The Business Book Awards celebrates the work of authors who have shared their industry or market knowledge, experience, and expertise in published book form.
The Awards were created in 2017 after a meeting with Lucy McCarraher, who is well known and leading Book Mentor & Publisher and the Founder of Rethink Press, a publishing company that works with entrepreneurs to write & publish books that build their authority & business. The Business Book Awards were formed with Lucy McCarraher being the leading Founder and our Events company owning, managing all aspects of the brand.
What is the Purpose of the Business Book Awards?
The Business Book Awards aims to promote Entrepreneurship, Leadership, Change Sustainability, Self-development and Diversity in Business.
By creating a platform that inspires excellence in publishing business books we are opening a niche market to a wider business audience, encouraging more entrepreneurs to share their knowledge and experience as well as encouraging more directors, senior leaders and business owners to read more books.
The awards has built a network of high profile individuals who are inter-connected, networking widely with each other, reads voraciously and extensively, refer and promote to each other, buy time saving and tech-savvy services, and represent the best of dynamic and cutting edge business in the UK and beyond.
Sponsors of the awards benefit from a unique opportunity to network and engage with this exclusive group of influencers by aligning their brand with the awards and by positioning their organisation as leader in it’s field.
The global business book market is growing faster than ever before, with millions of titles being sold in the UK every year. This is partly due to changes in business itself: in 2017, 5.7 million SMEs made up over 99% of all businesses in the UK. While a selection of the big names of big business continue to publish high profile books, it is entrepreneurs – the founders and owners of these burgeoning small businesses – who are writing books in ever greater numbers.
The desire to publish their books has been supported by developments in both the publishing industry and consumer interest. With more budding entrepreneurs the consumer demand for business books has increased, resulting in a 9% increase in the sale of non-fiction books.
Readers of business and self-development books have an ever-increasing choice of titles, as authors who might not have been offered contracts by traditional publishers (once a barrier to entering the publishing market) are now easily able to self-publish their works or use the services of hybrid publishers to produce and distribute their books in print, e-book and audio formats.
Award Categories
START UP/SCALE UP – Books that support, encourage, or inspire entrepreneurs how to get their business up and running or onto the next stage.
SALES & MARKETING – Books that offer guidance and information around sales and/or marketing in today’s business environment.
PEOPLE, CULTURE & MANAGEMENT – Books focused on improving people skills, management and working environments.
CHANGE & SUSTAINABILITY – Books that explore how technology, innovation or best practice can improve business or the environment.
LEADERSHIP – Books that developor inspire leadership skills and styles for positive impact.
BUSINESS SELF DEVELOPMENT – Self development books that give individuals the practical business skills to become better at what they do.
WORK & LIFE – Self-help books that offer insights and knowledge to help individuals baance their work and home lives.
WELLNESS & WELLBEING – Books that aim to improve the physical, emotional and mental health of people in business.
SHORT BUSINESS BOOK – Small format or short form business books that perfectly present their subjects with brevity and clarity.
SPECIALIST BOOK – Books aimed at a niche readership or specific type or area of business.
BUSINESS JOURNEY – International books that are biographies, autobiographies and other personal stories that inspire and inform business people (UK and international authors are eligible to enter).
SMART THINKING – Books that introduce new ideas or cast new light on old subjects, challenging and improving the way we think, work and live (UK and international businesses are eligible to enter)
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS BOOK – Influential business books from around the world (for non UK authors).
BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR – To be picked from the category winners.
The Business Book Awards gives every publisher, regardless of size or type, and author, regardless of experience or route to publishing, of a business book the opportunity to participate in a high quality, impartial judging process. The Awards allows all authors that enter, are short-listed or win to publicise and sell more books; the event instils aspiration in entrants and pride in winners; and the ongoing process inspires other budding writers to come forward and publish their book.
The Business Book Awards recognise the change in the current market and highlight the quality and variety of business books in the market. They offer industry-wide recognition to new and established authors writing on a multiplicity of subjects for a diverse readership. No existing book award is sufficiently broad-based for these entrepreneurial business authors. The Business Book Awards has ‘no barriers to entry’ and welcomes entries from publishers and all authors published in the UK.
The desire to publish their books has been supported by developments in both the publishing industry and consumer interest. With more budding entrepreneurs the consumer demand for business books has increased, resulting in a 9% increase in the sale of non-fiction books.
Readers of business and self-development books have an ever-increasing choice of titles, as authors who might not have been offered contracts by traditional publishers (once a barrier to entering the publishing market) are now easily able to self-publish their works or use the services of hybrid publishers to produce and distribute their books in print, e-book and audio formats.
Chris Walker from Expressive Design, In conversation with Safaraz Ali, Co-Founding Partner of Business Book Awards…
Can you talk about the event- it just seems to be getting bigger and better?
Absolutely There has been an incredible response each year as people from all backgrounds, genders and ages have stepped up and taken up the challenge of writing a book and putting
themselves forward for the Business Book Awards each year. I must say the quality defies gravity and seems to get better every year!
Can you tell us about your experience with books and learning in general?
Firstly, we all learn in different ways, including learning from the experiences of others and the good thing about the books that are submitted for the awards are that so many of the books have been personal stories about how they have faced challenges and learned from successes and failures. When I am talking to my team and fellow colleagues, I often quote the journalist, author and communications strategist Alistair Campbell, who is an advocate of ‘thinking in ink.’ And this is at the core of planning and writing a book.
Writing in all forms can be hugely cathartic and help us to understand and refine, never mind articulate our thoughts. So, our Business Book Awards we celebrate our authors and say well done to those who have been who has taken up the challenge in all its forms.
I am an author myself of the Canny Bites Book Series as well as being able to contribute to Business Magazine and Publications and one of the things that I often is that most Business Books don’t work unless you do!
The problem is not with the intention, because it all start with intention, it is in the doing. The intention is to read, digest and implement. Also, a bit obvious really there is no impact is that it doesn’t get read, so rather than self-development it becomes “shelf” development as we simply just stick the book on a shelf.
It is this reason; I keep harping on about carefully selecting the books you wish to read and filtering through the noise and this why these awards are so important. I do sincerely hope that the books presented in our awards will lead to making a meaningful difference and impact as many people as we can.
I am a massive believer in continuous self-development and life learning I will finish off my sentence by quoting the futurist Alvin Toffler who said “The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.
Saf, you have some big names and people in volved with the awards, haven’t you?
We wanted a cross-section of people to be involved with all aspects of this, starting with our judges, that is probably the single most area that we had to get right, people who are respected
