What has big business ever done for us?

It’s an understandable question if you’re the owner of a small or medium-sized UK business. You may be reluctantly reliant on big corporates to run your business, have them as customers or be in direct competition.

Either way, you probably don’t often think of them as friends and allies.

But we have good news, because many SMEs are genuinely benefiting from the actions of big business. How so?

Be the Business is a small, not-for-profit organisation with a big mission: to raise productivity in the UK. We want to help SMEs get stronger, fitter, prouder and fiercely competitive. But we can’t do it alone. Our approach is to share and spread expertise, knowledge and learning a little more evenly across the business landscape. So we’ve been asking the big corporates to chip in.

And it’s working.

The reason it’s working because it’s not simply a case of asking big business to throw money at a problem (although the financial contributions to Be the Business do help a lot). Our focus is on getting the support of bigger businesses in key practical areas like:

• Providing experienced mentors to help SMEs
• Sponsoring SME leadership programmes
• Other help easing operational costs

So why are big businesses helping?

There are many reasons for leading businesses in the UK to take part and support SMEs. Many of you will be in their supply chains, so it’s in everyone’s interest to achieve efficiencies, improve performance, better customer experiences and stronger relationships.

But, most importantly, productivity is now high on the agenda. Far from an abstract concept from dusty economics textbooks, it’s a real-life problem. It has experts, policymakers and business leaders puzzled, concerned and determined to find solutions. Productivity is critical to the economic health of our country. On a more local level, productivity, or improving it, should mean working fewer hours, taking home more money and altogether a better living standard for all.

And who’s going to argue with that?

So we can all agree, productivity needs a strong kick up the proverbial.

Take Lloyds Banking Group as an example

Lloyds Banking Group are one of our many corporate partners and are offering an awesome package of support to SMEs. Lord Blackwell, chairman at Lloyds Banking Group, said: “Productivity is critical to the UK’s economic performance, so it is important we support the mission of Be the Business, using our combined strengths and resources to help drive productivity improvements. For its part, Lloyds Banking Group is committed to using its strong relationships with businesses of all sizes to assist them in addressing their individual opportunities for productivity growth, tapping into the wealth of skills, research and support available to them.”

“Productivity is critical to the UK’s economic performance, so it is important we support the mission of Be the Business, using our combined strengths and resources to help drive productivity improvements”. Lord Blackwell, chairman, Lloyds Banking Group

But what does this mean in practice?

Lloyds Banking Group has made a major commitment to a multi-year programme of action. It will allow us to develop and deliver productivity improvement programmes for SMEs across the UK. It has also offering a reduced rate lending to SMEs investing in their productivity.

BAE Systems has been a leader with Be the Business since the start. It helped us design executive education programmes and has funded a development programme for SME suppliers. For the engineering firm, it means management excellence throughout the supply chain.

And, in the words of Sir Roger Carr, chairman of BAE Systems, here’s why: “BAE Systems is a founder member of Be the Business, and instrumental in developing ‘Productivity through People’, an executive education programme designed specifically for SME leaders. We are proud to be an integral part of Be the Business’s mission of helping every firm to be match fit to succeed.”

“The UK economy is an ecosystem and, by helping to improve the productivity of individual companies in our supply chain, we will make a real contribution to both the security and prosperity agenda of the United Kingdom.” Sir Roger Carr, chairman, BAE Systems.

Who else is helping so far?

Lloyds Banking Group and BAE Systems are far from alone in making a significant contribution of support. Further corporates contributing time, resources and expertise include Accenture, Amazon, Aviva, British Land, Cisco, Deloitte, EY, Grant Thornton, KPMG, GSK, John Lewis Partnership, Landsec, McKinsey & Co, Moneypenny, News UK, Rolls-Royce, Salesforce, Santander, Severn Trent and Siemens.

How are they helping?

Each of these businesses has committed to helping develop the next generation of UK business leaders by encouraging senior executives to become mentors for leaders of high potential SMEs. Many of them are sponsoring and subsidising our professional leadership courses, workshops and masterclasses. Others are leading productivity initiatives and driving forward innovative productivity tools such as the Productivity Index in collaboration with Cisco.

What can they tell us we don’t already know?

Many of the leading partners we have, such as EY and Deloitte, are supplying specialist expertise in complex areas such as technology adoption, cyber security and access to efficiency-boosting digital products. We also have sector, operation and region-specific contributions being made by our partners. This includes:

• Landsec, which is committed to delivering productivity improvements in the construction sector
• A Rolls-Royce focus on manufacturing excellence
• Moneypenny’s commitment to helping SMEs through using its experience of positive employee engagement
• Media channels like News UK, which are spreading the great work we and our corporate partners are doing

SMEs are already seeing positive results

For the thousands of SMEs in our network so far, this additional support and insight is proving invaluable. It’s enabling SME leaders to find their way through challenges, reshape their business strategy, adopt and embrace efficiency-driving technology, build more motivated workforces and develop leadership skills.

We paired Liz Smith, owner of LG Davis, a successful Birmingham-based family-run printing company, with a mentor from GSK, David Low. Having a mentor with the experience and insight of David enabled Liz to focus on the innovations to business operations needed to become more successful. In stepping off the “hamster wheel” of running the business and working in partnership with David’s guidance, issues were identified and resolved, changes made, and new targets set.

“We have had our best year for over 10 years. We achieved last year’s turnover in 11 months. We have also been able to buy another little niche business this month through improved profitability, which will further enhance LG Davis’’. Liz Smith, LG Davis

Paul Wenham is MD of Geometric Manufacturing. He employs 30 people in Tewkesbury and attended our Productivity through People programme. Trading through the recession meant finding more productive ways of working, like bringing in more efficient stock management and updating technology and machinery. Attending Productivity through People also highlighted the importance of communication and leadership.

“It’s clear that being more productive brings immediate rewards. By installing new machinery, updating our software and working with the staff to find ways to work smarter, we have managed to improve our performance’’. Paul Wenham, Geometric Manufacturing

Mark Holden is a company director at Inn Cornwall. He is also a productivity leader in our Collaborative Networks for Hospitality and Tourism programme. Mark implemented small, but high impact, changes across the business – raising productivity and performance. He motivated and empowered his people with improved career development, incentivising bonuses and better communication of company goals and successes.

“We now constantly evaluate our business through regular mystery shopper visits, external stock takes, training, reviews and feedback. We don’t always get it right – sometimes things need to go wrong to do things better, but we fix problems and make improvements quickly”. Mark Holden, Inn Cornwall

Big business is doing a lot for us. And for you.

To find out more about how we’re rallying big business to our cause, watch this video.

You can also find out more about our corporate partners in this press release.