Trainer Information

Home / Trainer Information

Tena Sheil, The Bookkeeping Academy of Ireland

The Bookkeeping Academy of Ireland (BAI) was formed to create a space where bookkeepers and business owners alike can learn the practical skills needed to record the transactions of a business and to understand clearly what those transactions mean. 100% Irish owned, BAI understands your business like no-one else does. The Bookkeeping Academy of Ireland’s courses are supported by Tena Sheil. She is a fellow of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) and business mentor. She has worked in SMEs since 1989 and has 10 years’ experience in training and development including award winning accounting students. She understands and fulfils the bookkeeping needs of SMEs and learners alike.

 

Leon Atkins, Impact Privacy

Léon is a solicitor, and a risk and compliance professional, having spent more than fifteen years’ operating at senior and executive level in multi-national organisations in a variety of sectors, latterly as Chief Compliance Officer at UDG Healthcare plc. He now leads Obséy, a Dublin based risk and compliance consulting business, which includes a specialist data governance practice. Léon has real-world experience of advising on data protection and managing privacy and compliance programmes, going back as far as the implementation of the original data protection directive in 1996. He is a regular speaker and commentator on data protection, including at the GDPR Summit in London.

Leon trains on the following course:

  • GDPR Essentials for SMEs
  • Succession Planning
  • Governance, Risk & Compliance

 

Michael Bosonnet, RADAR Insight

Michael is a big data and analytics strategist and the founder of RADAR Insight. He has worked as a researcher, insight analyst and strategic planner for almost 10 years. Known as The Friendly Detective, he developed RADAR after years of leading end to end projects. His work and involvement has enabled many clients to develop their brands with insight, including Sky, TG4, SEAT, Deep RiverRock and Bacardí. He currently works with entrepreneurs, SMEs and larger corporates. Michael is passionate about research, analytics and strategy offering clients BiteSized outputs using RADAR. Awards include Iapi ADFX long-term effectiveness and Digital Marketing Awards. He lectures in developing insight through data analytics and speaks at events. Michael values collaboration from the outset with a client. See Michael’s LinkedIn profile here.

 

Anne Conlon, All About Sales

Anne was an entrepreneur from the start and it was inevitable that her hunger for selling and business would lead her to forming her own company. Anne’s business, All About Sales, gives her the scope to combine all her skills with everything she has learned in the past 25 years.

All About Sales delivers high performance sales and talent development training across Ireland. With over 28 years’ experience working in print media (Irish Independent News & Media Group), wholesale (BWG Foods T/A Value Centre), retail (Mace, Spar & XL) and business to business sales in senior management roles.

Over the last 11 years, Anne has trained over 12,000 sales people and supported over 850 Sales Managers/Directors through sales mentoring. In addition over 4,500 staff have been trained in soft skills like time management, presentation skills, confidence building and motivation.

 

Jason Cooper

Jason has spent the last 20 years as a sales and digital marketing professional in the UK and Ireland. He has also co-founded several online businesses and has been in involved with other series A funded startups as an advisor and partner.

For the last 7 years, Jason has run his own sales consultative business and has developed new selling concepts from the areas of NLP, Neuroscience, Behaviour economics and psychology.

He helps people and teams advance their understanding to be more self-aware in the selling process and to create trust, authenticity in the buyer’s mind.

Jason is also a business and sales coach and works with people within organizations to develop there own clear paths to build a growth mindset.

Jason trains, amongst others, in the following courses

  • Sales Resilience
  • Story Selling
  • Building Confidence to rebalance your business

 

DCM Learning

DCM Learning is one of Ireland’s leading corporate training providers. They offer over 300 short training courses in Project Management, Lean, Management, Agile, Digital Selling, as well as soft skills training courses in Public Speaking and Time Management.

  • Finance for non-Finance Professionals
  • Business Writing Skills
  • Digital Selling for SMEs
  • Lean Six Sigma Green Belt Programme – Certified
  • Staff Retention Best Practices

 

Margaret Dorgan, Executive Coach & Communications Specialist

Margaret is an Executive Coach & Communications Specialist, highly experienced in planning and giving effect to communications strategies for national and global organisations.

