Brighton’s bright entrepreneurial couple whose love for business saw the launch of their first project together Learned.Live in 2020, are delighted to be sharing their expertise with the Sussex Newspaper.
Juggling a growing family, home and partnership, Sophia Spencer and Johnathan Reynolds set about creating the UK’s first live online learning platform after Johnathan’s own business was hit by the Covid 19 pandemic.
Meet Johnathan:
Before lockdown restrictions devastated the entertainment industry, Johnathan ran a global performance artist agency and toured alongside international DJs performing fire, magic and bubbleology acts for festivals, live shows and royalty.
His Learned.Live online platform was created after the first lockdown measures came into force in 2020. Johnathan joined the 82% of arts and creative businesses across the UK who suddenly faced having to pause trading. Covid-19 related restrictions meant bookings were cancelled overnight.
Johnathan said: “Lockdown forced me to rethink my business and seek new ways to share my skills. Having run business, magic and bubble classes online during the last lockdown, and learning so much myself online, it became apparent there wasn’t a single website offering new skills in a live social setting. Hence, Learned.Live was born.”
Johnathan began his career at the age of 16 working all manner of jobs where he picked up many valuable skills, often having to learn quickly. Travelling the world, he’s had the pleasure of performing for thousands of people. After gaining a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, he started three successful businesses which inspired him to create Learned.Live. Alongside Johnathan, the site home to a variety of teachers offering courses in all things weird, wonderful and essential from management skills to mindfulness, job searching to juggling, cookery to creative writing.
He has always followed a different path in life so it’s no wonder his businesses have reflected his own individuality. A world in which people can equip themselves with bitesize knowledge easily is something he is deeply passionate about. The Covid pandemic opened his eyes to what was going on in the lives of millions of adults and he quickly discovered how even small gaps in someone’s knowledge can impact finding a new job, a new relationship or even starting a new business.
Meet Sophia:
Ambitious and passionate about life, she has made juggling her two businesses, two children and two dogs into an art form, effortlessly switching from mother to marketing communications specialist and assistant to a long list of high-profile CEOs – areas in which she says she finds a surprising number of crossovers!
A highly successful female entrepreneur in her own right, Sophia has almost 20 years’ experience in business administration and communications. She has a head for extraordinary business ideas. In 2012, her own company, Callisto Associates based along the south coast of England, won a highly commended award for best start-up at the Adur and Worthing Business Awards. Humble in her acceptance of her achievements, she is driven by an unparalleled desire to support her partner and Learned.Live co-founder, Johnathan along with their growing family.
‘It’s big.’ She beams, ‘Learned.Live has the potential to become the number one search engine for online education. I really hope that will happen.’
It’s just as important to her as bringing live classrooms to the masses and filling their world with exciting skills to conquer any new challenge from starting a business to juggling. If that hasn’t tickled your taste buds, how about learning how to write a novel like a professional by an Amazon best seller?
Yet what Sophia and Johnathan plan to do for their community at Learned.Live doesn’t stop at simply helping people find a new job or a new career. They are fully aware that the damage to the lives of thousands of adults struggling today goes much deeper than that.
“It’s all about confidence,” says Sophia, “We know that there are still many people who are concerned about stepping outside of their front door, and that worries me. Johnathan and I are very much ‘people people.’ If there is a way what we’re doing at Learned.Live can help people develop the tools they need to feel confident about the world again, we want to do it for them.”
Braving the outside world is still quite a daunting prospect. Understanding how to gain back the skills that so many of us have taken for granted in the past is something that’s very dear to Sophia and Johnathan who have witnessed first-hand how devastating the pandemic has been. Many people have lost the confidence to move back into pre Covid social scenarios – it is the vision of Sophia and Johnathan to give these people the tools to feel confident about the world again.
Johnathan Reynolds and Sophia Spencer will be writing a regular column for The Sussex Newspaper starting from next month.