The 25 most inspiring people aged 30 and under in the UK and Ireland 2024

The rising stars in the first ever Sunday Times Young Power List are artists and entertainers, sportsmen and women dominating their field, entrepreneurs changing the world for the better, tech trailblazers, a political powerhouse and many more.

Our winners, from across the UK and Ireland, were chosen by editors across every section at The Sunday Times who selected not just the best young talent but the people who are making a real impact in the world and whose success they believe will endure.

They share their stories, revealing the determination needed to excel in their fields, the unexpected advantages of youth and inexperience and the unwavering passion that motivates them all.

The Young Power List is optimism in action. It demonstrates that prosperity can take many forms, and reminds us that the best journeys begin with ambition, tenacity and a sense of limitless possibility.

Read exclusive interviews with our winners as they share the advice that helped them get to where they are today — and prepare to be inspired.

Ambika Mod, 28, actress

“If I were a Shakespearean hero, my tragic flaw would be ambition,” says Ambika Mod, the star of the BBC’s This Is Going To Hurt and the Netflix hit One Day.

Mod, who grew up in Hertfordshire, had her first professional job on the BBC comedy The Mash Report in 2019. “I look back at that version of myself and I don’t know how she did it,” she says. “I was gigging, writing at the weekend and working to raise money to go to the Edinburgh Fringe. I was so hungry and scrappy. Just thinking about it now makes me feel tired.”

Five years later, Mod and her One Day co-star, Leo Woodall, were sitting on Primrose Hill, north London, on a sunny July afternoon during filming. “I remember turning to him and saying, ‘Can you believe this is our job? It’s insane.’” To date, the show has been watched by 15 million people.

“Now I’ve got to a place in my career where I can slow down, enjoy it and revel in the creative side a bit more,” she says.

Next up is Disney’s Playdate, in which Mod plays an investigative journalist, and she is keen to return to her writing and comedy roots.

My advice: “Whatever you want to do in life, just start. Even if you fail, if you can get through that, you’ll be fine. Thinking about it is always so much worse than just doing it.”

Bukayo Saka, 22, England and Arsenal footballer

“Everybody at Arsenal knows that Saka is burdened with glorious purpose,” Ian Wright once said of one of the biggest names in English football.

Aged 18, Bukayo Saka signed his first long-term contract with Arsenal. He dealt with racism and abuse after his decisive penalty was saved in the final of the Euros against Italy in 2020 but has come out on top, becoming Arsenal’s Player of the Season for a second consecutive season in 2022 and the Professional Footballers’ Association Young Player of the Year in 2023.

In order to reach these heights, Saka advises: “Make sure you’re 100 per cent committed to being the best player you can be and don’t forget to enjoy the journey you go on to achieve that.”

Saka, from Greenford in West London, whose contract with Arsenal is worth £300,000 a week, is known among fans as “star boy”. He uses his increasingly high profile for good, donating his time and money to causes he is passionate about, from funding critical medical care for children in need in Nigeria, where his parents were born, to helping those from disadvantaged communities after last year’s earthquake in Morocco.

He is also helping young artists, designers and charity and community workers to launch creative enterprises through a company called Fiverr.

My advice: “One of the most simple things I was told by my first coach that I really liked was, ‘If you don’t shoot, you don’t score’.”

Keir Mather, 26, MP for Selby and Ainsty

When Keir Mather overturned a 20,000 Conservative majority last year in Selby and Ainsty, where the average age of voters is 55, he felt he had done something “quite telling and powerful”.

Now 26, he is nine months into his role as Baby of the House, the unofficial title given to the youngest member of parliament, and is using his age to give the old guard in Westminster a run for their money.

“What I’ve found most rewarding about the role so far is the fact that MPs have a lot of practical power to help people and to change things locally on the ground, to a greater extent than I expected,” says Mather, who was born in Hull to working-class parents. “It’s our responsibility as young people to lean into politics with confidence and optimism.”

Top of his list of priorities in parliament is pushing for more support for people struggling with the cost-of-living crisis and tackling insufficient provision for children with special educational needs.

