained through regular meetups. ‘Our teams are in regular contact,’ Karl explains, ‘both virtually and by meeting up in person. They all take turns, to travel to each of our different locations and work from there, in the Hubs, or our Dublin office before heading out for a night together. Which is really nice to see!’

Along with PublicRelay’s base in Waterford and Cavan, the Connected Hubs network offers a host of flexible working spaces for businesses across Ireland. Find out what sort of space would suit your business here.

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