< Previous40 East Midlands Business Link www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk LOGISTICS A strategically important location The East Midlands’ reputation as a logistics powerhouse continues to grow with companies committing to the region, new developments underway, and a freeport on the horizon. 40-43.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 15:58 Page 1www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 41 LOGISTICS © Shutterstock /T ravel mania The East Midlands has long been regarded as a key location for the logistics industry, housing the ‘Golden Triangle’, ideal transport links - whether that be via rail, road, or air - and a wealth of warehouses. The region’s reputation has only been boosted as of late, while concurrently the demand placed on the logistics industry and associated real estate continues to rise in light of the pandemic’s e- commerce boom. Confidence in the East Midlands as a strategically important destination for logistics can be seen as major companies commit to placing operations in the area, with a plethora of deals made this year already. Just last month (May) it was revealed that Prologis, the developer and owner of logistics parks, had agreed a lease with one of the country’s leading homeware retailers, Dunelm, for a new warehousing facility on its Daventry International Rail Freight Terminal (DIRFT) development. The company will take a 10-year lease on a new logistics building at DIRFT, totalling 189,214 sq ft, with the furnishings giant set to move in once construction completes in September this year. Meanwhile Maersk, an integrated contained logistics company and member of the A.P. Moller Group, has signed to take 101,134 sq ft at Crossfire 14 in Kettering to satisfy the increased demand for warehousing from its clients, and e-commerce retailer Buy It Direct Group recently let EMDC 525, a 523,404 sq ft distribution centre situated off J24a M1, near East Midlands Airport. Moreover, Whistl, the provider of e- fulfilment solutions, is opening two new depots in the East Midlands, comprising a 300,000 sq ft site at Magna Park South, Lutterworth - Whistl’s largest dedicated 3PL logistics and distribution facility situated within the Midlands’ ‘Golden Triangle’ of logistics providers - and a 133,000 sq ft site adjacent to Whistl’s Northampton, Moulton Park depot. Emphasising the desire for logistics property in the region further is the fact that the Midlands recorded the largest regional share of logistics take-up in the UK during the first quarter of 2021, as noted in research from CBRE. The 42 Á 40-43.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 15:58 Page 242 East Midlands Business Link www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk LOGISTICS majority of the take-up in the East Midlands was for both online and store- based retailers, reflecting the overall national take-up trend, but, in contrast to previous trends, 74 per cent of take-up was for second-hand units, illustrating occupiers’ needs to satisfy immediate requirements. Also reflecting the region’s logistics prowess are the numerous significant developments being erected. SEGRO for instance currently has four new units under construction at its 700-acre logistics site, SEGRO Logistics Park East Midlands Gateway, after which the park will be nearly seventy-five per cent full. The company is also constructing SEGRO Logistics Park Northampton Gateway in the region. Once developed, the 450-acre site will become a multi-modal logistics hub with five million square feet of modern, sustainable warehousing and logistics facilities, including a dedicated 35-acre Strategic Rail Freight Interchange that will have the capacity for up to 16 trains a day. Also in Northampton, Panattoni is working on the second phase of its 1.6 million sq ft industrial park. Panattoni Park Northampton is already the home to three former Panattoni buildings and will see further units delivered at 250,000 sq ft, 380,000 sq ft and 430,000 sq ft. The second phase of development comes after the business speculatively developed and let 625,000 sq ft of space to Eddie Stobart Logistics. Panattoni has also committed to speculatively develop a 515,000 sq ft warehouse in Derby, as part of its 900,000 sq ft development at Derby Commercial Park, which is already home to the speculatively built Derby 370 unit, which has been let to Alloga UK on a 15- year lease term. The region’s own growing commitment to the logistics sector can be seen as it looks to form more talent, with a new dedicated training and research facility being developed through a partnership between industry and education at GLP’s Magna Park development in Lutterworth. The new Centre for Logistics Education and Research (CLEAR) is aiming to help the sector address key challenges as the UK moves towards economic recovery and renewed growth following the coronavirus pandemic. North Warwickshire and South Leicestershire College is working in collaboration with Aston University, Wincanton, supply chain partner, and investor and developer of logistics warehouses and distribution parks, GLP to provide skills training and professional development at all levels across the spectrum of logistics and supply chain roles, to enable the sector to become increasingly agile, 40-43.