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TOO MANY IRISH small- and medium-sized businesses are falling over because managers don’t have proper training in how to run their operations.
But a lack of time, money and interest in education are all turning owner-operators off improving their skills, small business groups have said.
As part of TheJournal.ie’s focus on education in the small- and medium-enterprise (SME) sector this month, we look at how business owners stack up in the classroom and ask readers what they think is the best way to learn about running your own operation.
SMEs accounted for nearly 70% of private-sector workers in Ireland and just over half all business turnover in 2011, and the segment has been identified as a key to building a sustainable recovery.
Where we at?
In early 2010 the Management Development Council recommended a national system for management training be put in place to boost productivity, competitiveness and innovation among SMEs.
It forecast that teaching the bottom half of Irish businesses better management skills could improve the economy by up to €2.5 billion just in the manufacturing sector.
But the council said management skills in Irish SMEs currently lagged significantly behind those in most European countries and in the US.
Time to focus, people
Small Firms Association director Patricia Callan said the council’s plans were shelved due to a lack of funds, but even when money was being invested in SME training it was often in the wrong subjects or geographical regions.
“We have always said that we need to focus on the owner-managers themselves; people don’t take the time out to learn about good management practices,” she said.
“It’s always an issue but it tends to be the fifth or sixth issue talked about – I think it should be a central plank.”
An IBEC survey last year found just over a quarter of businesses with less than 50 employees had formal training plans in place – the lowest share for any company size.
Many SMEs not keen to learn, until they see the benefits
Irish Small and Medium Enterprises Association (ISME) chief executive Mark Fielding said many SME owners and managers were reluctant to invest in management training, but once they saw what it did for their business they become converts.
“It’s difficult for many small businesses to see the return on investment for them, but when they do it you will find that over the following five or six years their staff will be trained as well,” he said.
ISME has said the government should be training future entrepreneurs in the basics of business before high school and more students should be encouraged to start their own company rather than just looking for a job.
“The best way to approach it is to go in very, very young and start at a primary-school level … but our (country’s) idea of entrepreneurial training is to wait until they are in their fifth year and give them one module on business,” Fielding said.
But it’s expensive, this education business
The most recent annual report on the cost of doing business in Ireland found the cost of education was high and the problem was one of the barriers to the country being more competitive in the international market.
Education costs had gone up 92% between 2001 and 2013, although the figures include schooling and training at all levels.
What about mentoring then?
Meanwhile, a parliamentary report last year found mentoring was the “most important soft support” the government could back to help SMEs and it had the power to make the difference between success and failure for some businesses.
It recommended setting up a national organisation to oversee mentoring for SMEs after recognising there were problems finding mentors with actual entrepreneurial experience and with properly keeping checks on their performance.
Have your say
What is the best way to learn about how to run a business well?
READ: What I learned: striving for the paperless classroom
READ: The Big Idea: The Dublin education company building a global audience of 1 million students
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He was cought with a hooker 21 years ago. You d swear it as murder
Eddie Murphy had a worse scandal…
Divine Brown also shook it off and took it on the chin.
On the chin???
Yes, we need the Communications experts to teach us how to fake contrition.
Very few politicians or powerful peole ever admit error or mistakes.
sometimes you just need to come out and say “yes, we were wrong and it was wrong to bully people”. we are still waiting, communications clinic, but in the meanwhile, let’s brush it under the carpet and get all this work with thejournal and today fm. remember, eoghan – don’t be the story, and don’t be blatantly hypocritical.
Didn’t do Liz Hurleys ‘career’ any harm either….
Let me guess he’s playing a socially awkward love struck loner in the new film…as usual
Or just don’t get a @@@@@@b in a public car park if you’re a major star, thereby avoiding the need to apologise
Quite right. Or drive a car with blacked-out windows. There’s nothing wrong with a fella getting a bj, but he broke the Eleventh Commandment: Don’t get caught!
He got caught because he was putting his feet on the brakes and a copper walked past and saw the brake lights
WTF is the point of this article?
Jaysus.
I kind of get it but maybe it should be in the business section. What had me confused was bringing up Hugh Grant, there must be more current celebrities stories to pull from than that. I thought Hugh Grant did something today because of the head line. Also I really think if that happened today there wouldn’t be a huge demand for n apology. I don’t see why getting a hooker is such a huge deal that you have to apologise to strangers for it. Sure he broke the law but that’s his private life. So yea, even a better analogy than the Hugh Grant story would have been more relevant to the message.
I made a mistake once……..’86 I think it was….
No it was ’87
Some companies have a No mistake culture. I own up to my mistakes pretty much the way outlined in the article and it has worked well for me. However I know of one high pressure environments in a certain workplace where the first person on the team to admit the mistake to the boss and that things weren’t going well was subsequently let go. Nobody backs down in there anymore over the most blatant and obvious small mistakes.
Productivity is zero.
How does an employee cope with such obviously poor management?
This article is improved tenfold if you read it as Alan Partridge
Its strange the way laws differ around the world if he had sex with a Prostitute in Holland or Australia were its legal would it still of been such a big story or full stop a famous person using Prostitutes is a big story.
the issue was getting arrested for kerb crawling, not using prostitutes. it was the seedy and unnecessary element of it that publicity worthy. to this day, it could still be a staged publicity event.
Didn’t he famously say “to err is human…” and had to stop himself mid sentence?
Fr. Jack had a famous “sorry” as well lol.
Take drumm and some of our equally irresponsible politicians. Drumm single handedly didn’t cause the financial crisis. Some politicians were equally negligent. They should be prosecuted too, some of these guys are getting away with murder and the culture in irish politics is not to take responsibility for anything, which is disgraceful behavior.
Show this to the bankers.
” If you do make a COCK up, the first thing to do is try to get out aHEAD of it” Awh come on journel it was 21 years ago. No need for the little reminders between the lines
Cockups !!very appropriate word considering the piece is about Hugh Grant but hey its 21yrs ago and makes no since in that article.
You didn’t get the AHEAD ref donna
The only time I say sorry as it seems is trying to pass those who always have their shopping trollies in the way like blind and deaf eejits in the shopping aisles, they do be in another world. Then they don’t answer you, the only one who does is a shelf stacker with his big ladder in the way as well and between the both of them they have the aisle blocked… Feels like Robot Wars when shopping sometimes…
Kate Fitzgerald.
But what happens if your blamed for something that was not your fault. As some people rather blame a stranger than their friends, passing the buck is great with some people as when they do wrong they try to pass it onto something or somebody else.
The reason something starts is never the excuse that is used, people will find any excuse to pass the buck or to keep it going because they need to or because they get something from it?
Look at the Birmingham Six and then read that, plenty of stories like that… Even to workplace bullies.
So David Drumm should just say sorry and thats okay!!!
The others got off and so will he…
He got his bag of coal. He should have been hanged drawn and quartered
Yeah That’s true.
http://www.techangaza.com
Alternatively…if you’re absolutely certain you can cover your ass and get away with it then do it……….
what people don’t know won’t hurt them.
have your say