Google Ireland head Vanessa Hartley: ‘Number one priority is making sure that we bring AI to Ireland’

“This is an extraordinary moment to take on Google Ireland,” says Vanessa Hartley, Google Ireland’s new boss. Despite uncertainty over political volatility, Ireland’s infrastructure deficit, securing staff for her growing business and harnessing AI, she is optimistic about the tech company’s future.
From modest origins as a small search engine that began in a garage in Menlo Park in the late 1990s, Google has grown to a multinational that employs around 180,000 worldwide and dominates its sector. Around 5,000 of those staff are in Ireland, where Google first opened an office in 2003. It is now the search giant’s Europe, Middle East and Africa headquarters.
Walk down Barrow Street in Dublin and it is clearly Google country. The company occupies several buildings – Google Docks at one end, the Foundry across the street and the newly-opened Bolands Mills at the other end, a building steeped in Dublin’s history. The last of these will house Google’s engineering centre of excellence, and hundreds of staff.
A few months after taking over the role from Adaire Fox-Martin, who left to head up Equinix, Hartley is ready to talk about how she will leave her mark on the company. Originally from Waterford, she is not what you would describe as a typical tech executive. Her college degree from DCU is in international marketing. And before she joined Google, she says she didn’t pay close attention to the sector – just enough to see the way things were shifting to mobile.
A decade ago, Hartley was working as head of personal banking and product strategy at what was then Permanent TSB. Prior to that, she had been founding commercial director of health insurer GloHealth (now known as Irish Life Health), following stints as group marketing director at Aviva Ireland and head of current accounts and savings at Halifax.
But when the Google opportunity came up, she was intrigued.
“At the time, I could see a massive shift from digital to mobile, and the potential to go and work with EMEA-based retailers on that, I just thought it was fascinating,” she explains. “It was a really extraordinary global view of the world. And the fact that, as Dublin is the EU headquarters, you’ve just got this outsize influence on what happens across the EU.”
In her 10 years with the business, Hartley has seen a transformation in Google.
The company was once known for its novel approach to interviewing, often asking candidates head-scratchers such as “How many golf balls can you fit in a school bus?” and “Why are manhole covers round?”. It spawned a series of copycats, a few books and a series of online guides in how to crack the interview process.
It seems the brain teasers have gone the way of other Silicon Valley trappings, such as cinema rooms, on-site massages and unlimited snack bars.
“We’ve stopped that. It was a little bit nonsensey, and the world has changed,” Hartley laughs. “But it was through the interview process that I met people who were the reason I came to work here: super-smart, hard-working, really kind people. And that, for me, is the essence of what Google is.”
It has been, she says, an incredible experience – six jobs across Google Ireland, the most recent looking after advertising sales for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. That remains her core role. Now she is heading up the Irish arm of the business at what is likely to be a pivotal moment for Google.
The reason? Artificial intelligence.
Google has been working on artificial intelligence for years, but it is no secret that the release of OpenAI’s generative AI ChatGPT caught it on the back foot. While the tech giant had been proceeding cautiously, the release of ChatGPT and the buzz it created, pushed Google to launch Bard, now known as Gemini.
There have been some public missteps – the “glue in pizza sauce” recommendation is often used as a cautionary tale of why we shouldn’t blindly trust AI – but Google has pushed ahead.
In August, the company unveiled its new Pixel devices built with AI in mind, stealing a march on rival Apple that was still weeks away from announcing a date for the availability of its own AI technology.
But it is not solely about winning over consumers. Hartley sees AI as bringing big benefits to the economy here. A recent study published by Google estimated that the new generation of AI could bring a 7 per cent bump in GDP to Ireland in the coming years. Fail to implement correctly, and we stand to miss out to the tune of several billion euro.
Hartley wants to see that capability come to Ireland; in fact, she is making it one of her priorities in her role as head of the Irish business.
“Number one is making sure that we bring AI to Ireland, and that we bring it to not just our large businesses but into SMEs, making sure that we also continue to build skills for AI and that AI is accessible to everyone,” she says. “We know that there is a big opportunity for AI in Ireland. But we’re only going to realise that if we get into the hands of people who really need it.”
That means training, into which Google has ploughed resources, and regular contact with the SME community to demonstrate the power and business benefits of the technology.
But it won’t be an easy task. Although people are warming to the idea of AI, there is still a reasonable level of suspicion that the technology will ultimately lead to the replacement of human jobs – something which, historically, has never been welcomed.
Another obstacle may be the resistance to data centres in Ireland. While our national data centre footprint has grown in recent years, there has been a pushback against their development in this country, amid concerns about the environmental impact of the facilities and grid capacity.
Google has come up against it first-hand, with plans to expand its data centre in Dublin currently going through the courts. The initial planning application, submitted earlier this year, was for a third phase of its data centre campus at Grange Castle, a 72,400 sq m facility in west Dublin with eight data centre halls. Once fully operational, it would create 50 jobs.