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 15:58 Page 3www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 43 LOGISTICS © Shutterstock /Simon Annable flexible and resilient. Meanwhile the announcement that the East Midlands will host one of eight new freeports in England (the only inland freeport among the designated zones) is set to bolster the region’s national and international trading links and facilitate more efficient trade with other countries. With freeports, businesses with international supply chains will have a chance to reconsider their logistics planning. Businesses will benefit from streamlined planning, tax relief and simplified customs procedures that will support growth, while our local communities are expected to see additional employment opportunities and better infrastructure. As the East Midlands looks set to become an even more important location for the logistics sector, the industry is witnessing significant change. Sustainability requirements and low emission zones are influencing the sector as the country strives to achieve net-zero targets for example. This is set to push forward greener buildings when constructing warehouses, use of renewable and low-carbon technologies in energy supply to buildings, and on the road, use of electric vehicles is set to expand, which can also be a brand advantage, or alternatively abatement technology can be fitted on vehicles to purify emissions. Furthermore, the sector is being impacted by Industry 4.0 and Internet of Things (IoT) advances, which are presenting numerous opportunities in the supply chain, particularly as visibility becomes more vital than ever. As businesses embrace IoT devices, like sensors, on packages, containers, and vehicles, data can be provided for logistics companies to track shipments in real time, increase security, monitor atmospheric parameters for product safety where sensitive goods are involved (such as pharmaceutical products), monitor driver activity and enact predictive vehicle maintenance. Tracking can also be opened up for customers, which is invaluable in the online shopping boom for improving customer experience. Within warehouses, automation and AI are growing, and this is expected to accelerate in light of the pandemic and social distancing as well as staff shortages. Automation via technologies like pick and place robots and AGVs is being used to increase efficiency, productivity and speed while reducing human intervention, and AI is optimising route planning and predictions, such as in demand planning by analysing online behaviour. 40-43.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 15:58 Page 444 East Midlands Business Link www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk BUSINESS ADVICE EXPERTS As they say, use the right tool for the job. To follow this advice through to its logical conclusion, one should also use the right company for any given need – be that IT, training, insurance or commercial property. It’s easy to define an expert as an individual skilled in a given area but doing so eclipses the journey involved in reaching that point. Indeed, experts begin their careers in exactly the opposite end of the spectrum – as bright-eyed novices. From here, they accumulate understanding and experience, honing their skills through practical learning until, years later, they can be labelled as experts. Suffice it to say, when you take their advice, you’re getting decades worth of know-how in every single answer. In this regard, it’s always better to invest in experts in their specific fields, rather than those who claim to adept across all fields. One can’t help but think of the adage of the ‘jack of all trades being master of none’. It only serves to follow that someone who has dedicated their professional life to a specific part of a sector would have much more valuable experience and insight than someone who has only delved superficially across a plethora of different sectors. After all, PhDs aren’t awarded to those students turning their hand to as wide array of topics as possible, but the ones who dedicated their time and energies to a specific niche. There’s a wealth of industrial sectors across the East Midlands from its pedigree in manufacturing and construction to emerging fields such as cloud computing and game development. With experience comes knowledge and so we’re using this feature to invite businesses from across the region to share their knowledge and offer insight into their success. For this issue, we’re bringing you leaders in training, information and communication technology, commercial property and insurance. Together, these companies represent a diverse cross- section of business in our region and, as such, offer truly valuable expertise and insight. These companies have risen to leaders in their respective fields so you can trust that the knowledge you’ll receive is trusted and proven. Who knows, you might even find a new supplier or get the ball rolling on a new contract. Top of their field © Shutterstock /Olivier Le Moal 44-45.