Maintaining a work-life balance is hard but a priority for Mather, who plays on the parliamentary five-a-side football team every Tuesday morning, “which is about as far as I can push myself in terms of early morning exercise”.

My advice: “When you’re working in a job with a lot of responsibility where the stakes are high at a young age, you won’t always get things right. So being kind to yourself is important.”

Amelia Dimoldenberg, 30, Chicken Shop Date host/presenter

It’s a strange trajectory to go from interviewing minor celebrities in a fast food restaurant to flirting with Andrew Garfield on the red carpet of the Golden Globes, but Amelia Dimoldenberg has made it work.

The deadpan comedian started her YouTube interview series Chicken Shop Date in 2014, interrogating grime artists over fried wings with an awkwardness reminiscent of Louis Theroux’s Weird Weekends. It now has 2.3 million subscribers, drawing in names including Ed Sheeran, Paul Mescal and Shania Twain.

As she gained viral recognition, demand for her sarcastic but loveable interviewing technique grew, and she was asked to be a red-carpet correspondent at the 2023 Golden Globes and 2024 Oscars.

Her direct and irreverent façade belies the hours of research she spends on each of her subjects. “After ten years of Chicken Shop Date, I feel so proud to have stuck with something until everyone saw the potential I always did,” she says.

“It’s also important to know you don’t have to do everything on your own. You need to steer the idea forward but it’s essential to collaborate.”

My advice: “Be persistent with your idea. Things might not happen for you overnight but that’s OK! If you believe in your work and are still excited by it, that’s what matters.”

Joe Seddon, 26, founder, Zero Gravity, social enterprise

Attending a state school in Morley, West Yorkshire, a former textiles and coalmining town, Joe Seddon says attending Oxford University “was never on my radar”.

On GCSE results day, when a broadcaster visited his school, he opened his results live on the radio. “The interviewer saw my grades [12 A*s] and said, ‘Will you apply to Oxbridge now?’ ” he says. “The idea had never crossed my mind but it planted the seed.”

He gained a place to study philosophy, politics and economics at Oxford but at times felt “social-mobility guilt”. “The year that I graduated from Oxford, not a single person in my parliamentary constituency of Morley and Outwood got a place there,” says Seddon.

Using the last £200 of his student loan and his self-taught coding skills, he founded the Zero Gravity website and app. It identifies ambitious students from low-opportunity backgrounds and connects them with mentors, masterclasses and scholarships, as well as internships and job opportunities with major UK firms such as HSBC. The platform has supported more than 8,000 students to get into top universities, including 800 into Oxbridge.

It has also distributed £1.5 million in scholarships to pay for the living costs of low-income students at university and recently signed a partnership with Mercedes-Benz F1 Team to fund £438,000 of scholarships to low-income Stem (science, technology, engineering and maths) students.

My advice: “Don’t bank on being an overnight success. It’s about playing the long game. And never forget the reason you started in the first place.”

Nicholas Galitzine, 29, actor

In May, Galitzine will play the lead opposite Anne Hathaway in The Idea of You, the film adaptation of the 2017 novel of the same name that became a sleeper hit during the pandemic. His character, Hayes, a world-famous pop star, was inspired by Harry Styles.

“Tapping into the humanity of a pop star was the most important thing,” says Galitzine. “To be adored is one thing, but to understand the person behind the façade is more important.”

Born in Hammersmith, the actor came to prominence playing the romantic leads in Red, White & Royal Blue and Purple Hearts, as well as in the comedy Bottoms. To his legions of young fans, he was also Prince Robert in Cinderella, the 2021 reimagining of the fairytale, with Camila Cabello.

The actor is starring opposite Julianne Moore in the television period drama Mary & George, and away from work enjoys the simple life. “I’m a big nature person. I go to the beach a lot. I like to ride horses and carve wood,” he says.

My advice: “In moments of doubt, I trust all the hard work that’s taken me this far. You need a healthy balance of work ethic while keeping a sense of freedom and play. Trust your instincts.”

Luke Littler, 17, darts player

“There are no shortcuts in this game,” says teenage darts champion Luke Littler. “You’ve got to put in the hours, practice well and hopefully success will naturally come your way.”

