Daryl McMullan
What is your name?
Daryl McMullan
What role do you do?
Officially, I’m the Managing Director of The Inclusivity Group LTD, which contains Complete Communication LTD, Complete Training LTD and Complete Independence LTD. Ultimately, this means that I’m responsible for all of our service provision, our future growth and ensuring that we continue to meet our vision of supporting deaf and disabled people to live in a world where they feel equal and valued by society.
In practice, this means that I spend significant time with my team to discuss projects and future developments and to identify how we can improve our existing and future service offerings. I also get the pleasure of meeting our clients to ensure we are doing what we say we will, which is definitely one of my favourite parts of the job.
When not managing, I continue to work as a communication and support professional to ensure that we remain at the top of our field. I’m massively passionate about the arts, specifically theatre, so you will often find me scribbling over a script, watching a show, or standing on stage, making theatre within the Southwest and further afield accessible to deaf and disabled people.
Why did you choose this role?
I have been a BSL/English Interpreter since 2014 and later became a Lipspeaker, Electronic Notetaker, Professional Supervisor and Captioner. All of these roles have been amazing but did not always fit around the life that I wanted when we decided to have a family. This is when Rhiannon and I decided to set up Complete Communication at our kitchen table at home, a few months before our first child was born and a global pandemic was about to begin.
Managing The Inclusivity Group is something that I absolutely love. We have a unique model in our office, whereby everyone is involved to some extent in big decisions that are made, and we all work together to get a project to its endpoint.
What do you enjoy the most about your role?
This is something that is easy to answer! Knowing that we are making a difference in people’s lives every single day, in either a small way or a not-so-small way! Having a job where you know you are directly impacting someone’s life for the better is, for me, the perfect job.
I also love seeing the team grow and watching each person develop as a professional and as a human being, finding their own interests, and specialities and bringing their own unique qualities to what makes The Inclusivity Group what it is.
What are your favourite aspects of being part of the office team?
For me, it’s the fact that there has not been a single day in the last four years where one or all of us have not been in tears with laughter. We are a unique group of individuals, who, on paper, should not work together, but somehow, we do. We all massively care about what we do and each other, which shows how much we are willing to support each other.
No matter how busy we get or how many demands we might have, we always find the time to come together and laugh. And to be clear, I don’t mean ha, ha! I mean, a real belly laugh, can’t breathe, tears rolling down your face kind of laugh!
What is your favourite moment/story from within the office?
For me, there are two that come to mind.
The first was when I hid behind the door to our office, trying to ‘jump scare’ a team member, but it turned out to be our IT contractor, who did not look too impressed.
Another time was when we all decided to have a roly-poly competition in the office, and all took it extremely seriously! Olympic rules were followed, and I can confirm that both Neve and I were joint winners!
Any tips or advice you would share with those who are in similar roles?
Find people who care about what you want to do as much as your do, and search for unique individuals. It is well known within our company, that when we are interviewing for new team members, I’m rarely interested in knowing what qualifications someone has but more interested in what makes them who they are, what interests, hobbies, stories, or experiences they have, as this truly adds to our company’s richness and diversity.
Find people whom you can trust, who support your goals and who you want to spend your working day with. Not only does this make reaching your goals easier, but it truly makes it a lot more fun along the way.
Finally, if you think that the standard workplace is not for you, then give building your own company a go. Make a company that works for you, and allows you to be your best and thrive. Ignore the business books and do things how you want them done.