Michelle Spillane, managing director of Paddy Power UK & Ireland, has been named Marketing Institute Ireland’s National Marketing Champion for 2027.
Spillane will be formally recognised at the MII CMO Summit on October 7 at EY, Wilton Park in Dublin, where she will also deliver a keynote address to senior marketing and business leaders.
The award recognises her contribution to marketing, business leadership and innovation, as well as her wider contribution to the marketing industry.
Spillane has led marketing at Paddy Power since 2018 and now serves as managing director across the betting company’s online and retail businesses.
Her career has included senior marketing and leadership roles across entertainment, technology, media and financial services, including positions with Disney, Warner Bros, RTÉ, Microsoft Ireland, Bank of Ireland and ITV.
At Paddy Power, she has overseen the continued development of a brand known for combining sport, entertainment, humour and topical marketing with a distinctive creative identity.
She joins previous MII National Marketing Champions Gráinne Wafer of Diageo, Sharon Walsh of Heineken Ireland and Orla Mitchell, former chief executive of WaterWipes and former global president of Gum & Mints at Mars Wrigley.
Marketing Institute Ireland chief executive Shane McGonigle said Spillane had demonstrated the role marketing can play in driving wider business performance.
“Michelle is an outstanding example of what the National Marketing Champion represents,” he said.
“She has demonstrated time and time again that marketing is not simply a communications function but a fundamental driver of brand, business and commercial success.
“Michelle has built an impressive career across media, technology, financial services and entertainment, and has brought that breadth of experience to Paddy Power to help build one of the most distinctive and recognisable brands in the market.
“Her ability to combine creativity with commercial thinking, while leading high-performing teams and building strong agency partnerships, is particularly impressive.”
Spillane said marketing had been the “golden thread” throughout her career and argued that the discipline had an increasingly important role to play in shaping overall business strategy.
“For me, breakthroughs happen where creativity, culture and commercial courage meet,” she said.
“That’s where brands earn their place in people’s lives and businesses find their next chapter of growth. Marketing teaches you to spot opportunity before it is obvious, make bold decisions before you have certainty and build belief in something that doesn’t yet exist.
“It demands the imagination to see what a business could become and the commercial discipline to make it happen. There are few better training grounds for business leadership.”
She said rapidly changing consumer behaviour meant marketers had an important role in ensuring the customer remained represented in senior business decision-making.
“Consumers move faster than organisations. Marketing keeps a business alive to that change, reading shifts in behaviour, culture and expectations, and gives them a voice at the leadership table,” Spillane said.
“That’s a unique and invaluable contribution: keeping the customer in the room when today’s decisions are being made.”
She added that her experience across different markets and sectors had reinforced her belief in the commercial value of strong brands.
“A powerful brand is one of the greatest commercial advantages a business can have,” she said.
“At Paddy Power, challenging convention is part of our DNA. We see every day what happens when a brand has the courage to stand for something and the creativity to make people care.”
Spillane said it was a particular honour to join previous National Marketing Champions such as Wafer, Walsh and said she would use her appearance at the CMO Summit to discuss lessons from her career and the changing role of marketing leadership.
The sold-out MII CMO Summit 2026 takes place on October 7 and will focus on the evolving role of the chief marketing officer and the contribution of marketing to business strategy and growth.
