Falta a parte dolorosa da transição

 Um artigo interessante na revista The Economist, "Britain | The low-wage economy - Britain's failed experiment in boosting low-wage sectors":

"Choking off immigration to make low-wage sectors more productive was never going to work

The BREXITEER plan to end free movement from the European Union was not only about satisfying popular hostility to immigration. Leavers also talked of fixing Britain's perennial productivity problems. Boris Johnson, as prime minister in 2021, described a future that was "high wage, high skill, high productivity", and would be realised only if Britain kicked its addiction to cheap foreign labour.

...

Businesses show little sign of investing more or raising wages to attract more domestic workers, says Jonathan Portes, a professor of economics at King's College London.

...

A lack of commitment was not the only reason the Brexiteers' experiment failed. The thinking behind it was also faulty. The real productivity problem starts at home. A significant factor is the poor quality of British managers, according to John Van Reenen and Nick Bloom, two economists who have conducted international surveys. Other research suggests that this is especially true in low-wage sectors."

Portanto a ideia de Boris Johnson era:

• 1.A produtividade é baixa porque o acesso a mão de obra barata não impele as empresas a aumentarem a sua produtividade. 2.Então, se cortarmos o acesso a mão de obra barata as empresas vão ter de aumentar a sua produtividade para poderem pagar salários mais altos. 3.Assim, os britânicos poderiam aspirar a "high wage, high skill, high productivity".

De acordo com a minha experiência, na frase acima:

• O período 1 é verdadeiro. É o que vêmos em Portugal, fábricas e turismo a quererem importar mão de obra barata para poder manter as coisas como estão - recordo as bofetadas na cara em - Uma bofetada que recebo como um aviso, Bofetadas e locus de controlo - produtividade é que não., e Mais bofetadas e a turbulência em curso. Este é o quadrante do empobrecimento na figura abaixo, o quadrante em que as empresas são competitivas sem ser produtivas.

• O período 2 é verdadeiro. Mas é insuficiente. Pagar melhores salários implica cobrar preços mais elevados aos clientes e os clientes não estão para aí virados se não houver uma vantagem competitiva por parte das empresas. É o quadrante da baixa produtividade e baixa competitividade. O aumento do preço é feito sem contrapartidas para os clientes, e esse aumento não é desviado para melhorar a competitividade da empresa via produtividade, mas para pagar os custos mais altos. Nunca esquecer o caso do Uganda. É tão fácil e comum os políticos (e não só) confundirem mais competitividade com mais produtividade. O problema é o quadrante do empobrecimento.
• O período 3 é falso, é rotundamente falso porque falta a parte dolorosa da transição. Falta criar as condições para os flying geese (A mudança bottom-up!, The "flying geese" model, ou deixem as empresas morrer!!!). É preciso deixar as empresas morrer (e como isto é dificil politicamente, os desempregados são eleitores). No entanto, o que se faz é apoiar essas empresas para que dêem o salto de produtividade ... a sério?! Quantas usam o apoio, (sem maldade, simplesmente porque é a única coisa que sabem fazer), para manter os preços baixos e aguentar mais um ano, como Spender ilustrou com as fundições inglesas.

        O Japão não ficou rico a produzir vestuário de forma muito, 

        muito eficiente. Taiwan não ficou rica a produzir rádios 

        de bolso de forma muito, muito eficiente.

O tema dos flying geese ilustra bem a quase irrelevância desta frase tão comum em Inglaterra e em Portugal: "The real productivity problem starts at home. A significant factor is the poor quality of British managers". Acham que os melhores gestores do mundo iriam conseguir pôr o sector do vestuário com um nível produtividade capaz de ombrear com a média europeia? Só no Batalha e no Largo do Rato (e na sede nacional do PSD, et al também).

"high wage, high skill, high productivity" tem de ser resultado de outro perfil de economia... olhar outra vez para o esquema dos flying geese. BTW, nem pensem que conseguem aumentar a produtividade para o nível médio europeu com o mesmo perfil de sectores económicos mas em grande.

Recomendo recordar a noite em que, na minha leitura, morreu a chama de primeiro-ministro de Cavaco Silva em Também estava escrito nas estrelas.

A economia é contextual

"If you read what Peter Drucker had to say about competition back in the late ’50s and early ‘60s, he really only talked about one thing: competition on price. He was hardly alone — that was evidently how most economists thought about competition, too."

A economia não é como a física newtoniana, é contextual. O que funciona depois de algum tempo não funciona mais porque o contexto mudou. Nos anos 50 e início dos anos 60 a concorrência era no preço, ainda vivíamos no século XX.

Trecho inicial retirado de "What Is Strategy, Again?"

"The "autotelic self""

E aplicar o que segue a empresas? Atentas ao contexto, prontas a abraçar a mudança, e sentindo-se ao volante,  estabelecem indicadores e objectivos, monitorizam o desempenho e tomam decisões com base no feedback. Não porque seguem uma receita, mas porque vivem.

"A person who is healthy, rich, strong, and powerful has no greater odds of being in control of his consciousness than one who is sickly, poor, weak, and oppressed. The difference between someone who enjoys life and someone who is overwhelmed by it is a product of a combination of such external factors and the way a person has come to interpret them - that is, whether he sees challenges as threats or as opportunities for action. [Moi ici: Recordar as reflexões sobre os que resistem à mudança versus os que a abraçam - Abraçar ou resistir à mudança? ou Resistir versus abraçar]

The "autotelic self" is one that easily translates potential threats into enjoyable challenges, and therefore maintains its inner harmony. A person who is never bored, seldom anxious, involved with what goes on, and in flow most of the time may be said to have an autotelic self. The term literally means "a self that has self-contained goals," and it reflects the idea that such an individual has relatively few goals that do not originate from within the self [Moi ici: Recordar as reflexões sobre o locus de controlo interno e externo - Isto é mesmo um desafio digno de Hercules e Calimeros - não obrigado!].  For most people, goals are shaped directly by biological needs and social conventions, and therefore their origin is outside the self. For an autotelic person, the primary goals emerge from experience evaluated in consciousness, and therefore from the self proper.

The autotelic self transforms potentially entropic experience into flow. Therefore the rules for developing such a self are simple, and they derive directly from the flow model. Briefly, they can be summarized as follows:

1. Setting goals. To be able to experience flow, one must have clear goals to strive for. A person with an autotelic self learns to make choices-ranging from lifelong commitments, such as getting married and settling on a vocation, to trivial decisions like what to do on the weekend or how to spend the time waiting in the dentist's office--without much fuss and the minimum of panic.

...

As soon as the goals and challenges define a system of action, they in turn suggest the skills necessary to operate within it. If I decide to quit my job and become a resort operator, it follows that I should learn about hotel management, financing, commercial locations, and so on. Of course, the sequence may also start in reverse order: what I perceive my skills to be could lead to the development of a particular goal that builds on those strengths - I may decide to become a resort operator because I see myself as having the right qualifications for it.

And to develop skills, one needs to pay attention to the results of one's actions-to monitor the feedback. To become a good resort operator, I have to interpret correctly what the bankers who might lend me money think about my business proposal. I need to know what features of the operation are attractive to customers and what features they dislike. Without constant attention to feedback I would soon become detached from the system of action, cease to develop skills, and become less effective.

One of the basic differences between a person with an autotelic self and one without it is that the former knows that it is she who has chosen whatever goal she is pursuing. What she does is not random, nor is it the result of outside determining forces. This fact results in two seemingly opposite outcomes. On the one hand, having a feeling of ownership of her decisions, the person is more strongly dedicated to her goals. Her actions are reliable and internally controlled. On the other hand, knowing them to be her own, she can more easily modify her goals whenever the reasons for preserving them no longer make sense. In that respect, an autotelic person's behavior is both more consistent and more flexible."

