PRIME Initiative

I grew up in a household where every time someone complained about something, my father said “Well why don’t you do something about it?”.  The “it” in the question was usually something as minor as third-world poverty or nuclear disarmament.
 
So having worked as a supplier in the business support sector for the last 18 years, I could not resist getting involved in the discussion sparked by Doug Richard’s provocative Enterprise Manifesto.
 
It’s easy to slag off the existing business support system. Indeed, that’s what we in the UK have a habit of doing. We moan. Then the politicians beat their chests and spend lots of taxpayers money creating a marvellous new approach, then we go round the loop again.

The old hands of the business-support industry label this “The Three Cs” ….. meaning that you expensively close the old organisation, then open up a new organisation across the road, rehiring the same staff but buying new Carpets, Curtains and Computers each time.
 
So what would I do if I was in charge?
 
Here are a three ideas:
 

1. Move to three UK providers.

At the moment, England puts most of its investment into one monolithic system: Business Link. This, like the UK’s education system, is in a state of constant change. Business Link was originally split into 82 units, each of which invented its own business-support systems (commissioning unique software, etc). Once these 82 were running smoothly, the 82 were scrapped in favour of nine units, with nine different systems this time, all run “by the private sector” (i.e. by short-term contractors) but all answering to one central set of objectives and metrics.

Meanwhile Wales and Scotland have each invented their own systems for business support, and have similarly changed these countless times.

This tinkering will never cease, because Soviet-style central planning will always lead to disappointment and yet another attempt at a new central plan by the next politician in charge.
 
Now ask yourself, why are the UK supermarkets so brilliant at giving the customer what the customer wants? It is because Tesco, Sainsburys and Asda compete to win customers. They find out what customers really want, then provide it cost-effectively to every town in the UK. (Hmmn, I can sense some readers’ hackles rising as I write this bit… )
 
We need a similar set-up in business support. I can imagine three or four companies (such as Serco and Exemplas) becoming superb as a result of such intense national competition. Rather then creating regional monopolies, we need a handful of national competitors which are rewarded in line with their success. How would I measure success? No room to explain it all here, but I believe that we could come up with a better system than the current one.
 

2. Mandate these big providers to use small suppliers

I never cease to be bowled over by the dynamism of the small business sector. These guys are truly hungry! The same goes for some of the smaller charities. It’s often a case of delivering excellent service or having no job next year.
 
And while public sector procurement is hugely biased in favour of (low risk) large suppliers, private sector procurement is far more open to small businesses.
 
When I think of training courses, or mentoring programmes, or websites , or online tools, or back-office systems, I can  always think of a small supplier who would be excellent… especially if they were given the chance to supply a national organisation (as proposed above) over a long period of time.
 
In fact I can imagine both the national business support providers and their small suppliers becoming world class, and supplying overseas customers, just as our private schools and leading universities educate students from around the world.
 

3. Encourage online suppliers

I count myself very lucky, as my company is one of the two main publishers behind the business advice on the massively successful www.businesslink.gov.uk website.
 
But this website leaves precious little room in the marketplace for the private sector websites. I think it should proactively partner with the private sector and I would include our own specialist websites in the list www.startupdonut.co.uk, www.marketingdonut.co.uk and www.lawdonut.co.uk.
 

Rory MccGwire is founder and Chief Executive of BHP Information Solutions.

If you are as interested as I am in the whole issue of how best to organise this country’s business support, you may also be interested in my blogs on this theme on the Startup Donut website:

Business regulation

Have your say! Business support – Part 1

Have your say! Business support – Part 2

Have your say! Business support – Part 3