Nigel Kershaw is Chief Executive of Big Issue Invest part of The Big Issue group of companies that funds ground-breaking, innovative business solutions by financing the scale-up of profitable social enterprises that create social transformation and environmental sustainability.
Nigel was made an OBE in the 2010 New Year’s Honours List for his services to social enterprise. He is a Cabinet Office Social Enterprise Ambassador, a Director of the Social Enterprise Coalition and in 2008 received the Good Director for Enterprise award from the Institute of Directors.
Nigel is also Chairman of The Big Issue Company Limited, which was founded by John Bird and Gordon Roddick. In 2008 The Big Issue generated £15 million pounds through its 147,000 weekly circulation with £8 million earned by over 2,500 homeless and vulnerably housed vendors. He joined in 1995 and has been the group’s Executive Chairman and Managing Director.
Before joining the Big Issue group, Nigel worked as a consultant, trouble-shooter and project manager in the publishing and printing industries, taking major capital projects from specification to production. He has also been a systems analyst, works manager and lithographic No.1 printer and founded two printing and publishing social enterprises. Trained as a lithographic printer, he gained his Diploma at the London College of Printing.
Nigel is also a director of the Social Enterprise Coalition and the Bright Ideas Trust, and an advisor and mentor to a number of social enterprises. He is a regular speaker at conferences including the Social Enterprise World Forum 2008 and World Entrepreneurship Summit 2009, and has spoken at the London Business School, Saïd Business School Oxford and at Wolfson College Cambridge. He has also been a non-executive director of a London borough regeneration company and Chair of the Board of the London College of Communications (London University of the Arts).
