Another day, another amazing historical tour! I really enjoyed our tour of the Dublin docklands with Dr. Kelly today. He painted the picture of how and why Dublin has grown to become the booming city that it is today, while also sharing details about his life growing up and describing the changes he witnessed firsthand.
Since I have been here, I have been amazed with how booming the city is. There are countless corporate headquarters, restaurants, tourist attractions, hotels, and more, so it was very surprising to hear that about 30 years ago Dublin was a completely different city. Dr. Kelly took us on a tour of the docklands, where many companies are headquartered in Dublin, and he told us that in the early 2000’s, most of the buildings were not there. This was truly shocking to me due to the fact that there were countless large office buildings over about a 2 mile stretch on both sides of the river.
Learning more about Ireland’s history in a business context has showed me how resilient the Irish are. Dr. Kelly discussed the way the Irish school system was set up when he was in school, and how it was nearly impossible to go to college after high school unless you grew up with privilege, something that the vast majority of Irish people did not have at the time. Most young people in Ireland (up until around the ’90s, I believe) dropped out of high school in order to leave home and find blue collar work. It is crazy to think that now most Irish people who live in Dublin work at one of the big corporations located here, in white collar jobs such as at Google.
The Google visit today was so cool! We got a look into what life is like working at Google in Dublin, and our tour guides (Google employees, aka Googlers) answered so many of our questions about both the company itself as well as corporate life in general. I personally would really like to work at Google. Would I be hired? Probably not seeing as they only hire about 0.63% of applicants, however I really liked the environment there and I loved how there seemed to be a job for every skillset. Even if my skillset was not tailored to one specific job, Google uses the power of different types of thinkers to grow and run their company, which I find so cool. They also foster learning new skills, even paying up to 80% tuition for their employees if they want to go back to school! Overall the Google visit was awesome and I loved all of the activities they had, such as a mini golf course, that are there to help their employees destress.
Whether I end up working at Google in the future or not, today was a very rewarding day full of learning and understanding growth on a country-wide level. See you tomorrow!
(The featured photo is a silly picture of Kathryn and me on top of the Google building today. So windy, but such an incredible view!)