It has certainly worked for him. Littler began playing darts on a magnetic darts board when he was 18 months old. By eight years old, he was using a full-height board and throwing the darts the official competitive distance of 7ft — and then there was no stopping him.

When he reached the final of the World Darts Championship in January, he went from being relatively unknown to one of the sport’s biggest names. In March, he won his first European title on his debut at the Belgian Darts Open after hitting a nine-dart finish, the perfect score for a single game.

Littler, nicknamed Luke the Nuke, says: “Success to me is winning at least one of every major championship before the end of my career.”

My advice: “Be determined. Sir Alex Ferguson told me to keep at it and don’t give up. If I ever had doubts when I was practising as a kid, I was inspired to keep going by the success of Phil Taylor and what he achieved in the game.”

Hannah Chappatte, 27, founder, Hybr, student letting platform

In her final year at Bristol University in 2019, Chappatte became fixated by the fact that although 2.9 million students go to university every year, there was no marketplace that allowed them to compare housing options.

The Londoner was hearing from fellow students living in damp, mouldy and poorly managed properties where landlords would enter unannounced or there were holes in the roof.

Disillusioned by filling in grad scheme applications, Chappatte became increasingly “exhilarated, energised and excited about what Hybr could be”.

She founded the student letting platform in 2020 with a mission to transform the young rental market. Four years on, the company has helped 30,000 students and has signed up 30 educational institutions, from the LSE and UCL to the University of Bristol. It has also generated more than £15 million in sales for its clients.

“The word hibernate means a place of safety from the chaos of the world, and that’s really what we’re creating here,” she says.

My advice: “Get involved in as much as possible while you’re in university. Join societies, ambassador programmes, and do as many internships as you can to meet people outside of your network and understand what you’re good at.”

CMAT, 28, musician

“I signed my first record deal at 25, which by the standards of the pop music industry is middle-aged,” says country-rock singer/songwriter Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson, who goes by the moniker CMAT. “I’m from a village in Ireland where I was just doing open mic [nights] and working at [the grocery chain] SuperValu. Nobody knew about me for the longest time.”

Thompson might feel like she showed up late to the party but she hasn’t wasted any time since. She released her debut album, If My Wife New I’d Be Dead, in 2022, and the follow-up, Crazymad, for Me, arrived last year. Both records went to No 1 in Ireland. This year, she made the BBC Sound of 2024 longlist and was nominated for International Artist of the Year at the Brit awards.

“Last year at Glastonbury, there were 10,000 people in the tent all howling my song, I Wanna Be a Cowboy, Baby!, back at me,” she says of her most memorable moment performing. “It was mind-blowing, I absolutely loved it.”

For Thompson, success isn’t about the accolades. “I’ve already achieved everything that I wanted, which was getting to make a record. I’m 28, so what am I going to do now, other than continue to make work that is pushing the boundaries that are within myself?”

My advice: “No matter where you are or what you’re doing, you can succeed as long as the music is good. You just have to work really hard and sacrifice pretty much every element of your personal life, but it’s worth it.”

Josephine Philips, 26, founder, SOJO, alterations platform

While studying for a degree in physics and philosophy at King’s College London, Philips kicked her fast-fashion shopping habit and began to buy only second-hand clothing.

“I learnt that the fast-fashion industry was based on the exploitation of women of colour. I started to realise the importance of quality clothing with longevity,” she says. Yet she was surprised to find most tailors were cash-only, collection-only and relied on paper tickets.

Inspired by her 94-year-old grandmother — who gave Philips her own 60-year-old dress from Sierra Leone and had a “zero-waste” mentality — she decided she would offer door-to-door clothing repairs through a simple app.

Philips initially bicycled around London taking people’s garments to a local tailor, but now has her own team of 20 tailors and riders.

Today, the app has raised £2.1 million in investment and SOJO runs a permanent base inside Selfridges, as well as becoming the official tailoring partner for brands such as Nobody’s Child, Ganni and Nanushka.

My advice: “Don’t take the weight of the world on your shoulders. Just think, ‘What do I have the power to do?’ and, within that, do as much as you can.”

