Jennifer Sieg meets Carol Shanahan, English businesswoman, philanthropist and owner of Port Vale Football club
English businesswoman Carol Shanahan – founder from a financial technology company Synectic Solutions and owner of Port Vale Football Club – is no stranger to hard work.
Shanahan, now 66, left school at 17 with no qualifications or work experience and went on to find herself behind what is now one of Stoke-on-Trent’s most successful businesses. Trent.
Synectics Solutions, an early pioneer in financial fraud detection and prevention, was founded in 1992 and has saved approximately £7.2 billion across the public and private sectors to date.
Looking back, the self-taught woman says it all started right out of school, when she became the first female mainframe operator in an all-male company in Birmingham.
Determined to find a job in which she could succeed, she put herself forward for a role that demanded everything she couldn’t offer. The advert was looking for a man with academic qualifications, a driving license and work experience.
“No, no, no, no,” she remembers hearing from her friend who was helping her with her job search.
“I didn’t have any qualifications at school. I had six failed attempts at education throughout my childhood,” she laughs.
Little did she know that her determination to get this job and prove her worth would be a lesson she would hold closely throughout her business career decades later.
You would be forgiven for wondering why Shanahan decided to buy a struggling football club in 2019 after a three-decade career in financial fraud detection.
Although she was born in Lincolnshire, Shanahan was raised by her mother in West Bromwich. When she was little, she often found herself wandering down the Birmingham road (before the M5) to watch football and find a telephone box to call her father about it.
The memories came flooding back to her of setting up Synectics Solutions and 350 staff members in an office next to Port Vale football club.
When she discovered the club was facing impending administration, she jumped at the chance to save it and give back to a community she felt felt like home.
With risk comes reward, Shanahan says. She still remembers the exasperated warnings of some of her most trusted advisors.
We can’t let you make this deal. It’s a terrible deal. This is an absolutely horrible deal.
“We can’t let you make this deal. It’s a terrible deal. It’s an absolutely horrible deal,” Shanahan recalled.
“You respect the information and you respect their education in this area and their knowledge… (but) you do it and you do it because it feels right,” she adds.
“I don’t mind the risk…I just want to know.” You don’t want to sit there not knowing what’s coming (because) a lot of things can happen.
To date, this investment has been one of her most difficult and proudest achievements.
Shanahan is not one to regret any of his decisions – whether professional or personal – and what seems like a life of risk has always paid off in his favor.
As long as you stay true to yourself and learn from your mistakes, of course.
On her first day as the first female mainframe operator, she felt the need to act like someone she’s not.
I went and tried to start with what a lot of women do when they enter a man’s world. I tried to outdo the men.
“I went and tried to start with what a lot of women do when they enter a man’s world. I tried to outdo the men,” Shanahan laughs.
This approach, she says, didn’t last long.
“I started to push back against that, and then I started to see the power of being a woman and being who I am, rather than trying to fit in by being something I’m not.” , adds Shanahan.
“That was a big lesson – and it was a lesson that came back when I bought Port Vale, because it really is a man’s world.”
Shanahan received an honorary doctorate from Staffordshire University in 2017 and also became chairman of the Port Vale Foundation Trust.
She founded the Hubb Foundation in 2019, a charity dedicated to helping disadvantaged children in Stoke-on-Trent, which recently served its millionth free meal.
The philosophy behind her charitable efforts, she says, is to give children the opportunity they might not have had otherwise.
“How many kids are on the same path as me, and how many have the opportunity to fall the way I fell?…That’s what really started to motivate me,” Shanahan says.
In April this year, the Shanahan family sold Synectics Solutions in a deal worth £180 million to private equity firm Synova Capital.
“We took Synectics from a family business to a family investment – and that was a big change,” says Shanahan, who now serves on the board as a non-executive with his daughter.
“Making the decision to sell Synectics was a big decision, but it was the right decision.”
The businesswoman has since devoted much of her time investing in the management team at Port Vale Football Club, led by manager Darren Moore and chief executive Matt Hancock.
“If you want to spend your time, spend your time making sure your leaders are the right ones,” she says.
Name:Carol Shanahan Business: Synectic Solutions Based: February 1992 Staff: 360 Title: Formerly founder and chairman, now non-executive director Age:66 Born: December 27, 1957 Lives: Cheshire Studied: 5 failed attempts at education but now has 1 O Level, 2 honorary doctorates and an OBE Talents: Crisis management, change management and everything related to people Currency: Know the difference between being right and winning Best known for: Community work in Stoke leading to Port Vale FC ownership First ambition: Be a flight attendant Favorite book: Heidi by Johanna Spyri Best advice: Respect yourself and don’t take yourself too seriously
