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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

"Bored stiff" on the dropped phone Wordle 🤣

Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Resolution Foundation @resolutionfoundation.org · 09/02/2026

Slowing dynamism is a key culprit in slowing productivity growth. One standard measure of dynamism is job churn - this mostly fell in the UK in the two decades before the pandemic. Jobs lost to exiting firms in 2024 were the highest since 2011, but other components of job reallocation remain weak.

Figure 8 shows one standard measure of dynamism known as job churn, which sums up
employment growth in new and growing firms and employment losses in shrinking or
closing firms. When churn is high, firms are growing and shrinking rapidly. Churn mostly
fell in the UK in the two decades before the pandemic, as it did around the world.

Churn has been broadly flat over the past decade, having fallen markedly in the decade
before that. But a close look at Figure 8 reveals that job destruction among exiting firms
picked up in 2024 to its fastest rate since 2011. This is not a turnaround by any means,
and is offset by lower destruction among incumbent firms, but it is a ‘green shoot’ of
improvement to the supply side of the economy.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/02/2026

Love the Wernham Hogg "Swindon lot" sponsor in the background 😂

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Tera Allas CBE @teraallas.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

Fascinating new analysis by the ONS on UK #business #dynamism and #productivity. Firms employing a third of workers in the non-financial business economy contributed negatively, and the next third only marginally, to productivity #growth. Full ONS analysis: bit.ly/48Yhqqn

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

As today's National Statistical blog explains, our microdata work supports the ONS Plan for Economic Statistics. Linked Employer-Employee Data will support quality improvement in labour market statistics, and deepen our understanding of economic dynamism. blog.ons.gov.uk/2025/12/08/h...

blog.ons.gov.uk

How firm-level data improves our understanding of productivity

For a few years now the ONS has been going beyond its traditional measures of productivity to look at how individual firms are performing. In this blog Sumit Dey-Chowdhury explains how these data, upd

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

In 2023 and 2024, net job creation was entirely due to incumbent firms expanding their workforces. This contrasts with most of the period since the global financial crisis, where the majority of net job creation came from entering firms creating more jobs than exiting firms destroyed.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

This year we have introduced analysis of business dynamism by industry, showing that although dynamism is lower in every industry than in 2001, there is variation in the levels and recent trends.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

The latest year's statistics continue the longer term trends: - business dynamism that is lower than 20 years ago - productivity growing faster for the most productive firms than the median - average markups the joint highest since our series began.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

Today we published our annual bulletin Trends in UK business dynamism and productivity: www.ons.gov.uk/economy/econ... To help users explore the rich detail in the business dynamism statistics, we are also piloting an interactive dashboard: ons-dynamism.shinyapps.io/lbd_dashboar...

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

ESCoE @escoeorg.bsky.social · 14/08/2025

It's well-established that UK firms engaged in international trade are more productive, but why? New analysis from @christinavpalmou.bsky.social and Kyle Jones (ONS) offers new evidence: tinyurl.com/5c9mazpa

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/07/2025

The ones that always annoy me are along the lines of "£70 a year...that's only 20p a day!" That always sounds more significant to me than the annual cost, not less!

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

We will deposit these surveys on the Secure Research Service, and hope that researchers will link the microdata more widely and uncover further insights. PSMPS was funded by the Public Services Productivity Review. Many thanks to my team and previous work by collaborators at @escoeorg.bsky.social

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

For example, researchers could apply their own judgement to whether limited financial incentives in the public sector reflect weaker management practices, or are appropriate to the nature of the work in that sector. Differences in characteristics, such as size, might also affect comparisons.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

It is worth reflecting on the trade-offs of applying the same management practices standards to public and private sectors. It is helpful to be able to compare results directly, but different organisational characteristics and cultures might affect how questions are interpreted.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

We also asked about average days worked from home by managers and non-managers. In all subsectors, managers were at least as likely as non-managers to use hybrid work, and in most cases were more likely. Average management practice scores were usually higher in organisations that use hybrid working.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

Scores on underperformance were strongly influenced by the proportion of organisations that reported having no underperformance. These scored zero under our scoring metric, because we assume that all organisations must have some examples of underperforming staff.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

While the public sector generally scored well on KPIs, Targets scored similarly to the private sector, with the lack of financial incentives for achieving targets reducing public sector scores. Despite prior question testing, the concept of KPIs was not consistently understood across subsectors.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

