DEBATE: Has the classic British cup of tea fallen out of fashion? February 3, 2020 Unilever could be selling its PG Tips and Lipton tea brands. Has the classic British cuppa fallen out of fashion? YES, says Jeff Young, founder of the London Coffee Festival, which celebrates its tenth anniversary on 2–5 April 2020. Britain is becoming a nation of coffee drinkers. This journey started 20 years ago with the [...]
Boris Johnson’s disastrous Huawei decision is an act of national self-harm February 3, 2020 Powerful US Republican senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas put it best. Letting the state-sponsored Chinese technology firm Huawei build even a portion of Britain’s 5G network — as the Prime Minister nonsensically decided to do last week — is quite a bit like letting the KGB construct the British phone systems in the 1980s. At [...]
Markets must wake up to the risks of the coronavirus February 3, 2020 It is still too early to be certain on the relative infectiousness or mortality rate of the new coronavirus. Nevertheless, there have been close to 10,000 confirmed cases, and 40m people in China are currently facing travel restrictions. The virus has now spread to 23 territories, including the UK, where two cases were confirmed last [...]
Businesses and young people should embrace the apprenticeship revolution February 3, 2020 If you are looking for a business leader of the future, look no further than Jamilah. Her peers are yet to graduate from university, and this brilliant digital marketeer already has a qualification and a role at Google on her CV. Jamilah, and thousands like her, are taking advantage of new apprenticeship opportunities, shaking up [...]
The ethical executive is coming to a boardroom near you February 3, 2020 We are undergoing a paradigm shift in our political, economic, and commercial worlds — and it’s truly stranger than fiction. Donald Trump, Brexit, Cambridge Analytica, the weaponisation of data, deep fakes, and artificial intelligence (AI) — phenomena that would have seemed inconceivable a decade ago are now our day-to-day reality. While some businesses are ahead of [...]
All eyes turn to China ahead of markets reopening February 2, 2020 When China’s financial markets plunged into crisis in the late summer of 2015, the authorities in Beijing were left panicking. Having encouraged tens of millions of their citizens to invest in the stock market, they were unprepared for the consequences of a mass sell-off. As millions of small investors began to offload shares, the government [...]
Brexit day is here – but does the rest of the world even care? January 31, 2020 Today is the day that many have dreaded, many have dreamed of and a lot thought might never come. At 11pm, just as the first pubs begin to close, the United Kingdom will quietly slip out of a side door to exit the European Union, ending our membership of a club we’ve been in for [...]
Carney goes out not with a bang but a whimper January 31, 2020 There may be a part of Mark Carney that will be glad to see the back of the Bank of England. His eight-year tenure, which ends in March, has been dominated by political turbulence and so, perhaps inevitably, rows about the politicisation of the Old Lady. Threadneedle Street is not alone in being pulled into [...]
Listed firms need public flogging January 31, 2020 The £18.5 trillion in assets managed by members of the Investor Forum would cover a fair few shopping trips to Poundland, and buy its parent’s shares hundreds of times over — but will public market shareholders get the chance? That’s one of the questions indirectly prompted by the forum’s latest annual review, which highlights the [...]
DEBATE: Should some conversation topics or ‘banter’ be off-limits to keep workplaces inclusive? January 31, 2020 Should certain conversation topics or ‘banter’ be off-limits to keep workplaces inclusive? Melanie Stancliffe, employment partner at Cripps Pemberton Greenish, says YES. There’s a fine line between catching up with your colleagues and inappropriate discussions. You have to remember that the office is a place of work, where nobody should think it acceptable to discriminate [...]