Magpie businesses could boost UK economy by more than £100bn

The Confederation of British Industry’s Director-General Carolyn Fairbairn has highlighted the importance of businesses taking a magpie approach and seeking out new technologies, stating that it could help to boost the UK economy by more than £100bn.

Fairbairn is also set to call for more support for Britain’s medium-sized businesses (MSBs) at the CBI’s MSB Summit to help them be more productive and improve the UK’s economic growth.

Recommendations

As part of its aim to encourage businesses to boost productivity, the CBI has released a report entitled “Be more magpie”. The report offers guidance to MSBs, advising them on how to behave more like magpies by finding and adopting technologies to boost productivity, rather than taking the ostrich approach and sticking to what they know.

The study sets out five recommendations to help businesses adopt a magpie approach, with firms being advised to diagnose problems and opportunities, engage their suppliers, be cautious about customisation, involve their people and tap into other networks.

The CBI states that if more businesses in the UK behaved like magpies and searched for ways to improve, then this could help to boost productivity and drive the UK’s future economic success.

Transformational

Commenting on the importance of more businesses adopting a magpie approach, Fairbairn said: “If we had more, it would be transformational for our economy. They’d not only be able to focus more on their core business, they could save hundreds of hours in admin and collectively, deliver a £100bn plus uplift to the UK economy.”