Accenture’s Donal Óg McCarthy discusses team building in a competitive space and the challenges of the cyber landscape.
As Accenture’s cybersecurity lead in Ireland, Donal Óg McCarthy’s responsibilities span several key areas, such as the growing and running of the security business, a focus on clients and the creation of a rewarding working environment for the organisation’s people.
“I also hold several other responsibilities in our European and global business, which allows me to bring insights and experiences from around the globe to our clients here in Ireland,” McCarthy told SiliconRepublic.com. “I really enjoy that variety and given the global nature of today’s threat landscape for Irish clients, I believe this external perspective is critical.”
He added, “These days I see myself as a builder, bringing together knowledge and expertise from across both Accenture and our ecosystem partners to answer our clients’ most challenging questions.”
As someone with experience in leadership, how did you develop the skills needed to lead others in the cyber space?
I’ve been fortunate to develop my leadership skills through a wide variety of roles and through the guidance of some exceptional mentors along the way. I began my career in an organisation in Galway called Nortel Networks. One of the first things I had to learn as a graduate was how to engage directly with and present to our customers. That experience, alongside the technical foundations I learned in the graduate programme, has really shaped my entire career since then. It is really important to get those career foundations right early on.
Since then, I’ve worked in a variety of roles across the UK, Australia and the US. Upon returning to Ireland, I moved into the consulting side. This constantly changing landscape is something I have realised that I am very attracted to and it’s why I enjoy working at Accenture. I have had three different roles in the last six years in Accenture, all focused on building new businesses. Once I hear an interesting idea or an opportunity, I am happy to just jump right in and figure out the details along the way. While that adds a nice element of pressure, I love it.
How crucial is it to invest in career development across teams?
I don’t believe you can have a highly skilled workforce without a relentless focus on both learning and excitement. Excitement is really important. While each of us has things we need to know to operate successfully inside our organisation, extra learning has to make sense for you as an individual and what you want to achieve. I spend a lot of time with colleagues crafting these learning pathways so there is choice for everyone, while ensuring that ultimately all these skills together are what we need to run and to grow our business.
We’re fortunate at Accenture to have our own learning platform through Udacity, where everyone has access to an endless amount of learning and not just in cybersecurity. We also focus heavily on foundational learning elements, what we call TQ or technology quotient. These are bite-sized learning modules on everything from agentic AI to quantum computing.
What are some of the challenges of a career in the security sector?
While a career in cybersecurity is highly rewarding, it certainly does come with challenges. Skills shortages in the sector are putting a lot of additional pressure on existing leaders and their teams. We can see this leading to heavy workloads and when you mix this with individuals in incident response, for example, it can contribute to higher levels of stress and risk of burnout. Incident response is a good example of where structure and support are essential. Clear on‑call rotas and escalation models are critical. Too often the same individuals end up getting the call and for busy teams this adds to that burnout risk.
I spend a lot of time with teams to simulate the importance of rotation, shared responsibility and senior leadership support in the wake of a cyberattack. Many incidents can go on for a longer period of time than first anticipated, so this planning means that when an incident does occur, we have a very structured response that includes prioritising teams’ wellbeing and recovery.
How can skilled and qualified teams address the challenges of the modern cybersecurity landscape?
It is clear that we are operating in an ever-evolving threat landscape. Geopolitical instability, from unrest in Europe and war in the Middle East, has pushed business resilience and cybersecurity front of mind for all organisations. It can be challenging when looking at multiple sources of threat intelligence to identify those areas that are the highest priority. There are, however, a few practical steps that can make a real difference.
The first is staying close to your partners that understand your business and getting their support, especially where an industry-specific narrative is important, for instance in the case of critical national infrastructure. The second is maintaining strong engagement across your security community and keeping those lines of communication open. In a connected supply chain, we are all dependent on each other so these relationships will and do really matter.
How can sector leaders have a positive impact on career development?
Leaders in the security sector have a critical role to play in shaping the future capability and resilience of the profession itself. Having a positive impact on both career development and innovation requires intentional leadership across people, culture and ways of working.
In today’s cybersecurity world, there are many career paths and it is important that we provide opportunities to our teams, ensuring they can progress, specialise or broaden their experience. The security practice of tomorrow is one that is focused on enterprise transformation and can adapt to the changing needs of the business.
Have you any predictions for how the cybersecurity landscape might evolve in 2026?
Unfortunately, we can expect to see a continued rise in AI-powered attacks across industry in 2026. Geopolitical tensions around the world will continue to drive threats in Europe and for Ireland. Our upcoming EU presidency will potentially focus these efforts on organisations based here in Ireland, particularly those who manage critical national infrastructure. The good news is cybersecurity has never been a greater priority for ‘Ireland Inc’, or for organisations operating here.
We see cyber modernisation and increasing investment in security across industry. With this additional investment and focus, we must continue to simplify our security landscape so we can understand what we have in our estate, identify those threats early and continue to strengthen those modern security capabilities. Every one of us in cybersecurity plays a part in Ireland’s national cyber resilience and that responsibility has never been more important.
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