But South Dublin County Council (SDCC) refused it, citing the “existing insufficient capacity in the electricity network [grid] and the lack of significant on-site renewable energy to power the data centre”.
The case is ongoing and, as such, Hartley does not want to comment specifically about it. However, she says, the decision was a “surprise and a disappointment”, and that Google is “very invested” in the Dublin data centre.
“We have global access to data centres; every country in the world is looking for data centres,” she says. “So I’m confident that we can work with the SDCC and An Bord Pleanála to address the concerns.”
That isn’t the only challenge Google faces. On top of the data centre refusal, the company has also found itself in the wrong side of a judgment in the US that ruled it had monopolised the online search market. It has been subject to increasing regulation in the EU, with the Digital Markets Act, the Digital Services Act, and the AI Act all seeking to regulate various aspects of its business.
Hartley says the company welcomes the regulation. In a previous life, she worked in banking, which is no stranger to regulation either. “I think it’s a really important moment to get the regulation right.,” she says.
Some of that burden clearly falls on the Irish business, acting as a gateway between what the EU decrees and what US-based engineers are building.
Talk of Ireland’s infrastructure issues have dominated the public discourse this year, and you can’t help but wonder if multinationals will reconsider further investment as a result.
She acknowledges there is work to do, but isn’t convinced there is a perception problem with Ireland, and expects investment to continue. Since Brexit, Ireland has been viewed as a gateway for US companies into the EU. Despite its problems – a housing crisis, the spiralling cost of living, anti-immigration protests – the idea of Ireland as an attractive location for investment has not waned.
“I’m always struck by the optimism and the confidence in Ireland as that EU headquarters for Google,” says Hartley. “Every single large city in the world faces these challenges.” She also notes that the company is building a global centre of excellence in engineering that will be housed in Bolands Mills.
“We’ve already recruited more than 1,000 engineers, and will continue to do that. So there is incredible confidence that we can continue to attract the best engineers in the world, notwithstanding the fact that we know that large cities like Dublin do have challenges,” she says.
“My job is going to be to work with Government policymakers to make sure we are really clear on the next five to 10 years and what we need to do in order to make sure we capitalise like we did in the 1980s and the 1990s on these opportunities that are ahead.”
Part of that will not only be getting the right staff in the right place, it will be keeping them.
Amazon has broken ranks in terms of remote working, with the tech giant requiring staff to be back in the office five days a week. As yet, Google has no plans to follow suit. Not only would it be a big change to how the company works, with staff currently in the office three days per week, but it would also undermine its own message that its tools can be used to work from anywhere at any time.
Hartley quite likes the flexibility of remote working herself, describing herself as a “massive proponent” of it. Having a young family, she benefits from Google’s policy of “work from anywhere” weeks, where staff can work from anywhere in the world, tying in family obligations with their work commitments.
“We’re really happy with how hybrid’s working for us. It gives us the right flexibility in order to hire and retain the best talent. For now, I don’t see that changing,” she says, adding that it does come up in the course of conversations at professional events, but not so much in-house.
“It’s the number one question being asked. It is, interestingly, not the number one question being asked by Googlers. I think they recognise that, actually, we give them a lot of flexibility.”
Part of that is being clear about the expectations around hybrid work arrangements. Hartley describes it as an adult conversation. “I see it as a leadership challenge, rather than a productivity challenge,” she says.
Getting that balance right, though, is crucial, and Hartley has learned how to detach from work when it is appropriate. Living in Clontarf, she is a stone’s throw from the sea, where she swims four times a week. Having three children under 12 means life is busy for the Google boss.
“All I want to do when I’m not here is just to be with the kids, with them in the kitchen or on the beach. I’m very good at detaching,” she says. “I think that’s been a key learning that has come over the last 10 years. When you’re off, you’re off, and you’ve got to make sure that you build in rest time.
That is something she says she has picked up from younger Google staff, who can do much more purpose-driven work. “We need to learn, particularly with our Irish psyche of ‘I have to do everything’. You don’t, actually; you have to do the right things really well.”
CV
Name: Vanessa Hartley
Age: 47
Position: Head of Google Ireland
Lives: Dublin
Family: Married to Ross, with three children under 12
Outside interests: Sea swimming close to her Clontarf home
Something you would expect: She has become the de facto tech support for everyone even vaguely in her social orbit. Requests for help with Google services are common. “Can I remove their house from Google Maps?” she laughs. “You get your mam’s bridge friend called Nick, asking: ‘Can you take that picture of me down’. Which, again, is kind of funny to people who know me.”
Something that might surprise: She isn’t a techie at heart, which makes it all the more amusing that she heads up one of the largest tech companies in Ireland