Margaret’s passion and flair for PR and corporate communications have in more recent years been augmented by a developed skill set as an Executive Coach, Mentor, Lecturer & Facilitator. Her newly launched service, ‘Catalyst Coaching’ finds her working with CEOs, leaders, Entrepreneurs, Social Enterprise Initiatives as well as individuals striving to bring clarity to their process, helping them identify and then achieve their optimum targets, one conversation at a time.

Margaret was a Senior Communications Executive with The Atlantic Philanthropies, Bord Bia and Barnardos. She possesses strong analytical, planning and organizational skills and has significant experience influencing at senior level. Margaret was interviewed by Marian Finucane about Time Management on RTE Radio 1. Listen back to the interview here.

Margaret trains on the following courses:

  • Effective Communication Skills for SMEs
  • Time Management for Busy SMEs
  • Business Writing Skills
  • Resilience and Optimism
  • Supervisory Skills for SME Managers / Team Leaders

 

Michael Foley, Aspire Digital

Aspire Digital is a Digital Marketing Agency based in Dublin, Ireland. They provide a full range of digital services, such as development, support and digital archiving to small and medium sized companies.

Aspire Digital has been delivering great digital solutions to entrepreneurs, SMEs and government agencies since 2012. Based on Lower Camden street, Dublin 2, their highly qualified team deliver optimised multi-platform advertising and marketing solutions.

Aspire Digital have also provided Digital Training and mentoring across a number of industry sectors through various training partners. Their Strategic Marketing mentoring and advice is provided to start ups through Spark Crowd Funding. They offer full day training as well as business clinics to Irish SMEs through ISME and to Irish companies looking overseas in association with the Irish International Business Network (IIBN).

 

Griffith College, Dublin

Griffith College is Ireland’s largest independent 3rd level institution with locations in Dublin, Cork and Limerick. Established over 40 years ago, Griffith College enjoys national and a growing international reputation for student success. The College has gained an enviable, award winning reputation for providing students with first class lectures and excellent study material.

  • Sales & Marketing Certificate for SMEs

 

Simon Haigh, GCM Advisory

Simon spent 13 years as a commercial lawyer in UK, Ireland and Australia, including as in-house counsel for Dell Inc. and Xilinx Inc. Global tech companies where he was responsible for managing high value tech negotiations and growth.

For the last 13 years Simon has been a CEO and GM of US and Australian companies and latterly, owner of his own global consultancy business, GCM Advisory: simonhaigh.com, which specialises in assisting organisations with business, leadership, personal and mindset growth.

His work is endorsed by World no.1 leadership thinker, Marshall Goldsmith. Simon is author of three business books, including Contract Law in an E-Commerce Age, Round Hall Sweet & Maxwell, 2001, Deal-making for Corporate Growth (Oak Tree Press), 2016 and How to Be a Better Deal-closer (Business Expert Press) 2019. Simon’s clients include Business Schools, Government & Industry bodies and corporates

Simon trains, amongst others, on the following courses:

  • Sales Resilience
  • Deal Making Excellence
  • Building Confidence to Rebalance Your Business

 

Ian Hannon, Activate Training

Ian Hannon is founder and MD of Activate Training.  Ian has been in sales and management roles for over 20 years, across a variety of industries, mainly in the Business to Business sector.

Ian’s business focuses on Sales & Selling Skills, Managing People and Effective Communication for Business, and has worked with hundreds of businesses in the Irish and International markets.

Ian’s training is practical and interactive, and targets real actionable takeaways that, if put into practice, deliver real results.

Activate Sales & Selling Skills Training focuses on the following areas:

  • Getting in front of more, and better prospects
  • Professionally managing a pipeline over the long term
  • Confident follow up
  • Closing more deals
  • Creating customer loyalty and increasing revenue and profitability per customer

 

Derek Howard, The Customer

Derek is the founder and CEO of ‘The Customer’. He is passionate about helping leaders build stronger customer relationships, win more business and increase team engagement. Always with a focus on excellent service and strong commercial results.

He has over 20 years’ experience working as a sales and marketing consultant and an executive coach. Derek has developed and delivered training programmes and coaching throughout Europe on sales, pitching, fee negotiation, relationship building, networking and key account management.

He also coaches and advises senior executives and their teams on their business growth, people engagement, talent development and communication strategies.

