Most commentary about UK business starts with the economy.

The Voice of the Business Owner starts with the owner.

Because businesses don't make decisions. People do.

Every investment, every hire, every marketing decision, every delayed purchase and every exit begins with a business owner weighing opportunity against uncertainty.

That is why We Are Unchained created The Voice of the Business Owner, an independent annual research programme exploring how Britain's business owners really think, behave and make decisions.

Alongside the report, Simon Leadbetter also wrote the foreword to the internationally acclaimed book Branding for Buyout, bringing together two complementary perspectives:

Understanding how business owners think
Understanding how businesses create long-term value

One explains today's decisions.

The other explains tomorrow's outcomes.

The Voice of the Business Owner

The UK is often described as an SME economy.

The evidence suggests something different.

Most businesses are micro businesses. Most owners are balancing uncertainty, cashflow and time rather than pursuing aggressive growth. They are not simply managing companies. They are managing livelihoods.

The Voice of the Business Owner combines independent research, behavioural insight and strategic analysis to explore:

why business owners start businesses
why so many remain intentionally small
how confidence changes over time
why owners delay decisions
what really drives buying behaviour
the reality of business exits
the demographic and AI changes reshaping ownership

Rather than repeating conventional narratives, the report challenges assumptions with evidence and offers a clearer picture of the UK's business landscape.

Download the report and discover what business owners are really thinking.

Branding for Buyout

Most owners spend years building a business.

Very few spend enough time building its value.

Branding for Buyout, by Ted Schlueter, argues that branding is not simply about marketing. It is one of the most powerful drivers of enterprise value.

The book demonstrates how stronger positioning, clearer differentiation and better strategic storytelling can significantly increase the value of a business before sale.

Simon Leadbetter was invited to write the foreword to the UK edition because the themes closely align with We Are Unchained's work around business strategy, owner behaviour and value creation.

Whether an owner intends to sell next year or in twenty years' time, the principles remain the same:

A valuable business is built deliberately.

It doesn't happen by accident.

Why these two publications belong together

The Voice of the Business Owner explains why owners behave as they do.

Branding for Buyout explains how those behaviours ultimately determine business value.

One is rooted in behavioural research.

The other is rooted in decades of real-world acquisition experience.

Together they provide a framework for understanding both the psychology and the economics of building a successful business.

If you understand the owner, you make better strategic decisions.

If you make better strategic decisions, you build a more valuable business.

That is the philosophy behind everything we do at We Are Unchained.