#CannesForAll returns to take two cohorts of diverse talent to Cannes Lions
CannesForAll, an initiative seeking to make the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity more inclusive,…
Empower the next generation by becoming a mentor at Brixton Finishing School. Share your expertise and guide talented individuals in the creative, media, and tech industries.
Are you seeking guidance in your career? Connect with experienced professionals through Brixton Finishing School's mentorship programme and advance your professional journey.
Through our free, award winning programmes, we turn raw talent into industry superstars that are ready to take on entry level roles in the Marketing, Advertising and Communications industries.
We exist to build an equitable super highway into the Creative, Media, and Tech industries and improve the early years experience for people from under-represented communities.
We deliver diverse talent to fuel a company’s competitive advantage as more diverse teams produce better returns. Different types of thinking mean new perspectives, fresh ideas and better results. We are an ‘end to end’ solution to the industry’s diversity challenges.
Our focus is on finding and developing untapped talent / under-represented talent. We don’t give out places on our free, award winning programmes, based on work experience or qualifications. We want to make industry roles accessible to anyone who has the talent and drive to succeed.
We believe that there is a huge pool of talent that deserves to feel encouraged and supported into careers in the Creative, Media, and Tech industries.
Brixton Finishing School is a not for profit and relies on the generous support of brands, agencies and media owners to improve the outcomes for underrepresented talent. We can’t thank those that fund our mission enough.
There are multiple ways for us to work together to tackle the industry’s diversity challenges and drive positive change.
Ally Owen is a Digital Leader with over 25 years of tenure in the Media & Advertising industries.
Her previous roles include Guardian News and Media, Unruly, MailOnline, Yahoo!, Women’s glossies and John Brown (Waitrose & John Lewis). Ally ran the Communications for HowTheLightGetsIn, the world’s largest music and philosophy festival and volunteered at Refugee Action.
Award-winning campaigns include Life of Pi and Dove Prism.
Ally regularly speaks on bravery, the business benefits of diversity, untapped talent and imposter syndrome. Other favourite subjects include “How the hell did that Ad leave the house dressed like that” and showcases of great creative work and the insights behind them.
We are a small team of creatives, problem solvers, relationship builders, and project managers that make a BIG impact.
Get in touch with the team today to find out more about how we can work together to tackle the industry’s diversity challenges and drive positive change.
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I lead the outreach and marketing team - we’re all about reaching as many young people as possible with our mission, awesome courses and great jobs.
There’s two! The first is hearing the success stories of our alumni and putting them front and centre of our campaigns. Secondly, working with an amazing group of changemakers.
Launching our ADcademy media campaigns - it's great seeing our alumni in our ads, and our ads nationwide!
I love being outdoors, I live right by the Peak District so most weekends you’ll find me in the hills. After a career break from working 10 years in media agencies and before I joined BFS, I trained in teaching yoga and meditation, which I now happily do alongside my role at BFS.
I help plan, conceptualise and design our social media activity as well as help make everything look on brand.
Getting to create reactive and topical content like memes or cultural references.
This January I got to design our billboards for a nationwide campaign, but I am particularly proud of creating our “60 seconds with” series.
My hobbies include skateboarding badly and crying over spiritfarer!
I look after all of our social media channels and manage our communities. As well as coming up with channel specific strategies and content, which my design partner Keda helps bring to life.
Being able to connect with all of our communities, planning and executing content. I personally love working in Social Media because it helps keep me on my feet. You never know when the algorithm changes, or when content stops performing as best as it once did. So trying to figure it out and put puzzle pieces together for our target audiences is great!
Continuing to grow our social channels, modelling for the Kurt Geiger People shoot, plus being able to work towards internal projects that continuously help to change the industry and seeing the gang at work everyday.
In my spare time I run a small jewellery business called ‘Rose Valley’. I would say that’s definitely my hobby (and my side hustle). I love creating jewellery pieces that allow people to express themselves artistically.
I help spread the BFS mission & message to the masses whilst handling all things data.
The impact. Working for an organisation that is breaking down barriers, providing opportunities and is really for the people is everything.
Attending a careers fair at an Academy, talking to students & teachers about BFS and seeing the penny drop when they realise this amazing opportunity is free haha!
I love fashion, travelling & creating memories. I have a brand on the come up @bysheycolee, where I hand-make resortwear pieces for my ladies (and men at some point) who love to travel and look good whilst doing it 😉
I manage outreach and marketing to as many organisations and diverse young talented people as possible. I have worked for BFS since 2019, managing many different aspects of the business
It's great working with a creative dynamic team that helps young people get a foot in the door to the creative industries, to enable them to fulfil their career dreams. I love keeping in touch with alumni, and watching their confidence grow and their careers blossom and develop.
Recruiting great candidates, speaking with one of our alumni and her telling me years later "You actually changed my life with a phone call". Being part of a leading brand's marketing and billboard campaign was fun!
I am passionate black culture, history, vintage fashion and style, recently setting up @thenewancestorsuk www.thenewancestorsuk.com a creative collective, teaching children black history, through creativity. I enjoy writing, walking, hot yoga, and travelling anywhere hot!
My role is to project manage all of our wonderful programmes and to make sure we are delivering a best in class experience to our students.
Seeing people’s confidence grow - making people feel part of something - and being tagged on LinkedIn by happy students 🙂
Definitely designing and delivering our ADcelerate Week programmes (my first mission when I joined BFS). Also working with WPP on the VisibleStart programme which had a massive positive impact on the midlife women who took part.
I like simple pleasures and am at my happiest when I’m either at the top of a mountain or by the sea. I’ve recently moved to the coast and can’t recommend it enough - starting my day with a dog walk on the beach keeps me sane!
I'm a part of the programmes team, which means we get to plan and deliver fantastic programmes with our partners for talented young people and midlife women trying to break into the industry and provide logistical support to ensure our programmes run smoothly.
I enjoy meetings with our partners and collaborators and meeting new people who are a right laugh!
I'm new, so there are still lots more achievements to come. For now, I would say executing successful speed networking events over Zoom and having time in between to learn some new shuffle dance moves! The fact that I now enjoy the logistical aspect of speed networking events is a unique achievement and skill.
My main hobby is lecturing/motivating my younger siblings, as I'm the eldest. Other than that, I enjoy spin classes, swimming, yoga, learning Spanish, and testing my palette.
To look after the relationship of our amazing partners and to identify new partners to get involved.
The endless positive outcomes from all the collaborative hard work, from the BFS team and our partners.
Too early to say, but it has been great meeting the team. Everyone is fab!
Long walks and eating! In my spare time I also volunteer at Haringey Play Association who are doing some great work in the local community and where I am also a trustee.
I help make sure our agency and brand partners that have signed up to get involved with BFS & ADcademy are getting stuck in!
I get to be pretty creative about how we can get our partners involved with BFS and have some really exciting conversations with enthusiastic industry leaders. I feel like an advocate for underrepresented talent and that is something I am very passionate about!
Helping some of our partners launch internships for underrepresented talent that will propel them into the industry. And going into partner’s offices to film content.
I am a documentary filmmaker, content creator and science communicator (very busy!). I am a co-founder of the Black Scholarship Collective which aims to center the experiences of black PhD students in the U.K. - we’re always on the hunt for sponsors!
As a documentary filmmaker and Grierson Trust Doc Lab alum, I am a passionate storyteller interested in making films that make people think about the possibilities of tomorrow. You can check out my work on IG @jsd.lndn or blackexposureblog.wordpress.com