Our staff

Liam Harbison

CEO/Secretary General

Liam has been involved in Paralympic sport since 1996. As Performance Director for the Paralympic Council of Ireland, he developed a high-performance system which paved the way for Irish success at Beijing 2008.  Liam became the organisations first CEO in 2008, and led the 2012 Irish team in London as Chef de Mission.

Sport

Nancy Chillingworth

Performance Director

Nancy joined as Assistant Performance Director in 2007 and was a member of the HQ team at Beijing 2008 taking over as performance director later that year. Now Paralympic Performance Director, Nancy works hand in hand with all our sports and athletes on a day to day basis to ensure continued success for Ireland at World and Paralympic level. Nancy leads a team of four in our sports department and is responsible for securing the necessary investment for our performance programme annually.

Naomi O’Reilly

Classification Manager

Having joined Paralympics Ireland in 2011 in conjunction with Sinead Naughton, Naomi developed the www.followyourstar.ie programme; our primary schools education initiative. Naomi also developed a formal classification strategy for Paralympics Ireland which has now begun its extensive implementation phase.

Dave Malone

Head of Paralympic Swimming

Dave became Head of Paralympic Swimming in July 2009. Prior to this, he competed for Ireland at four Paralympic Games, winning medals in his favoured 100m backstroke event at Atlanta 1996 (silver), Sydney 2000 (gold) and Athens 2004 (silver). As team manager in London, Dave led a highly successful team of six swimmers to two gold medals and a host of personal bests, and continues to lead the programme to Rio 2016.

James Nolan

Head of Paralympic Athletics

ames became head of Paralympic Athletics in April 2010. He enjoyed a distinguished athletics career, winning 800/1500m silver at the European Indoor Championships in 2000 and competing at two Olympic Games (Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004). As team manager in London James led the team of ten to a fantastic four gold, one silver and one bronze medals, and continues to lead the programme to Rio 2016.

Communications

Sinead Naughton

Communications & Events Director

Sinead was a member of the HQ team for the Beijing Games in 2008. Up until 2012 she led in areas of education and events, and in conjunction with Naomi devised and developed the www.followyourstar.ie programme; our primary schools education initiative. Sinead now leads the organisation’s Communications department as Communications and Events Director.

Commercial

Patrick Haslett

Commercial Director

Patrick joined courtesy of Vodafone Ireland Foundation’s “World of Difference” programme in August 2010 as Partnership Manager for a year, leading the rebrand from Paralympic Council of Ireland to Paralympics Ireland. Patrick worked closely with our many corporate and community partners in the run up to, and at, London 2012. Now as the organisation’s Commercial Director Patrick is working to secure investment from the Commercial sector for the Rio cycle.

Administration

Patricia Fitzgerald

Financial Administrator

Patricia joined the organisation in 2005 under then Secretary General Anne Ebbs. Patricia has led the office administration function since then, and from 2013 onwards will move to the role of financial administrator for the organisation.