Jack Draper, 22, tennis player

“I knew tennis was going to be my career when I was 12,” says the British No 2, Jack Draper. “I’m at a ranking now where my childhood dreams are in front of me. I really want to be one of the best players in the world.”

Born in Sutton, London, the rising star, who is 6ft 4in and turned pro at 18, is 43 in the world rankings.

“The men’s game is tough,” he says, “There’s a lot of travel and you’re alone a lot. When you’re coming up from the bottom of the pit and grinding really hard, it can be difficult. I’m starting to realise my potential now and that keeps me motivated.”

Draper made the last 16 in the US Open in September, his best grand slam result to date, and is estimated to be worth £3 million from prize money and endorsement deals.

Touted as Sir Andy Murray’s successor, he is taking the high expectations in his stride. “Tennis is a sport of tough emotions but I’m incredibly fortunate to be doing what I love and travelling the world,” he says.

My advice: “Learn from your mistakes. Every tournament I play, I’m gaining a greater understanding of what I need to do to become better.”

Leo Reich, 25, comedian

Cambridge graduate Leo Reich’s comedy persona contains a multitude of contradictions. Decked in a tight top and hot pants, with lashings of eyeliner for his hit show Literally, Who Cares?!, he simultaneously embodies and skewers the vanity and narcissism of Gen Z, while articulating very real fears about financial insecurity, climate change and political turmoil.

“I use irony and satire as a mode of expressing something that I really feel,” he says.

Four years into his career, the Londoner has picked up numerous comedy awards and had a sold-out show at EartH in Hackney, east London, which was recorded for an HBO special. He is now filming Lena Dunham’s new Netflix series, Too Much.

Reich has learnt that when it comes to comedy, you can’t please everyone. “I think the anxiety about trying to appeal to everyone starts to dissipate,” he says. “Though it’s hard to remember that when there’s such pressure to be palatable.”

My advice: “In Tina Fey’s memoir, Bossypants, she tells a story about Amy Poehler performing an outrageous bit in the writer’s room and Jimmy Fallon telling her he didn’t like it. Poehler replies: ‘I don’t fucking care.’ It was freeing to read that as a teenager and realise that it’s not the end of the world if not everyone understands that you’re a comic genius.”

Jamie Chadwick, 25, racing driver

Chadwick is Britain’s most successful female racing driver and is breaking down barriers for women in motorsports.

She started go-karting aged 11 on the Isle of Man, home of the TT Races. “I wasn’t particularly talented when I first started but I just remember loving it and immediately wanting to go back,” she says.

That early passion helped her to become a three-time W-Series Champion, the only female driver to win a Formula 3 race and an MRF Championship, and the only female and youngest driver yet to win a British GT Championship.

She is a development driver for Williams F1 and races in Indy NXT, the top flight of US single-seater racing — the first female for more than 15 years to race in the series. She hopes to one day compete in the male-dominated Formula One.

This year, Chadwick has launched a grassroots initiative to offer free karting and mentorship for young girls interested in racing. While her own parents were always “incredibly supportive”, she did occasionally encounter sexism from others. “There was always this statement, ‘She’s good for a girl’, which I hated and drove me to always want to prove whoever said it wrong.”

My advice: “Don’t let anyone put you off. There are so many more opportunities out there than people realise. Don’t be afraid to put yourself out of your comfort zone.”

James Dacombe, 24, founder, CoMind, technology company

“An advantage of starting my business so young was naivety,” says James Dacombe, who dropped out of school at 16 to set up his neurotechnology company CoMind. “You don’t have the scar tissues from what hasn’t worked, so you just try a lot of things. Fortunately, some of them work.”

Dacombe, who grew up near Harrogate, began programming at 13, building apps and websites for fun.

In 2022, he was named a Thiel Fellow, receiving a $100,000 grant as well as guidance and resources from the billionaire entrepreneur Peter Thiel’s foundation.

Along with his team of 60, Dacombe is developing a patch that’s worn on the forehead and measures key brain signals to help clinicians treat patients across intensive-care units and in surgery. They want to use that data to better understand the brain and improve the treatment for strokes and traumatic brain injuries.

