Running any business these days can be challenging, as Ian McGuinness, founder, managing director and CEO of Roganstown Golf and Country Club just ten minutes north of Dublin airport in Ireland can testify.

So to be acknowledged by your peers with the award of Fingal Business Person of the Year for 2024, was testament to his hard work and endeavours, both on and off the course.

In truth, Roganstown is much more than a one-man band, and is very much a family affair with the entire McGuinness family employed in some capacity. His brother Colm is head greenkeeper, his sister, Elaine McLoughlin , is director of golf and even his mother, Denise, founded the club.

Originally farmland, McGuinness’ mother was a pioneer for golf in the local area and opened Swords Golf Club – adjacent to Roganstown – in 1990.

“It was a family farm, and we redeveloped it,” said McGuinness who had a background working for multi-national companies such as Siemens and Microsoft before opting to join the family business.

“My mother was big into golf, and she was a member of Skerries and then Balbriggan where she was Lady Captain,” he recalls. “She started Swords Open golf course as a nine-hole and then converted it to 18 back in the 90s.

“My mother was complaining about a draughty old house and my stepfather wanted to retire and none of us were interested in taking over the farm, so we came up with the Roganstown model side-by-side with Swords.

“My mother started it all and we do an annual Denise McLoughlin memorial at the club. She was a pioneer. She started Swords, and if she started today, she would have been held out as a pillar for women in business. She was ahead of her time.”

That dream of creating and building a golf and hotel took some years to come to fruition however, during which time McGuinness worked for Microsoft between 1997 and 2004 as EMEA operations director for small and medium-sized businesses before leaving to manage Roganstown on a full-time basis.

“There was a lot of work putting it all together,” he recalls after planning permission was granted in 1998. “We had the land, and we knew about the golf business.

“It started off quite small then ended up being a 52-bedroom and leisure centre – a proper country club golf course designed by Christy O’Connor Jnr.

“At the time, I was wrapped up in the Microsoft thing and was working 60 hours a week; I was travelling a lot. I remember having telephone calls out of Seattle with people back here talking about planning and things like bathrooms. I had to make a decision about what I wanted to do,” he recollected.

“My folks had to have a certain amount of faith in me to give me the property to develop. There is more responsibility attached to it because it is our own. If it goes wrong, it is my family who are involved.”

And on the face of it, the faith put in McGuinness by his folks and the rest of his family has paid off, as today, he is ultimately responsible for the overall management of the hotel, spa and both Roganstown and Swords golf courses.

When the course at Roganstown opened for play in May 2004, the course instantly gained widespread recognition within the Irish community, and a crucial part of that success was the involvement of O’Connor Jnr.

McGuinness and his brother Colm – who was previously the course superintendent at Swords – approached O’Connor during the planning stages to design the course.

The partnership was built on mutual respect and a shared vision for creating a first-rate golf course, with O’Connor’s design philosophy focused on creating a course that was challenging yet accessible, with wide fairways and strategically placed hazards.

“Roganstown has all the charm of a country estate, with mature trees and water,” said O’Connor Jnr at the time of opening. “The site, on gentle rolling terrain with natural running water, has allowed me to be truly creative and I’ve exploited water to the full.”

O’Connor Jnr. created a 6,588-yard par-71 layout off the whites with the Broadmore River flowing beside the course, and with water guarding all but six holes.

Since opening, Roganstown Golf Club has hosted numerous prestigious tournaments, including the Irish PGA Southern Championship and the Irish PGA Championship.

The club has also been a venue for the EuroPro Tour, further cementing its reputation as a top-tier golfing destination, but in recent years, Roganstown’s commitment to the environment – and enhancing sustainability – is perhaps, its most acknowledgeable achievement.

Back in August 2021, Roganstown became the first golfing venue in Ireland to appoint environmental specialists GreenClub as consultants to help fulfil its long-term goal of becoming carbon neutral and provide a sustainable roadmap across all elements of its business to ensure a greener future.

After carrying out a detailed top-to-toe review of all existing infrastructure and energy provision, GreenClub helped Roganstown develop environmental strategies and create an opportunity for the venue to generate their own renewable energy on-site using the most appropriate power sources – helping to reduce overheads.

Commenting on the collaboration, McGuinness said: “Sustainable energy provision and a greener approach to all elements of Roganstown infrastructure is very important to me and the whole team here. We were one of the first golf resorts here in Ireland to install a wood chip burner, rather than rely on LPG gas, and alongside the 60,000 trees we’ve planted in the past few years, we’re at a great starting point.

“In order to secure success for the business in the future, it’s imperative that we have a coherent environmental strategy moving forwards, and GreenClub can help us to deliver this in an efficient, responsible way so that we can reap the rewards in the future.”

GreenClub chief executive, Liam Greasley, said: “All the team at Roganstown is committed to building a brighter and more environmentally friendly future and we’re delighted to be working with our first club in Ireland.

“They have some very ambitious long-term plans, and it will be our job to provide them with a strategy and regular recommendations so that they can achieve their aims in the most efficient and cost-effective way possible, from the initial comprehensive audit and setting out the long-term goals to reducing carbon emissions and the creation of their own renewable energy sources.”

And as part of this commitment to reducing carbon emissions, recently Roganstown became the first two-course operator in Ireland to go fully autonomous for all course maintenance, using five hi-tech GPS-RTK robots to cut the fairways.

Perhaps then, McGuinness’s commitment to the environment played a small part in his recent business accolade saying: “I’m humbled to have been named Fingal Business Person of the Year 2024.

“I loved my 15 minutes of fame but it was only made possible through the support of my family and the wonderful team at Roganstown.”