Lord Mark Price: Waitrose, working in government and happiness at work

Lord Mark Price began his career at the John Lewis Partnership as a graduate trainee in 1982. It was the start of what would be a 34-year stint, culminating in him becoming the MD of Waitrose in 2007. During his nine-year tenure, he would guide the business through the financial crisis and double its size.

One of the things he is most proud of is radically reducing staff turnover from roughly 70 per cent to around 20 per cent. This inspired his latest venture, a digital HR platform called WorkL.

In 2010, Price was invited by then-prime minister David Cameron to sit on a committee that was looking to use happiness as a measure of GDP. The announcement of the committee was heavily politicised, with the trade union Unite attacking the plan as “another attempt by the coalition to pull the wool over people’s eyes”.

But Price says that Cameron was onto something. WorkL collects data from millions of workers in 106 countries across the globe and has found an important pattern: “The happiness scores for the UK align precisely with where we are for productivity. And that is the same for every other country we measure. People who are happier at their work perform better, work harder, give more and outperform their competitors.”

Price, who recently stepped down as president of the Chartered Management Institute, highlights research by the organisation which found that over 80 per cent of managers in the UK have no training in management. He believes that at the heart of our productivity issue is the fact that in the UK we are not as good at managing and motivating people as elsewhere.

“Recognition is a great example,” Price says. “In the UK, on average, people are recognised and thanked for doing a good job once every two and a half months. However, people get critical feedback twice a week. If you go to America, it’s exactly the reverse. I think the way that we manage people and the metrics we use to measure them becomes crucial.”

When Price stepped down as the boss of Waitrose, it brought to an end a stellar career at the John Lewis Partnership. He became the UK trade minister in April 2016, just two months before the UK voted to leave the EU.

Being charged with agreeing trade deals post-Brexit and his current position in the House of Lords has given him a unique insight into the export trends of UK businesses. He says they may be missing a real opportunity for growth: “Our small companies are pretty good at exporting. Our very large companies are very good at exporting.

But our medium-sized companies aren’t. There was research done when I was at the Department for International Trade that showed that medium-sized businesses don’t necessarily want to take the risk of exporting.

“Also, VC-backed mid-sized businesses tend to get sold and turned around more quickly than they do in Europe. Therefore, there’s less chance for them to scale to become big businesses. There’s something structurally different in the UK, which is really missing a trick.”

Price also gives his thoughts on the current state of the John Partnership, which is well worth a listen. You can listen to the full episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.