The Fair Work Agency launched in April 2026 with new powers to enforce employment rights. Its CEO, Lisa Pinney MBE, joins us to tell UK SMEs exactly what to expect.

The Fair Work Agency is the UK government's new enforcement body, created under the Employment Rights Act 2025 to bring existing enforcement functions together into one place. For UK employers, especially small businesses, understanding what it does, what triggers an investigation and how to reduce your risk isn't optional.

Lisa Pinney MBE is the Fair Work Agency's Chief Executive. She spent over 20 years at the Environment Agency in senior enforcement and regulatory roles before leading the Mining Remediation Authority as CEO. She brings practical experience of how government enforcement bodies work, not just in theory.

What you'll learn:

• What the Fair Work Agency is and how it differs from previous enforcement bodies
• What triggers an FWA investigation and what legitimate businesses should watch out for
• Where the FWA is focusing first: National Minimum Wage, employment agency compliance, holiday pay and statutory sick pay
• Why the FWA is encouraging self-reporting and what that means if you've made a mistake
• How AI could be used to analyse payroll and working time data at scale
• What UK SMEs can do right now to reduce their compliance risk

Setting unrealistic growth targets doesn't just hurt results. It breaks your team's trust in you. Alex Olley, Co-Founder of Reachdesk, learnt that the hard way.

After Reachdesk raised $43 million in a Series B and delivered 600% growth, the board asked for more. Alex said yes without properly interrogating whether it was achievable. What followed cost him trust with his team. He talks through what he did to turn it around, and what he'd tell any leader facing the same pressure from investors or boards.

Alex Olley is Co-Founder and Chief Revenue Officer at Reachdesk, a B2B gifting platform that's scaled through some of the toughest conditions in the tech sector. He's also a Forbes Business Council member and Executive Member at Pavilion.

Research from the CIPD Good Work Index shows workers with poor managers are 50% more likely to say work harms their mental health, a reminder that this isn't just a performance issue.

What you'll learn:

• Why agreeing to unrealistic targets is a leadership failure, not a sign of ambition
• How to build a stress-tested, data-grounded plan your team can actually believe in
• What "wartime revenue leaders" means and why it matters for how you hire
• Why the rise of AI has made human connection in business more valuable, not less

Charlie Boss stepped in as CEO of Bristol City FC with a three-season Premier League plan, a head coach to replace and a fanbase watching every move. Here's what he learnt.

The first weeks in a new leadership role are unlike anything else. Decisions stack up fast, trust has to be built quickly and the pressure to deliver is immediate. For Charlie Boss, that reality played out in full public view.

Charlie arrived with nearly a decade at Disney, senior roles at the Jockey Club (including Cheltenham Festival and the Grand National) and experience at Southampton FC through relegation and then promotion back to the Premier League. None of that fully prepared him for what came next.

He shares what he did immediately: aligning the board on a clear vision, bringing his direct reports together to present a three-season plan built around three pillars: football success, developing talent from within and becoming the number one sports brand in the region.

What you'll learn:

• Why board alignment in the first days is everything for a new CEO
• How to build a strategic plan fast without cutting corners on buy-in
• What honest gap analysis looks like and why it builds trust rather than undermining it
• What any leader stepping into a new role can take from Charlie's first month

[00:00] Introduction [01:14] What the first four weeks have been like [02:04] Why things moved fast: board alignment from day one [03:59] The three-pillar club plan: football success, developing talent, number one sports brand in the region [05:42] What makes football leadership unique [07:24] Lessons from the Jockey Club and horse racing [10:17] What goes into making match day actually happen [13:16] People, culture and the biggest opportunity at Bristol City [17:17] The fan advisory board: making supporter voice structural [24:31] Final question: how Charlie wants supporters to feel

Employment Hero helps UK businesses build the HR and people processes that high-performance leadership needs. Book a demo: https://employmenthero.com/uk/request-a-demo/

Follow Inside the Workroom for the full series.