‘I was a city girl, but I put on my wellies and built up credibility’

“Irish companies succeeding anywhere in the world is a win for Ireland”, says Hannah Fraser, Director Nordic Region, Enterprise Ireland who has dedicated her career, to date, to helping Irish companies export and grow abroad.

“I love living and working across the Nordic Region. I think, as a woman in business, it’s a region that you can really feel equal in – walk into companies and you see equality,” she remarks.

Two things that became apparent to a young Fraser, who grew up in Clontarf with a view of Enterprise Ireland HQ across the bay, was that she had a sense of adventure and she wanted to travel. She travelled to Chile as part of Habitat for Humanity house building project when she was 16, during her transition year.

This was followed up by Erasmus in Tokyo and six weeks of volunteering in the Philippines for a charity run by an Irish missionary priest. It involved “helping kids that get caught up in sex trafficking or young boys that are taken into prison for petty crimes . . . bringing them in under this shelter and help reintegrate them,” she explains.

“I was in my early 20s, during my second year in university. My aunt was actually a missionary nun and had spent 20 years in the Philippines, and she’s also my godmother, so she inspired me with her stories of life over there,” she says.

Graduate programme

After studying business at Trinity, Fraser applied for the Enterprise Ireland International graduate programme in 2012.

“I suppose I’ve always had an appetite to travel and explore internationally. Was it a conscious decision? I don’t know, but I knew Enterprise Ireland stood for that – that was probably what attracted me.

“I love Ireland – it was a chance to support Ireland while living overseas.”

The two-year programme placed her in Australia, where she was given the opportunity to remain in the region after the programme.

“I never necessarily planned to stay, but a role came up looking after the agricultural sector. So I moved into a sector role looking after our agricultural technology and machinery companies. I didn’t come from a farming background but quite quickly I was travelling around rural parts of New Zealand.”

How did this inner-city Dubliner cope with the move into agriculture?

From fake tan to forklifts

“I’ve learned over the years that in our role, we aren’t experts – we’re dealing with everything from quantum computing companies to agricultural machinery and tech, to pharma companies – I used to say, I represent everything from fake tan to forklifts! My portfolio in Australia was the full spectrum from Cocoa Brown Tan to Combilift Forklifts from Monaghan,” she explains.

“I managed to build pretty good relationships with a lot of the distributors and importers of machinery in New Zealand, that was the sector I kind of started [my career] in, and it still has a really special place in my heart. These companies are the bedrock of Irish industry. They’re across all the regional parts of Ireland – employing so many people in the local area. So, I was a city girl, but I managed to put on my wellies and build a bit of credibility over that time.”

Leadership position

After seven years down under, working across agriculture and later the industrial and construction sector Fraser sought a new adventure, a leadership opportunity in Enterprise Ireland Nordics came up, and she was on her way to Stockholm.

“I wanted to move from Australia at that point, and I’d never been to any of the Nordic countries, so I moved here having never stepped foot in any of the countries. But I had always looked to the Nordics and their values – what’s important in society up here, and I’d admired it. I thought, you know, that would be a really interesting region to live in,” she says. “Weather-wise, it was obviously a massive change!”

Fraser’s move to Sweden saw her take up the role of Director Nordic Region.

“We opened the Copenhagen office a couple of months after [I started], I had to recruit new people into the team and the existing team were really supportive. I think I’ve had imposter syndrome at times, I’ve had it at lots of different stages – I was stepping up to lead a region and a region that was new to me. There were lots of personal challenges at times, but it’s been hugely rewarding,” she says.

“We’ve seen phenomenal growth in exports. When I arrived, it was around €870 million in exports, and it’s now at €1.7 billion – Sweden is our largest market, followed by Denmark, Norway, and then Finland,” she explains. “The Nordic region is maybe not always front of mind for Irish exporters, and it’s a region that sometimes falls further down the list of regions when Irish companies think ‘global’.”

The high-tech construction sector was what brought an influx of Irish companies into the region, gaining contracts to fit-out data centres. Many have stayed and diversified to work across the pharma, food and beverage, and battery manufacturing sectors.

Cultural integration

“Swedes are quite reserved, so it is hard to integrate into local life up here. But through meeting my fiancé, I managed to open access to a whole Swedish family and a wonderful group of Swedish friends, so my road to integrating has been very easy – we are getting married next summer,” she says.

When it comes to business, Fraser appreciates that the business style in the Nordics is rather different to that in Ireland.

“I think you pretty quickly realise the direct nature of how people communicate up here. It certainly struck me very, very early on,” she says. “What they appreciate here is getting direct to the point, they’re all about value, but I think the other side of that is you know where you stand – it’s a really appreciated aspect.”

Gender parity

Another appreciated aspect for Fraser is gender representation; it is visible at work and in day-to-day life.

“My two soon-to-be sisters-in-law are both in senior positions in large industrial companies. That’s just a norm – that was maybe less surprising than seeing male representation when you walk by a school, and 50% of people dropping kids off are men – there are men on paternity leave, and they have male groups that go for walks with their kids – representation in lots of different ways has been really just so refreshing.”

Through her work supporting companies, Fraser has respect for entrepreneurship and has a great role model in a family member who might just inspire her, should she combine her passion for the climate and entrepreneurialism herself someday.

“My sister is an entrepreneur, and I’m always just so inspired by people who start their own business. She founded the second-hand clothing stores, Nine Crows, and then she also has a talent agency, Not Another INTL. She’s grown the two businesses, on her own, and so I see that first hand.”

“In this role, we get to help and support those but, you know, there’s probably nothing like actually stepping out on your own and doing something,” she says.

For now, helping Irish companies export and grow in the Nordics is where Fraser can be found. This interview was conducted at the Slush Tech and start-up conference in Helsinki.