Given the pilot nature of the PSMPS and the diversity of subsectors, it is worthwhile looking at the responses in more detail. Responses on Employment Practices were more likely to score highly across most of the public sector, but in Education the lack of promotions lowered the score.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

There are similarities and differences between and with the sectors. The mean management practice scores were close: 0.56 for the public sector and 0.55 for the private sector. But the spread was wider in the private sector, where firms were more likely to receive the highest or lowest scores.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

We combined the 2023 Management and Expectations Survey (MES) with our pilot 2023 Public Sector Management Practices Survey (PSMPS). We kept scoring management practices questions in the PSMPS identical to MES to allow direct comparison. More info on MES methods here: www.ons.gov.uk/economy/econ...

ons.gov.uk

Management practices in the UK QMI - Office for National Statistics

Quality and methodology information for the Management and Expectations Survey (MES), including strengths and limitations of the data, recent corrections, methods, and data uses and users.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

On 22 April we published new analysis comparing management practices in the public and private sectors. Previous research shows that good management practices are linked to higher productivity and other positive outcomes for organisations. www.ons.gov.uk/economy/econ...

ons.gov.uk

Public and private sectors in the UK, comparisons of management practices - Office for National Statistics

An analysis of structured management practices and organisational characteristics, as reported in 2023 across the public and private sectors in the UK.

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

ESCoE @escoeorg.bsky.social · 22/05/2025

Another busy room for this panel on trade and productivity in British firms with @grantfitzner.bsky.social, @christinavpalmou.bsky.social, Swati Dhingra, Gregory Thwaites, Mairi Spowage and @sophie-piton.bsky.social. #EconStats2025

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Jakob Schneebacher @jschneebacher.bsky.social · 09/04/2025

The UK will soon have a new industrial strategy. What can we learn from past policies, and from examining the sectors in the government's recent green paper? Our new CMA report looks at the data. www.gov.uk/government/publications/… 1/

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

The article and data pack contain more results on uses of AI, barriers to adoption, and the relationship with productivity. Please let us know if you have feedback on the analysis. The dataset will be available to accredited researchers in the Secure Research Service. www.ons.gov.uk/economy/econ...

ons.gov.uk

Management practices and the adoption of technology and artificial intelligence in UK firms - Office for National Statistics

Investigating how technology adoption and use of artificial intelligence by businesses vary with management practices.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

By linking waves of the Business Insights and Conditions Survey in 2024 onto MES 2023, we also found that among firms who hadn't adopted AI in 2023 but said they planned to in 2024, the firms with stronger management practices were more likely to follow through on those plans.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

The positive relationship between management practices quality and technology adoption remained after controlling for other business characteristics such as size and industry.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

Firms with higher management practice scores were more likely to adopt advanced technologies. 20% of firms in the top tenth of firms by management practices quality used AI in their methods or processes in 2023, compared to 2% of firms in the lowest tenth.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

Conditional adoption rates give clues about which advanced technologies might be required or complementary to adopting others. 91% of the firms using AI in 2023 also used cloud-based computing systems and applications, and 83% of the firms using AI also used specialised equipment.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

This looks into what supporting investments are needed for businesses to adopt AI, including good quality structured management practices, and complementary technologies. This is important for understanding potential barriers to diffusion of AI to firms throughout the productivity distribution.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

Today we published further analysis of the Management and Expectations Survey 2023, focusing on the relationship between management practices and the adoption of technology and artificial intelligence: www.ons.gov.uk/economy/econ... #econsky

ons.gov.uk

Management practices and the adoption of technology and artificial intelligence in UK firms - Office for National Statistics

Investigating how technology adoption and use of artificial intelligence by businesses vary with management practices.

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

ESCoE @escoeorg.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

At tonight’s #NationalProductivityWeek event with @productivity.bsky.social and @resmedia.bsky.social we’ve have presentations from ONS, TPI, Scaleup Institute and CBI.

