connect 2018 • 98 YOUNG LEADERS SOCIETY BELFAST Belfast Leadership Series with John Fitzpatrick Belfast Digital Diaspora at DigitalDNA APRIL, 2018 John Fitzpatrick, President and CEO of the Fitzpatrick Hotel Group, North America, and Chair- man of The Ireland Funds America, spoke to the Belfast Young Leaders for the Leadership Series on May 18. The event was hosted in the Duncairn Centre, a grantee of The Ireland Funds, a shared space venue for Arts & Culture in North Belfast. Guests were welcomed by Rev. Bill Shaw and U.S. Consul General Daniel Lawton who warmly introduced John Fitzpatrick. John and Jonathan Ireland, Belfast Young Leaders committee member, engaged in a fireside chat, discussing John’s success, his lessons on leadership, and his entertaining stories of the early years he spent in New York. John spoke of the Paddy and Eithne Foundation, which he set up in honor of his parents. He urged the Young Leaders to engage with the work of The Ireland Funds and to make sure they take every op- portunity to see and meet the organisations it supports. A lively questions and answers session followed. JUNE, 2018 The Ireland Funds hosted a special session on Digital Diaspora at DigitalDNA, Northern Ireland’s leading business and technol- ogy event. The session explored how technology can better connect the diaspora, and in turn, how that diaspora contributes to Northern Ireland both from a philanthropic and commercial perspective.The panellists were: Ryan Feeney, Head of Public Engagement, Queen’s University Belfast & Belfast Young Leaders steering committee member; John Greer, Director of Economic Development, Belfast City Council; Dermot McLaughlin, Principal Consultant at Creative Strategic Solutions; Anton McGonnell, MBA Candidate Harvard University and Siobhán Gallagher, Director, The Ireland Funds. After the session, Belfast Young Leaders, networked at an after-event kindly hosted by DigitalDNA and planned their trip to the Global Young Leaders Summit in New York in 2019 to meet their fellow diaspora. 1 Jonathan Ireland, John Fitzpatrick 2 Back Row: Dan Lawton, Gareth Quinn, Trevor Ringland, Richard Willis, Caitriona Fottrell Front Row: Jonathan Ireland, Siobhán Gallagher, Emma Hunt, John Fitzpatrick, Andrew Trimble, Jonny Elliott, Bill Shaw 3 John Fitzpatrick 4 Bill Shaw, Gareth Quinn 5 John Fitzpatrick and guests 6 John Fitzpatrick and guests Photos: Neil Harrison Photography 1 Young Leaders at DigitalDNA 2 Ryan Feeney 1 4 2 5 3 6 1 2