John Munday took up the role of chief executive of Colliers UK in March, with the remit of setting the strategic direction of the UK transactional and advisory services business, which has more than 1,000 employees.
A year on, he is reflecting on what he has learned, what has been achieved and what is coming down the tracks.
With 30 years of industry expertise, Munday has grown businesses that offer varied property services to clients and advanced the careers of the people in those organisations. He joined Colliers in 2022 as co-head of project and building consultancy following the establishment of a strategic partnership with Paragon, one of the UK’s largest independent building and project consultancies, where he was co-managing director.
He succeeds Tony Horrell, who had been CEO of Colliers’ UK business for the last 14 years.
Munday's move into the hotseat has come at a busy time for the UK's major brokerage peers, with new chiefs at JLL, CBRE, Cushman & Wakefield, Knight Frank and Savills. There has been no obvious trend among these hires, with each coming via different routes.
"I am different to some of the others in that I came to the role from an acquisition," says Munday. In terms of his success in being selected for the role he adds: "I think I have had experience of building two relatively small businesses and growing them to something substantial and that probably made me attractive to senior leadership. It's an exciting role because the business has been built strongly in the UK but there is also a lot left in the tank."
In particular, Munday has set himself the task of making the UK business mirror the status of Colliers' North American arms.
"The business's global status is a top three brokerage by market capitalisation and also it has been the fastest growing real estate advisory business over the last five years. But here in the UK if we are talking about transactionally the figures are lower in terms of where we sit. My ambition – that I have set – is to reflect that global position in the UK. It will not be easy but we have had record results in 2024 and 2025. Our business in the UK is split to around 73% of revenue in advisory and the remainder in transactions and we want the strategy to be closer to a global ideal of around 60:40."
Munday's growth strategy focuses on both areas. "In advisory it will focus on where there are gaps in our service, or where we have small teams that can be expanded via organic growth. The teams in project and building consultancy and management, in ratings and valuations are strong but we will look at where there are gaps, for instance in asset management. We want to advise across the whole life cycle of ownership, from development and planning advice and onwards. There are some areas where we might seek external input at the moment but we will look to fill these gaps so there are no chinks in the armour."
There have been major recent wins to celebrate, such as taking on the mandate to advise across the Cadogan Estate's 500,000-square-foot office portfolio, as well as a very busy time in London office capital markets. Munday says the business will be celebrating and highlighting these successes more and more. "The feedback I had was we had unrivalled expertise and energy in the room when speaking about the Cadogan portfolio."
Munday said a major focus has been bringing in "top, key hires in teams". These include Phil Gardner, who joined in August as the first UK chief transformation and growth officer, a new strategic role designed to drive business evolution, digital transformation and enable sustainable expansion.
"That role is in some ways a typical COO role, but we have widened the title to reflect all we are targeting. He is helping me work on finding growth opportunities and recruits. We have hired Mark Girling from Montagu Evans to head retail capital markets and James Fairweather from BNP Paribas to head industrial capital markets and be a co-head of the industrial business. These are strong performers in key transactional sectors."
Munday has, as part of this, reorganised the business in what he calls a vertical manner, joining together different teams in specific sectors. That has seen Colliers combine its investment, leasing and advisory teams in industrial while launching One London, merging its office and retail teams to create a dedicated service across the capital.
"It is pulling together capital markets and leasing, for instance, so they can provide better advice. It is a people first strategy, because in the end it is still all about relationship building; long-term relationships make advice more effective. In the first six months I had around 650 meetings both internally and externally asking about Colliers. It was immensely helpful."
In terms of new areas, Munday says data centres are particularly in the business's sights with the structure organised to reflect the fact companies in this space think about Europe effectively as one area.
Munday highlights core offices in London and then major regional cities, beds and the living sectors, hotels and industrial as key transactional focuses for growth. "The most important thing now that brokerages can do is to provide new ideas. We want that new thinking from our recruits."
Munday says the company will leverage its global teams to help. "We have a $10 billion market cap and yet 25 people in our head office – it is a decentralised business. There is real autonomy in local markets so things are done in the right way for the local market. But globally we are keen to create better connections with global capital. The UK remains a key destination of choice for geographic and time zone and other reasons and we are dialling into appetite for the UK. Japan is particularly strong at present, with capital coming back to London. We need to dial investors into the right people."
In terms of the expected revolutionary impact of AI on real estate, Munday says it is "really exciting" to be involved with how Colliers invests in the space.
"I think some competitors have gone long early but we are partners with Google and learning from their [research and development] as to how we best use and deploy the tech. The point is it can free people up from their laptops to have more time to go and see clients and go and support them with advice. AI will not be replacing surveyors it will be supporting them to do their jobs better."
Asked about the upcoming Mipim real estate conference in Cannes, Munday says: "I hope of course the discussion is around what a strong market the UK is and I expect sector led opportunities will drive discussions. It is unrealistic that there will be the confidence in values to say the property market is thriving in all areas but it is getting closer to that in some – in living, in core London offices and major cities, in sheds, though there is not much stock available for trading here.
"Ultimately being at the conference is about ideas and bringing together conversations. How can we as a country provide a compelling story in terms of the case to invest here? I anticipate more positive sentiment and more targeted conversations given the improving economic picture."
The one thing Munday really wants is political calm. "The last thing we need in this country now is a leadership challenge. Let us make the best of it as it is now and wait for the General Election if there is to be change."
If there is a key feature Munday wants to come from his time at the helm it is the importance of relationships in business.
"As a UK board we have found more time to meet and the aim is to unlock energy and excitement across the business with a clients and employee first strategy." Alongside this is what he terms a "family first approach".
"Business as a whole has been quite silent on this. People have become less relational with their peers than they were at their companies of old; it is better to reconnect again."