According to press releases on 19th February, 2015—online training provider, Engage, launched free live-training for creative entrepreneurs by world-class educators at the Innovation Centre in Derry, Londonderry. Engage has been developed to help people follow their passion. It plans to offer classes in the areas of photography, videography, cinematography, art, design, music, crafts and business. These workshops are for free via the ‘Engage’ website. You have the option to purchase and download the workshop sessions in case you missed a course, or if you would like to watch a session in particular (online).
Meet the brain behind it!
Founder Donal Doherty came from a background in marketing and PR before making a shift in his career five years ago—to become a photographer. Donal was shortlisted in 2009 as Entrepreneur of the Year and was awarded PPANI Fashion Photographer of the Year and Creative Photographer of the Year in 2014. He speaks at conventions all over the UK and USA.
The Path
When developing his business he listened to the experts and they have helped him create a market-leading photography studio. While he loved watching live workshops, it was difficult to participate due to the time difference and sometimes the content shared was not 100% relevant to his business. Donal knew that some of the best trainers he’d heard were based in Europe and wished there was a world-wide resource that blended their ideas and strategies with those of their US counterparts. So, two years ago, he began working to bring those experts together to help people to succeed in their creative businesses.
The expansion of Engage signifies a healthy investment and the company hopes to crowd-source the funding on Kickstarter for further developments. With an initial target of £15,000, the company hopes to surpass the amount to cover some of the production costs – the video, audio, live-chat and technical team.
Donal is excited to launch the new format and he explains what’s in store:
“We will offer thousands of people around the world a chance to learn from leading educators for free and to interact and shape the learning experience live. People can also apply to be in the in-person studio audience and we’ll have both delegates and trainers flying in from around the world for the courses. To an extent this all rests on the success of our Kickstarter campaign which we hope will fund 16 courses in 2015, with the plan to offer a course each week in 2016. Not only will this help us to create employment in the local economy, but we’re hoping to be part of the sea change of native digital companies accessing global markets.”
For more information on Engage, visit www.engagelive.co To support the Kickstarter campaign, visit their Kickstarter Project page to support them: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/engagelive/engage-free-live-education-for-creative-entreprene