Undertaking additional training with Careers and Development to start my own business.

During my study at the University of Salford, I have undertaken a lot of extra-curricular training over the last 3 years with the University's Careers and Development department.

Personal Branding Course. Mon 18th February 2013. 4-7 pm.

I saw this course advertised on The Careers and Develoment section of the university website and though that it would be very relevant to this module and to my my own future practice so I booked myself a place.

I undertook the three-hour ''Personal Branding'' training session on Monday the 18th of February with the Careers and Development team.

The purpose of this session was to try to understand more about myself as a brand. Not just the product or service that I am providing.

We spent a lot of time talking about first impressions and how important that they are to potential clients when we make that initial contact with them.

We worked in small groups practising introducing ourselves to each other to make a good first impression and this was really useful. It was done in a very informal manner and we were all able to identify certain areas that we could all improve our initial greeting style.

We also spent quite a lot of time during this session practising what is known as an ''elevator-pitch'' this is where theoretically, you meet a potential customer in a lift or elevator and only have a very limited time to promote yourself and make a good first impression.

We finished the session by trying to identify as many positive elements about ourselves and our practice that will appeal to potential future customers.

Some of the keywords that I came up with were, determination, ambition, passion, success, desire, drive and motivation.

These are all very important keywords that will help me when I come to write my personal statement for this module.

Overall, I found this training session to be incredibly helpful to identify and improve key areas of my verbal communication skills and in particular, the first initial meeting with a prospective client.

''Business Bootcamp'' 
Two-day intensive course to develop business start-up skills and enhance enterprise and employability skills.

Thursday 11th and Friday 12th April 2013. 9am -5pm.

Figure 1.

Figure 2.

Figures 1 and 2 show the agenda for my two-day ''Business Bootcamp'' training course.

As mentioned above, I have undertaken a huge range of business-related training course with Careers and Development over the last three years.

As a result of this, I was shortlisted to gain a place on an intensive two-day course at Careers and Development that was targeted at final year students who want to start their own business after they leave university.

As I want to start to develop my own freelance photographic practice after i graduate. I thought that this would be of a great benefit to me.

I have to complete a very detailed online application process where I had to give a detailed outline of the idea for my small business.

There were only 20 places available in total.

After completing my application, I received an email to let me know that out of over 70 applicants, my application had been successful and I had gained a place on the course.

The course was absolutely brilliant.

We worked from 9am to 5pm both days and had a lot of presentations from some very helpful guest speakers.

We received a huge amount of advice on subjects such as:

1. Communication Skills.
2. Business Basics.
3. Introduction to Networking.
4. Setting up Social Enterprises.
5. Entrepreneurial Skills.
6. Growing Your Business With Social Media.
7. Intellectual Property.
8. Finding Funding for our Business.

These presentations were delivered by some really helpful people who have all successfully started and run their own businesses.

We also had a few guest speakers who have been incredibly successful in starting up their own businesses and I found this to be a real inspiration.

Another very valuable part of this training course is that we have all been assigned a personal business mentor who will keep in contact with us in the  future and offer us continued guidance and support as we start our own businesses.

We will also be able to receive continued support from the Careers and Development team even after we graduate.

Figure 3.

Figure 3. The certificate that I received from Careers and Development for the successful completion of the 2-day Business Bootcamp course.

I have learned a huge amount from attending this course.

I now understand a lot more about using social media to market my company for free and I have also gained a much greater understanding of my intellectual property right which is of fundamental importance to a photographer.

It has made me realise just how much that I will have to learn my make my business a success but at the same time, I have worked with so many people who have started from absolutely nothing and made their businesses incredibly successful and this has really inspired me to continue to start my own photographic practice and to make it a success in the future.