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Giles Wilkes @gilesyb.bsky.social · 11/12/2024

My first big blog of the BlueSky era! Examining the multiple claims (found in @financialtimes.com and elsewhere) that Tech sector success is the main factor in US outperformance ... The answer is: it's not that simple freethinkecon.wordpress.com/2024/12/11/u... Thread later, maybe tomorrow

freethinkecon.wordpress.com

US outperformance isn’t *all* about Tech

Failure brings some benefits. UK growth and productivity performance over the past 15 years has been *so* dire that an economy, formerly facing the challenges of being at the Frontier, is instead i…

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Jakob Schneebacher @jschneebacher.bsky.social · 09/12/2024

The UK Longitudinal Business Database allows any accredited researcher in the ONS Secure Research Service to track the near-universe of UK firms at quarterly frequency and to link them to other administrative and survey data sources. I have written about it here. #EconSky

escoe.ac.uk

The UK Longitudinal Business Database – What it is, what it can do, and why we need it - ESCoE

JAKOB SCHNEEBACHER How quickly does firm entry and exit respond to changes in the economy? […]

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

ESCoE @escoeorg.bsky.social · 09/12/2024

ONS has also just published a new report on business dynamism. tinyurl.com/4w5ku5xk Great to see an ESCoE technical report on the UK Longitudinal Business Database referenced in this ➡️ tinyurl.com/mwr79n3p

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Tera Allas CBE @teraallas.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

Enjoyed being on the panel on the ONS's analysis of #business #dynamism (bit.ly/41mctVf ). Needs attention if we want #productivity #growth. One example: the 50% of firms in the bottom half of productivity distribution contributed almost nothing to productivity growth in the last 20+ years.

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

ESCoE @escoeorg.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

Great to see ESCoE work referenced at an ONS and Department for Business and Trade event on business dynamism today.

Photo shows a speaker from ONS and slides.

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Dan Mawson @diepingu.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

Really good ONS / DBT event today on business dynamism - how the UK is doing (not great) and what can we do about it.

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Reposted by Tom Wickersham

Josh Martin @joshmartinecon.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

I'm at ONS & Department for Business and Trade event this morning in business dynamism, #productivity and growth. First, @twickersham.bsky.social describes new ONS work on dynamism and firm-level productivity. Most of the productivity slowdown post-GFC due to the middle of the firm distribution.

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Yannis Galanakis @yannisgalanakis.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

@twickersham.bsky.social gave an amazing presentation this morning at the 'Stimulating UK economic growth through dynamism' featuring our dashboard data

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Jakob Schneebacher @jschneebacher.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

The ONS today published its latest productivity and business dynamism bulletin. Headline figures: no change year-on-year to average markups, job reallocation or the overall labour productivity distribution. www.ons.gov.uk/economy/econ... 1/

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Tera Allas CBE @teraallas.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

Fascinating ONS analysis on business dynamism and productivity (bit.ly/41mctVf ). The UK suffers from a 'big bulge' of below-average firms: >70% of employees work in firms with productivity below the mean. Also, older, large firms and micro, new firms key to job creation. #dataisbeautiful

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Yannis Galanakis @yannisgalanakis.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

Anthony Savagar and I are working on a *real-time* #BusinessDynamism project In our dashboard we visualise the entry and exit of UK-registered companies: asavagar.shinyapps.io/BusinessDyna... Soon a working paper is coming

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

If you want to dive deeper into these trends, we publish detailed statistical tables alongside the bulletin. The Longitudinal Business Database microdata is available to accredited researchers on the Secure Research Service and Integrated Data Service.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

There was a small increase in job destruction from firm exits in 2023 compared to 2022, but this was offset by a small decline in job creation from new firm entry.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

Business dynamism should support growth, as more productive businesses expand while less productive ones shrink or close. We measure dynamism as the proportion of jobs created or destroyed each year: added together they give the reallocation rate, which is lower since the financial crisis.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

Our estimate of mean cost markups, a measure of market power, was 1.27 in 2022. This is unchanged from 2021 but the joint-highest since the start of our series in 1997. Over that period, there is a trend of increasing dispersion, with the highest markups increasing the fastest.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

Longer term, increasing dispersion in firm-level productivity means that the UK has been increasingly reliant on its 'frontier' firms to drive overall productivity growth since the financial crisis.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

Workers in firms at the 90th percentile of labour productivity produced 3.59 times as much output as workers in median productivity firms in 2022.

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Tom Wickersham @twickersham.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

2022 data for firm-level markups and productivity show how these measures looked after the Covid-19 pandemic. These statistics come from business survey sources, so are unaffected by the Labour Force Survey.

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