"Subjective experience is not just one of the dimensions of life, it is life itself"

"Spoiler alert: The good life is a complicated life. For everybody.

The good life is joyful... and challenging. Full of love, but also pain. And it never strictly happens; instead, the good life unfolds, through time. It is a process. It includes turmoil, calm, lightness, burdens, struggles, achievements, setbacks, leaps forward, and terrible falls. And of course, the good life always ends in death.

A cheery sales pitch, we know.

But let's not mince words. Life, even when it's good, is not easy. There is simply no way to make life perfect, and if there were, then it wouldn't be good.

Why? Because a rich life-a good life-is forged from precisely the things that make it hard."

Trecho retirado de "THE GOOD LIFE - Lessons from the World's Longest Scientific Study of Happiness"

"Subjective experience is not just one of the dimensions of life, it is life itself. Material conditions are secondary: they only affect us indirectly, by way of experience. Flow, and even pleasure, on the other hand, benefit the quality of life directly. Health, money, and other material advantages may or may not improve life. Unless a person has learned to control psychic energy, chances are such advantages will be useless. Conversely, many individuals who have suffered harshly end up not only surviving, but also thoroughly enjoying their lives. How is it possible that people are able to achieve harmony of mind, and grow in complexity, even when some of the worst things imaginable happen to them? That is the outwardly simple question this chapter will explore. In the process, we shall examine some of the strategies people use to cope with stressful events, and review how an autotelic self can manage to create order out of chaos.

...

The ability to take misfortune and make something good come of it is a very rare gift. Those who possess it are called "survivors," and are said to have "resilience," or "courage." Whatever we call them, it is generally understood that they are exceptional people who have overcome great hardships, and have surmounted obstacles that would daunt most men and women. In fact, when average people are asked to name the individuals they admire the most, and to explain why these men and women are admired, courage and the ability to overcome hardship are the qualities most often mentioned as a reason for admiration. As Francis Bacon remarked, quoting from a speech by the Stoic philosopher Seneca, "The good things which belong to prosperity are to be wished, but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired." 

Trechos retirados de "Flow - The Psychology of Optimal Experience" de Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.  

"messianic belief in the power of government"

"The real problem with the Treasury's intelectual scepticism is that there is not enough of it in the world. The west is going through a phase of almost messianic belief in the power of government.

...

The state can do spectacular things. Europe cut its reliance on Russian fossil fuels at speed. Governmental leadership, not just biomedical genius, produced the Covid-19 vaccine.

But these feats tend to happen under extreme duress. In normal times, the business of government is to make things a bit better, knowing that it will make other things a bit worse. This is because: resources are finite, different goals conflict, advanced countries plucked most of the low-hanging fruit long ago, unintended consequences obtain, and social outcomes are determined as much by deep historical patterns or geographic constraints as by diktat.

The problem illness isn't Treasury Brain. It is Do Something-itis. Public life isn't full of pessimism. It is full of 10-point plans and summits called things like Horizon 2055. Sunak began the year with a pledge to halve inflation within 12 months. This is a man who "runs" an open, midsized economy, exposed to such outside vagaries as the Ukraine war and foreign central bank policy. Even if the pledge is met, it was vainglorious to make. And he is a relative sceptic about government. The Treasury was always accused of hiring humanities-trained generalists over technical economists. Is that all bad? With some Shakespeare or Conrad, it is easier to see that one's schemes to better the world have to reckon with the permanence of human nature, among other external forces. It is a public service, not a mental defect, to understand how little we can do against the tempest."

Trechos retirados de "The west has forgotten the limits of government"

"A store manager is the CEO of their store."

Em tempos trabalhei com uma empresa em que a gerência não queria que os comerciais soubessem o que se vendia e quanto se vendia. Juro!

Entretanto, ontem no WSJ, "Why a Zara Bet Big on a Maxi Dress":

"The Zara store in London's Chelsea neighborhood received a new range of maxi dresses in various styles. After just one week, store manager Ana Oliveira analyzed the sales data and saw that the dresses with prints were selling much better in her shop than those in solid colors. So she moved the print designs to the tall rails by the entrance. They would be the first thing shoppers would see as they came into the store, she said.

Zara is going local, giving store managers control over their shops' inventory, displays and designs.

The strategy relies heavily on its proprietary data system and a willingness to break the standard fashion-chain practice of making centralized decisions on stores' behalf.

...

"It's my kingdom, ," said Oliveira. She credits the new tech with giving her a level of control that wasn't previously possible.

Especially useful, Oliveira said, is her ability to crosscheck what's happening regionally, using data compiled from a basket of comparable U.K. stores. If a top-selling item at other British stores isn't doing so well in Chelsea, that is her cue to change up her displays, move unpopular items to storage or request new designs from Zara's headquarters.

...

After a warm weekend in June, her store's data showed a rise in demand for linen menswear, Oliveira said. Sensing the beginning of a trend, she quickly rearranged the layout of the men's section to put linen shirts and trousers in the most visible display areas.

It doesn't make sense to keep commercial data locked away at headquarters when store employees can use it to maximize sales, said Inditex Chief Executive scar García Maceiras. He said the mirror system was developed in response to managers requesting access to more data to help them oversee their stores, crediting managers as the key ingredient to Zara's success: "A store manager is the CEO of their store."

When Oliveira saw a drop in demand for blazers and a corresponding bump in T-shirt purchases relative to the week before, she interpreted it as a sign of a seasonal shift as summer arrived. As a result, she changed the displays to give more space to warmweather clothes."

Acho estranho ...

No FT de hoje "Novartis plans to spin off generics unit Sandoz in October".

Em empresas pequenas este tipo de decisão devia ser tomada mais vezes. Empresas pequenas têm poucos recursos e devem concentrar-se onde podem fazer a diferença. Em empresas pequenas, normalmente, um dos negócios vive à custa do outro. E recuo a Jonathan Byrnes, a Kotler e à curva de Stobachoff. Em empresas pequenas, sem "plant-within-the-plant", a gestão comporta-se como um esquizofrénico que às segundas, terças e quartas olha para as bolas vermelhas como artesanato, e às quintas, sextas e Sábados olha para as bolas vermelhas como produção em série. Resultado: desempenho zombie.

Em empresas grandes, com acesso a recursos humanos que se podem focar em coisas diferentes... acho estranho. Quer isto dizer que quem pensa a corporação não vê capacidade de criar valor na pertença da Novartis e da Sandoz a um mesmo todo. 

Inveja da Novo Nordisk?

Seguir a onda?

Simplesmente impressionante

Simplesmente impressionante:

Deixar esta mensagem afundar lentamente na consciência...

Imagem retirada de "Mais de metade dos jovens até aos 34 anos vive com os pais"

Curiosidade do dia

Coisas que não acontecem em Portugal, mas aparecem no FT:

"Hawaiian Electric/fires: transmission risks

The securities of US energy utilities are supposed to be safe investments.

Consumer prices for power are set by regulators with the aim of producing solid returns. In parts of the US, climate change has upended that.

Shares of Hawaiian Electric Industries have fallen nearly 70 per cent this month. Investors fear that electricity transmission equipment may be implicated in wildfires claiming more than 100 lives and causing property damage running into billions."

Acerca dos que nos pagam a mesada

"The German economy: what is the problem?" (muito interessante e mais balanceado)

"Is Germany’s great economy sinking into ‘slowcession’?"

"Insolvencies on the rise in Germany amid economic downturn" (também algo balanceado)

"Germany: Willkommen to normality?"

