Coming out of the army, I almost have too many options! I'm looking at several things, one of which is journalism. It's so hard to get to speak to anyone! I'd tried several places, smaller magazines, local papers, but no one would even talk to me, so when I heard about ViewVo from Careershifters it was amazing! I got to speak to Shafi pretty much straightaway. He's such a great guy, and clearly has some interesting views as to how to get into the business. He's pretty adamant you don't need the specialist journalism qualifications which training businesses are keen to stress you do need, so it's possibly saved me 6 months! Instead, I have some ideas on how to pitch to editors so will go down that route first. Thanks ViewVo for taking the pain out of the closed doors!
I found Jehane very warm and welcoming, lovely and easy to talk to. Jehane gave me feedback on areas in my portfolio which could be improved & developed. I found it useful to get Jehane’s opinion on where she thought my work would fit in the industry. She encouraged me to keep pursuing personal projects and was able to offer really constructive feedback on my portfolio which will hopefully see me improve my work and gain more freelance job opportunities in the future. I would definitely highly recommend Jehane to friends looking to publish and license their work.
I'm Vicky, I have a dream to open a Play cafe in Reading. I don't have a background in running a coffee shop so I’ve done as much research as I can online and sitting in coffee shops, but I got to the point where I really needed some expert advice on where to go next, and someone to say ‘this is awful go back to the drawing board, or this is great, this isn't,’ and just really some guidance on what to do.
Today has been so busy and full on I’ve literally got a head full of ideas and it's been so exciting to see it in action. I’ve tried the food, I’ve tried making the coffee (not very successfully) and we've just had a great day talking about all the different aspects of what needs to go into starting the business. It's been brilliant. And walking around the building and seeing simple things like why that's in that drawer and why they work a certain way it's really, really valuable. I don't think I would have learnt half of this stuff just doing what I was doing so which was desk-based research and sitting in coffee shops and watching – it’s just not the same thing. I’ve already said that I might need to pay for another half day! :)
I worked as MD at a large investment bank in Canary Wharf managing over 300 people. I really enjoyed the people management side of the role, so after 20 years thought I might like to move more into coaching. After spending a day with a Hannah I realised I would miss being part of a bigger team and having a more strategic business remit and operations to guide. I'm now working in consultancy helping companies go through change management processes - so very much focusing on people management, but giving me more of the strategic business focus I realised I needed.
If you have a dream and you want to implement it, it's a risk free way of getting experience without getting hurt. The sorts of things I got help with were how to staff, what sort of ratios you need to work to, I've revised my business plan after we went through it. I'm hoping to open in a few months!
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