I started my career journey working in the travel industry, I always jumped at opportunities to help when it came to plan in-store activities, managers meetings, company socials etc. When I was unfortunately made redundant, I was afforded some time to think about my next steps and what I wanted to do next. Do I stay in travel or do I try something new?

I started to dissect my role to discover the areas I most enjoyed; I soon realised it was the events side of things (including from within my own social circle) and was encouraged to investigate this further as a possible career move. I undertook various volunteering opportunities with different charities and organisations to help on some of their events, ultimately leading me to study for an Events Management diploma. As part of the diploma we had to work in groups to deliver on a live brief, and it is fair to say this was my first real experience of presenting to real clients. I loved it.

I am an active member of ILEA UK which is the UK chapter of the internationally known industry association, and I currently sit on their board as part of the membership committee. A key moment for me is meeting some fabulous people, our industry is full of them! A few years ago, I got talking with two new contacts, Elena and Caitlin, about our own individual journey into the industry and discovered that we shared similar views on how there wasn’t enough assistance when taking your first steps into the industry whether that was through academia or a through a career change like myself. In order to bridge this gap, we created and co-founded Event First Steps where our aim is encouraging newcomers to forge their own career paths. We care about, and have previously held panel discussions on routes to industry, visibility of the entire industry and diversity.

In 2017 I applied and was successful in getting a place on the Fast Forward 15 mentorship programme. Through the programme I met my wonderful mentor Caroline Jackson who has played a pivotal role in helping me realise my goals and putting plans into action for achieving them.

Priya