“In the future, we’re also interested in how we use this for screening for Alzheimer’s and dementia,” he says. “The applications are massive.”

There have, of course, been challenges along the way. “You have such erratic ups and downs in the beginning, almost day by day, from technical challenges to hiring issues. Being able to withstand that is key,” he says.

My advice: “Just get going. Your first idea is probably wrong but as you start, you’ll figure that out. Take every opportunity and move as quickly as you can.”

Grace Beverley, 27, entrepreneur

Publishing videos of her workouts from her Oxford University bedroom, Grace Beverley grew a social media following of hundreds of thousands at 18 years old.

Under the name Grace Fit, she became a leading fitness influencer, but the constant pressure to maintain an online profile did not fit her personality. She deleted all her YouTube videos and channelled her energy into her businesses instead.

The serial entrepreneur, writer and podcaster now owns three businesses — sustainable activewear brand TALA, fitness app Shreddy and her own daily planners, which she sells via The Productivity Method. She recently used her global following of more than three million people to confront the lack of female representation in venture capital, a space where women receive only 2 two per cent of funding.

Beverley has made engagement with her young female audience her USP. “It’s become a lot less easy to doubt myself because I feel like I know the customer so well. We’ve spent so much time getting to know her in order that we can deliver what she wants,” Beverley says.

My advice: “Identify what isn’t currently working for you so that you can alleviate it. A pivot doesn’t necessarily need to be 180 degrees, it can be 45 degrees and that can still be hugely effective.”

Jacob Nathan, 23, founder, Epoch Biodesign

Jacob Nathan had a lightbulb moment around climate change and plastic waste during a lesson at school when he was 17.

“I was intrigued by this idea of using microbes in nature that would be capable of breaking down plastic into something we could reuse for a different purpose,” he says.

The Londoner became so absorbed in the project that he indefinitely delayed his plans to study biochemistry and economics at the University of Chicago.

“I quickly realised I didn’t have a PhD and I needed much smarter people than me to help me take it forward.” He partnered with Douglas Kell, a professor at the University of Liverpool working in synthetic biology, and they secured an initial £300,000 for research.

Today, his company, Epoch Biodesign, of which he is the chief executive, has raised £15 million of government and EU funding and private investment and employs 22 scientists.

Epoch is working on breaking down old plastics and turning them into new, high-quality materials — old clothes into high-performance clothing, or scrap car pieces into airbags. “I feel like I’m working on something that matters, that could have an impact,” he says.

My advice: “Listen more. Ask questions. Try not to be the one in the room who’s talking the most. Become an expert by speaking with as many people as possible.”

Ahana Banerjee, 24, founder, Clear, skincare app

Having suffered from severe cystic acne since she was 12 years old, Ahana Banerjee found a way to help her own skin and create a multimillion-pound business in the process.

During the final year of her degree in physics at Imperial College London, she founded Clear, an app that enables users to track their skincare routine, monitor flare-ups and share recommendations and product reviews with an online community.

“I had an app to track my period, my diet and my exercise, but nothing for my skin,” says Banerjee, 24, who lives in Oxford but grew up in Cheshire, Delhi and Singapore. “I wanted to find other people with the same skin type as me and find out exactly what they were using and what was working.”

Clear analyses the progress of customers’ selfies, the products and ingredients they use and their feedback, to make independent product recommendations. The app has 17,500 users worldwide and has raised $1 million in investment — it is valued at $15 million.

My advice: “For aspiring entrepreneurs, my advice is to learn how to code. It empowers you with the autonomy to bring your ideas to life.”

Caleb Azumah Nelson, 30, author

Caleb Azumah Nelson secured an agent for his award-winning debut novel Open Water while he was working at the Apple Store. From that point onward, life was “like a fever dream”.

He grew up in southeast London, the son of Ghanian parents who arrived in the UK as children.

Critics frequently characterise his work as having a profound tenderness, the richness of his writing influenced by his experience in photography and love of jazz and modern rap.

His writing, which explores black culture, masculinity, love and grief, has earned him the Costa first novel award and recognition on the American National Book Foundation’s “5 under 35” list of promising debut writers.

