Budget Pressure, Productivity Crisis: My Take on the Real Problem

In this week’s blog I really wanted to take the time to talk about the problems we're facing with finances in relation to all the current news on the budget, after the Chancellors pre-budget speech.

If we look in regard to hospitality; There’s costs everywhere… but the real killer is productivity and a culture that’s “quietly talked us out of graft”.

Ten years ago, pre-pandemic, one “switched-on” server could look after 20–30 people.

Today…. too often you now need two, to do the same job to the same standard.

Did we flog people back then? Certainly not. People simply worked faster, with focus and more pride. And here’s the blunt reality:                                                         

If effort or hard work per person drops, prices go up or profit dies.

You know, I was just saying to someone the other day, we're now charging eight, nine pounds for a starter, which, again, pre pandemic, was four or five quid.

I mean, you're talking double the numbers, and we still can't make profit with those types of numbers right now, due to rising costs…and productivity.

Productivity is down, and productivity is basically the need of everyday people working a little bit harder, doing a little bit more, and that ultimately is our big crisis in this country.

When did we start treating hard work like a problem to be solved, instead of a muscle needing to be built up?

If you go back to the 50s the 60s, people worked hard. They were in bloody coal mines. They literally earned their living as such. Then as we got into the 80s, 90s we started to get excited about tech, globalisation, and smarter working, taking the foot off the gas a little, fast forward to the 2000s and oh, I shouldn't be working this hard, my Tech makes me so efficient or I can get it cheaper from Asia.

There will be days during your career where you go;

“F@*king hell, this is hard graft. Bloody hell, I don't want to do this anymore”

But you know what…. Without that sacrifice, without that hard work, I can tell you now you won't have the successes you desire.

And until we start telling our kids that and stop babying them and stop making them pretend that the world is bloody perfect, we are going to continue this painful run of poor results and poor work ethic.

Have I always done it right? No. I’ve gone bust. It’s horrific. It empties your stomach and your bank account. But it teaches you, and I work ten times harder now, because I don’t want to go there again.

Could it still happen? Who knows for sure, but I do everything I can each day to ensure it shouldn’t through hard graft. The world isn’t fair. You put money in your pocket by creating value and working for it. In the rain, when the boiler packs in, when the six turns up as nine with allergies and a buggy and you’re already a runner down. That’s the job. And weirdly, that’s why I love it.

So, where does politics land in all this chat?

Truth: we can argue red, blue, purple till we’re hoarse, but we still must open the doors each day and make the payroll on Friday.

Brexit? We voted for it, Crickey at the time I voted for it. Would I change that vote now? Yes, have I lived and learnt my lessons thru the consequences? Yes, but I didn’t look for the facts and like 52% of other people in the country, we have to understand we live in a democracy and also mistakes are made and it will cost us in some ways.

Covid pandemic? No one wanted it. Every government threw money at furlough to stop the roof caving in, so of course the national debt ballooned. It wouldn’t have mattered who was in power, but the Tories had it on their watch and subsequently get the grief, even though overall they weathered the storm.

Can we criticize the Tories for PPE scandals and all this type of stuff? Of course we can. I think it was disgraceful. And somebody should be held accountable for things like that.

Let's be honest, no matter who was in, Reform, Labor, Conservatives, I think we all know that type of thing probably would have happened under anyone's watch.

I think we have to understand where the country is at and push forward.

So, going back to what I was saying previously, the drama and the problem here is productivity, and productivity is down to our education system and the way the media is reacting. Overall our wokeness and our communication across so many platforms is an issue.

We need to work harder. We need to educate our people that you can't sponge off the state. We need to educate our people that, yes, life is hard and I'm not talking about hard in relation to, “oh - I don't have Netflix” or “I can’t get the pub until Friday when I get paid”.   

Ultimately: What we tolerate is what we teach!

And what do we tell our kids? Should life always be soft and curated? Or that hospitality is a brilliant, honest career where you’ll learn more in six months of real service than in six years of scrolling, if you turn up, listen, and push yourself?

We should be in schools saying exactly that: this job isn’t easy, and that’s why it’s rewarding. People, pace, pressure, pride.

So here’s my ask; with all the budget noise swirling;

Government: if you’re going to take more, at least make it easier to hire, train and invest, then get out of the way.

Owners: stop accepting two people are needed for a one-person task.

Managers: coach on the floor, in the moment, show and mentor change/pride/effort.

Teams: choose to be counted, show up with pace and pride and watch how quickly your value climbs.

We won’t spreadsheet or tax-tweak our way out of a productivity hole.

We climb out, together, with straighter talk, smarter systems, and the courage to work hard again.