Hertfordshire Business Productivity Survey - Interim Report

The Hertfordshire Business Productivity Study was commissioned by the hertfordshire LEP and hertfordshire Growth Hub for the explicit reason to collect an understanding of the current challenges of Hertfordshire businesses challenges around improving turnover and productivity.

Business survey focused on the key challenges impacting on Hertfordshire businesses' productivity performance.

• Fifty per cent of Hertfordshire businesses reported an increase growth in the last financial year. Forty-four per cent had approximately the same turnover and 16 per cent had a fall in turnover.
• Fifty-seven per cent of businesses expected turnover to increase in the next twelve months, 35 per cent thought it remain approximately the same turnover and 8 per cent thought it would be lower.
• Thirty-nine per cent of businesses employed more people than 12 months previously. Forty-none per cent employed the same number and 13 per cent employed fewer.
• Over sixty per cent of businesses had introduced new or significantly improved, goods, services or processes in the last year. Information, communications and technology (80 per cent) were almost twice as likely to introduce a new or significantly improved goods/services/processes than high-end logistics and retail businesses (47 per cent).
• Thirty-two per cent of businesses had a training budget for their staff, and 29 per cent for their managers/leaders in the last year. Thirty per cent expected to have a staff training budget, and 27 per cent a manager training budget for the next year.
• The most commonly cited constraints on business, having a medium-to-very high impact on business performance were lack of skilled labour (31 per cent), regulations and red tape (31 per cent), high cost of labour (23 per cent) and business rates (23 per cent).
• Financial information was sought by professional/financial/technical service businesses (41 per cent), arts/entertainment/recreation business services (42 per cent), manufacturing/advanced engineering businesses (39 per cent) and construction/built environment businesses in the last year.
• In the next three years businesses identified increasing skills of their workforce as having the most impact on increasing turnover (59 per cent), contributing towards business growth (56 per cent), and increasing overall productivity (67 per cent).