About Us

RODi HR was officially founded in 2024 but was a long time in the making. Our founder, Irial O’Farrell, first became involved in designing performance management processes in 2001 and has designed many more since. A “first principles” type of gal, she approached design from a “What are we trying to achieve here?” perspective. As part of roll-out training, she has discussed performance management challenges and frustrations with 1,000+ managers and employees.


Sitting in a beautiful wood-panelled room, in 2018, talking to a client, her “A-HA” moment arrived when she asked “Do you not know what good looks like?”


In that moment, several things crystalised, the key one being “No, managers DON’T know what good looks like…that’s the problem!”


Not every manager, you understand, but enough managers (if Pareto stuck his head in here, we’d go with 80%) to seriously derail a company’s ability to develop talent and maximise profits. 


Ever keen to innovate and test new approaches, Irial and the client built a framework so managers WOULD know what good looks like. And their findings?  Much better performance outcomes.   

Armed with such positive feedback, Irial went on to test this new approach with clients, across 7 different industries, all struggling with talent challenges.


Over time, clients shared benefits and outcomes such as: 

  • Expectations across management levels aligned
  • Manager and employee expectations of roles aligned
  • Quality of performance conversations improved
  • Career aspirations were better managed
  • Performance improved
  • Onboarding new employees into the culture accelerated
  • Promoted employees stepped into their new roles faster and more successfully  
  • Promoted employees knew to let go of their old role

Clients' organisational systems worked better, delivering better business performance. 


Finishing a postgraduate certificate in Innovation and Enterprise in 2024, Irial realised it was time to share this superior approach with many more companies.

RODi HR was born in August 2024.

ABOUT OUR FOUNDER

For the last 30 years, Irial has been endlessly fascinated with how people show up in the workplace and how that impacts on business performance. As a result, she has deep expertise in many disciplines: Learning & Development, Executive Coaching, Leadership, Emotional Intelligence, Insights Discovery, Organisation Design, Innovation & Strategy, Change Management.

 

She has 10 years direct experience of developing her own high-performing teams, along with 25 years of equipping other leaders to develop high performing cultures and teams, always with an eye on achieving business goals.


She also likes to put fingers to keyboard and has written three books:

  • Values, Not Just for the Office Wall Plaque: How Personal and Company Values Intersect, 2012
  • SMART Objective Setting for Managers: A Roadmap, 2020
  • The Manager’s Dilemma: How to Empower Your Team’s Problem Solving, 2021


Her next book, Re-imagining Performance Management for the 21st Century, will be released in Q1, 2026.


Irial is the first Change Management Institute-accredited master of change in Ireland, and currently the only one. So your business will be supported throughout the change process, ensuring a successful implementation.