Inclusion & talent development
A scheme is not a career.
I work with organisations in the screen industries on inclusion and talent development — the part after the announcement, where people either build a career or quietly leave. I don't refer talent to other people's opportunities. I run one, and I'm still in contact with the filmmakers who came through it.
S.O.U.L. since 2014 · 240+ filmmakers platformed · BAFTA & BIFA qualifying
The problem
Getting people in is the easy part
Most organisations I speak to can already point to an entry scheme, a trainee cohort, an open call. The numbers at the top of the funnel look reasonable. Three years later, almost nobody from that intake is still in the industry, and nobody can say precisely why.
That's not a recruitment problem. It's what happens in the eighteen months after someone arrives — who they report to, whether the second job exists, whether anyone has a stake in them staying. That's the work I do.
Illustrative — the shape most organisations recognise once someone goes looking. Yours will have its own numbers, which is the first thing worth establishing.
What I do
Four kinds of work
Most engagements are one of these. If your problem sits between two, that's usually the interesting part — say so when you write.
Designed to produce working professionals, not alumni
Selection, mentoring structure, progression routes and follow-through. Built so that the outcome is measured at year three, not at the launch photo.
Where the funnel actually leaks
Where roles are advertised, who sits on the panel, what your criteria quietly reward, and which parts of the process filter out the people you say you're trying to reach.
Why people leave, and what to change
Honest findings from the people who left as well as the ones who stayed, with a small number of specific recommendations you can act on this year.
Real relationships, not a media buy
Reaching communities that don't currently see your organisation as an option, through the networks, festivals and grassroots routes where that talent already is.
How I work
What I won't do
Being clear about this up front saves everyone a meeting.
- A one-off workshop with nothing attached to it. If there's no change to a process afterwards, the day was theatre.
- A report designed to be published rather than acted on. You'll get findings you can use, including the ones that are awkward.
- Speaking for a whole community. I bring my own experience, a festival's worth of relationships, and evidence — not a mandate.
Ways to work
Pick the size of the problem
Diagnostic
A short, focused look at one part of the pipeline. You get a written recommendation on where the loss is happening and what to do first.
Programme design
Build a development or progression scheme end to end, or rebuild one that isn't producing careers. Scoped and quoted after a first call.
Ongoing advisory
Retained across a cycle, or embedded with a team. For organisations who need someone in the room when decisions get made, not a document afterwards.
Talks and panels
On building pathways in the screen industries, and on what independent film culture can teach institutions about finding talent. For events, courses and industry days.
For individual creatives
One-to-one coaching
I've been doing this informally for years — it's how most of the filmmakers below ended up where they are. It's now something you can book directly, rather than having to happen to meet me.
This is for filmmakers, producers and writers who are past the beginning and stuck somewhere specific: a first feature that won't finance, a short that did well with nothing after it, a decision about whether to hold out or take the job. It isn't a mentoring scheme and there's no cohort. It's an hour with someone who knows the terrain and has no stake in flattering you.
Single session
One hour on one problem. Come with the actual question. You leave with a view and, where it's useful, the names of people worth talking to.
Ongoing
Monthly sessions across a project or a year, for people who need continuity rather than a one-off answer. By arrangement after a first session.
Track record
The receipts
Every filmmaker below came to me through S.O.U.L. Fest or another S.O.U.L. event. That's the point: I'm not describing a pipeline from the outside, I'm running one — which is also why I can tell you where each of them is now, rather than where they were on the day of the press release.
- Corey Bovell Took his one-man theatre show Chicken Burger N Chips from stage to a BBC Radio 4 drama — later a Radio Times readers award runner-up at the BBC Audio Drama Awards.
- Daniel Rands Short films through to feature film development.
- Dean Leon Anderson Short films through to feature film development.
- Danielle Goff Producer of four shorts selected for S.O.U.L. Fest, now working across shorts and features.
S.O.U.L. Celebrate:Connect — quarterly screening and networking events, 2014–2019. The figures above cover the fifteen events from 2016, when I began recording them.
S.O.U.L. Fest — founder, director and executive producer since 2019. Nearly 100 further filmmakers platformed across seven completed editions. The eighth runs 5–13 September 2026 in London, Newcastle and Birmingham.
I have been recording attendance, programme size and filmmaker numbers since 2016. It is the reason I can tell you what happened to people rather than how many turned up.
S.O.U.L. Cast — host and producer.
I write about this work as I do it — the decisions, the trade-offs and what they cost. Read the blog.
Start here
Tell me what you're trying to change
Or build the brief here — it drops straight into your own mail app, ready to read before you send it.
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