ROD pays tribute to late Chairman, Harry Meighan

Many of you will have heard about the passing of our Chairman, Harry Meighan, on Friday, 6 June 2025. We would like to take this opportunity to share our memories of a dear friend, esteemed colleague and gifted leader, whose passion for engineering, commitment to quality and dedication to the development of the company and its people earned him the respect of the engineering community in Ireland and abroad. 

Harry graduated with a degree in civil engineering from University College Dublin (UCD) in 1986 and spent the next 10 years working for contractors in the UK, principally Balfour Beatty. He returned to Ireland in 1996 to work for SIAC Construction as structures agent on the M1 Balbriggan Bypass. In 1998, Harry joined ROD, undertaking the contract administration function on projects at construction stage, a role that enabled him to develop lasting relationships with local authority clients; the National Road Authority (NRA)/ Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII); and contractors. 

Over the following decade, he applied his calm demeanour, his skills in contract law and engineering, and his sense of fairness to supporting the delivery of numerous infrastructure projects around Ireland, from interurban motorways to one-off bridges, and through this he leaves a wonderful legacy to Irish society. Harry also used his extensive experience in dispute resolution and client advocacy to contribute to the development of new forms of contract and to providing training to various public bodies. Meanwhile, he was generous with his time in giving us insightful procurement and contracts advice. 

Harry became managing director of ROD in 2009 and led the company through the difficult years that followed. During this period, he demonstrated the forward-thinking approach that defined his term as managing director. In 2009, he was instrumental in ROD establishing a new research arm, Roughan & O'Donovan Innovative Solutions, with Professor Eugene O’Brien at UCD and Professor Alan O’Connor at Trinity College Dublin, to advance our commitment to innovation and applied research. 

In 2011, Harry secured an invitation for ROD to join Europengineers, a network of independent European engineering consultants brought together by a common desire to share industry best practice knowledge and foster collaboration between its member companies. ROD was the network’s first Irish member, with the other eight members drawn from France (Setec), Germany (Schüßler- Plan), Greece (Salfo), Italy (Hydea), Spain (Pondio), Switzerland (Basler & Hofmann), the Netherlands (Aronsohn) and Bureau greisch (Belgium).

During the 2010s, Harry established our Contract Administration and Intelligent Transport Systems Groups, demonstrating his proactive and strategic approach to developing ROD, and creating new business pipelines that continue to thrive today. In 2011, Harry oversaw the creation of ROD’s graduate development programme to share the experience of his generation of engineers with the younger members of our team through mentoring, structured knowledge sharing and cross-team rotations. His commitment to nurturing young professionals also extended to our trainee technician and chartership support programmes, both of which expanded during his time as managing director.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Harry demonstrated his heartfelt concern for our team’s well-being, sharing reassuring and encouraging memos with our staff during what was a deeply challenging time, and bringing our risk management, safety, HR, Future of Work, and employee represtentative groups together to chart a path forward for the company. He was one of the most consistent contributors to our social committee’s ‘Song of the Day’ initiative (established during the pandemic to give our then fully remote team a sense of connection with one another) , with his wide-ranging love of music evident in his requests, his first being “Hanging on the Glow” by Malojian and a more recent being “Mr Soul” by Neil Young.

In 2021, Harry became chairman of the group companies and assumed responsibility for planning – in meticulous detail – ROD’s 50th anniversary celebrations. He oversaw every aspect of our gala dinner in the Shelbourne Hotel, from the menu and the invitations to the music and the entertainment. While illness prevented Harry from attending the event, his ROD family – keenly feeling his absence - raised a glass in his honour, expressing our gratitude to him with a rousing round of applause. As part of his commemoration of ROD’s first 50 years, Harry oversaw development of a book that told the stories of ROD’s founders, Derry Roughan and Joe O’Donovan, and charted the humble beginnings of the company, the highs and lows, and the projects that defined us. The book is a testament to Harry’s deep respect for Derry and Joe as well as his desire to capture the people, the events and the work that shaped ROD so that future employees would know where we have come from and where we are going.

Harry was widely recognised as an influential figure in the engineering consultancy sector, in Ireland and abroad. He volunteered on various industry committees and encouraged colleagues to do the same. Over the years, he served on the ACEI Executive, the ACEI Civils Committee, and the Engineers Ireland Dispute Resolution Board. He was Chairman of Europengineers from 2021 to 2024.

