In light of the recent storm over Stephen Hester’s bonus, it might not be a huge surprise to learn that 13% of the businesses who responded have frozen or scrapped bonuses in the last year. Perhaps more startling are the top three rising benefits trends. The ability to buy or sell annual leave is on the up as are the increased availability of money purchase pensions and subsidies on bicycles. Of course, the rise of money purchase pensions is mirrored by a decline in final salary pensions but the idea that pushbike subsidies are becoming more popular would seem to mark a culture change.

Indeed, according to the survey, the company car is only just more popular than the subsidized bike.

There is a similar contradiction in today’s Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply’s (CIPS) purchasing managers’ index for UK manufacturing. The PMI figures seem to show that manufacturers’ new orders grew in January, after six consecutive months of decline. This might come as a surprise to anyone who, as recently as last week, read the headlines about a potential double dip in the UK caused by, you guessed it, a decline in manufacturing orders.

Of course, newspapers have to sell copies and a story that constantly switches between good news and bad is one way of doing that. Which of the above views is the correct one? That probably depends on whether your glass is half full or half empty as Martin Flanagan explains in this Scotsman piece.

As Facebook gears up for a rumoured initial public offering later this year, the company has been keen to demonstrate its value to potential buyers. One way of doing this has been to commission a survey from Deloitte to quantify how much business Facebook generates in the UK. The report figures that the company has contributed £2.2 billion to the UK economy and that it supports over 35,000 jobs.

One of the companies to have made good use of the Facebook platform is Morphsuits. Set up in 2009 with reported seed capital of £9000, the company sells spandex fancy dress suits. By building a community of Facebook fans who send in photos of themselves wearing the Morphsuits, the company has accumulated over 750,000 friends and sold over 500,000 suits. According to this report from the BBC last summer, this equates to a turnover greater than £10 million.

The Scotsman has a full report here along with quotes from Richard Allen, Facebook’s head of policy in Europe, Middle East and Africa. Allen is quoted saying, ‘There are businesses that use Facebook to engage new markets and develop a larger order book and are therefore able to employ more people.

‘Morphsuits is a classic example as it has been able to grow the business in a way that wouldn’t be possible without the existence of this word-of-mouth marketing mechanism where it can build a loyal following that then passes on their recommendations to others with similar interests.’

Facebook have announced that, in conjunction with the British Chamber of Commerce, there will be a series of roadshows showing SMEs how to make the best use of the Facebook platform. There will be a Glasgow date but the exact details are still to be confirmed. We will pass them on when we get the details.

While January and the lead-up to Burns Night are the busiest time of the year for Macsween, the company has worked hard to make haggis a year round dish. Product development and innovations, including a range of microwaveable haggis and fresh ways of serving the food, have opened up new markets for Macsween.

As Burns Night approaches, Jo discusses her family business and what effect her membership of Vistage has had.

Is this a peak time of year for you?

JM: January accounts for about 30% of our turnover. In fact, most of the customer orders for Burns Night need to be completed in less than a month. It’s usually about the 6^th of January by the time everybody has woken up from Hogmanay and, if people don’t have their order en route by Monday 23^rd, then it’s too late.

It’s a very concentrated period for the business which has to be run with military precision. It puts a lot of pressure on the team but they have done it before and it is nothing they are not used to doing.

What we want to do is ease that curve out and get away from the idea of haggis being the national dish which is just for Burns Night and only served with neeps and tatties. It’s so much more than that.

How are you trying to change that perception?

JM: Some of it is down to product innovation. The microwaveable range has been a huge success with our core market but what we were really after was the under thirties. We knew they liked and ate haggis, often from the chip shop, but wouldn’t go to a supermarket and buy it because it was an inaccessible product to them.

Microwaveable haggis allowed us to change that. We did some market research and found that one product has changed the haggis eating demographic considerably. Macsween is the brand that has brought a whole new consumer base to haggis. In the last three years, we are responsible for a quarter of a million new haggis consumers and I’m really proud of that.

You have just launched a new website with advice for haggis virgins along with sections on haggis myths; serving tips and even a Burns Night app. Is that part of the campaign?

JM: It’s just at phase one and we have more to do but January is when the site gets most visitors and we wanted to get the new site up and running. We’ve gone out on a limb a bit. The whole haggis virgin things needs a bit more design but we wanted to get it out there, get some feedback and see what it does for us.

We have had some fun with it. There are clips of people dressed up as giant haggis. If you want to engage with your customers then you have to give them something. It needn’t cost much. You can give them a laugh which is why we have people dressed up as giant haggis doing silly things.

As it develops, we will add sections on sustainability and a chefs’ section showing how our products can be used in different types of commercial kitchens.

There is also a blog element to it and, as that progresses, it will be less about haggis and more about Scotland and all things Scottish. We stand for all those things and I want to promote the best of Scotland and not just haggis. The point of a good blog is not to do hard selling of your wares but to engage with people at a wider level and build your brand credibility.

Is there a big export market for haggis or is it all for the domestic market?