Now he is overseeing TV adaptations of Open Water, which he is also directing, and his second novel, Small Worlds.

“At 18, I knew what I wanted to do, but I had no idea how I would get there,” Azumah Nelson says. “So often, we think about the ways in which we’re making the journey from A to B. How do we get there in an urgent way? But there’s a process, and nothing is wasted.”

My advice: “Trust yourself. So much of writing for me feels like a trust exercise, and you should really lean into that.”

Leah Williamson, 27, England and Arsenal footballer

Overcoming sexism and a birth defect of inward-pointing toes, Leah Williamson has blazed a trail for girls in football since the age of six, when she forced her way onto the local boys’ team.

As she reveals in You Have the Power, her forthcoming memoir, which is also partly a motivation manual for girls aged ten to 14, parents of boys on the opposing teams screamed: “Get the girl.”

Now 27, at the top of the England captain’s list of victories has to be leading the Lionesses to victory in the European Championships in 2022. It was England’s first football trophy in 56 years.

To make it in the sport, Williamson says, you have to “play football as often as you can for as long as you love it. It’s a simple bit of advice but it will go a long way in your journey to becoming a professional footballer”.

My advice: “The best career advice I’ve ever received is to just be true to who you are. Always believe in yourself and never take no for an answer.”

Louis Rees-Zammit, 23, Wales rugby union star turned NFL player

In 2021, Louis Rees-Zammit, from Penarth in Wales, was already on his way to conquering one sport, winning the Six Nations Championship with Wales and making the British & Irish Lions squad.

But Rees-Zammit had watched his father play American football in Europe as a child, and this “planted the seeds” for him to consider a career further afield. In January, he began training for the international programme that funnels potential American football stars from outside the US into the NFL.

“It was a true grind. For two and a half months, we were working six days a week, for 12-13 hour days,” he says.

The hard work paid off in March, when he signed as a running back for the Kansas City Chiefs.

Rees-Zammit has been glued to his iPad learning new rules of play and it’s been an adjustment moving to Kansas City.

His next goal is to join the list of players who are eligible to play on game days, called the roster. “It’s been my dream to continue [my father’s] legacy, and inspire other athletes back home to be confident enough to make this change if they have a desire to try,” he says.

My advice: “My father told me not to have any regrets. And I knew I would regret it for the rest of my life if I never gave American football a real go.”

Maximilian Davis, 28, creative director, Ferragamo

Born in Manchester to Trinidadian-Jamaican parents, Davis moved to London to study at the London College of Fashion, then assisted the designer Grace Wales Bonner before starting his own label, Maximilian, in 2020. Known for his precise tailoring and slinky dresses, his designs won him celebrity fans such as Rihanna, Dua Lipa and Kim Kardashian.

In the uncertain early days of his fashion career, Davis lent on friends, family and colleagues for support. “It’s important to stay grounded in this industry,” he says.

In 2022, Davis was shortlisted as semi-finalist in the LVMH Prize for Young Fashion Designers but withdrew to move to Milan and take on the role of creative director of the Italian heritage brand Ferragamo.

He has been credited with injecting a new vitality into the 96-year-old fashion house and at last year’s Fashion Awards was named British Womenswear Designer of the Year.

For Davis, age is a state of mind. “Youth is something that everyone has inside of them,” he says. “I guess it has made me overcome fear, not worrying too much about what needs to be achieved by a certain time.”

My advice: “Act like you’re in the job you want in three or four years’ time.”

Mya-Rose Craig, 21, environmentalist and activist

“I was an opinionated 12-year-old on the internet and lots of people didn’t care about what I had to say until I turned 18,” says the UK’s best known young ornithologist, Mya-Rose Craig. “I had to learn how to articulate myself.”

She did, and 14 publishers fought over the rights to her memoir, Birdgirl, which became a bestseller when Craig was only 20.

Craig, who grew up near Bristol, has turned a lifelong passion for birdwatching into environmental and diversity activism. As a British-Bangladeshi girl, “the older I got, the more I was aware I never saw anyone who looked like me in these spaces”, she says.