"Business bankruptcies up 35% in France, 55,000 jobs on the line"

Curiosidade do dia

"You, as a mere taxpayer, or holder of UK public debt, might ask when you can expect this putative return on spending to materialise. Look, don't be so difficult. And learn to call it "investment". "Spending" is as below-stairs now as calling a napkin a serviette."

Um clássico português, chamar investimento a torrefacção pura de impostagem presente e futura.

Trecho retirado de "The west has forgotten the limits of government"

Acerca das exportações portuguesas e espanholas

Neste interessante artigo "La industria farmacéutica da el 'sorpasso al automóvil como mayor exportadora de España":

O artigo chama a atenção para o peso das vacinas Covid-19 produzidas em Espanha e que não terão peso no futuro. No entanto, é interessante notar a evolução do perfil das exportações entre 2019 e 2022 na figura acima.

Fiquei curioso e com vontade de comparar o perfil espanhol com o nosso:

Quase 20% das nossas exportações são veículos e combustíveis (em Espanha pouco mais de 13%)

Uma evolução assim faz-me pensar logo na evolução dos produtos farmacêuticos na Irlanda. 

Vou numa próxima oportunidade comparar a evolução do perfil das exportações portugueses entre 2013 e 2023.

Mongo e o "Bud Light Fiasco"

O planeta Mongo da série de banda desenhada Flash Gordon é o lar de várias tribos e reinos com culturas, tecnologias e sistemas distintos. Da mesma forma, a economia pós-século XX é marcada pela complexidade e diversidade da oferta e procura cada vez mais atomizada e apaixonada. Foi disso que me lembrei em 2007 para criar uma metáfora que dura até aos dias de hoje (A cauda longa e o planeta Mongo).

Seth Godin usa uma imagem interessante, o século XX via os clientes como plancton, uma massa homogénea. Eu vejo o século XXI como o tempo de Mongo, ou do Estranhistão, terra de Um número infinito de nichos.

Em Novembro passado escapou-me este artigo sobre Mongo, "Strategy in a Hyperpolitical World":

"So what does that mean for strategy?

We define strategy as the art of making informed choices in a competitive environment. Choices are important when differing paths lead to differential risks and rewards. When the social environment is broadly favorable to business, a company's strategic choices can be justified in purely business terms or, as necessary, finessed with carefully crafted press releases. Today, however, choices must be made on an expanded playing field. They are often complex because the underlying ethical, social, and political issues are constantly evolving and defy simple analysis. To make and implement the best strategic choices in this environment, leaders will have to (1) develop robust principles to guide strategic choices, (2) address ethical issues early, (3) consistently communicate and implement their choices, (4) engage beyond the industry to shape the context, and (5) learn from mistakes to make better choices."

Entretanto, há dias li "The Strategy Lesson from the Bud Light Fiasco": 

"A company’s goal should be to present an offering — supported by compelling messaging — that has advantaged appeal to the biggest circle possible. That may be a relatively small circle — Red Bay Coffee — or a relatively big one — Starbucks Coffee. But it should be as big a circle as the offering can support.

The Temptation

In pursuing the biggest circle supportable, companies are forever tempted to send different messages to different parts of their audience — whether inside or outside the confines of their current circle — in an attempt to strengthen and/or enlarge their circle.

...

this kind of thing is getting ever more dangerous with ever increasing transparency,

...

In this age of fuller transparency, brands must think a lot more thoroughly and carefully about the heterogeneity of their Where to Play (WTP), which hangs together now and produces their current market share. But under its apparently calm surface, that overall share hides fault lines — those customers aren’t all the same even if they buy the same product. If a brand isn’t careful, it can take those fault lines that lie benignly beneath the surface and turn them into giant fissures with its actions.

...

The naïve idea — not an unusual one but naïve nonetheless — was that Bud Light could keep all its current customers, and, with this terrific new message, could appeal to some new ones (whether light users or non-users). This kind of naivety has always been dangerous. But it has gotten a lot more so in this hyperpolitical and transparent world.

The Particular Challenge for Broad-Based Companies

It is particularly challenging for broad-based companies and going to get more challenging. The broader-based a company is, the greater heterogeneity its customer base is likely to embody. Every company will have heterogeneity in its customer base. But a giant retailer, like Target, will likely have a greater level of heterogeneity in its customer base than tiny LGBTQ+-friendly clothing retailer, WILDFANG. Ultra Right Beer was launched to woo disaffected Bud Light customers and seemed deliriously happy to hit the $1 million mark in sales. But that is one-five thousandth of the (pre-fiasco) sales of Bud Light. With great size comes more dangerous and pronounced fault lines."

Como não recuar a 2014 e a "-Tu não és meu irmão de sangue!"

O século XX económico (da inauguração da linha de montagem da Ford até à queda do Muro de Berlin) foi um acidente histórico que agora estamos a corrigir, o futuro não é de homogeneidade, mas de heterogeneidade. E mundos heterogéneos não são meigos para com os gigantes. Nunca esqueço: Too big to care.

O destino do turismo

Assisti ontem à noite na CNN Portugal a uma parte da conversa com profissionais do turismo algarvio. Na parte da conversa que ouvi este tema surgiu "Algarve "descola da imagem de destino barato". Subida dos preços compensa menos dormidas":

"Decréscimo no número de dormidas no Algarve está a ser compensado pelo aumento dos preços. Redução foi registada essencialmente por parte dos portugueses, pressionados pela inflação e taxas de juros."

Não é impunemente que se sobem salários acima da produtividade, a consequência natural é aumentar os preços e/ou cortar as margens. É o destino!

É o mesmo destino das PMEs exportadoras nos sectores tradicionais. Produzem para fora porque os portugueses não têm poder de compra para as suportar.

Já ontem tinha apanhado este artigo "Açores: Falta de mão-de-obra deixa restaurantes a «meio-gás". Sinal gritante de que a procura (turistas) é superior à oferta. Se os açorianos querem restaurantes com qualidade de serviço têm de ter empregados qualificados, se não os há têm de aumentar os salários e para isso têm de aumentar os preços. Se as pessoas percebessem a assimetria do impacte da subidas de preços, optariam por ele mais vezes. Recordo o Evangelho do Valor, os clientes que se perdem com a subida de preços são mais do que compensados pelo que se ganha a mais com os que se mantêm.

Turistas mais satisfeitos, empregados mais satisfeitos, patrões mais satisfeitos e ambiente menos ameaçado.

Claro, o Evangelho do Valor só funciona se os Açores se focarem nas suas vantagens competitivas como destino turístico: baleias, líquenes (acho que ninguém liga a este potencial) e Atlântida.

🐳Santuário de Baleias

Os Açores é considerado um dos melhores locais do mundo para observação de baleias. Nas suas águas abrigam uma incrível diversidade de espécies, incluindo a baleia-azul, o golfinho-roaz e o cachalote.
#açores #labterra #TERRA #laboratorioassociadodoterra pic.twitter.com/M9p125iQtB

— LabTerra (@lab_assoc_terra) July 1, 2023

Curiosidade do dia

No FT de sexta, 11 de Agosto último, este artigo muito interessante, "Is Britain really as poor as Mississippi?"

Primeiro, este gráfico super-eloquente:

Uma nota final, aplicável a Portugal:

O autor destaca um paradoxo: Londres é a principal força que mantém o Reino Unido numa posição económica superior, mas a sua posição de domínio tem impedido outras regiões de contribuirem plenamente para o seu potencial económico. O artigo conclui que, se o Reino Unido pretende superar a "Questão do Mississippi" e recuperar a mobilidade ascendente, será necessário mais do que apenas a força económica de Londres; outras partes do país também devem desempenhar um papel como motores económicos.

