Paul S. Walsh

Walsh was born in Middleton, and raised in the former mill town of Chadderton, Lancashire, in the North West of England. The only child of Arthur and Anne Walsh, his father was a pipe fitter who later ran a small thermal engineering company, and his mother was a housewife. Walsh believes that he inherited his work ethic from his father, his organisational skills from his mother, and his confidence from both parents, who he has described as "strict" but "loving". His great grandfather emigrated from Ireland, hence he bears the common Irish surname of Walsh.

Walsh was educated at his local comprehensive, the Royton and Crompton School, followed by Oldham College. He initially aspired to become a fighter pilot after becoming influenced by his "hero", a mathematics teacher who had been in the Royal Air Force during World War II. Walsh gained his pilot licence, but failed the medical examination to fly fighter jets due to colour blindness.

Instead, Walsh took a sandwich degree in accounting and economics at Manchester Polytechnic in 1973, with a work placement at the Co-operative Group's soft drinks operation. He did not enjoy accounting, but reasoned that the skill would provide a good gateway into business. He moved to London to work for International Computers Limited, and later the American Eaton Corporation, a manufacturer of industrial equipment, which he says he learnt a "can-do attitude".

Grand Metropolitan

Walsh joined London-based property and brewing conglomerate Grand Metropolitan (Grand Met) in 1982 as a financial planner and account manager for their brewing division Watney, Mann & Truman. By 1984–5, at his request, he had moved into a sales and marketing role. In 1986 he became the brewing division's chief financial officer (CFO), where he came to the attention of Grand Met's chairman Allen Sheppard after he reformed the financial reporting system.

In 1987, Walsh moved to New York to become CFO of Grand Met's 100 property-strong Intercontinental Hotels division. There he was tasked with acquiring properties, but having arrived at the height of what he identified as a real estate bubble, he argued that, "at that price we should be selling, not buying". Walsh also believed that the hotel group utilised an excessive amount of working capital. In 1988, he helped to negotiate the sale of the chain for $2.3 billion in cash (a price to earnings ratio of 52) to the Saison Group, in what he later described as "the deal of the decade". Even before the bubble burst, it was suggested that the Japanese company was overpaying for the chain; one analyst described their valuation of Intercontinental as "off the chart". Saison sold the chain in 1998 for $2.8 billion, having added a further 87 hotels.

Following the divestment, Walsh joined Grand Met's US-headquartered food division as CFO. In 1989, Grand Met used the proceeds from the Intercontinental sale to initiate a hostile takeover of Pillsbury, owner of the Green Giant and Häagen-Dazs brands, for $5.7 billion. The Grand Met offer was held by analysts to be a generous one for a struggling company that was under-performing in its industry. Walsh subsequently admitted to overvaluing the Green Giant vegetables division. Grand Met was attempting to diversify, and was attracted to Pillsbury's brands, which they believed held under-exploited potential for international growth. Writing in Businessweek, Mark Maremont accused Pillsbury of being "lax" in exploiting Häagen-Dazs' potential overseas. Walsh said: We thought Pillsbury had powerful brands, but it had kind of lost its way. We felt we could leverage its brands and its technologies. They had under-resourced their R&D and done a number of things to make the number, make the number. Cost reduction is a way of life, but you have to be responsible about it. You have to protect the seed today because that will be the tree that bears fruit in the future. I don't think Pillsbury had done that.

In January 1992 Walsh was made chief executive of Pillsbury, in addition to his job as CFO of the Grand Met food division. A Star Tribune profile described him as "a boy-wonder [with] traits of boldness, curiosity and financial wizardry". Walsh identified the various divisions of Pillsbury as poorly integrated and reined in their independence to make them more accountable to head office. He also invested heavily in research and development, technology, IT systems and marketing.

Concentrating the company on consumer food, in 1994 he sold the Alpo pet food business to Nestlé for $510 million in cash. In February 1995 he participated in Grand Met's friendly takeover of Pet, Inc., the makers of Old El Paso branded Tex-Mex foods, for $2.6 billion. A number of analysts feared at the time that Grand Met had overpaid for the company, and was taking on too much debt, but Walsh defended the acquisition, arguing, "we are paying a fair price for attractive brands", adding that he had faith in the continued growth of the Tex-Mex food sector. In October 1995 he joined the Grand Met board of directors and assumed additional responsibility for Grand Met's Paris-based European food operations. In 1996 he was made chairman and president of Pillsbury. Investors Chronicle described Pillsbury as "well managed" under his leadership. Walsh was credited with re-energising the company, and operating profits grew from $250 million to $660 million between 1992 and 1996.

Walsh was described by Philippe Naughton in The Times as "tall, paunchy, balding and thickset...[with] a burly confidence that exudes from every pore...a bluff Mancunian whose blokeish humour masks a fiercely competitive nature". Walsh claims to lead a "relatively modest" life that is dominated by work. At Diageo, he spent around half of his time in various foreign countries, totalling over 5 million air miles.

Walsh met Manchester-born Nicolette (Nikki) in London in 1978. They married in 1980 and have a son, Dean Paul Walsh. They separated in 2006.

In October 2012 it was reported that Walsh was engaged to marry his longterm girlfriend Julie Lewis, a public relations executive, and they married in May 2013.

Walsh is one of the highest-paid businessmen in Britain, earning £11.2 million between June 2011 and June 2012 from his work at Diageo. He lives near Horsham in West Sussex. He holds a minority stake in a 2,400-acre (970 ha) game ranch in South Africa, where he enjoys big game hunting.