Latest / Best of Business / Leeann Watson: Business Canterbury CEO on the mood of business owners and growing confidence in the region

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Leeann Watson: Business Canterbury CEO on the mood of business owners and growing confidence in the region · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talks Be follow
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  Speaker 1: this and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio.
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  Speaker 2: Today's the first of what's going to be a regular
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  Speaker 2: catch up with LeAnn Watson, who's chief executive of Business
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  Speaker 2: Category Iileen, Good morning John. Our Business Canterbury of course
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  Speaker 2: used to be the Chamber of Commerce. That's right.
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  Speaker 3: How come we change the name?
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  Speaker 4: Look, we've undergone quite a significant transformation across the organization
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  Speaker 4: over the last three years, and actually really the name
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  Speaker 4: change in the new brand is probably the most sort
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  Speaker 4: of publicly visual part of that transformation. But the main
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  Speaker 4: name was really just to make sure that it, I
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  Speaker 4: guess it is more reflective of who we are and
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  Speaker 4: the businesses that we support. So, you know, we're all
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  Speaker 4: about cannery and we're all about supporting businesses and the
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  Speaker 4: people that they employ, and so Business Cannery just seem
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  Speaker 4: to have a better ring to it, and I think
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  Speaker 4: it makes us also a bit more accessible. You know,
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  Speaker 4: we are still a Chamber of Commerce. That's a pretty
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  Speaker 4: important international brand, So we're still a chamber, but Business
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  Speaker 4: Canary is all about providing that support across the Canary
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  Speaker 4: business community and the people they support.
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  Speaker 2: So surveying the business community is one of the things
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  Speaker 2: you do, and you've recently been talking to businesses about
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  Speaker 2: their level of confidence.
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  Speaker 3: What can you tell us?
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, Look, so we run the quarterly Canary Business Survey.
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  Speaker 4: I've been running that for quite a few years, and
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  Speaker 4: really since about May last year. What we've seen is
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  Speaker 4: just sort of gradual increases around business confidence, which is
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  Speaker 4: really positive. The last survey, which just finished last week
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  Speaker 4: again has seen quite a strong uptick in business confidence.
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  Speaker 4: So generally businesses are feeling much more optimistic about the
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  Speaker 4: future and also feeling much more optimistic around their own businesses,
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  Speaker 4: not only the economy that they operate in, but also
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  Speaker 4: about their own businesses.
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  Speaker 2: How confident are you that that is confidence as opposed
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  Speaker 2: to hope.
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  Speaker 4: It's a really good question. Look, I think what we
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  Speaker 4: have seen in the survey, and so normally what happens
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  Speaker 4: is when you see an uptack and confidence, you will
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  Speaker 4: say also see the same sort of uptick in businesses
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  Speaker 4: intentions to invest in things like new plant and equipment,
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  Speaker 4: employing more people. What we've seen is that has moved,
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  Speaker 4: but it hasn't moved at the same pace as what
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  Speaker 4: business confidence has. So I think probably one of the
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  Speaker 4: big issues is that I guess slow down of consumer
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  Speaker 4: demand that we saw you know, really hit hard last year,
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  Speaker 4: but really really over the last three to four years.
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  Speaker 4: It's been pretty tough that that has just taken a
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  Speaker 4: while to shift. So, yes, wild businesses are very optimistic
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  Speaker 4: and positive about the future. They're just a little hesitant
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  Speaker 4: in racing out and actually employing a whole bunch of
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  Speaker 4: more people and investing in plant and equipment. But it's
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  Speaker 4: starting to track in the right direction.
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  Speaker 3: What's made them feel more confident.
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  Speaker 4: I think things like you know, the ocr drop and
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  Speaker 4: drops over the last few quarters has certainly been helpful.
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  Speaker 4: It's provided really strong signals for businesses that interest rates
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  Speaker 4: are going to come down, that inflationary pressure you know,
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  Speaker 4: will come down. Obviously, some of those things take away
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  Speaker 4: while to kick in. But what we've also seen is,
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  Speaker 4: you know, some recent changes in some of the government
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  Speaker 4: announcements around just simply making it easier for people to
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  Speaker 4: do business. Things like ninety day trials are back for
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  Speaker 4: all businesses. You know, we've seen things like the holidays
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  Speaker 4: X being reviewed, which we know has been a real
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  Speaker 4: bug beer for businesses for a long time. You know,
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  Speaker 4: there's a new Ministry of Regulation to actually cut out
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  Speaker 4: some of the red tape and some of the compliance
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  Speaker 4: burden that business's face. So those are the sorts of
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  Speaker 4: signals that give businesses the confidence that things are going
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  Speaker 4: to change.