Empobrecimento garantido

Primeiro estes números:

Desde Q4 2019 até Q1 2023 os custos do trabalho cresceram 19%. Como refere Nogueira Leite no Twitter:

"Aliás é aquele em q os ganhos relativos dos salários foram mais expressivos"

Recordo do ECO, "Portugal é o país da OCDE com o maior aumento real dos custos laborais" 

Entretanto, no Expresso encontro:

"O aumento do emprego, como aconteceu em Portugal no segundo trimestre deste ano, é sempre positivo. Mas nem tudo foram boas notícias nos números divulgados pelo Instituto Nacional de Estatística (INE). É que o emprego mais qualificado caiu. E caiu muito.

Entre o segundo trimestre de 2022 e o segundo trimestre deste ano, contam-se no país menos 128 mil pessoas empregadas com ensino superior. Um recuo de 7,3%. E "a comparação homóloga regista uma queda pelo quarto trimestre consecutivo" salienta uma nota de análise do BPI."

No Público li, "Ao fim de nove meses, número de trabalhadores licenciados voltou a subir":

"Num mercado de trabalho em que o emprego continuou a crescer (mais 54,7 mil empregos face ao trimestre imediatamente anterior e mais 77,6 mil empregos face ao período homólogo do ano anterior), esta quebra em termos homólogos no número de trabalhadores licenciados tem como contraponto um aumento do número de trabalhadores com niveis de ensino mais baixos. Passou a haver, DOS últimos 12 meses, mais 171,3 mil trabalhadores que não foram além do terceiro ciclo do ensino básico.

...

O que é que terá acontecido nos três trimestres anteriores para se assistir a um retrocesso? A explicação poderá estar na forma como a economia portuguesa tem crescido mais recentemente. De facto, a maior parte dos empregos criados em Portugal nos últimos 12 meses veio, mostram 

...

a maior parte dos empregos criados em Portugal nos últimos 12 meses veio, mostram os dados publicados ontem pelo INE, do sector do alojamento e restauração (mais 74,3 mil empregos) e do sector da construção (mais 40,7 mil empregos). Estes são sectores que, em média, tem trabalhadores com níveis de ensino mais baixos"

Ainda no Expresso encontro "Turismo e construção puxam emprego em Portugal para novo máximo"

Salários a aumentar e produtividade relativa a cair ano após ano ...

Ou eu me engano muito, ou o caldinho que se está a preparar não é o melhor:

• salários a crescer mais do que a produtividade - em vez de gerar morte das empresas com menos valor acrescentado, mata emprego qualificado… isto é tão weird. Especulo que só acontece por causa da facilidade em importar mão de obra barata.
• salários a crescer mais do que a produtividade - em vez de gerar o flying geese que mata as empresas com menos valor acrescentado, gera uma abordagem que alimenta os sectores não transaccionáveis (competitivos pelos custos).
• Sucesso das empresas competitivas pelos custos gera empobrecimento garantido.

Agora vou repousar uns dias para carregar pilhas.

Isto é quase 1 metáfora mas dá bem ideia da tragédia da última década. E nem contabilizamos os custos emocionais para quem parte, a solidão dos progenitores envelhecidos q ficam etc. tudo por um modelo de deixa andar que a maioria (os velhos) privilegiam (e do qual serão vítimas) pic.twitter.com/05ajc2K1dC

— Αntonio Nogueira Leite (@al_antdp) August 10, 2023

Exportações - sobre o primeiro semestre de 2023

Como referi em Inversão de ciclo até que ponto a metalomecânica está a ser, vai ser, o equivalente ao têxtil nos anos 70?

Os animais vivos e aas preprações hortícolas continuam a sua estória de sucesso.

Um lado que estas análises não revelam encontra-se neste artigo "Franceses e alemães ajudam a aliviar perdas das exportações têxteis em julho":

"Em termos de grandes categorias de produtos, as exportações de matérias têxteis caíram 7% em volume e 1% em quantidade, valor enquanto nos têxteis-lar e outros artigos têxteis confecionados baixaram 9% em volume e 17% em valor. [Moi ici: Em tempos de crise o têxtil sofre logo] Já o vestuário, embora tenha vendido menos peças lá fora (-8%), conseguiu vendê-las mais caras (+9% em valor)."[Moi ici: Apesar de tudo, um bom sinal]

Um acompanhamento pessoal, o vinho. Daqui "Exportações de vinhos portugueses sobem quase 4% para 447,6 milhões até junho":

""Nos primeiros seis meses do ano, as exportações totais de vinho atingiram os 447,6 milhões de euros, 158,3 milhões de litros, a um preço médio de 2,83 euros por litro",[Moi ici: Come on, que preço mixiruca é este?] indicou, em comunicado, a ViniPortugal. Em comparação com o mesmo período de 2022, verificou-se um crescimento de 3,4 milhões de litros nas exportações em volume, 16,8 milhões de euros em valor e 0,05 euros no preço médio."

Prepare-se, não seja apanhado desprevenido

Na capa do WSJ de ontem, "The World's Factory Floor Struggles to Attract Workers":

"The workplace features floor-to-ceiling windows and a cafe serving matcha tea, as well as free voga and dance classes. Everv month, workers gather at team-building sessions to drink beer, drive go-karts and go bowling.

This isn't Google. It's a garment factory in Vietnam.

Asia, the world's factory floor and the source of much of the stuff Americans buy, is running into a big problem: Its young people, by and large, don't want to work in factories.[Moi ici: A minha primeira reacção é pensar que isto é um sinal positivo, um sinal do mecanismo dos Flying Geese a funcionar]

That's why the garment factory is trying to make its manufacturing floor more enticing, and why alarm bells are ringing at Western companies that rely on the region's inexpensive labor to churn out affordable consumer goods.

The twilight of ultra cheap Asian factory labor is emerging as the latest test of the globalized manufacturing model, which over the past three decades has delivered a vast array of inexpensively produced goods to consumers around the world.

...

"There's nowhere left on the planet that's going to be able to give you what you want," said Paul Norriss, the

British co-founder of the Vietnam garment factory, UnAvailable, based in Ho Chi Minh City. "People are going to have to change their consumer habits, and so are brands.""

Um extenso artigo e com vários pontos de vista:

• banhista gordo,
• flying geese,
• demografia,
• implicações no futuro do mercado e das marcas,
• tentativa das empresas melhorarem a experiência no local de trabalho,
• para quem não tem filhos, ou vive em casa dos pais, o dinheiro não é tudo.

BTW, "Mexico Steps Up As Largest US Trading Partner"   e  "Chipmakers have plans for new US factories. But not enough workers to run them.":

"Chipmakers are rebuilding the US semicondutor industry with $231 billion in new investments spurred by the enactment of the landmark CHIPS and Science Act a year ago.

But even as Biden officials celebrate the anniversary of that legislation this week, there are mounting concerns about whether enough skilled workers will be there to run these factories once they are online.

Labor shortages have already affected the construction of one major project in Phoenix. Meanwhile, a possible national shortfall could also complicate efforts in the year ahead by

Intel (INTC) in central Ohio, Micron (MU) in upstate New York, as well as other new projects from Texas to Utah.

The issue could prove a headwind for America's efforts to reverse a decades-long decline in semicondutor manufacturing and also complicate a key tenet of Biden's case for reelection."

Não seja apanhado desprevenido

Exportações em queda.

"Insolvências em Portugal sobem pelo terceiro mês seguido, com aumento de 23% em julho".

"Há seis anos que Portugal está a afundar no ranking da produtividade europeia".

