After surviving 13 years inside one of Ireland’s most notorious Christian Brothers institutions — later exposed for systemic child abuse — 78-year-old Pat Ward has made history as the oldest doctoral student at Warwick Business School’s Shard campus.
“I was worried about my age, but Warwick didn’t see the number – they saw the person and accepted me.”
As the business school celebrates a decade at The Shard, Pat Ward is inspiring a new generation of entrepreneurs with his remarkable journey to business success.
At three years old, Pat Ward was placed in a Christian Brothers institution — a place later exposed as of emotional, physical, and sexual abuse.
“I left the institution with nothing,” says Pat. “I fled to England to escape the stigma of that place and got a job as a labourer in a steelworks factory. As I came to terms with my new world I began to feel that I could do better than labouring.
“I dreamed of becoming an electronics engineer so at 18 I joined the Royal Navy in the hope of achieving my dream. They saw my potential and they trained me in electronics.”
After leaving the Navy Pat returned to Ireland. In 1985 he started his own electronics engineering company, Western Automation Research and Development (WARD). By 1988 it was in serious difficulty and 22 people lost their jobs.
Pat recalls: “I realised they lost their jobs because of my failure at running a business. I was an engineer but I knew nothing about running a business so I decided to learn how to.
Pat enrolled on a Diploma in Professional Management course with the Open University (OU).
“It taught me the key requirements of managing a business.”
With that skillset Pat got the company going again.
He went on to do a Master’s Degree in Management Practice at Trinity College Dublin where he learned how to position his company strategically in a competitive market. “The OU taught me how to operate a company. Trinity taught me how to think and plan strategically.”
All of this was done through distance learning while he ran his company.
“Prior to my studies with the OU and Trinity I never knew from one year to the next if we’d make a profit,” he says. “But from 1995 onwards, we never made another loss.”
WARD grew into a global player, competing with giants like Siemens and Schneider. In 2023 Pat sold the company to a US multinational for more than £100 million.
Despite having no qualifications when he left school, Pat has put his amazing business success down to education.
“Don’t let a bad start in life be an excuse for doing nothing,” says Pat who flies from Dublin to study at WBS London at The Shard. “I am proof that if you have ambition, achievement will follow. You just need to give it a go and you’ll be surprised at what you’re capable of.
“I got a lot of help with my business and I want to give something back. I have a wealth of personal experience but I need to broaden my knowledge if I am to help others.”
That desire led him to Warwick Business School where he applied to enrol in their Doctorate in Business Administration (DBA) programme.
Pat says: “It has been a revelation and I have enjoyed every minute of the DBA programme.”
Pat’s research focuses on identifying early signs of business failure in SMEs. He’s tracking 112 companies across the UK and Ireland, trying to understand what pushes some towards failure and how to plan a timely intervention to avoid failure.
Pat, who has two children and three grandsons has recounted his life story in his biography called “The Runner”, available on Amazon. The book has inspired people from around the world and reviews have been posted on Amazon from readers in Ireland, UK, Spain, Portugal, USA and Canada.
“Everyone has an interesting story to tell and we just need to put it in writing. My view is that life is a journey. WBS has added a new phase to my journey and I’m embracing it.”
