Shareholder and Board Member, Business Link Yorkshire

John Collier

John Collier is a natural innovating entrepreneur who possesses a combination of energy, creativity and drive coupled with firmly grounded appreciation of financial robustness and focus on results. 

John is Group Chief Executive of Exemplas Holdings Ltd.  In April 2008, in partnership with Reed, Exemplas established the regional Business Link service for Yorkshire and Humber (now delivered through joint subsidiary Y&H IDB Ltd). Exemplas is also a founder shareholder of the company which delivers the Business Link service in the East of England region.

John was instrumental in founding Exemplas in 1994 and under his leadership the company has shown profitable year on year growth from £4m to £42m turnover per annum - a journey which has required a highly adaptable workforce culture, continuous refreshing of the business model and constant challenge to established practices to stay ahead of emerging market demands (Exemplas is now part of a £250m group specialising in skills, education, innovation and enterprise).

John passionately believes that the ability to innovate exists within all of us and what is required is the environment and the opportunity to let it flourish. These values have resulted in the development of a business which is now one of the largest UK providers of government funded business support services and also has an impressive track record in the field of workforce skills development. The company has been instrumental in developing some of the UK’s most innovative enterprise creation and business start-up support programmes, with much of this knowledge now being transported into overseas markets.

Over the last three years John has also worked closely with the University of Hertfordshire to help shape their thinking in becoming one of the most business facing universities in the UK.