LDC Top 50 2024
Nick Higginson
CEO
Phoenix Health & Safety
At 23, Nick Higginson was broke and sleeping in the lounge of a one-bedroom flat. “I had a dead-end job. I had to turn my life around for my kids,” he says. He started studying health and safety and self-funded his way through a diploma, degree and MSc.
In 2005, he started Phoenix Health & Safety, delivering a range of health and safety training courses online, in the classroom and via distance learning. Higginson, who has a tattoo of a phoenix rising from the ashes, expects profits to hit £8m in the next five years. “I’m driven by fear. I’ve come from nothing and don’t ever want to go back.”
I’m driven by fear. I’ve come from nothing and don’t ever want to go back.”
Q&A
What was the turning point for your business?
When the pandemic hit, I was advised to shut everything down and furlough all employees, but I refused. As we could no longer run courses in hotels, we launched a ‘virtual classroom’ offering, which was ultimately more profitable and sustainable, and I lobbied the accreditation bodies to allow exams to be taken online. Over the last four years, turnover has jumped from £4m to £10m and around two-thirds of our courses are now delivered online.
What’s your best piece of advice for other entrepreneurs?
Work smart, not hard. I’ve learned to prioritise and delegate. I’m more effective in one hour than most people are in one day.
What’s your ambition?
The NEBOSH qualification that we deliver is recognised worldwide but we currently only have 0.25% of the global market share. There’s huge growth potential. We have a small subsidiary in South Africa and we want to ramp up our overseas presence, either with our own offices or through M&A. I think I’ll always feel like I have something to prove to make up for those wasted years. It’s a never-ending race. Even if someone handed me £100m tomorrow, I wouldn’t stop.
