Are you interested in stretching your entrepreneurial wings and establishing your own online business?
Vision Australia is seeking interest in a second round of a new pilot online small business training program for people who are blind or have low vision following a successful pilot that ended in March this year.
Under the initial pilot, five aspiring entrepreneurs from the blind and low vision community got the chance to learn how to set up and run an online business.
Program facilitator Trudy Rankin says the new course will include an intensive week of face-to-face sessions in Melbourne to equip clients with key skills, before six months of weekly face-to-face meetings, online group meetings and coaching sessions to help participants to establish a business as a group.
Participants then apply what they learned in the group setting to develop their own online business.
Trudy says a variety of business ideas stemmed from the pilot course.
“Some really interesting businesses were set up through the course including app development, a training course and an antique store,” Trudy said.
“The best part is that each one was inspired by the participants’ own strengths and interests.”
Participant Ken Moulang was in sales and marketing before he was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa at the age of 39, forcing radical changes to his career.
He then worked in telephone marketing for a telecommunications firm, in the charity sector and in his own business, but during the course he decided to head in a new direction – public speaking.
He said the pilot program involved much more than computing skills.
“We learned about PR and working with the media about how to promote the products. We learned about podcasting, we had someone else talk to us about coaching,” Ken says.
“We’ve had various inputs from different professionals along the way, and it’s been a really interesting program.”
It’s hoped that Vision Australia can begin the new online business course in the final quarter of this year.
For further details, or to register interest in the second pilot program, please email Vision Australia Employment Manager Jan Hauser here or email Trudy Rankin here.