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Business giants team up to boost supply chain productivity

A group of 23 major companies including BAE Systems, GSK, Rolls-Royce and Siemens have joined a campaign to help their suppliers and other SMEs to boost their competitiveness.

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The Business Leadership for a Better Decade campaign, launched by productivity-led movement Be the Business, aims to build partnerships with the UK’s biggest companies to turbocharge competitiveness in every region and every sector of the economy.

So far 23 companies have joined the call, each making different commitments, from supporting mentoring, management and leadership programmes for SMEs to developing tools to boost the adoption of technology.

BAE Systems is extending its support through the Productivity Through People programme, committing to help develop the next generation of business leaders in the supply chain by encouraging senior executives to become mentors.

GSK has seconded executives directly to Be the Business to help scale-up the Mentoring for Growth programme and help SMEs all around the country to access strategic guidance from experienced business leaders.

Rolls-Royce is also supporting the mentoring programme, as well as agreeing to provide outstanding IP on manufacturing productivity to the SME community.

Meanwhile, McKinsey & Company has committed to scale-up its provision of mentors to help SMEs become more technologically-enabled.

Sir Charlie Mayfield, Chairman for Be the Business and John Lewis Partnership, said:

“Productivity matters. No growth for over ten years means people are poorer and the UK is weaker, competitively, than we should be. We want to change that and we know it can be done. We’re stepping up, as businesses, to support a movement across the UK. With this support we will work with businesses, with sectors and in places right across the country to build a better decade.”

Sir Charlie Mayfield (R) and Tony Danker (L) open Business Leadership for a Better Decade. Credit: Be the Business

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