2020 - 2029
Honorary Citation by Professor Mark Hutchinsons for Leslie Buckley
President, graduates, visitors, friends, and colleagues, it is a very great honour for me, and I am thoroughly delighted to have been chosen to say a few words about the life and accomplishments of Leslie Buckley. The degree to be conferred on him, a Doctorate in Arts, Honoris Causa, is very well deserved, because of his philanthropic impact on society.
I have been fortunate to listen to Leslie give talks to our students. He has focused on several themes, and these are going to form the basis of today’s citation. The first is Being true to yourself.
Leslie Buckley was born in Cork on 18th October 1944. For the mathematicians in the audience, you will realise he recently celebrated a milestone birthday on Friday along with his twin brother Ray. Congratulations to you both and your families.
Leslie grew up on Cork’s College Road, a stone’s throw from UCC, with Ray, and their three brothers.
He was raised immersed in a family business. His grandfather was an entrepreneur and his father and subsequently his twin brother ran a successful floor-covering business, John Buckley and Sons, on Washington Street. From the age of 7 or 8 Leslie worked in the business, particularly during summer holidays and Christmas. He attended Glasheen Boys National School and Presentation Brothers Secondary School, before deciding to attend UCC.
He took a slight diversion, to complete a science degree. At Presentation Brothers Leslie had an excellent maths teacher who also subsequently lectured Leslie in maths at UCC. Leslie kept really detailed notes, put an Ad up in the restaurant in UCC, subsequently making his first fortune, giving maths grinds during the years he attended. He also worked for a period at Cork Airport as a student and had an abruptly truncated side-line as a door-to-door salesman of ladies’ makeup.
Leslie graduated with a BSc in 1967 and then an MSc in 1969, with a specialism in Botany. But, during this period he realised that an academic career wasn’t for him, mainly, as he recently told me, due to the plants dying, but he did discover a bit more about himself.
To be successful in life you have to be prepared to take risks, and this was something Leslie realised he is comfortable with.
As an example, Leslie and his friend were working on their theses in the lab on the campus one Saturday afternoon. They finished their work about 8pm that evening, leaving a year-long collection of lecture notes and test results on his desk, with the aim of going back in after lunch on Sunday. Unfortunately, the chemistry lab caught fire on Sunday morning, so they shot up to UCC. Being extremely concerned about his years’ work, Leslie approached two firemen at the top of a fire exit at the back of the building, casually inquiring how long they felt the floor would last – and they responded probably a couple of minutes. With that he ran straight to his work desk – collecting notes in one hand and desiccator in the other. Coincidentally, a Cork Examiner photographer was on scene and Leslie, with face blackened from the smoke, made the next day’s front page with the headline: “UCC Student Saves All”.
Clearly, this is not something we would advise our current students to do, but it does show Leslie’s comfort with taking calculated risk, a strong theme amongst high impact philanthropists.
One of the other key ingredients that Leslie has conveyed to our students is the importance of enjoying what you are doing, or in the words of Steve Jobs, The only way to do great work is to love what you do.
Leaving UCC, Leslie joined Waterford Crystal in 1969 where he quite soon was responsible for about 500 people. During this period, he began to develop his skills in managing complex negotiations, particularly with unions, and also driving cost reduction. This would later lead to him becoming renowned as a corporate restructuring specialist. Based on his developing reputation, he left Waterford Crystal to join Bunzl and then was recruited to join Smurfit Group. He worked closely with Dr. Michael Smurfit, as his PA, while Dr. Smurfit was Chairman of An Bord Telecom, before Leslie returned as a Managing Director in the Smurfit Group. He then decided to take what he had learnt about corporate restructuring and leave his full-time role to go out on his own as a Business Consultant.
Leslie has often told our students, how Relationships are built on trust, and the importance of trust to be able to work closely with someone for a long period. In 1993 Leslie began, what would become a long and successful entrepreneurial collaboration with Denis O’Brien, including their success with ESAT Telecom Group, which was listed on the Irish Stock Exchange, London Stock Exchange and the NASDAQ, and Digicel Group, a telecoms company operating in the Caribbean and into Latin America and the Pacific Rim.
During this period Leslie was involved in several other notable businesses. In 1999 they invested in an Online Recruitment business called Irishjobs.ie, and also acquired the number two operator (jobs.ie). They eventually agreed to sell for a multiple of 90 times the original investment.
Leslie’s most important impacts, which we are here to celebrate today, is in philanthropy, where his work with his wife Carmel has had a dramatic positive impact on the lives of thousands of people in Haiti.
Carmel and Leslie met while Leslie was a student at UCC. They have three children, John D, Jane and Patrick. While talking to students, Leslie has always highlighted how important it was to him, to have such a strong partner who believed in what they were trying to achieve, and that Carmel always agreed with the approach of taking calculated risks and backing themselves. This is particularly evident in their work with the Haven Partnership.
Through his business commitments with Digicel, Leslie had visited Haiti many times during the previous four years and after every trip he always left Haiti feeling gripped by the appalling poverty that existed.
Haiti is only the size of Munster with a population of 10.8 million people. It is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.
During the 11 years of operation Haven achieved so much, including:
- Raising over €29 million.
- Over half a million people have directly benefitted from Haven projects and programmes. This is an outstanding achievement.
With strong roots in the university, I know Leslie holds his relationship with UCC very dearly. Leslie has been an unstinting generous supporter of programmes at UCC and elsewhere which seek to widen and enable access to education. He is deeply understanding of the transformational effect a high quality education can have on an individual and he has helped many to overcome barriers to accessing education and to flourish as students.
Notable projects include the UCC+ Programme which provides scholarships for disadvantaged students and the Student Disability Support Services (DSS), and he has also been a generous supporter of the Quercus Programme for talented students.
Leslie served on the Board of the Cork University Foundation from 2010 to 2015 and was nominated as an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Accounting and Finance, from 2015 to 2020. During the period as an Adjunct Professor Leslie would regularly meet a group of MSc Finance students for lunch and then they would present a case study to them. Invariably one of them would come to tell me a couple of weeks later that his office has contacted them to offer them a role in one of his companies. He never mentioned it to me. A mark of his generosity and approach to giving.
Leslie is also a strong supporter of the Cork Life Centre in Sundays Well which educates marginalised young people in the city. A keen Ireland and Munster rugby supporter, he became a member of the Munster Rugby Commercial Advisory Board in February 2013. He is a UCC alumnus achievement awardee, and he has also been honoured as Cork Chamber Business Person of the Year.
President, because of his significant contribution to society, and his tremendous philanthropic efforts, I am honoured and privileged to present to you Leslie Buckley for the honorary award of Doctorate in Arts from University College Cork.
Praehonorabilis Pro-Vice-Cancellarie, totaque universitas!
Praesento vobis hunc meum filium, quem scio tam moribus quam doctrina habilem et idoneum esse qui admittatur, honoris causa, ad Gradum Doctoratus in Artibus; idque tibi fide mea testor ac spondeo totique Academiae.