O dinheiro dos frugais para nos sustentar vai rarear.

Não seja apanhado desprevenido.

"Getting control of life is never easy"

"Contrary to what we usually believe, moments like these, the best moments in our lives, are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times-although such experiences can also be enjoyable, if we have worked hard to attain them. The best moments usually occur when a person's body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile. Optimal experience is thus something that we make happen. For a child, it could be placing with trembling fingers the last block on a tower she has built, higher than any she has built so far; for a swimmer, it could be trying to beat his own record; for a violinist, mastering an intricate musical passage. For each person there are thousands of opportunities, challenges to expand ourselves.

Such experiences are not necessarily pleasant at the time they occur. The swimmer's muscles might have ached during his most memorable race, his lungs might have felt like exploding, and he might have been dizzy with fatigue-yet these could have been the best moments of his life. Getting control of life is never easy, and sometimes it can be definitely painful. But in the long run optimal experiences add up to a sense of mastery or perhaps better, a sense of participation in determining the content of life - that comes as close to what is usually meant by happiness as anything else we can conceivably imagine."

Trecho retirado de "Flow - The Psychology of Optimal Experience" de Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.  

"And the nicest thing about not planning is ..."

Ontem, via Twitter, cheguei a este artigo, "Lanxess-Chef warnt: Die DeIndustrialisierung beginnt". Entretanto, para contextualizar o artigo, este gráfico é eloquente. Ilustra a evolução do preço da energia na Alemanha desde que foi tomada a decisão de fechar as centrais nucleares.

Mais um grupo de especialidades químicas alemão, Lanxess, anuncia o encerramento de duas fábricas por falta de capacidade competitiva dado o elevado preço da energia, mas não só. Outras empresas químicas também estão actualmente a cortar custos. A empresa química Evonik, está a cortar novas contratações até o final do ano, reduziu fortemente os orçamentos de viagens e cortou custos de consultoria - com o objetivo de economizar 250 milhões de euros neste ano. O grupo de plásticos Covestro também está a apertar o cinto em todas as áreas de custos. Em Fevereiro passado foi a BASF.

A minha pergunta foi:

qual a estratégia de Portugal para o Inverno europeu?

— Carlos P da Cruz 🇺🇦🚜🇳🇱🇬🇪 (@ccz1) August 6, 2023

Sem dinheiro dos impostos alemães para sustentar países não-frugais qual será o contexto futuro? Que oportunidades e ameaças?

Claro, a frase do ICI-man vem-me sempre à mente:

"Planning is an unnatural process; it is much more fun to do something. And the nicest thing about not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise rather than being preceded by a period of worry and depression." 

"Don't aim at success"

"What I "discovered" was that happiness is not something that happens. It is not the result of good fortune or random chance. It is not something that money can buy or power command. It does not depend on outside events, but, rather, on how we interpret them. Happiness, in fact, is a condition that must be prepared for, cultivated, and defended privately by each person. People who learn to control inner experience will be able to determine the quality of their lives, which is as close as any of us can come to being happy.

Yet we cannot reach happiness by consciously searching for it. "Ask vourself whether vou are happy." " said J. S. Mill, "and vou cease to be so." It is by being fully involved with every detail of our lives, whether good or bad, that we find happiness, not by trying to look for it directly. Viktor Frankl, the Austrian psychologist, summarized it beautifully in the preface to his book Man's Search for Meaning: "Don't aim at success - the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue... as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a course greater than oneself." So how can we reach this elusive goal that cannot be attained by a direct route?"

O bom velho tema da obliquidade:

• "Obliquity"
• Obliquity

Trecho inicial retirado de "Flow - The Psychology of Optimal Experience" de Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. 

Quando acaba o dinheiro barato (parte II)

 Quando acaba o dinheiro barato ...

"If current trends continue, more VC- or private equity-backed startups will fall into bankruptcy this year than at any point since 2010.

In the first half of 2023, 338 U.S. companies filed for bankruptcy protection, according to newly released S&P Global Market Intelligence data, including 54 companies with private equity or venture capital backing. At that rate, 108 VC-backed startups will fail by year's end, besting the 95 that failed during 2010.

Why is this happening? Highly leveraged companies are dealing with headwinds they didn't face just a year ago. Because of rate hikes by the Federal Reserve, they're paying higher interest rates on loans. And it's become increasingly difficult to secure new money from investors. As a result, some companies can't bring in enough revenue to keep the business moving toward profitability and eventually a lucrative exit for their backers."

Trecho retirado de "Venture-backed startups are failing at record rates" 

"Gradually and then suddenly"

Há dias apanhei esta imagem no Twitter.

Tenho lido e visto imagens sobre o que se passou e está a passar com os agricultores nos Países Baixos.

Entretanto, ontem li isto e depois, também isto, "The beginning of the end of Britain's net zero consensus":

"The towns and suburbs in the vicinity of Heathrow airport receive cruel treatment. Then, last month, one blasted itself on to the map and, I argue, into history. In Uxbridge, the Labour party lost a winnable by-election as locals mutinied against a green levy. Since then, Rishi Sunak, the Conservative prime minister, has said nice things about fossil fuels and confirmed plans for new drilling licences in the North Sea. Britain will look back on this seemingly banal election in this ostensibly quiet summer as the beginning of the end of its net zero consensus.

...

Had politicians been frank about the cost of the green transition, voters might have felt prosperous enough to pay it. Now? Not a chance.

Let us dispose of the idea that net zero is popular. Yes, in Ipsos surveys, voters endorse various green policies by supermajorities. But when a financial cost is attached to them, most are rejected. ("Creating low-traffic neighbourhoods"? 61 per cent against to 22 per cent for.) And that was in November 2022, after a summer of sadistic heat. Last month, a YouGov poll found that around 70 per cent of adults support net zero. If this entailed "some additional costs for ordinary people", however, that share falls to just over a quarter. The wonder isn't the political faltering of net zero. The wonder is that it took until Uxbridge.

...

The trouble is that it really does capture something about politics. A change can be in the works for years, under the surface, until an event exposes, legitimises and accelerates it."

Isto faz-me recuar à Primavera de 20011 e a uma reunião num Sábado de tarde, na Ribeira do Porto, onde se discutiu regionalização e passei-me. A mensagem que eu fixei foi: se a impostagem for de Lesboa é má, mas se for do Norte é boa. Este tweet é dessa altura:

@filipelib Como aqu eles tipos que acham que ser enrabado por um gajo do Norte é melhor do que ser enrabado por um gajo de Lisboa

— Carlos P da Cruz 🇺🇦🚜🇳🇱🇬🇪 (@ccz1) June 8, 2011

Se as pessoas passarem fome por causa dos políticos de direita, é mau. Se for por causa do ambiente, é bom!

Tudo vai depender do tal jogo de forças (parte VI)

Há um ano escrevi aqui "Qual o resultado final?"

Qual o resultado final do balanço de forças entre a procura tradicional das empresas portuguesas (sector transaccionável) e a procura na Ásia para satisfazer os mercados que as empresas portuguesas já servem ou podem vir a servir.

Depois, em Setembro de 2022 escrevi "Como eu gostava de saber" (parte I e parte II)

Na sequência desse tema desenvolvi uma série de postais sobre o tema "Tudo vai depender do tal jogo de forças" (parte I, parte II, parte III, parte IV e parte V).

Já em Julho passado fui obrigado a escrever "Inversão de ciclo", perante a evolução dos números das exportações.

Entretanto, ontem no FT encontro "China's factories bear brunt of the economic slowdown":

"From slowing global demand to rising geopolitical tensions and a tentative post-Covid recovery, China's manufacturers are tackling some of the strongest headwinds in years.