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  Speaker 2: What do you say to people who say that perhaps
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  Speaker 2: the government's going too far in the other direction? Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: in terms of stuff like that worker's rights eroding all
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  Speaker 2: of that stuff.
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  Speaker 3: What's your take on that?
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  Speaker 4: Yeah? And look, I think, you know, we need to
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  Speaker 4: be mindful that there does need to be a balance,
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  Speaker 4: you know, for any government decisions around that. But what
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  Speaker 4: we also need to make sure is that we don't
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  Speaker 4: stifle business's ability to grow, to be innovative and to
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  Speaker 4: be productive. And actually, the one thing that businesses you
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  Speaker 4: do a really good job of and don't take lightly
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  Speaker 4: is the investment that make in people. You know, to
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  Speaker 4: actually employ someone and to provide the livelihood for someone
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  Speaker 4: is a really big burden that businesses carry, and so
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  Speaker 4: they don't make those decisions lightly to either employ people
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  Speaker 4: and certainly not to let them go. And so, you know,
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  Speaker 4: just making sure that you know, there are many rules
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  Speaker 4: and regulations around employment laws, and so let's use those
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  Speaker 4: as opposed to creating some of these other perhaps what
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  Speaker 4: that have been blunt instruments in the past.
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  Speaker 2: What's the employment market like? Because I telling a story
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  Speaker 2: I heard the second hand from someone person applied for
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  Speaker 2: a retail as systant job in christ Church recently and
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  Speaker 2: was told that nine hundred people had applied.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I mean, we know unemployment figures across the
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  Speaker 4: country have been rising for quite some time, and you
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  Speaker 4: know that is probably not too dissimilar here. Again from
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  Speaker 4: the survey, more than half of those surveyed have indicated
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  Speaker 4: that they are looking to employ more staff in the future,
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  Speaker 4: which is really positive. Again, that is a change to
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  Speaker 4: what we've seen last year. So again that's a good
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  Speaker 4: indication that people are now starting to shift their thinking
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  Speaker 4: around that.
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  Speaker 3: Do you do you know of those people yourself?
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  Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know how granular you get, but
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  Speaker 2: do you know that those those fifty you say, yes,
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  Speaker 2: So the fifty percent of businesses who say they intend
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  Speaker 2: to employ more people in the near future, do you
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  Speaker 2: know how many of them let staff go and so
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  Speaker 2: therefore they're looking at returning people. We're at or levels
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  Speaker 2: beyond what they've been up until now, or up until recently.
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  Speaker 4: We don't get that granular for that particular question, but
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  Speaker 4: whatcdotally we you know, we engage with businesses each day
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  Speaker 4: every day across our organization, and what we have seen
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  Speaker 4: is probably you know, off the back of COVID, many
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  Speaker 4: people had to make some pretty tough decisions, and you know,
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  Speaker 4: we saw you know, a number of redundancies. We also
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  Speaker 4: saw directly off the back of that, you know, record
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  Speaker 4: constraints around you know, labor market shortages, and so once
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  Speaker 4: people geared back up again, they were actually really hesitant
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  Speaker 4: around letting people go for for those reasons because there
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  Speaker 4: were some businesses that simply couldn't operate to full capacity
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  Speaker 4: because they didn't have the staff.
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  Speaker 2: So what would have stopped them? What could have prevented
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  Speaker 2: them from doing that? Though in the head of the moment,
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  Speaker 2: when things were looking like them it was going to
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  Speaker 2: go oh southwards big time, what could have been done
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  Speaker 2: or what could have they done differently?
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, oh, look, I think you know that, you know,
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  Speaker 4: that's a million dollar question in a lot of cases.
