Language of cyberspace

Jan 15 2008 by Sue Scott, Evening Gazette

FOR 10 years Kirby Fleetham’s Bernadette Wall has been running a successful one-to-one language training company. But five years ago she began to notice a distinct change in attitude among her corporate clients.

“We found that companies are getting leaner and fitter with fewer employees. They are travelling more and don’t have time for traditional lessons. Whereas they would have had three hour sessions twice a week, we were seeing them for an hour once a month. They needed something to keep them practising between lessons.”

So she began text messaging a ‘word of the day’ and podcasting the training sessions.

“We tried to make it as easy as possible for them, so they could learn during slack time, waiting at the airport or driving in the car. Then we began to think about it and realised there must be lots of people in this position, all over the world.”

And so gapfillers.co.uk was born.

More than a training site, it’s being developed as a unique social network for language learners around the world. Although still embryonic, it has already attracted 300 subscribers.

“Most of the people signing up are business professionals,” says Bernadette. “The biggest group are in France and the next biggest in India.”

Although Bernadette admits that developing the site soaked up more money and time than anticipated, she believes taking language into cyberspace is the future - a view confirmed when Unilever, one of her biggest clients, announced that it was to move more of its training to the web.

Meanwhile, gapfillers.co.uk is being promoted at international trade fairs and through free trials to universities.

And the Kirby Fleetham team will expand as a result.

“For us, it’s just a wonderful way of getting to a lot of people,” says Bernadette.