For the staff at ROD and the many engineers who developed successful careers under his guidance, Harry’s sharp intellect, fairness, honesty and wry smile will always be remembered. Harry played a central role in our social events and activities, including the greyhound syndicate, the lotto syndicate, the football team in the Engineers League and later the annual Christmas charity football match for the John Harkin Memorial Cup. Harry was also fiercely proud of his Kilkenny roots, and on GOAL Jersey Day - one of his favourite work days of the year - he would don his black and amber jersey and remind our staff of Kilkenny’s dominance. He also initiated our annual summer social at Leopardstown racecourse, an event staff will always consider synonymous with Harry given his dedication to social outlets in the workplace and his love of racing.

In 1986, I graduated with a degree in civil engineering from University College Dublin (UCD), where Séamus MacGearailt incidentally was a classmate. Ireland was economically depressed at that time, and as there were no employment opportunities for graduate engineers, I emigrated to London. I spent the next 10 years working for contractors there, principally Balfour Beatty for six years. By the mid-1990s, things had started to improve in Ireland, and I returned with my wife, Catherine, and sons in December 1996 to work for SIAC Construction as structures agent on the M1 Balbriggan Bypass. 

As was common in those days, the road was designed in-house by Fingal County Council, and the eight bridges were designed by four consultants, allocated two bridges each. ROD was the designer for the Naul Road and Rowan’s Road overbridges, both of which were of voided post-tensioned deck construction (with the first full-scale grout trial beam in Ireland); had early use of GGBS (Ground Granulated Blast-furnace Slag); a controlled permeability formwork liner for all exposed surfaces; and a protective coating system. 

The County Engineer in Fingal was the ‘Engineer’ for the overall project while Joe O’Donovan was the ‘Engineer’ for ROD’s two bridges. We had monthly progress meetings with Joe, and the design queries, of which there were few, were dealt with by Pat Maher and Nigel O’Neill. I knew nothing of ROD when I returned to Ireland, but it quickly became apparent from my conversations with the likes of Rory O’Sullivan and Tom O’Connor of Fingal, Hank Fogarty and Michael Durkin of SIAC, and Tom Foley of Ascon that the company was highly respected for the quality of its design and detailing. 

In late 1997/early 1998, Joe approached me about a position as contracts manager with ROD. By that time, the Irish economy was growing rapidly; the National Roads Authority (NRA) had been established since 1993; and the legwork put in by Joe, Derry Roughan, Garry Smyth and Shay Ryan to establish and maintain ROD during the lean years was starting to bear fruit. The move away from contracting to a fixed office base appealed to me, and I started working with ROD in March 1998, undertaking the contract administration function on projects at construction stage. The role involved multiple projects and a lot of travelling for progress meetings, but that enabled relationships to be built with many local authority clients; the NRA/Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII); and several contractors, who later became clients.

There were seven board directors during my 12 years as managing director, and six when Richard Power retired in 2013. We worked well together, reaching unanimous agreement on every strategic action and initiative. The ownership model in ROD allows us to take a perspective on business, client and project matters that is not concerned with optimising shareholder value but directed towards securing the long-term viability and prosperity of the company. This principle guided us during the early years of my tenure, when we were working through the effects of the 2007-2008 financial crisis, which would continue to constrain the business until 2016. The Irish government, for instance, introduced the Financial Emergency Measures bill in 2009, and our public sector clients subsequently sought an 8% reduction in our contracted fees through what were termed the ‘Bord Snip’ letters. 

We successfully resisted those cuts, but we had come from the heady heights of the Celtic Tiger years, and our internal cost base was unsustainable compared to revenues. When we decided to close the Galway office, which had been established in anticipation of the NRA advancing Atlantic Corridor projects that were shelved during the recession, we put in place a voluntary redundancy process. We also had a small number of involuntary redundancies, which were limited because all employees bought into the principle of accepting across-the-board salary cuts with a view to maintaining maximum employment numbers—in essence, employees put their colleagues above their own self-interest [Aside: - a principal resolution at the June 2009 shareholder strategy day was ‘to provide employment for as many of the current design office staff as possible.’] These measures required extensive consultation with our employees, including through employee briefing days, and may well have been the seed for our employee consultation forum, which was established in March 2010 and continues to this day. We also set up a cost control group to look at every head of expenditure, and we developed what were essentially ‘survival’ business plans. Ultimately, we remained profitable throughout those post-recession years, albeit at a marginal level. 

