Tomorrow will be a better day is a mantra for business, too February 5, 2021 “Tomorrow will be a better day.” Words of comfort from the late Captain Sir Tom Moore that will inspire a nation in the days to come. The news of his passing hit me harder than I had any reason to expect. I admired him greatly for the life he led and the dignified positivity and [...]
Feast in the East: UK’s Pacific tie-up could be world’s first digital alliance February 5, 2021 Last week the government announced that it was applying to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership or CPTPP. The trading group circles the Pacific with 11 members, including major economies like Japan, Mexico and Australia, and the UK’s trade with it already stands at over £100 billion. The cabinet’s current rising star, international trade [...]
Screenshot: How Amazon set up shop on cloud nine February 5, 2021 This week **Media Moment of the Week: Parish the thought **How Amazon set up shop on cloud nine **Will BT look to the stars? Media Moment of the Week: Parish the thought Anyone who thinks local politics is boring has clearly never attended a meeting of the Handforth Parish Council Planning and Environment Committee. Or [...]
The Kalifa Review can be the launchpad for UK fintech to take off February 5, 2021 When the Fintech Founders group that I chair recently hosted an event with Ron Kalifa, to discuss his ongoing Fintech Review, the energy and enthusiasm of the founders on the call was palpable. Many of the men and women who took part, all of them Fintech entrepreneurs, have been struggling over the last twelve months. [...]
New Amazon chief needs to think about his company’s role in society February 5, 2021 Amazon’s recent financial report saw it hit another huge milestone, delivering its largest quarter by revenue of all time at $125.56 billion – reaching the $100 billion mark for the first time. This success has much to do with founder Jeff Bezos’s relentless focus on the customer and their unchanging needs: value, choice and convenience. [...]
The financial case for Scottish separatism doesn’t bear real scrutiny February 4, 2021 The story goes that in 1787, as Russian Empress Catherine the Great travelled in the Crimea, her minister Grigory Potemkin erected fake portable villages along her route as a façade to hide deep-seated poverty in the region. The Potemkin Villages, as they became known, were the means by which the gilded monarch was persuaded that [...]
Offices will reinvent themselves to play host to the capital’s social capital February 4, 2021 When Mark Twain’s obituary was prematurely published by an American newspaper, he responded with the now iconic assurance that “the reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” Over a century later, the same could be said of the capital’s offices. For much of the past year, a growing Niagara of newspaper articles have speculated about [...]
GameStop: Might the Redditors target the bond market next? February 3, 2021 They say a week is a long time in politics, but perhaps it is even longer in financial markets. Before institutional investors have even had the chance to fully take stock of last week’s events, which saw the David’s of retail trading get one up on the goliaths of the City institutions by sharing trading ideas [...]
Beware those who’d lock us down and throw away the key February 3, 2021 Rather like dedicated Remainers, pro-lockdown enthusiasts never seem to give up. Their ardour will have been fuelled by leaks over the weekend of results from the epidemiological models. Apparently, even though quite soon all the over-70s will have been jabbed, lifting restrictions before the summer would lead to a massive third wave of the virus. [...]
Too many bosses are using Covid-19 to indulge their Big Brother tendencies February 3, 2021 Controversy around technologies used to monitor employees is not new. However, against the backdrop of COVID-19 with office-based workforces operating remotely, businesses have struggled with how to effectively manage staff and have hastily deployed surveillance technologies. This knee-jerk reaction is perhaps understandable, but employers must be wary. The backlash can be severe, unexpected, and sometimes [...]