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  Speaker 4: But you know, I think there are a lot of
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  Speaker 4: learnings from off the back of COVID, and I know
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  Speaker 4: that you know, these obviously all sorts of inquiries being done,
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  Speaker 4: and I think what, you know, what we would say
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  Speaker 4: to businesses is make sure that you've explored all avenues
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  Speaker 4: available to you rather than letting people go. And many
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  Speaker 4: of those businesses did do that. You know, they cut
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  Speaker 4: back hours, you know, they looked at job sharing. You know,
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  Speaker 4: they provided you know, long term extra lead for businesses
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  Speaker 4: or people operating in those organizations. You know, that was
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  Speaker 4: a really tough situation with you know, the fact that
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  Speaker 4: we closed our immigration as well, and so perfect storm.
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  Speaker 4: You know, we had COVID, you know, when we started
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  Speaker 4: coming out of COVID and building back up again, you know,
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  Speaker 4: our borders were closed for a lot longer than any
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  Speaker 4: other country. You know, Prior to that, we thought that
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  Speaker 4: in New Zealand was seen as the place to come
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  Speaker 4: as a migrant. You know, when we reopened, we were
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  Speaker 4: about fourth or fifth or sixth or whatever the number
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  Speaker 4: was on the queue. So all of a sudden, we
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  Speaker 4: went quite as attractive as what we thought we were.
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  Speaker 4: And you know, we had to get back out there
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  Speaker 4: globally and talk about the fact that we welcomed people
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  Speaker 4: back into the country and we're still we're still paying
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  Speaker 4: the price for that a little bit.
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  Speaker 2: I know, business around all around the country hurting, But
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  Speaker 2: what sort of cumulative effect do you think there's been
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  Speaker 2: here in Canterbury, earthquakes, everything else. COVID is that is,
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  Speaker 2: is there an overall impact from that? All the businesses
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  Speaker 2: just deal with the particular crisis at a time then
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  Speaker 2: move on.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a great question. One of the questions that
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  Speaker 4: we do ask in the survey is and I think
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  Speaker 4: we started asking it in about July twenty two, around
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  Speaker 4: how prepared businesses were for ongoing disruption. And what we've
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  Speaker 4: seen in the last survey was a significant shift, in fact,
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  Speaker 4: the highest shift that we've seen in the survey since
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  Speaker 4: July twenty two around businesses are being well and truly
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  Speaker 4: prepared for ongoing disruption and the mindset shift. So previously
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  Speaker 4: people reacted to disruption. Now what they're doing is they're
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  Speaker 4: having conversations and they're preparing for what the next disruption
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  Speaker 4: might look like. And actually, I think, and this might
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  Speaker 4: be you know, me being the one I can Tabrian,
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  Speaker 4: but I do believe and I strongly believe this because
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  Speaker 4: we have faced so much adversity in this city and
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  Speaker 4: in this region that has prepared our business community and
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  Speaker 4: our residents to actually deal with that disruption. You know,
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  Speaker 4: they're much more agile around, thinking ahead, around you know,
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  Speaker 4: pivoting to a to a new way of operating. You know,
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  Speaker 4: when we went into COVID, most businesses across the country
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  Speaker 4: had already worked from home because of the earthquakes, and
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  Speaker 4: so we you know, we were able to stand up
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  Speaker 4: businesses really really quickly in that sort of hybrid working environment.
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  Speaker 4: And so I think the fact that we have faced
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  Speaker 4: that adversity has actually set us up really well and
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  Speaker 4: built a level of resilience into our business community. And
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  Speaker 4: I think we've seen that The way that we responded is.
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  Speaker 2: An amazing Think it was only fourteen years when the
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  Speaker 2: quake happened and you had businesses trying to get them
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  Speaker 2: to get servers out and things like that.
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  Speaker 3: Well, none of those issues these days.
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  Speaker 1: No.
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  Speaker 4: And actually, you know, out of any crisis and horrific situation,
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  Speaker 4: you know, you do have to reflect often around you
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  Speaker 4: know what has that actually given us? And I think
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  Speaker 4: that ability to be much more agile, you know, we've
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  Speaker 4: we've now got better I guess relationships and connections with
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  Speaker 4: our customers and with our people, with with you know,
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  Speaker 4: the people that we employ, you know, we understand more
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  Speaker 4: about who they are as people as opposed to just employees,
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  Speaker 4: and they bring their false elves to work, and we
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  Speaker 4: understand some of the pressures that they have outside of work,
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  Speaker 4: and I think all of those things are actually silver
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  Speaker 4: linings from what you know, some of that adversary that
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  Speaker 4: we've actually faced.