JM: It depends what you mean by domestic. There is a 40/60 split in sales and you might be surprised to learn that the 60% goes to England. About 20% of our turnover is sold in London alone. Export is under developed and we intend to work on that.

What is the biggest challenge for Macsween?

JM: We are going to step up our leadership, management and delivery of ideas. We are very clear about where we want to go. We have spent a lot of time on strategy. Now, we want to empower and develop the management team to deliver our strategy.

Over the last twelve months, we have built a management team to allow James and I to step away from the minutiae of the day to day business. Because we now have a factory manager, this is the first January that James is not in a white coat on the factory floor. It frees him up to think about our export strategy.

Linked to this is the professional development which James and I have been doing. I’ve been getting coaching and professional development with Vistage, James with ‘The leadership Factory’. When the directors of the business are receiving intense development, that ethos of life long learning spreads to the management team and through every level of the business. It creates a very powerful culture of learning.

A big commitment for us is that, by 2013, every single person in the business will have been on a professional development course or gained a new qualification relevant to their role.  For those directly involved in making and packing haggis, for example this will be the achievement of an SVQ level 2 or 3.  It is all part of our vision to create ‘The Haggis Academy’!

In what ways did you hope to benefit from joining Vistage?

JM: I hoped to gain a clearer personal and business vision. We were doing a lot of thinking about the business and too often, I was internalising it and it was going around and around in my head. I thought that Vistage would offer both a way of externalising those thoughts as well as coaching and support for how to map them out.

When you have been in a family business for twenty years; it’s the main place you have ever worked, with a newly created management team, then you need external influences and ideas to challenge yourself and the team.

Although I’m the main person that benefits from being part of Vistage, I feel as though all of Macsween has joined. On the Vistage member guest days, my managers can come along and they have absolutely loved those sessions. They have been very powerful for them.

We went to one with Susan Scott called ‘Fierce Conversations’. It was about having emotionally intelligent communications. As a result of going to that session, one of my managers came in the next week and told me that she had had a life-changing conversation with her husband which enabled them to understand each other more clearly. That’s the sort of value add that you can’t put a price on.

Is there any one aspect of Vistage which is most useful for you?

JM: Each strand is very powerful and would be on its own. If I just turned up for the lectures and had the coaching then that would be good but, what makes it very special, is the other people in my group who are on the journey with you.

We have shared a lot of very special moments and I feel that I am in a very good place when I meet with them. We all learn together and we all challenge each other and I trust them.

That’s very special in business: to have a safe place in which you can be vulnerable and to admit that you have struggled with something. That opens up possibilities. You don’t have to look tough and look as though you know what you are doing. It’s a space in which you can say, ‘I’m really lost. Help me out here’. And then people do. They give fantastic feedback and it’s hardcore in that they don’t miss and hit the wall. It’s like being surrounded by really heavyweight consultants that care about you.

While some shops had a profitable Christmas, many did not. The Scottish Retail Consortium sales monitor for December 2011 is headlined ‘Worst December since at least 1999’. Piling on the pressure, the Scottish Chambers of Commerce (SCC) quarterly report, produced in partnership with the Fraser of Allander Institute at Strathclyde University, suggests that 2012 may be even tougher than the previous year for Scottish businesses. Finally, today’s job figures also showed that the number of unemployed people in Scotland rose by 19,000 between September and November of last year. Concerns over the Eurozone; weak domestic demand and limited access to funding are all thought to be weighing down the country’s economic prospects.

The Scotsman has an in-depth look at the figures along with commentary. Garry Clark, head of policy and public affairs at the SCC is quoted as saying, ‘In the midst of the current political debate in Scotland, it is crucial that all our politicians keep their eyes on the economy as the number-one priority.’

The paper also has quotes from Scottish Labour’s finance spokesman, Ken Macintosh, warning the SNP not to let the independence debate distract it from the economy.

Donald MacRae, Chief Economist at Bank of Scotland, commented: ‘The labour market is showing the negative effects of the slowdown in the Scottish economy. The Barometer, although still just positive and indicating a marginal improvement in December, is at its lowest for over a year. Growth in the number of job vacancies slowed while the number of people appointed to jobs fell for the first time in 15 months. The Scottish economy is struggling to maintain growth momentum in the face of the global slowdown.’

The Scotsman has tried to put some sort of positive spin on the news with a piece headlined: ‘Scottish jobs market hits lowest level in 14 months – but still outperforms UK’. The Herald takes a rather more bleak view with a report titled: Global economy stalling Scottish labour market’.

Against all this gloom, many of Scotland’s top companies appear to be doing rather well. Business Insider magazine recently published the results of their annual Top 500 survey. Designed to take the pulse of Scotland’s largest companies, the report shows a large rise in profits and increases in turnover for the majority of the entrants.

You can find a breakdown of the figures here while the BBC’s Douglas Fraser has analysed some of the results here. He notes that many of the companies featured are very closely integrated with the wider UK economy. A fact that many Scottish business leaders will be pondering as the SNP tries to advance their arguments for independence.