Derek works with other experienced sales and people specialists to coach, train and advise clients in meeting their growth ambitions.

 

Samantha Kelly, Tweeting Goddess

Samantha Kelly, founder of Tweeting Goddess, is a social media strategist, speaker and author. She serves as ISME Skillnet’s expert trainer on social media for business purposes. She has built a loyal following of over 53k by engaging and interacting on Twitter as her own campaign manager. She has a deep knowledge and understanding of how to harness the power of social media and make it work for your business. Samantha started from scratch and went from kitchen table business to digital influencer, all thanks to the magic of Twitter.

Samantha is also founder of the Women’s Inspire Network, of which ISME Skillnet is a sponsor.

 

Safann Mac Carthy, Intonate

Safann Mac Carthy, Marketing Strategy Advisor with Intonate, has over 20 years experience in the world of marketing. A graduate of the Marketing Institute of Ireland and University of Ulster, she has spent her career to date working for well know brand names such as Tesco, SPAR, Vodafone and IrishJobs.ie.

Safann has created marketing strategies for multiple industries, resulting in double digit growth and market leading positions. Her experience runs the full spectrum of marketing activity both on and off line, B2B and B2C.

Intonate brings marketing into focus for scaling SMEs, providing a clear path to growth, while avoiding the pitfalls of using the wrong marketing tools.

 

Maureen McCowen, Soft Skills Success

Maureen McCowen, founder of Soft Skills Success, is a Communication and Presentation Skills Specialist who helps business professionals create and deliver presentations with impact.

After spending almost thirty years teaching, communicating and connecting, Maureen knows the importance of being able to communicate your message clearly, effectively and professionally. Maureen works with individuals and teams by helping them

  • Identify their message clearly
  • Create a presentation that communicates that message effectively
  • Deliver the presentation competently, confidently and professionally.

 

Aidan McCormack, e-Motive

Aidan is highly accomplished business professional and owner, with an exceptional level of expertise in business development, education, training, coaching, mentoring and consultancy. Specialising in Coaching, Consultative Selling, Management, and Project Management. Former President of The Association of Dental Dealers in Europe. Known as an exceptional communicator with excellent people skills. Aidan’s areas of expertise includes:

  • Executive Coaching; Career Coaching; Team Coaching; Leadership & Management: Project Management: Training & Mentoring; Communication; Strategy & Innovation; Strategic Marketing; Sales.

Aidan trains on the following courses:

  • Practical Project Management
  • Customer Focused Selling

 

Jane Murphy

Jane is a practising barrister, specialising in employment law, criminal law and family law. She has provided representation to clients in the Workplace Relations Commission and in disciplinary hearings. She has previously worked as a project manager in the Law Reform Commission and as senior judicial researcher in the Courts Service. Jane holds a Bachelor of Laws in Law and European Studies (University of Limerick, 2008) and a Master of Laws (University College Cork, 2009). She has also completed the Advanced Diploma in Applied Employment Law (King’s Inns, 2018). She is a member of the Employment Bar Association and a regular contributor to the Employment Law Reports.

Jane trains on the following course:

  • Employment Law for SMEs

 

Lorraine Murphy

Lorraine Murphy is an accredited Executive Coach, Consultant and Trainer – bringing a new perspective to you and your business. She is a talented and accomplished Executive Coach, Soft Skills Trainer and Special Projects Consultant who heightens awareness of existing skills & resources and facilitates clients to identify the strategies needed to succeed.

Lorraine has experience of working in several countries and across public, private & SME sectors. Her aim is to create a safe environment for professional and personal development, and then to offer powerful support and direction so that real results are achieved.

As well as her work with Business Owners, Executives and their staff, Lorraine has led several initiatives in the field of developing the competencies of Women in Business / Female Entrepreneurship and was awarded the Global Essence Entrepreneur Award 2015.

 

Damien O’Brien, SME Matters

Damien is the founder of SME Matters and has successfully delivered our 2 longer running programmes for SME owners, managers and employees since 2007. He is an expert in developing strategies and transforming businesses and has worked with PLATO, SOLAS, Skillnet Ireland and ISME funded programmes. He has worked across numerous business sectors including software development, healthcare, engineering, insurance, banking, printing and food.

