Welcome to PyroTalks CIC

It is with great excitement that we welcome you to PyroTalks CIC, a new Community Interest Company dedicated to providing accessible specialist knowledge to the not for profit sector.

Careful thought has gone into our Training & NanoConference concepts and hopefully this, and the expert advice we have received, is reflected in our offering.

The main aim of the organisation is to fill a gap in knowledge provision and to add value to the conference experience by rethinking how they are done.

Training

Once fully developed, our training offer is intended to focus on a whole range of specialist knowledge. However, for now the emphasis remains on enhancing the sectors understanding of the financial world.

For a long time myself and many other colleagues have noted a lack of professional knowledge provision on finance within the fundraising sector, despite demand. This is particularly true for major gift fundraisers and prospect researchers, who wish to better understand how the companies that their prospects work in operate, how wealth is mobilised to provide large donations, or how to identify red flags. Providing this knowledge will enhance donor relationships, research effectiveness and better protect charities from ethical & reputational risk.

As you will see in the training section, we are offering sessions in concise formats so that they are accessible and affordable. Our aim is to increase the speed and customisation of learning, allowing sessions to be mixed and matched to suit needs. We are still working on securing dates for some of our training but we felt it was important to share the wider intention of the programme from the outset.

NanoConference

I personally love the conference experience and have always benefited from it. Though through consulting and working with charities, I was always sad to hear that many of my colleagues had never been to a conference due to time or budget restrictions. Not without wanting, they missed out on cutting edge ideas and inspiration from their peers that were sure to elevate their causes. This was especially true of those organisations and individuals that seemed to need it the most.

Having attended many conferences and delivered talks myself, I’ve also felt that session timings would benefit from being shorter, therefore encouraging more precise content and aiding swifter learning. TED Talks for example, have proven how complex ideas can be condensed and delivered with equal effectiveness when in more concise formats. Why not apply this thinking to a conference in the not for profit sector?

It was thinking over these issues of accessibility, affordability and concise learning that the NanoConference was created. Please read more about its aims and format, and join us on our first ever one on the 15th of June. 

Support

To be able to meet the CIC aims, we will be running training sessions and the NanoConference all year around. To be able to do this we have to cover costs.

For example, organising a NanoConference alone, despite its ‘nano nature’ takes a great amount of planning; confirming sector needs, designing topics, preparing speakers, and that’s not to mention the need to cover direct costs of a workable website, online conferencing facilities, future venues and reimbursing people for their time.

All our events come with Pay-What-You-Feel options. We hope this increases our accessibility even more. All surplus funds are reinvested back into the organisation to the betterment of the sector.

CIC

Jonathan Jeffery and I were busy founding PyroTalks CIC before the virus and the lockdown began. Doing so as the global situation deepened helped shape our ideas and made what we were trying to achieve seem even more important and necessary.

As a Community Interest Company we exist in the interest of the community, and so to be truly effective, we need to be shaped by the community. We therefore welcome anyone to get involved to help advise, deliver their own training or to organise a NanoConference in an area they feel passionate about.

Thank you for taking the time to see what we’re all about, and we hope you can see the value of what we’re trying to achieve.

Jason Briggs

Co-Founder