Sharon is a leading voice on a more equal Ireland and a powerful speaker. Inspiring leadership in 2016 at Áras an Uachtaráin, Sharon spoke with host President Higgins, Champion World Leader of the UN Women HeforShe campaign and with international phenomenon Hozier who donated the proceeds of his Cherry Wine single to SAFE Ireland. Sharon engaged those leaders and the rest of the country saying, “our culture and attitudes allow domestic violence to continue as a largely undocumented crime in Ireland.” Also in 2016 she led the design and delivery of the first SAFE Ireland Summit held in the Mansion House in 2016. It was a groundbreaking, first of it’s kind event that hosted 45 of the world’s most disruptive change agents and raised the profile of domestic violence like never before in Ireland.
CEO of SAFE Ireland since 2001, Sharon has collaborated with its 40 Irish member services to transform the coalition into the National Social Change Agency working on domestic violence in Ireland. She is changing how this social, political and cultural issue is discussed in government, in the media and in communities not only within Ireland but around the world. Sharon has created relationships with US and European partners that are moving the topic of domestic violence onto national agendas. She brings her experience in community development to her management of national and EU funded projects, to SAFE Ireland’s development of strategic partnerships, gender based violence prevention campaigns, public relations and grassroots service support.
Sharon is a fully qualified biodynamic psychotherapist, interested in the intersection between social change and trauma, healing and ending intergenerational cycles of violence. A graduate of Bangor University, she has a post graduate diploma in Mediation Studies from Dublin University.
