James Wildman

James joined Hearst UK as its President and CEO in April 2017 and has overall management responsibility for the company. He has worked in the media industry for over twenty-five years and has a wealth of experience transforming media companies.

Hearst is the UK’s largest premium publisher and is best known for iconic and market-leading magazine titles such as ELLE, Good Housekeeping, Cosmopolitan, Women’s Health, Harper’s Bazaar and Esquire amongst many others. Its award-winning content is engaged with by more than 20 million people per month across print and digital and every year over a million people attend Hearst’s highly acclaimed Events such as the Country Living Fairs and Red Smart Women Week.

At Hearst James has led a business turnaround, culminating in a return to top line revenue growth in 2018 after several years of decline. Hearst UK’s print circulation is more than 5m magazines a month and the business has gone from strength to strength under James’ leadership to accelerate its revenue diversification and digital development strategy which has paid strong dividends. A relentless focus on cultural transformation has also driven strong gains in team engagement and business success.

James joined Hearst from Reach (previously Trinity Mirror) where he was Chief Revenue Officer from 2014 with responsibility for all commercial revenue across the group and, from 2011, was Yahoo’s Managing Director, UK & Ireland, responsible for leading Yahoo’s biggest market outside the US. Prior to that, he worked in TV with stints at ITV and other television businesses, working his way up to become Managing Director of Virgin Media’s television sales house.