I am in the process of looking at leaving my full time employment as I want to work 3 days a week.

I have been told that there are alot of companies out there that offer work to associates, do you know any companies who do this?

I have 11 years L&D experience as well as CIPD qualifications, ILM level 5 in business coaching, NLP master practitioner qualification and MBTI qualification.

My specialist areas are:

Talent management

Forum Theatre

Succession planning

Coaching

Hi Lisa

The associate or freelance world may or may not suit you. Ther will be rare occasions where you can have work on the actual days you want - unless you work tue, wed & thurs and refuse work on other days.

While doing freelance work is in theory more flexible - the reality is different - for many refusing to accept an assignment which requires a lot of travel at short notice or changing days can mean the difference between more work or no work from an associate provider. Equally those that attach themselves to only one associate provider are at risk of IR35.

It seems that you are well qualified, so credibility should not be a problem.

Consider joining organisations like http://www.trainerbase.co.uk as they provide a lot of support to freelancers in this area.

good luck

mike
http://www.rapidbi.com/mikemorrison

Thanks for your advice Mike. I think initially I will need to take the work as it comes and hopefully later down the line may be able to pick and choose.

I have taken your advice and registered with trainerbase, I also have a website in the pipeline.

Is there anyone else out there who use associates?

The Calcomgroup who specialise in performance improvement thru people, based in Wimbledon, with projects all over the UK, use associates. Their website will tell you more about what they do and provide contact details.

To be honest a lot of training  providers use associates so it's worth taking a look at the exhibitor list of something like The World of Learning Conference and then approaching them with your cv

Good Luck!