France takes the summer off.  many factories close down for a month while workers holiday en masse. Other European countries also take longer holidays than the UK. Yet the productivity of these countries is higher. Can anyone explain this - it is intuitive. I have voiced my doubts about the way we measure national productivity

A few of my recent posts have related to U K productivity and challenges.  This is not because the UK faces more challenges than anyone else (though Brexit is  causing some fears). The UK is going through a 'bad patch' but is at least trying to do something about it with new committees and task

f your employees were fighting in factions, arguing among themselves and failing to do what you expect them to do, would you continue to pay them?  You might - but presumably you would also initiate disciplinary procedures to try to correct such behaviours. I suspect, though, that your answer to the question is that you

UK productivity in the first quarter of 2017 was the same as it was in 2007.  This  after relentless if sometimes slow growth over many years.So, not only have we not had the bounce i refereed to last week; we seem to have had a capsize and a sinking. Successive governments seem to be powerless

The Office for National Statistics says that, had productivity in the UK returned to its pre-recession trend, it would be 20% higher than its current level. Britain would be one fifth better off. The normal pattern is that after a recession, productivity bounces back and we recover (at least most of) what we lost. However, we have

Canada's labour productivity rose 1.4% in Q1 2017. This is not a spectacular result but a solid performance. Sometimes, slow and steady progress is preferable to high gain, fall-back performance.  (Think 'tortoise and hare'.) This is exactly why continuous improvement programmes, resulting in a number of evolutionary performance gains, often beat the occasional revolutionary improvement

We have been told a few times that what creates success is sheer hard work... the perspiration not the inspiration, and the 10,000 hours.  But many great men (and women) have achieved their greatness by original thought  by avoiding the 10,000 (wasted)  hours. it seems that both routes might take you to success - and

I try to keep up to date with productivity trends and productivity news. In scanning the airwaves and the twittersphere, I often see governments urging their citizens to be more productive. At least in religions when people are urged to be more 'holy' there are priests and other religious leaders helping prepare them to be

In the UK, we have been through a rather exciting General Election - though as I write this, we have the same government and the same Prime Minister. In their campaigns, all parties made us promises - of what they would do and deliver - better health care, more jobs, lower taxes, etc. How would

Many nations have realised that the only true long-term key to economic growth is productivity improvement. The problem is that this realisation is often the end, rather than the start, of the matter.  Governments and their agencies exhort commerce - and perhaps even the population - to improve productivity and to compete - but without