Damien trains on the following course:

  • Develop Yourself, Develop Your Business
  • Transform Your Business
  • SMB Academy

 

Tracy O’Brien, The People Password

The People Password is dedicated to unlocking the potential in people through Training, Business Strategy, Coaching, Mentoring, Mediation and positive HR Solutions. As a Psychologist and former HR Director, I founded The People Password to bring my passion for and experience in delivering business results through people to business owners, individuals and HR Departments. I have over 20 years board level and generalist HR and business leadership experience. Through this experience I have gained in-depth knowledge of Business Management and Strategy, Employee Engagement, People and Business Integration, HR Strategy and Operations, Change Management, Coaching, Mediation, Performance Management and Talent Management in B2B and B2C businesses. I have worked with teams who have gained international accreditation as best employers under my strategic and operational vision and execution. I add value through training, coaching and mentoring in business and soft skills and supporting teams and individuals to operate at their best, consistently.

 

OLAS Software Training

OLAS has delivered a number of training events for ISME Skillnet. Experts in all the Microsoft suite of products, they provide trainees with low or high based skill levels with further in-depth knowledge of office based technical applications.

  • Microsoft Office Training

 

Optimum

Optimum was created in 1990 to provide professional Training and Business Services support to companies and individuals aiming to achieve their ultimate success in business. Their training programmes are designed to increase proficiency and competency in personal and business development skills. Their ethos is about combining a tailored, flexible approach with ‘real life’ business knowledge offering hands-on tools for immediate implementation. Optimum have recently assisted with the delivery of the ISME Skillnet Essential Management Skills training programme to Hickey’s Pharmacies.

  • Essential Management Skills
  • Management Development Programmes

 

Karen Sommerville, Call Focus

Karen Sommerville of Call Focus specialises in communications, sales and customer relations skills training. With over 25 years’ experience in various sales and marketing roles, Karen has worked across a number of different industry sectors in direct and distribution sales. She has over 16 years direct experience having worked in the outsourced contact centre industry, as well as the IT, Telecoms and direct marketing industry. As a trainer, her delivery style is very energetic, practical, and interactive; with all exercises and discussions focused around participant’s real life situations and business needs.  As a result, Karen regularly achieves satisfaction ratings exceeding 85% on many of her training programmes.

  • Customer Service and Complaints Handling
  • Sales Planning & Lead Generation
  • Cold Calling & Appointment Making
  • Handling in-bound Sales Calls
  • Consumer Law Ready
  • Business Writing & Email Etiquette

 

Sure Skills

Sure Skills helps organisations to develop the competencies, skills and knowledge they need to fulfil their collective potential. Sure Skills exper trainers bring agile, practical solutions in the design, development and delivery of mission-critical technical orientated content and knowledge based programmes. As an ISME Skillnet trainer, Sure Skills provides expert training in Excel. These sessions via Cisco WebEx or Microsoft Teams platforms but they can also work with clients using other platforms such as Zoom.

 

David Waldron

David Waldron is a Senior Business Consultant with a background in IT and various other roles in the ICT Industry. He is currently A Director of Cloud Solutions for Radius Technologies and has a vast amount of experience built up over the last 16 years with SME’s and IT. David is a Certified Data Protection Practitioner by the Irish Computer Society (ICS). He has spoken at various events including the most recent GDPR Summit in Croke Park, on the practical IT and Security steps business owners should put in place for both Security and Compliance reasons.

David trains on the following courses:

  • Cyber Threats to SMEs
  • Best Practice Strategies for Cyber Threat Protection
  • GDPR Essentials for SMEs

 

Fiona Walsh, Empower Presentations

Fiona Walsh, the founder of Empower Presentations, is a PowerPoint and Presentations Specialist. After spending over twenty years working in a corporate environment, Fiona knows the importance of creating slides that are fit for purpose and engage the audience. Fiona works with teams by helping them:

• Create professional slides that are on brand and suitable for the place they will be delivered
• Deliver a presentation competently, confidently and professionally, either in-person, with MS Teams or with Zoom
• Create slides for TEDx-style presentations – slides for large audiences

Visit her website here – https://empowerpresentations.com/ and you can follow Fiona on Twitter HERE.