Her charity Black2Nature, which she founded aged 15 to help Black and Asian children from inner cities into green spaces, has the support of National Geographic. Next year, she’s going to the Sylhet District of Bangladesh to present a film for Oxfam about how flooding caused by climate change has devastated her family’s hometown.

She is now finishing a degree in human, social and political sciences at Cambridge University, so, momentarily, the birdwatching that launched her career has become a “form of mindfulness”.

My advice: “Lots of people want to change the world and don’t know where to start. Find other people who care about the same thing and create a platform in any shape or form, whether it’s a social media account or writing a local newspaper article.”

Abby Cook, 21, Blue Peter presenter

Abby Cook has worked in occupational therapy, tutoring and disability support — all before turning 20.

“I still don’t really know what I want to do in the long term but that’s the beauty of being young: you can try out a bunch of different things,” she says.

The 21-year-old, from Falkirk in Scotland, has Ehlers Danlos syndrome, which affects connective tissue and causes pain and fatigue, so she uses a wheelchair to get around.

She discovered wheelchair racing aged 12 after her condition stopped her participating in mainstream sport, and still makes time to train twice a week. When Blue Peter called, she was posting TikTok videos from her bedroom under the account name “hotwheels007”.

“They asked if I wanted to become a new presenter and I thought, “Yeah, why not? You only live once,” she says. Cook is now the show’s 42nd presenter and a mega fan who can name all her predecessors.

The work is unpredictable: some days she’ll be trying her hand at dog agility training, others hanging off a viaduct. “I felt like I wasn’t going to be good at any of that but actually everyone’s got to start somewhere.”

My advice: “Don’t let the fear of not being good at something stop you from doing it. The only way to get better is to try.”

Harry Gestetner, 23, co-founder, Fanfix, app

When British-born, California-based entrepreneur Harry Gestetner met angel investor David Glick, Glick said: “Winning is a habit, and it’s good to get in the habit of winning.” Having created and sold a multimillion-dollar company by the age of 21, you could say Gestetner is on his way to forming a habit.

Gestetner moved to the US from London with his family when he was 15. Fanfix, conceived in his American dorm room with a high school friend in December 2020, allows social-media creators and influencers to profit from their fan bases by offering a monthly paid subscription for content such as personal DMs, vlogs and social media posts — like a clean version of OnlyFans.

By the time he graduated two years later, the company had been acquired for a reported $65 million (£52 million).

Gestetner says one of the hardest things about being young in business is making people respect you, but it’s not impossible. “You need to be able to convince people to buy into your vision.”

Fanfix expects to pay $2 billion to creators by 2027. The next phase of the business is developing AI content-creation tools.

My advice: “You have to pick an idea that you really want to work on, that keeps you up at night and fires you up in the morning.”

Abby Lee, 30, chef

Described as “a quiet magician of Malaysian cookery”, Abby Lee has gained a reputation as one of the most exciting names in the food industry. Mambow, her restaurants in south and east London, serve refined modern Malaysian cuisine in an informal setting. Combined with an affordable price tag, the winning formula has customers queuing out of the door.

Born in Singapore to Malaysian parents, Lee grew up eating wonton noodles from the local street stalls and watching her grandma cooking classic Malaysian dishes. “My family ran a bakery, so I spent all those years absorbing how a business should be run,” she says.

Lee moved to the UK at 15, growing up in Lewisham before studying economics at Bristol University. In 2017, she got her diploma at Le Cordon Bleu and the following year moved to Italy to cook at Michelin-starred Pashà, near the city of Bari.

“In Italy, I was watching head chefs create pieces of art on plates,” she says of the experience. “Cooking is therapeutic to me and it was a way I could focus my ADHD brain. I realised I could really flourish in a kitchen setting, being engaged all the time and having my creative side come through.”

In moments of self-doubt, Lee goes back to her memories of cooking with her aunt. “I remind myself that cooking is about the exchange of flavours and stories, not the pressure of thinking how many dishes can I sell. All I have to do is cook and make the customers happy.”

My advice: “MyMalaysian aunties in Mambo would tell me, ‘Go slow and not try and do everything all at once’.”