By Paula Ballester Murat

Erasmus Entrepreneurship Programme Participant, 2017/2018

This week I’m going to talk about another business in which Sli Nua Careers is involved, and where I have been getting some invaluable experience.

It’s a streaming TV service that shoots Gaelic football matches here in Co. Mayo – MayoGAATV.com.

It started in September and I’ve been following its first steps, becoming involved with the business and the crew little by little. And now I can say that I’m starting to understand what a black card means, the difference between point and goals and the many ways you can touch the ball.

All this knowledge is really useful to meet people here as Gaelic football is always the main topic to talk about (something quite similar with soccer in Spain with the difference that here all the players are local so this sport is part of Mayo’s identity). And as I have a degree in audiovisual communication I’m allowed to be camera woman and participate in the social media strategy (in the picture, I’m on the left corner with the camera).

I even started doing one of the things I’m most afraid of: answering customers’ calls with queries about the procedure to watch games. It can be difficult to understand someone in another language when you cannot talk with them face to face.

So, after one month, I could claim I’m becoming native…although my strong Spanish accent might convince Irish people otherwise.

Besides, it’s being an incredible chance to see at first hand how to start a business from almost the beginning, with all the troubles and processes that you need to resolve; how to build up a team; how to improve the services offered; and how to deal with new customers who don’t yet fully understand how the service works.