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  Speaker 3: We're an election year.
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  Speaker 2: We're going to be electing a new council, not just
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  Speaker 2: us but everywhere, and I'm interested to know what your
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  Speaker 2: assessment is of what the business community is expecting from
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  Speaker 2: candidates and their new council.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's another great question, John, Look, I think for
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  Speaker 4: we will do a little bit of work around this
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  Speaker 4: in our next survey, and we'll run a couple of
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  Speaker 4: focus groups with our members to really ask and drill
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  Speaker 4: down into some of those sorts of questions. But by
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  Speaker 4: and large, when we talk to most businesses, what they
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  Speaker 4: want to understand is of the money that has been spent,
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  Speaker 4: what are the outcomes that we're getting and are we
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  Speaker 4: making sure that the council are using that money well?
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  Speaker 4: So are they getting value for the money that has
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  Speaker 4: been spent on lots of different things across the city.
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  Speaker 4: They also want to make sure that when the council
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  Speaker 4: makes decisions that they understand the either the intended or
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  Speaker 4: the unintended concertquance is on businesses. And yes, we know that,
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  Speaker 4: you know, the council serves both businesses and the general
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  Speaker 4: residents and rate payers, but we also know that actually
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  Speaker 4: the business rate payers do pay a higher proportion of rates,
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  Speaker 4: and so we need them to understand that unless we
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  Speaker 4: have a strong business community, we will not have a
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  Speaker 4: strong community. And the two go hand in hand. So
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  Speaker 4: we've been talking to the council for quite some time
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  Speaker 4: around them getting closer to the business community, understanding what
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  Speaker 4: their needs are, understanding what the decisions that they make
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  Speaker 4: around the council table how they might actually impact the
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  Speaker 4: business community.
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  Speaker 2: Last year, I think it was you said that the
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  Speaker 2: council was not business friendly. You still feel that way.
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  Speaker 4: I think they can do a better job of really
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  Speaker 4: understanding and engaging with the business community, and they have
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  Speaker 4: their there have been good in roads into that. You know,
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  Speaker 4: we've worked really closely with the christ chich City Council
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  Speaker 4: and the surrounding councils. You know, I go and meet
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  Speaker 4: with you know, with the me's and the CEOs from
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  Speaker 4: all of the Canterbury councils and so we have lots
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  Speaker 4: of good conversations to understand, you know, what their priorities are.
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  Speaker 4: I give them a bit of an outline of what
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  Speaker 4: we're hearing and seeing from the business community, but I
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  Speaker 4: think they can continue to do more and making sure
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  Speaker 4: that that filters right through the organization is really really important.
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  Speaker 4: So at work in progress, and I think you know,
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  Speaker 4: we will hold the council and the candidates to account
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  Speaker 4: as we head into the local body elections this year.
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  Speaker 2: This might be unfair, but can you think of a
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  Speaker 2: specific example of what a council could do to support
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  Speaker 2: a business?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah?
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  Speaker 4: I can. So we're hearing a lot at the moment
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  Speaker 4: around procurement, and procurement from both local government and central
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  Speaker 4: government has been a bit of a bugbear for many
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  Speaker 4: businesses for a long time. So you know that both
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  Speaker 4: local and central government have procurement rules and what I
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  Speaker 4: think needs to be looked at is whether or not
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  Speaker 4: those rules are still fit for purpose and if we
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  Speaker 4: want to drive our local and national economies, then we
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  Speaker 4: actually need to make sure that the procurement from local
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  Speaker 4: and central government reflects that and so how do we
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  Speaker 4: make sure that when the council are tendering for big
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  Speaker 4: pieces of work, that there is some waiting put towards
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  Speaker 4: a local business and understanding the full cost of life
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  Speaker 4: for that particular project, rather than going for either the
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  Speaker 4: cheapest quote or whatever else they might you know, build
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  Speaker 4: into that. So I think, I mean, that's one sort
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  Speaker 4: of high level example, but that will make a significant
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  Speaker 4: difference if we get that right.
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