CMI (Chartered Management Institute) is today calling on political parties to put improving the quality of management and leadership in Britain higher up the agenda in the next Parliament.
CMI is encouraging politicians, employers, managers and leaders to join over 3,000 of their colleagues who have already pledged their support to its Manifesto for a Better Managed Britain by signing up at www.managers.org.uk/manifesto.
Ruth Spellman, chief executive of the Chartered Management Institute, said: “Britain is suffering because our managers and leaders are simply not up to scratch. It’s clear that turning the present economic situation around is going to be the battleground on which this election is won and lost. But the parties are missing a trick by not tackling the dearth of management skills which are harming UK plc. Without investment in effective management and leadership in the UK , we are in danger of lurching from crisis to crisis.
“Since we launched our Manifesto to the three main political parties in November we secured a great level of cross-party support, with MPs including former Minister for Women and Equality, Meg Munn MP, John Hayes MP, Conservative Shadow Minister for Universities and Skills and Liberal Democrat Shadow Secretary of State for Business, John Thurso MP signing up to our pledges. We’ve also recruited heavy-hitters from the business world, including PriceWaterhouseCoopers and SimplyHealth. But we want to take this further.Now is the time to stand up and be counted – we need to put pressure on political parties to understand the impact bad management is having on the UK’s profitability and the huge part they have to play in addressing the issue.”
CMI research conducted in November showed that 47 per cent of the UK workforce have left a job due to bad management, while a similar number (49 per cent) said they would take a pay cut to work with a better manager. Following extensive consultation with the 85,000 managers, leaders and employers it represents, CMI then launched its Manifesto for a Better Managed Britain – www.managers.org.uk/manifesto – which sets out six pledges, two each for managers, employers and Government, with the aim of bringing about urgent action to improve management standards and pushing the development of management and leadership skills higher up the national agenda.
Ruth Spellman added: “Improving management and leadership standards is critical to the UK’s economic and social future, and is one of the most significant issues facing UK plc today. The views of the business community will help determine the outcome of the forthcoming election and business leaders have made it clear that improving management and leadership standards and tackling the skills gap has to be a national priority. The shared promise by all three political parties to boost the skills of the British workforce is meaningless unless action is taken to improve management standards.”
Ruth continued: “Only 1 in 5 managers hold any type of professional qualification and managers are no longer regarded as professional, competent or accountable. We cannot allow our three main political parties to lose sight of the need to act now to tackle these inadequacies. By securing candidates’ support for our Manifesto, we will ensure that the next Government realises the issues and what needs to be done to address them as soon as they are in place. The most recent National Strategic Skills Audit estimated that we will need 2,2 million new managers by 2017 so, whatever the outcome of the upcoming election, there is a huge amount to be done in terms of ensuring we can not only recruit and develop these new managers, but also upskill the current generation so the next one is learning from the best.”