The Institute of Public Administration is the largest distance-learning organisation in Ireland, with a throughput of 15,000 people taking training courses, 1,500 people doing nine under- and post-graduate degrees, a staff of 115 and a turnover of £9 million.

Alumni include Mr Eddie Sullivan, secretary-general of the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs; Mr Michael Dowling, former secretary-general of the Department of Agriculture; Mr Patrick O'Connor, Ambassador to France; Mr Conor Murphy, Ambassador to Saudi Arabia; Mr James Flavin, Ambassador to Hungary; Prof Tom Garvin, Professor of Politics in UCD; Mr Eddie Breen, the Waterford City Manager; and, indeed, Mr John Gallagher himself, the current director-general.

When we meet, he is battling a bad dose of 'flu, but he's at his desk in a handsome house on Dublin's Lansdowne Road, one of five such houses that are home to the Irish public sector management development agency. Mr Gallagher has been head of the IPA for 14 years and has steered it - and continues to do so - through a period of enormous change for the public service.

"When I joined the Civil Service, I was on trial; for people joining the Civil Service now, the Civil Service is on trial. That is the big problem at the moment: getting and motivating staff and keeping them. To do that we're going to have to balance work and family life.

"I think the biggest challenge we have for the future is keeping up with the frightening pace of change and satisfying the needs of a sophisticated clientele who in turn have to meet the demands of a more sophisticated public."

The bulk of the IPA's work is to provide training and third-level education - all part-time courses - for civil and public servants, as the Irish Management Institute does for the private sector. It publishes a number of reference books, not necessarily commercial propositions, as well as the hugely successful IPA Administration Yearbook & Diary, which sells some 10,000 annually.

When the IPA started in 1957, most public servants joined the workforce straight from school. "Now they have degrees. Now there is a demand from us for masters.

"They will specialise in public administration, management, local government, health, criminal justice, business studies and information systems. Everyone in the public service knows the IPA; it would be my objective to make sure that doesn't change. Our influence has been huge over the years." About 80 per cent of training and development now is done in situ, in local authorities, health boards, government office and State bodies, rather than bringing people to Dublin.

The evolution of the IPA came about in two ways, as John Gallagher explains: "One was as a result of having a look at what was happening elsewhere; the other way was customer-driven and reflected changes in the public service, ranging from EU membership to the Freedom of Information Act, the Public Management Act, the Strategic Management Initiative and, more recently, performance management. "We have to shift the emphasis away from the public service to the wider commercial market if we're to compete for business in the State-sponsored bodies area."

The IPA's work is quite similar to that of the IMI, he explains, "except the public service management ethos is different from the private sector because it has to take into account social and political aspects that the private sector doesn't have to". John Gallagher knows a lot about the life in the Civil Service. Until he came to the IPA, he was an assistant secretary in the Department of Finance and is still on secondment. He joined the Civil Service in 1960 straight from St Flannan's College in Ennis, where his father was the Latin and Greek teacher, and studied public administration at UCD by night.

When he was interviewed for his current job, Mr Sean Cromien, then chairman of the institute, reminded him that through the Top Level Appointments Committee, he could easily become a Government department secretary, given that he had leap-frogged 16 people to become an assistant secretary.

"I said I wouldn't leave the IPA until it was in the shape I wanted it. I never applied for any job in the Top Level Appointments Committee in the last 14 years. This place gave me the start and I am still committed to it," he says. But he is still only 57 . . .

So, what of the future? Well, he has big plans for the expansion of the education and management side of the institute. "There's a huge demand for post-graduate qualifications. We have a couple of master's and are designing a couple more. We graduated 440 in 1999.

"There is a demand for help in meeting new financial management requirements in which we're playing a major part for the local authorities. There is a demand for consultancy work in relation to the introduction of performance management and the appropriate performance indicators, but essentially it's the professionalisation of the Civil Service.

"We have to keep abreast of all the changing learning and teaching trends that may emerge. On the research side, there is a continuing demand for public research; we have a specialist research area with five full-time researchers," he explains.

Then there is the publications section, which this year plans to publish a range of books, including The First Department, a history of the Department of Agriculture, by Mary Daly; Irish Third-level Education 1960- 2000 by Tony White; and The Irish Criminal Justice System by Paul O'Mahony.

However, the IPA has to pay a fair bit of its way. About 22 per cent of its running costs comes from the Department of Finance - compared with 37 per cent 14 years ago, while the balance is made up by fees. For example, the Barrington O'Reilly extension, completed last year, cost £4 million, of which the State paid only £1 million, while Dr AJF O'Reilly put up $1 million in honour of his father, Jack, who himself was a pioneer of Civil Service training and development.

"I'm in the process of looking for another donor for a new £2 million to £3 million library," Mr Gallagher says coyly, and you can be sure he has someone in his sights. But he's not planning a move from its current location.

"I think the IPA is firmly fixed in Lansdowne Road, " he insists. "I looked at other places, including moving to the UCD campus, but whatever way we stroked the figures, the bottom line was about £10 million. I wasn't prepared to put a noose like that around the institute."

Married, but separated, he has five children "none in the public service, though". He enjoys golf and classical music and is an excellent after-dinner speaker. If he ever retires he would like to write children's stories; he's already done a few for his partner's grandchild.

"I just might write a humourous reflection on the Civil Service and the characters I met over the years in it. Like any very large organisation, there were some fantastic characters and humourous episodes."

Public servants, you have been warned.