No cricket chat? Management gurus dropped the ball this time January 28, 2020 England’s cricketers haven’t made a habit of winning Test matches abroad recently, so the 3-1 series victory over South Africa is cause for celebration — not least due to the arrival on the international scene of Ollie Pope and a sign that we might have found openers who can keep us in a game beyond [...]
Big tech’s calls for more regulation offers them a chance to increase their power January 28, 2020 At the World Economic Forum in Davos last week, “tech for good” was one of the key themes on the agenda. The big tech companies like Microsoft and Google used their airtime to call for more regulation, particularly in the area of artificial intelligence (AI). It’s a broad term that applies to a set of [...]
Wellbeing is the new health and safety January 28, 2020 A new decade focuses minds on the future and new strategies to encourage companies and individuals to thrive. And if there’s one commitment that the City should make in the 2020s, it’s to treat the mental health of staff as seriously as their physical health and safety. Everything from the harnesses used by window cleaners [...]
DEBATE: Does it make sense to ban Huawei from access to the UK 5G network? January 28, 2020 Does it make sense to ban Huawei from access to the UK 5G network? Matt Kilcoyne, deputy director of the Adam Smith Institute, says YES. Chinese state-owned enterprises are accused by our Five Eyes intelligence partners in Australia and the US of keeping extensive databases on foreign individuals. That’s everything from who you’ve rung, when [...]
It’s not just Whitehall that needs a Dominic Cummings January 28, 2020 The topic of Whitehall reform has never exactly been sexy. No list of “Moments that Made the Modern World” would ever include, let alone kick off with, the publication of the Northcote-Trevelyan Report in 1854. Even many who work in Westminster would be unable to pick the cabinet secretary out of a line-up, even though [...]
We’ve got online shopping and internet banking, now it’s time for digital voting January 28, 2020 On 12 December, 24m of us trudged to polling stations — many braving wind and rain. Another eight million cast postal votes or had proxies. But about 20m UK adults did not vote at all. Some probably really did not want to, but for many others, it was just too inconvenient. A General Election costs [...]
From climate change to the Iran crisis, we need to bring back the experts January 28, 2020 The EU Referendum set in motion a debate the nation had rarely seen before. Among the first casualties of the divisive and brutal campaign were the “experts”. As Michael Gove famously said, the country had had enough of experts getting it wrong. The public rejected advice from academics, business leaders and prominent politicians, and voted [...]
12 steps to turn your brilliant idea into a business January 27, 2020 Most of us have probably had a great business idea at some point in our lives. A lightbulb moment in the pub, a problem solved in the shower or brief thought whilst waiting for the bus. But so rarely do these ideas ever progress beyond a fleeting thought. And setting up a business can be daunting, [...]
Britain is back. Great. But where to next? January 27, 2020 The clash of ideologies personified by US President Donald Trump and Greta Thunberg dominated Davos and the coverage of this year’s World Economic Forum. Climate change was the main theme of the gathering and almost all of the public-facing events and speeches were dedicated to the cause. But alongside the forum’s preference for addressing these big-picture [...]
The new Downing Street team can’t afford to ignore business January 27, 2020 Political wisdom has it that the first hundred days of any new government is its most vital opportunity to set its agenda. Not so with this government. Having just racked up its first 50 days, it risks accusations of being coy by its lack of public visibility and the paucity of new policy proclamations since [...]