Unit 1&2 Evaluation

At the start of the year while studying Level 4 Creative Enterprise, I did not expect what I would have come to learn. Through both written work and practical, I have learned a significant amount of what to expect while working in the creative industry, as the career I want to pursue - music journalism - is based within it. I was drawn to this venture in particular as I was certain I wanted to work in the creative industry, but just wanted to clarify what I would want to work in more specifically. The most beneficial learning points for me were during the research tasks, which is where I learned the majority of what I know about creative enterprise today. Most notably, looking into regulatory frameworks and bodies was of most use to my learning due to the fact that from an outsider's perspective, you wouldn't expect there to be as many rules and regulations as there are, and so becoming aware to this is absolutely crucial when starting a career within creative industries, especially in terms of legality. In my opinion, the most interesting regulatory body to learn about was IPSO (Independent Press Standards Organisation), as this is of most relevance to my desired career in journalism as IPSO’s framework, the Editors’ Code, is something I will have to follow. Researching already existing businesses as part of our business research also helped build an idea of what I would like to do as a career, which steered down the path of music journalism.

When I first started establishing a business idea, I was sure that I wanted to go down the freelancer route as a music journalist freelancer. However, when I started looking more in depth at freelancing as a career, I learnt that doing this long-term would not be something I would be interested in, as being a freelancer means you have to take up your clients' own views and requirements, and so your work would lack your own unique views and flexibility - I would not have as many opportunities to implement my own creativity working as a freelancer as I would working as an independent music blog/publisher. Therefore, I realised that instead I would prefer to start up and manage my own independent music blog, which would allow me to have the flexibility of opinions that I craved to have which freelancing would have come to lack. As well as this, the short film that my class created at the start of the year gave me a taste of what teamwork is like within the industry, of which I found was not as favourable to me as working alone. Although this experienced helped me open up and develop my lack of communication skills, I found that having varying interests of what you would like to pursue caused some friction, and so I found it easier to work with others interested in writing and publishing, of whom shared the same struggles with teamwork as myself. This was also my first time working as a boom operator, which birthed my love and interest for audio work. 

The course allowed me to establish a starting point for my own business, which required creating a business plan, business model, business website, business financing spreadsheet and professional business social media accounts. These business tasks enabled me to learn about the importance of varying factors in a business and their effect on said business. For example, through the creation of my business website, I learned about the importance of branding, and how this would affect my business. I would then go on to receive feedback for my business model from a local publisher, the Belton Village Voice, which gave me an insight into the journalism industry from a professional perspective. Summing up their feedback, they advised that in a business model, you must consider how to go about handling different finances, in which they suggested considering outsourcing for my business in particular.

Leading onto work experience, although the COVID-19 pandemic made it more challenging to find experience, I managed to complete work for two 'employers', so to speak. One of these was the college's own E-Sports team, which required me and a few other classmates conducting filmed interviews on the players pre-game. I was the boom operator in this, as working with sound is something I am interested in as well as being something which is relevant to my desired career, since I may have to conduct my own filmed interviews at some point during the running of my business. As a result, from my experience as a boom operator, the most important thing I learned about was boom positioning and the effect on the audio, since I found that a few audio samples were not as good as others as a result of poor positioning. As well as this, I also worked for a professional publication, the Belton Village Voice, as to get a taste of tasks I would have to take up as an independent publisher. This task required transferring physical prints of the magazine to digital prints. Although this was a tedious task, it allowed me to work towards gaining a familiarity with physical and digital prints. Consequently, working in these two contrasting environments allowed me to develop an understanding of which career path I would be more interested in, in which I concluded to be journalism.

I would like to have learned more about smaller businesses in the creative industry, as the success of small businesses is presented far less than accomplishments made by well-known companies. Although my business research tasks allowed me to look further into this, I feel that using examples from smaller successful creative businesses on the course would have given students more motivation when it comes to planning for their own business, as they would have been aware that small businesses can be just as successful as larger ones. We did touch on the success of smaller businesses through talks we received from individuals such as Mark Finbow, who founded his own theatre company – this talk taught us more about financing meant for creative industries, with examples being Arts Council England and Creative England. However, I would like to have focused more on small businesses. On the other hand, I understand that more knowledge would have been given to us from completing further work experience, which we were not able to do much of this year as a result of the pandemic. I would also liked to have learned about diversity in creative industries. As the creative industry as a whole is constantly changing as the world develops, views and representations within the industry should also change. Through my own research, I have noticed that diversity is accepted more in music and art, although the same positive representation is lacking in other areas. Thus, I would like to have learned what individuals within diverse groups should expect when working in creative industries and how they would be affected as a result.

To conclude, studying units 1 & 2 in Level 4 Creative Enterprise has allowed me to develop a professional view of businesses in the creative industry, while also instilling me with the confidence to work within it and develop my own business. I have learned important factors such as financing and where to find it – such as Arts Council England - establishing my own business, working with other professionals and the common barriers that one may come across while working in the industry. I hope to use these skills when going on to study Multimedia Journalism at university, which I hope will be the stepping stone into my desired career as a music journalist.