...

Factory activity, one of the main pillars of growth during the pandemic, has slowed for four consecutive months to July 31, according to official statistics.

...

Feng Tai Footwear exemplifies the difficulties faced by the low-technology manufacturers on which China's economic success has been built. Before the pandemic it sold some 5mn pairs of shoes a year to clients such as Walmart and Target. This year it will do well to sell 3mn. Orders for the second half of this year are down at least a third compared with last year.

"Our sector is in misery," said chief executive Eddie Lam, who runs more than 10 manufacturing plants in China and employs more than 3,000 workers. "Orders often get cancelled halfway. We are basically at a standstill," he added. The country's monthly export delivery value of goods made with leather, fur or feathers as well as footwear has fallen more than a third from 2019, hitting nearly Rmb17bn ($2.4bn) in May this year.

...

Some clients have asked if the company can set up factories outside China, but Feng Tai has no plans yet.

"The US knows very well it cannot risk decoupling from China," Lam said. "I just don't see the advantage of moving production to south-east Asia with higher supply chain costs and additional investments required.

...

"We have to consider [China] 'plus one' or even more," said Ho, managing director of Tien Sung Group, of global tensions and supply chain disruptions. "We can't put all our eggs in one basket."[Moi ici: Aqui recordo o banhista gordo]"

BTW, este gráfico faz-me lembrar o esquema dos Flying Geese:

Vamos ver se o governo chinês resiste à tentação de, também ele, usar a receita portuguesa: proteger o passado e hipotecar o futuro. Porque como se lê no artigo, é desejo do Presidente Xi Jinping optar por um crescimento "de alta qualidade" que favorece as indústrias de tecnologia em detrimento dos vastos centros de fabrico que produzem bens de consumo básicos.

Sou um cândido ingénuo

Nestes tempos da Era da Ebulição em que os carris de ferro em Inglaterra derretem com o calor do sol, primeiro encontrei este artigo, "In some scientific papers, words expressing uncertainty have decreased": 

"Careful scientists know to acknowledge uncertainty in the findings and conclusions of their papers. But in one leading journal, the frequency of hedging words such as "might" and "probably" has fallen by about 40% over the past 2 decades, a study finds.

If this trend holds across the scientific literature, it suggests a worrisome rise of unreliable, exaggerated claims, some observers say. Hedging and avoiding overconfidence “are vital to communicating what one’s data can actually say and what it merely implies,” says Melissa Wheeler, a social psychologist at the Swinburne University of Technology who was not involved in the study. "If academic writing becomes more about the rhetoric ... it will become more difficult for readers to decipher what is groundbreaking and truly novel.""

Ontem, encontrei este outro, "Open science advocates warn of widespread academic fraud":

"A decade since Brian Nosek launched an initiative to tackle academic fraud, efforts to impose greater accountability in research have in the past few weeks claimed two of their most high-profile scalps.

Marc Tessier-Lavigne, a distinguished neuroscientist and president of Stanford, resigned and pledged to retract a series of papers in prestigious journals after an independent inquiry concluded they used manipulated data. Harvard has similarly demanded retractions of papers co-written by Professor Francesca Gino, a leading dishonesty expert in its business school who is currently on administrative leave."

Depois, uma breve pesquisa no Twitter levou-me a esta thread onde também encontrei o nome de Dan Ariely.

 

Num cenário polarizado ...

Há muitos anos que aqui no blogue, praticamente desde a primeira hora, escrevo sobre a importância de seleccionar os clientes-alvo e trabalhar para eles. Por exemplo, em 2006 escrevia sobre o perigo de ser uma Arca de Noé:

• Deixar de ser uma Arca de Noé
• Porque não podemos ser uma Arca de Noé!

A reforçar esta mensagem de focalização nos clientes-alvo, tenho desenvolvido aqui também a metáfora de Mongo, um mundo pleno de variedade e de tribos numa paisagem enrugada:

• 1 Origem de uma metáfora
• Criatividade e Mongo
• Covid, empresas, estratégias e paisagens enrugadas

Às vezes criticam-me porque supostamente no mundo actual as empresas tanto podem servir em simultâneo gregos como troianos. No entanto, continuo na minha, ainda na semana passada li, "Why Mushroom Leather (and Other New Materials) Are Struggling to Scale":

"Compare the number of venture capital firms funding software to the number of venture firms specialising in material innovation or fashion. There are far fewer.

The reasons for the chasm are structural. Once a software solution is invented, the marginal cost to distribute the second, third and one millionth sale are close to zero. By contrast, once a new material is invented, the marginal costs for subsequent units are nearly the same. It is only with learning and scale that costs begin to decrease.

At the same time, building the capacity to produce new materials often requires considerable capital expenditure to build out infrastructure."

Entretanto, ontem li "The Myth of the Mainstream":

"Chasing the mass market is a losing proposition for marketers in a polarized culture. Allying with the subculture that loves you is the best way to drive brand success.

...

For years, McDonald's seemed to embody everything that was wrong with the American diet. The brand had become a symbol of food choices that were driving escalating rates of obesity and hypertension.

The company spent more than a decade trying to fight this perception among American consumers by targeting them with messaging about its updated menu, which offered healthier alternatives more in line with contemporary diet trends - but to no avail. Year over year, McDonald's sales declined, and its brand perception continued to spiral downward.

...

Finally, the company decided to go on the offensive. Instead of combating the opposition's hate and attempting to win over those in the middle, McDonald's decided to focus on its fans - the people who self-identify as McDonald's devotees despite the vitriol directed at the brand. 

...

In doing so, it tapped into what these devotees love about McDonald's and not only activated their collective consumption but also inspired them to spread the word on behalf of the brand. The result of this strategy was a 10.4% increase in global revenue for McDonald's from 2018 to 2021 and the return of dormant customers: more than a quarter of those who came in to buy the Travis Scott meal, for example, hadn't visited the chain in over a year. Seemingly overnight, McDonald's went from being a cautionary tale to the darling of brand marketing and a case study for advertising effectiveness.

If you want to get people to move, you must choose a side. The notion that you can win by playing to the middle is a misleading myth.

What's going on here? Conventional wisdom would tell us that in a world of increasingly polarized opinions, our best bet is to appease the middle, if only because that's where the majority of the market is. That also seems like a safe bet to many companies, as a middle-of-the-road position is less likely to alienate potential customers.

...

The middle doesn't adopt new products with any urgency. They are not the first to respond to marketing communications, nor are they likely to weigh in on a debate between advocates and detractors. They mitigate their own risk of moving out of step with what might be considered generally acceptable by stepping back and observing other people's responses first.

The red herring is that we perceive this indifference as an opportunity to persuade them to one side or the other. But the truth is, they are not typically convinced by any marketing communications. Instead, they, too, take cues from other people - sometimes those who are for you, and at other times those who are against you.

Our chances of successfully influencing behavior increases when we choose to address the people who are most likely to take action.

With this in mind, it becomes abundantly clear that in a polarized scenario, the chances of marketers getting people to move are far greater when we activate the collective of the willing as opposed to trying to convince detractors or even persuade the indifferent."

Sobre a polarização do mercado, recordo Polarização do mercado ou como David e Golias podem co-existir. 

As "inocentes" distracções e interrupções.

Há algum tempo, durante uma conversa informal antes de um jantar, o responsável pela qualidade de uma empresa farmacêutica mencionou-me números absurdamente altos de mortes causadas por distrações em organizações de saúde nos Estados Unidos.

