Business Leader

Business Leader Inspiring business breakthrough for mid-sized businesses across the UK. Content, events, membership. For more, please contact - [email protected]

Business Leader is the UK’s leading media platform for ambitious entrepreneurs. We support businesses with the latest news and advice as well as providing a platform for business leaders who are doing amazing things.

* A national online news platform (businessleader.co.uk) with hundreds of business stories, features and interviews each week.

* E-newsletter packed with exclusive interviews and original content three times a week to your inbox

* Round-table events and conferences discussing key business issues.

* The Scale-Up Awards - UK's leading national awards for high-growth companies and entrepreneurs that run them

* The Go:Tech Awards - the UK's No. 1 business awards for tech and innovation, from AI and Big Data, to FinTech and IoT.

* Business Leader Awards - Major regional Awards, including the prestigious Business Leader Awards with 700 guests and a line-up of celebrity hosts. With a team of over 70 professionals including journalists, digital marketers, video producers and event experts, Business Leader partners with some of the UK's leading brands including Amazon, Audi, Barclays Bank, BDO and many more.

07/09/2026

The CEO’s job, Paula MacKenzie says, is helping people see what really matters.

At PizzaExpress that means sorting work into rocks, pebbles and sand — the rock projects shift the dial, but pebbles and sand have their place too. New Mac and wings were an obvious way to lift sales. She’ll review at six and twelve months, wary of correcting too quickly: things take time to nurture.

Watch the clip to hear how Paula decides what matters most.

07/09/2026

Most category leaders fear competition. Paula MacKenzie welcomes it.

A healthy, thriving independent sector, she argues, is good for the whole category — proof it’s popular enough that people want in. After 60 years, competition keeps PizzaExpress honest about what it brings and makes it double down on its towering strengths.

Watch the clip to hear why Paula sees rivals as a good thing.

06/09/2026

PizzaExpress has 62 listed properties and a genuine art collection. One set of portraits ended up in Richard Harpin’s home.

Paula MacKenzie notes the chain’s fantastic art. Richard recalls his local branch in York, refurbished around 2005, and the 200-year-old portraits of York people that vanished into the cellar. He tracked them down, connected with head office, and bought them — they hang in his house to this day. “That is some story,” Paula says.

Watch the clip to hear how PizzaExpress York’s portraits found a new home.

06/09/2026

You make your own luck, Paula MacKenzie says — and to become a CEO, you have to make yourself the most obvious candidate.

People forget that someone has to want to offer you the job. So the honest question to keep asking is simple: of all the choices open to them, are you unequivocally the one they’d pick? Would you choose you?

Watch the clip to hear the question Paula says keeps you honest about your own career.

01/09/2026

When venture capitalists buy a family business, something often gets left behind.

Watch the clip to hear why Stephen believes culture isn’t just nice to have it’s the thing that holds everything together.

31/08/2026

Stephen Johnson started Quooker UK with a hire car, 40 taps and no outside investment. His strategy was to sell the owner one for home, one for the showroom and leave one on the shop floor.

333 dealers. 999 taps. Year one.

Watch the clip to hear how Stephen built a £100m business one kitchen showroom at a time.

30/08/2026

Stephen Johnson wants a humble business. One where people appreciate what they’ve got.

But underpinning all of it is one simple truth. If they don’t sell more taps this week than last week, all of it is at risk.

Watch the clip to hear how Stephen balances gratitude with the relentless drive to grow.

29/08/2026

After 26 years learning every corner of a business, Stephen Johnson went to the job market expecting it to be straightforward. He sent thousands of CVs. The response was mostly silence and when it wasn’t, it was blunt. You’ve just worked for your father. You have no real skill sets.

It sat with him. Still does. Which is why today he personally ensures every candidate who applies to Quooker gets a reply.

Watch the clip to hear how rejection shaped the leader Stephen became.

28/08/2026

Stephen Johnson’s father couldn’t understand why he bought his team lunch. Stephen’s answer was simple: 60 people who stay in the office, socialise and connect is worth every penny.

Watch the clip to hear how Stephen built a people-first business from the lessons and the contrasts from of where he started.

27/08/2026

Stephen Johnson spent 26 years in his father’s business. Watch the clip to hear how those years shaped the leader Stephen became and what he took with him when he eventually went out on his own.

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