The other challenge during those years was to find new work, which was a main topic at the Shareholder Strategy Days. During the Celtic Tiger years, which also saw the NRA’s roll out of the major inter-urban motorway network, a disproportionate percentage of company revenue was coming from NRA/TII funded projects. There was a need for us to diversify our client base, our sectors and our geographical base, and this continues to be a strategic objective to the present day. 

Our lowest point in terms of turnover was 2013. Reviewing the revenues for that year: - Tony Dempsey had diversified fees from projects in Poland, Panama, Copenhagen, Malaysia, India (where he and Pankaj Kumar Das had invested a lot of personal time and effort in business development); Mark Kilcullen had projects in England, Scotland and Wales; Marc Jones was working on the A2 Shore Road in Belfast, which ultimately led on to the A6 projects and the current A5 ECI; Séamus’s main projects were the Applegreen sites and the Dublin-Galway Cycleway; and Jim was project director for the NRA ITS Support Services, which was a new services stream for ROD. 

With a leaner company, we concluded that there was a need for more cross-functional capability such that staff could migrate to a sector that was busy when their own team was quiet. There was only limited success with this strategy, but the policy was a forerunner of the Graduate Development (Rotation) Programme initiated in 2011, and which has proven to be a great success. 

By 2015, market conditions were looking better, staff numbers had started to increase again, and we were confident enough to undertake a major refurbishment of our Arena House offices. By 2016, we began to consider the possibility of opening a north Dublin office, and two years later, on 24th September 2018, we opened our Northwood office. By 2017, we had started thinking about opening a UK office as a Brexit hedge, to foster diversification and to align with Jim’s long-term plans. The office in Otley was subsequently opened in August 2019. 

We categorise the first generation of shareholders from 1974 to 1981 as GEN1, and those appointed from 2000 to 2008 as GEN2. The transition to GEN2 was made considerably smoother by the continuing presence of GEN1 shareholders. Succession planning for GEN3 was on our strategy day agenda from 2014 following Richard’s retirement in 2013, but the formal process didn’t commence until 2019. Aonghus O’Keeffe, Barry Corrigan, Eoin Ó Catháin and Lewis Feely were the first wave of GEN3 appointed in 2020, followed by Daire Ó Riagáin in 2023. Again, there will be a managed transition period with GEN2 shareholders continuing in the business, and I hope this will set the company up for the next 20 years. 

The Covid-19 pandemic was the last major challenge during my time as managing director and required us all to move to remote working in March 2020. Our Risk Management Group, Safety Group, HR team, Future of Work task group, Employee Representatives and Social Committee all contributed to managing the challenge, and everyone engaged and cooperated with the actions we took and the phased return to work. The experience precipitated the remote working policy launched in 2022, which has fundamentally changed the way we work and improved the work-life balance for employees.

My wishes for 10 years’ time would be that the company is still trading independently and successfully; that the ROD UK company has grown and prospered; that the ‘familyfeel’ of the company has been nurtured and sustained; that employees remain valued and are (generally) happy with ROD; that the third generation of ownership is directing the company and driving strategy; and that we have promoted and improved diversity at director level and across the management team.

Garry Smyth and Shay Ryan, who were there from almost the very start, continue to attend our annual Christmas party and various other company events. I know both are proud of where the company is today, and I am confident that Derry and Joe would be equally so. I think they would be proud of our multidisciplinary services offering; the diversity of project types we undertake; our involvement with major projects and programmes; our expansion into the UK (and north Dublin); our standing as a consultant of choice for clients for complex projects; our development of specialist capabilities in research, environment, etc., while retaining the qualities and ethos they valued. 

I believe our most enduring accomplishments have been won through hard work and dedication, professionalism, honesty and integrity, and our commitment to long-term relationships over short-term gain.

There is something unique about ROD, but it is not easy to put it into words. Much of it comes back to the people, and I guess people always reflect the values they see in the company. My memories will certainly be about the people rather than the projects.