Based on data compiled from monthly replies to questionnaires sent to purchasing executives in around 600 private manufacturing and service sector companies in Scotland, the PMI figures show output increasing for the twelfth month running and new business up at the sharpest rate since April 2011.

The headline facts are that Scottish firms recorded the first increase in new business for four months in December and business wins rose at the fastest pace since April 2011. Growth was confined to the service sector, however, where product launches and successful marketing led to a robust month-on-month increase in new work. New orders placed at manufacturers continued to fall, albeit at a slower rate.

Output growth edged up for the second consecutive month in December, but remained shy of the pace of expansion registered in the first half of 2011. This was signalled by the Bank of Scotland PMI posting 51.2, up marginally from 51.1 in November. Any figure over 50 signals growth. The UK as a whole, however, performed even better, expanding solidly on the month.

Donald MacRae, Chief Economist at Bank of Scotland, said: ‘The PMI has been positive (above 50) for all 12 months of 2011 indicating growth in the private sector of the Scottish economy. However, the last four months have seen a slowdown with December’s result just positive at 51.2.

‘A pickup in the services sector at the end of last year has compensated for falling output and export orders from a manufacturing sector suffering from the slowing of the Eurozone economies. The increase in new business for the first time in four months is very welcome and suggests the Scottish economy, while struggling to grow, is avoiding a fall in output.’

The Scotsman has a report with comment from the Scottish government here.

Starting with the good news, the IT and social media sectors are in for exciting times. Writing in Scotland On Sunday, Michelle Rodger reckons that the ‘social’ part of the term ‘social media’ will become redundant as the technology enters many more areas of life. ‘Social networking, social media, social gaming, social business, social communities will become an integral part of every business function,’ she writes, ‘and not simply something with which so-called “Generation Y” is fascinated.’

Perhaps more controversial is her assertion that the ‘gamification’ of the business world is well underway and set to continue. By this, she seems to mean that increasing number of companies are trying to encourage a sense of competition among  their employees with 21^st century advances on old school motivational techniques such as leader boards plus points and prize systems.

Rather more certain is her prediction that crowdfunding is set to expand in the face of high barriers which prevent many SMEs from accessing more traditional sources of funding. Last year, Fraserburgh brewing company Brewdog raised slightly under £2 million from its online share offer, Equity for Punks. Rodger contends that crowdfunding ‘for start-ups, students, social enterprises, and third sector and community projects will make its mark here in 2012’.

According to a report in The Scotsman bylined by Perry Gourley, lending to larger businesses is beginning to thaw a little but SMEs are still struggling. However, he points out that a raft of joint public/private initiatives, such as the Scottish Loan Fund, aim to start doing deals in the coming twelve months.

A recurring theme among many commentators is that while the Scottish economy is by no means helpless, it is, to a large degree, at the mercy of events in Europe. In the worst case scenario for the Eurozone, exports, imports, consumer demand and credit will all contract considerably. However, writing in Business 7, Sandy Manson, chief executive at Johnston Carmichael, has high hopes for Scotland’s SMEs despite the difficulties that 2012 will almost certainly bring. He foresees genuine reductions in red tape and improved access to funding

Further commentary on various Scottish business sectors can be found here from Business Insider magazine and here in The Scotsman.

The chief executive officer (CEO) of the Miller Group has claimed its decision to sell shares to a private equity firm is a positive move, report businessman.scotsman.com.

Keith Miller, whose father and uncle founded the construction firm in 1934, has given up control of the family business. However he has suggested the £160 million refinancing deal with Blackstone will give the company the financial muscle to succeed in the current economic landscape.

He said: “I’m delighted we have attracted a significant capital investment from one of the world’s leading financial investors. This is due to the outstanding quality of our business and also to the continuing support of our existing banking partners.”

Mr Miller will continue as CEO after the European Union’s competition regulator has reviewed the Blackstone deal, which replaces the previous financing arrangement from 2008 with Bank of Scotland. The bank became the first organisation from outside the family to own shares when it invested in the group.

Ft.com’s Scotland correspondent Andrew Bolger pointed out that the Miller Group has been privately-owned throughout its history, but this latest arrangement will heavily dilute the 62 per cent stake held by the Miller family.

Mr Bolger also highlighted comments made by Mr Miller earlier this year, when the businessmen predicted that consolidations were set to take place in the construction industry, but stated he wanted his firm to be at the table rather than on the menu when this “meal” started.

Now, Anthony Hilton, Financial Editor of The Evening Standard, has waded into the fray with a plea for less email communication and more human interaction. The crux of his piece is that many people are now so habituated to electronic communication that they lack the people-reading skills which are essential in business.

Writing in CA magazine, he tells of a friend who laments that his new graduate intake has no idea how to read a room. They don’t know how ‘to assess at a client meeting who has the power, who needs persuading, who will talk a lot but can be ignored, who is saying yes but thinking no and who is likely to stitch you up when you have left’.

The full piece can be found here; click through to page 10.