Simon, tell us a bit about yourself and how you discovered Alison.
My name is Simon Furnivall and I live in Edinburgh, Scotland. Before I worked for Alison, I worked for a number of years in the publishing industry, as both a proof-reader and a copy-writer. I found out about Alison through a former colleague who said there were openings with Alison to work as a Course Creator and that seemed very interesting to me.
Why did you pursue the chance to become an Alison Course Creator?
I knew of Alison, not through personal experience, but through family members who had done courses and spoke very highly of Alison, as did my former colleague. I was working freelance at the time and the opportunity for more work in the publishing field just seemed to make working for Alison a good fit for me.
How did you find the remote Course Creator training?
The remote Course Creator training for Alison is very comprehensive and it really does take you from having no experience of being an Alison Publisher to being able to put your first courses out. It teaches you every aspect of being an Alison Course Creator that you need to know and really gives you the confidence to be able to create and publish courses.
What was the first course you published on Alison? How did you find the experience?
The first course I published as an Alison Course Creator was a Diploma in Cryptocurrency. This is a subject I don’t know a huge amount about but because the content was provided to me, and because I had a good grounding in the Alison training, it made sense very quickly how to put the course together. I was helped by colleagues at Alison who gave me feedback and it ended up published on the site. It was a really enjoyable experience.
How has your decision to work for Alison affected your career path?
Coming to work for Alison has given me a really strong career path. Before, I was in a freelance position and, with the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, things had slowed down and work was difficult to come by. The opportunity to come and work as an Alison Course Creator fit perfectly. Now I’ve earned a career path within Alison because I’ve gone from being a Course Creator to leading my own team of Course Creators. I have a path to move forward with Alison in this role. If you work and succeed with Alison as a Course Creator, then they are more than open to you progressing along a career path with them.
What’s the best part of working as an Alison Course Creator?
I think the best part of working as a Course Creator with Alison, aside from the career path, is the support that you get from them. You never feel like you’ve been left alone and have to solve problems by yourself. If you have issues, if you need advice on how to structure something then you can contact Alison. They’re wonderful, helpful people who will always have time to reach out to you.
If you could publish course that would teach the world, or yourself, anything, what would it be?
If I could publish one course that would teach myself anything, it would honestly be teaching myself how to sing. I would love to be able to sing but believe me when I say, you do not want to hear that sound. I would adore to just be able to belt out a tune but it’s just not within me and so I would love a course that would teach somebody completely tonedeaf like myself how to sing.
