Sessions for Creative Connect are now open for booking.
Creative Connect offers industry-specific career coaching for anyone looking to work in the creative, cultural, or digital sectors. These are delivered in person and with knowledgeable industry professionals from a range of organisations and creative practices.
Sessions are up to 45 minutes long and are available between 10am-5pm. And take place in-person only at the Good Growth Hub.
Whether you’re certain of what you’d like to explore next or a bit unsure of your options, the Creative Connect service is a useful resource for all young people at any stage of their career, wanting to build long-term sustainable careers in the creative, cultural, and digital technology industries. This includes feedback on CVs or existing work and portfolios. Get support navigating the job market by exploring new job opportunities or career paths that match your skills, learning goals, and creative career aspirations.
Please note: This service is designed for individuals who meet our eligibility criteria (listed below), which helps us make sure the support reaches the people it’s intended for. If you don’t meet the requirements, we won’t be able to offer this service, but you’re welcome to email us and we can direct you to other options that may be a better fit.
For any additional information, please email: creativeconnect@anewdirection.org.uk
Who can you book a session with
Aoife Allen, Assistant Commissioner @ BBC Pop Hub
Key skills & areas of expertise: Careers support for young people interested in radio production.
Aoife Allen is an Assistant Commissioner at BBC Pop Hub, working across outreach and schemes for BBC Radio 1, 1Xtra and Asian Network. Prior to her current role, Aoife has worked in radio production, community participation and learning roles.
Angharad Rafferty, Creative Ideation / Partnerships @ Seen Studios
Key skills & areas of expertise: Creative ideation for brand activations, talent sourcing & management.
Angharad heads up the Creative Partnership teams at Seen Studios. Their Creative Partnerships team thoughtfully connects brands to communities through meaningful partnerships, creative integration, and a genuine commitment to representation. They begin by grounding every idea in insight and cultural understanding, shaping concepts that feel relevant, credible and rooted in real communities. With a strong focus on nurturing meaningful talent partnerships, we collaborate with grassroots and established creatives whose practice naturally brings these ideas to life, ensuring authenticity at every touchpoint.
Cultural integration sits at the core of our approach, guiding how they curate integrated experiences with diverse, credible talent to protect brand relevance and authenticity. Internally, they lead insight and research projects across grassroots communities globally, building a deep, nuanced understanding of local communities that informs both our thinking and our partnerships.
Alex Burke, Project Director @ Seen Studios
Key skills & areas of expertise: Creative Direction & Strategic Oversight, Production & Delivery, Commercial & Financial, Business Development, Leadership & Management, Strategic & Performance.
Alex has been with Seen Studios for around 8.5 years, working up from intern to Project Director within the senior leadership team. Her background is in creative, and sshe now leads Seen's retail design and experiential teams, overseeing how brand strategy translates into retail and experiential environments delivered consistently and to a high standard.
Her role spans leading a multidisciplinary team of project managers and producers with deep expertise across permanent and semi-permanent retail design and delivery, experiential activations, and digital content. Together, they sit at the intersection of brand, design, production, and build, ensuring ideas are not only creatively strong, but operationally robust and scalable.
Tabitha Thorlu-Bangura, Cultural strategist and Music consultant
Key skills & areas of expertise: Creative Strategy, Client Management, Strategic & Performance.
Tabitha is a cultural strategist and music consultant, working across music, contemporary art, and film. She spent twelve years building the globally acclaimed NTS Radio, joining a six-person team and leaving as Director of Music & Programming. As part of the executive leadership team, she was pivotal in the platform growing to an audience of over four million monthly listeners, and led creative and music strategy for partners including adidas, Netflix, Dr. Martens, Tate Modern and MOCA LA.
She now works independently, advising music platforms, brands, and arts institutions on cultural strategy, positioning, and programming, with recent clients including Boiler Room, Resident Advisor, and the Hartwig Art Foundation in Amsterdam.
Her curatorial practice expands across Europe, from Somerset House Studios to Haus der Kunst and Batalha Centro de Cinema, and as a music director her credits include The African Desperate (dir. Martine Syms) and A Radical Duet (dir. Onyeka Igwe). Her book After Hours: Clubbing on Film was published in April 2026.
Chantal Adams, Executive Producer and Head of Video @ NTS
Key skills & areas of expertise: Creative Strategy, Executive Producer and Director, visual storytelling.
Chantal Adams is an Executive Producer and Director with 10 years of experience working at the intersection of music, culture and film. As Head of Video at NTS, she leads creative strategy, production and teams, developing culturally driven work across music, editorial and commercial projects. Alongside NTS, she has collaborated with global brands and cultural platforms including Valentino, Diesel, A Vibe Called Tech and Meta. Her work focuses on a people-first approach to production, emphasizing talent development, innovative visual storytelling and culturally relevant works.
Leala-Rain Shonaiya, Event Producer, DJ and voice-over artist
Key skills & areas of expertise: Event Production, Multi-disciplinary artist
Leala-Rain Shonaiya is an Event Producer, DJ and voice-over artist working across music, culture and the creative industries.
Coming from a performance arts background, they cut their teeth in free party and festival scenes before moving into professional event production, bringing their experience of global underground music scenes and cultures to large scale creative projects.
They have produced projects with Boiler Room, Ballantine’s, HBO, MAC Cosmetics and more worldwide. Alongside production, they've DJ'd internationally and on radio stations including Ballamii and Threads, and have voiced documentaries for VICE, i-D and Netflix, as well as campaigns for Tanqueray, MINI and Bershka.