Na altura não lhe pedi a referência do estudo, mas o tema não me tem largado porque reconheço a quantidade de distracções a que eu e outros somos sujeitos diariamente no trabalho. Basta recordar o tema do "multitasking", por exemplo.

Há dias, pedi ajuda à inteligência artificial para me elucidar sobre o tema e foi-me recomendado este artigo, "Identifying and reducing distractions and interruptions in a pharmacy department".

Segundo o artigo as distracções e interrupções na área da saúde (mas não fiquemos por ela, pensemos no nosso próprio trabalho) podem ter várias consequências negativas, incluindo:

1. Aumento do risco de erros de medicação, que podem levar a danos nos pacientes.
2. Aumento do tempo necessário para concluir tarefas, o que pode levar a atrasos e redução da eficiência. 
3. Aumento do stress, desconforto e insatisfação dos trabalhadores. 
4. Redução da qualidade e segurança dos serviços farmacêuticos.

O ponto 2 fez-me recuar ao meu tempo de responsável da qualidade numa empresa da indústria química e ao impacte da conversa na necessidade de repetir ensaios.

Quais os principais motivos de distracção e interrupção?

1. Chamadas telefónicas e mensagens.
2. Colegas que páram para conversar.
3. Doentes que fazem perguntas ou fazem pedidos.
4. Pacientes fazendo perguntas ou fazendo pedidos.
5. Alarmes de equipamentos e outros estímulos auditivos.
6. Factores ambientais, como ruído e temperatura.
7. Distracções pessoais, como telemóveis e redes sociais. (esta faz-me lembrar conversa recente com o Aranha, que me contou sobre...
8. Tarefas administrativas, como preencher papéis e respondera  e-mails.
9. Outras tarefas relacionadas com o trabalho, como reabastecer prateleiras e limpar equipamentos.

O que propõe o artigo para minimizar a frequência de distracções e interrupções?

Coisas práticas como:

• Usar dicas visuais, por exemplo fazer com que as pessoas que executam tarefas que exigem atenção total usem uma bata colorida.
• Usar barreiras para identificar uma zona "livre de interrupções".
• Usar listas de verificação para ajudar a garantir que os funcionários se lembrem do que estavam a fazer antes de serem interrompidos.
• Proibir o uso de telefones pessoais por funcionários que desempenhem funções relacionadas com a prescrição, distribuição e administração de medicamentos.
• Dar formação contínua sobre a importância de tarefas complexas e como reduzir as interrupções.
• Determinar quais são as interrupções inaceitáveis no contexto das operações em curso.

Outro artigo, com uma perspectiva muito mais interessante sobre o motivo das distracções e interrupções é "Driven to distraction: The nature and apparent purpose of interruptions in critical care and implications for HIT"

O que me impressionou neste tema é o impacte das "inocentes" distracções e interrupções no número de  vidas humanas perdidas ou prejudicadas

Obrigá-los a falar

Mais um artigo interessante, "3 Questions Sales Teams Should Ask After Losing (or Winning) a Deal":

"When salespeople lose a deal, most prefer to move on rather than linger over the specifics of the loss. Similarly, when they win a deal, most are quick to celebrate. But very few take the time to assess why they won the business.

In our experience leading and coaching sales teams, we see evidence that a brief, well-pointed sales retrospective, where you unpack the reasons behind a win or a loss, can significantly improve a team's future win rate. Beyond the obvious benefits for the sales team - for whom the process can help identify the best messaging and behaviors to use going forward - unpacking wins and losses also provides valuable insights for product, marketing, and finance teams."

Algo que algumas empresas não fazem.

As empresas deviam "torturar os dados" e obrigá-los a falar.

Recordo um caso, recolher os dados de uma tabela e trabalhá-los com os dados de outra tabela, para reparar em 3 pistas:

• por que é que um cliente tem um preço muito mais alto do que a média?
• por que é que um cliente nacional tem um preço inferior ao período homólogo em mais de 10%?
• por que é que a Espanha saltou do limbo para o top 5 de vendas?

Como é que estas análises não se fazem com mais frequência? Recordo de um postal recente:

"too many small company leaders work "in" their businesses, rather than "on" their business"

Estratégia versus planeamento

Um extenso artigo, "How to Thwart Strategy Masquerades" a merecer uma leitura. Sublinho alguns trechos:

"Strategy always involves giving up something to get something else better. If we decide to offer only a single class of service, the consequence is that first class passengers will fly elsewhere. If we choose to offer only index funds, the consequence is that investors desirous of managed funds will invest elsewhere. If the opposite of your choice is stupid on its face, it causes no consequences and it is likely to be planning. Planning involves being non-stupid. Strategy involves consequences.

...

Strategy is centrally about compelling the thing you don't control - your customers - to take actions you wish they would take. No matter what you do, you will never be in control of your customers. If you start assuming that just because you want them to buy a certain volume of your offering, they will comply, then you are planning - and you will be sorely disappointed. Control is a planning illusion.

...

Strategy creates a future that does not now exist. That can't be accomplished by using inductive or deductive logic to extrapolate the past into the future. If your discussion focuses on 'what the data tell us we should do that is a planning discussion, not a strategy discussion. Planning doesn't create. Planning organizes."

Quando acaba o dinheiro barato

Muitas vezes ao longo dos anos tenho referido aqui no blog esta figura que criei em 2008:

Por exemplo:

• em 2022 -  We're not in Kansas anymore
• em 2017 - Antecipar a próxima jogada

Quando o preço do dinheiro desce, a rentabilidade necessária para um projecto sobreviver baixa, e vice versa. Vivemos mais de uma década de dinheiro barato... quais as implicações para os negócios habituados a baixo rentabilidade?

O NYT de ontem chama a atenção para o tema em "Corporate Debt Was Cheap, But Economy May Pay Price":

"Companies loaded up on cheap debt during an era of superlow borrowing costs to help finance their operations. The Fed has since lifted interest rates to a range of 5.25 to 5.5 percent from near zero, where they were as recently as March 2022.

The fear is that as debt comes due and businesses still in need of cash are forced to renew their financing at much higher interest rates, bankruptcies and defaults could accelerate. That risk is especially pronounced if the Fed keeps borrowing costs higher for longer - a possibility that investors have slowly come to expect.

...

The bankruptcies that have happened this year haven't seriously dented the economy so far. But analysts have warned they are symptomatic of the excesses that developed during a decade of historically low interest rates. And financial stress is unpredictable, so it poses a wild-card risk for the Fed as it tries to tame inflation. It hopes to do that without causing a recession.

...

As higher rates last, “more and more corporations will need to refinance into a higher-rate environment,”

...

But in a sign of the uncertainty over the severity of debt distress on the horizon, the Moody’s forecast also suggested that in a “severely pessimistic” scenario defaults on risky debt could jump to 13.7 percent in a year, higher than the 13.4 peak reached during the 2008 financial crisis."

Acerca da produtividade no Reino Unido

Li no FT, "Why productivity is so weak at UK companies" com o subtítulo "Longstanding problems of low investment and skills gaps exacerbated by overconfidence and lack of management time".

"But he is still in the vanguard of a collective UK effort to solve the puzzle of why British workers turn out less for every hour they work than their counterparts [Moi ici: Não gosto desta formulação. Como se os trabalhadores fossem os culpados ou a solução] in other advanced economies such as the US, Germany and France.

...

Productivity may be an abstract concept for many, but its consequences are real. Higher output  [Moi ici: Outra linguagem arcaica que não gosto de ver usada qunado se fala de produtividade porque me recorda a mentalidade dos engenheiros - foco no denominador] leads to better wages and a more prosperous economy. But UK productivity has grown by just 0.4 per cent annually in the years since the financial crisis, less than half the rate of the 25 richest OECD countries, according to think-tank the Resolution Foundation. UK household income, which used to be ahead of competitors such as France and Germany, now lags behind.

