Boosting productivity is the greatest economic challenge facing the UK. Productivity is crucial to long-term economic prosperity and household income growth. Yet there is no fully agreed understanding of the factors behind the UK’s ‘productivity puzzle’- the unexplained decline in national productivity in comparison both to historical trends and relative to our key competitors. Within the UK, such is the dominance of London and the South East in terms of economic performance, all other regions and devolved nations exhibit levels of productivity that are below the UK average
The on-going Covid-19 pandemic poses even greater challenges. During the height of the first lockdown, it was estimated that day-to-day economic activity had shrunk by almost one-fifth. As we enter another national lockdown, working from home remains commonplace.
What does this mean for traditional methods of measuring productivity? What does it mean for the productivity of businesses, regions and nations going forward?
In our February mini-series, PrOPEL Hub colleagues and friends explore what productivity measures and drivers might look like in a post Covid world and consider challenges to the traditional system of measuring and compensating employees primarily on hours worked.
Productivity – Not Just Another Buzzword: What is productivity and how do we measure it?
Although productivity is an important and much-talked-about concept in policy circles, it is only vaguely understood among businesses. In this blog, Dr Anwar Adem discusses what productivity means, how we measure it, and why it should matter to businesses and government.
Finding the Measure of Management: New Data from the Covid-19 Era
In recent years, management practice has gained prominence as a major driver of productivity within organisations. In this blog, Dr Anwar Adem examines the evidence and lessons businesses can learn from it.
Understanding the Link between Productivity and Leadership
Measuring how businesses function in terms of basic financial and output indicators is the first step towards better management. In the context of the Wales’s own ‘Productivity Puzzle’, Professors Brian Morgan and Nick Clifton examine how companies in Wales view and manage their own productivity and how productivity is affected by firms’ management practices.