Business professionals make a vital contribution to the Irish arts world

A CONCEPT where employees from Irish businesses volunteer to help arts organisations solve their business problems, was relaunched in Dublin yesterday.

The Business2Arts mentoring programme matches managers from the business community with arts organisations, who may not be able to afford to hire an expert to help with things like business plans, website design and market research.

Employees from AIB, Accenture, PricewaterhouseCooper and AXA have given up their free time, since the programme was first launched five years ago.

Enterprise Ireland have supported the scheme by providing three mentors to work with organisations over the coming year, as well as hosting the launch of the programme.

Business2Arts hosts a database of arts practitioners currently seeking to be matched with a business mentor, in a range of areas from finance, PR, marketing, strategic planning, IT and human resources.

An average mentoring project requires one hour a month over a maximum of 12 months.

Siobhán Broughan, chief executive of Business2Arts said: “Being a mentor is a challenging, stimulating and hugely rewarding experience, developing coaching and counselling skills that are transferable to a mentor’s personal and professional life.

“In addition, by joining the Business2Arts mentoring scheme, business professionals are helping to make an important contribution to the Irish arts world.”

Charlie Kelly, manager of the Enterprise Ireland Mentor Network said: “Enterprise Ireland is delighted to be associated with the Business2Arts mentoring scheme, providing a natural link due to the nature of our own successful mentoring programme.”

“Our mentors are very enthusiastic about the organisations that they have been teamed with and are looking forward to learning more about the arts.”