...

suggests British companies are long on confidence but short on commitment when it comes to action and investment in becoming more productive.

...

"Confidence can be a good thing - self-belief is powerful," says the report. "However, an alternative way of putting it is that we [the UK] are good at complacency." [Moi ici: Bom ponto!]

...

Another potential drag on improving output per worker is a relative lack of business investment. "If UK business investment had matched the average of France, Germany and the US since 2008. ... our GDP would be nearly 4 per cent higher today, enough to raise average wages by around £1,250 a year," the Resolution Foundation said in its recent report "Beyond Boosterism", part of its Economy 2030 research on the UK's economic prospects.

...

The proportion of UK businesses that have taken steps to improve or try regularly to measure and improve productivity is slightly down or unchanged since 2020. Some 37 per cent of businesses have discussed or planned improvements - up 8 percentage points between 2020 and 2022 - but not yet taken action.

...

That in turn feeds into concerns about the wider calibre of British managers, memorably voiced in 2017 by Andy Haldane, then Bank of England chief economist, who suggested "a (lack of management quality" was one reason for the UK's long tail of lagging businesses.

In fact, "our long tail doesn't seem to be much worse than others" , says Greg Thwaites, research director at the Resolution Foundation, and most businesses in the long tail are either too small or simply too unproductive for remedial measures to have a big macroeconomic impact. 

Be the Business chief executive Anthony Impey, who has first hand experience of starting and running technology businesses, also defends British managers. Although he acknowledges the cliche that too many small company leaders work "in" their businesses, rather than "on" their business, he points out that the obsession with day to day operations often reflects the ownership structures of such firms.

Many founders mortgaged their homes to launch or sustain their businesses and for those owners "there's a scale of jeopardy which is very often overlooked, because economists and those in big businesses don't have these sorts of stakes in their jobs", he says.

"If you have that kind of pressure, you're going to work in your business 12 hours a day", leaving little time or energy to plan investment or pause operations to implement improvements.

...

Nor do UK managers, accidental or otherwise, seem especially keen on asking for outside advice. The government's long-running survey of small businesses tracks how many leaders have sought "external advice or information" on their business (excluding "casual conversation"). That proportion dropped from almost a third to less than a quarter between 2018 and 2020 and was almost unchanged in 2021, according to the latest report available.

That is worrying because managers who do not take advice tend towards overconfidence, according to the Productive Business Index, which Be the Business has been compiling since 2021. Its latest edition found that business leaders who took no external advice were actually more confident about their leadership and management skills than those that did seek outside support. But managers without external advisers or non-executive directors were less likely to have a two- to five-year strategic plan or to feel they were prepared for unforeseen events.

...

If there were a single catch-all prescription for self-improvement, businesses would probably have applied it by now. Instead, recent analysis suggests companies need to apply a range of measures.

One would be developing and improving management skills and practices. US smaller companies top the ranking of G7 countries on management and leadership and operating efficiency, and are consistently higher than their UK equivalents in their plans to improve capabilities over the next 12 months."

Para reflexão ...

Risk and luck are doppelgangers.
They are so similar that you can’t believe in one without equally respecting the other.

- Morgan Housel pic.twitter.com/isIFpn1bNm

— Sachin Ramje (@SachinRamje) July 25, 2023

 Risco ou oportunidade não são atribuições intrínsecas... dependem da estratégia, do contexto e do apetite de risco 

Luxo, ambiente, massas, caça, salários e calçado

(X) Por que é que os portugueses, genericamente falando, não compram sapatos Made in Portugal?

(Je) - Por que são demasiado caros para a bolsa-tipo portuguesa.

(X) Por que é que as fábricas portuguesas não produzem calçado mais barato que possa ser comprado por portugueses?

(Je) - E depois, como se pagavam os salários e as matérias-primas?

Para que os salários possam subir há que aumentar o valor acrescentado. Para aumentar o valor acrescentado  há que aumentar o preço médio de cada par de sapatos. Para aumentar o preço médio de cada par de sapatos há que procurar clientes que os possam pagar.

Claro que há outra forma de aumentar o valor acrescentado: reduzir o custo unitário, praticar preços mais baixos e aumentar a quantidade produzida e vendida. Só que isso implica ter vantagem competitiva no custo e isso é incompatível num produto com muita mão de obra incorporada e situado na Europa Ocidental.

Escrevo isto a propósito de um texto publicado no semanário Expresso no Sábado passado: "Especulação Já não há hotéis na terra da fraternidade e uma noite num dos empreendimentos de luxo pode chegar a €1650 - Zeca Afonso teria de "montar uma tenda para dormir" " em Grândola""

Estou a lembrar-me dos anos a seguir à revolução de 74 e dos milhares de caçadores anónimos que íam caçar para o Alentejo em regime de caça livre (não havia outro e era um direito de Abril).

Eu nunca ocuparei esses empreendimentos turísticos em Grândola, porque não tenho dinheiro para isso e porque não fui educado nesse estilo de gasto e de vida, mas não consigo deixar de pensar que talvez esse nível de preços proteja a região do turismo de massas e permita pagar melhores salários.

"That's the part I have to start lying about."

"I would like, in this book, to show that the crisis of the world around us, and also the "crises of religion" ... are enormous windows of opportunity opened to us by God.

...

I regard the awakening of just such an attitude to life - not avoiding crises but taking up one's cross - to be one of Christianity's most valuable contributions. Christianity is not primarily "a system of dogmatic texts," but instead a method, a way, a route." (1)

Precisamente a opção contrária ao modelo português-tipo. No entanto, cada vez mais não estamos sozinhos.

"If I'm doing something that's growth-based and if I suffused all of these institutions with certain growth obligations The portion of that institution like its pension fund that had to grow at a level that it cannot grow at becomes psychopathic. Right?

...

So we started to get into a place where we couldn't sustain the science, the science couldn't sustain the technology, the technology couldn't sustain the markets, and everything had been built with an obligation. So the whole point of this theory of egos or embedded growth obligations is how do we have a theory why all? Institutions would sort of get into trouble at once and it's the common thing is a growth that can't be met.

Right, so that's that's why everything went funny, now.

That's not to say that we're not analytic. If we didn't want to lie to keep this game going. We could fix a lot of things. So things that do get fixed are things like airplane checklists to make sure that we don't take off with something broken. The checklist is also operative in a hospital, so you don't amputate the wrong leg. So the explosion in iatrogenics, which is the harm done by physicians to their own patients, and the epidemic of crashes, that ended, both in part result from a common understanding and management that a checklist is a life-saving thing.

We could do that with integrity to the growth based parts the pension I could say to you actually, you know these commitments we made to get to your pension can't be met. Here's what's realistic and here's what's safe. What do you guys how do you guys feel about 2% or you know, or 1.5% growth? 

You say well, can I retire? Not really very well? You might paid my whole life into helping other people. Yeah, you're the loser in a pyramid scheme.

How do you feel? Well, you don't feel good. That's the part I have to start lying about."(2)

De ontem:

"Future generations of retirees will be impoverished, as will the country as a whole."(3) 

Conseguem ouvir o governo de turno dizer com uma lata só semelhante à cobardia dos media que a ouvem:

- A Segurança Social foi salva! 

1 - Trechos retirados de "Night of the Confessor: Christian Faith in an Age of Uncertainty" de Tomas Halík.

2 - Trechos retirados de "Eric Weinstein - All Hell Is About to Break Loose"

3 - Trecho retirado de "The government needs to be far bolder on pension reform"