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 16:00 Page 1www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 45 St Peter’s House, Mansfield Rd, Derby, DE1 3TP Tel: 01332 343194 Web: www.linkict.co.uk Email:enquiries@linkict.co.uk Company profile Founded in 2004, Link ICT provides a comprehensive range of services, including IT support, risk management, audio visual installation and maintenance, networking, telecoms and connectivity to businesses and schools across the East Midlands region. Services profile Whether you’re looking for project specific services, such as AV installation or network cabling, or looking to build a long-term partnership with regular IT support, Link ICT is the perfect partner to meet your business IT requirement. Why Link ICT? • A dedicated technician with a guaranteed support slot • Access to helpdesk to allow for logging tickets out of hours • Tailored support designed to meet your needs • Helpful technicians with a “can-do” approach to resolve your issues as quickly as possible • Transparent pricing with discounted rates for remote support and other services • All technicians are DBS checked and experienced at working in a range of organisations IT © Shutterstock /NicoElNino Dromintee Road, Leicester, LE67 1TX Tel: 01530 833 533 Web: www.oms.uk.com Managing Director profile Clive Ormerod founded OMS in 1998 after holding a number of high- profile leadership roles with several large UK companies. He specialises in providing bespoke management solutions across a range of disciplines including health & safety, quality, environment and business continuity, combining business acumen with impressive technical qualifications and expertise. Company profile Trading for over 23 years, OMS has grown through developing solutions that meet customer needs and aspirations with a clear focus on listening to their customers. Today, OMS has a core team at its head office and training centre in Leicestershire, as well as a number of other training venues throughout the Midlands and UK and a network of specialist associates, enabling it to provide a broad range of expertise to public and private sector organisations or all sizes. Applying their consultancy and training principles to their own company, OMS has a clear focus on empowering and investing in the team. BESPOKE MANAGEMENT SOLUTIONS Cattermole Buildings, Market Place, Codnor, Derbyshire, DE5 9QA Tel: 01773 514750 Web: www.htcassociatesltd.co.uk Email: information@htcassociatesltd.co.uk Company profile Established since 2004 in Codnor, HTC Associates has been delivering honest, trusted and clear advice on general insurance and has built an enviable reputation in Professional Indemnity – a specialist cover for any business providing advisory and consultancy services. Through understanding their clients’ businesses, HTC aims to deliver cost- effective and comprehensive insurance solutions. Pen portrait – Justin Conroy Justin Conroy founded HTC after building up considerable experience in the insurance industry working for both insurers and brokers. The fundamental aim of creating HTC stands true today - to deliver a concierge- style service to business owners that are, rightly, busy enough running their own enterprise without having the additional worry of knowing they have the right protection for themselves and their employees. Mr Conroy oversees the whole business, and is proud of the team that he has assembled. “We have a full range of skills across the wide range of general insurance products and welcome the opportunity to review your current insurance arrangements without obligation,” he said. INSURANCE Castledine House, 5-9 Heanor Road, Ilkeston, Derbyshire, DE7 8DY Tel: 0115 697 8888 Web: www.cpa-a.co.uk Email: info@cpa-a.co.uk Company profile Director Daniel Hawkins founded CPA and Associates in 2011 with a paperless approach to property management. This paid off in spades with the company being named ‘Britain’s Best SME’ in 2012. This approach became favourable to landlords and tenants because it offered greater transparency and, more importantly, speed of information. It has been proven that allowing for instant access to documentation contributes to a significant reduction in both time and costs during the conveyance of any letting or sale. The company’s cloud management system gives both landlords and tenants the ability to gain instant access to live service charge information and building documentation. Landlords can view rental information and their buildings leases and find tenants to occupy their commercial property premises. CPA adopts a common-sense approach to service charges that offers a unique advantage to both landlords and tenants. Our fixed fee approach allows for reduced service charges. Tenants desire savings in their property expenditure and are very responsive to offsetting a percentage against a rental increase. COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE 44-45.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 16:00 Page 246 East Midlands Business Link www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk PUBLIC RELATIONS I am writing this from the front row of a business event, yes, a real-life business event with people and everything. I’m actually up on the stage in the next 20 minutes ahead of one Piers Morgan. That is not a typo. It technically makes me the warm-up act! The host organisation wants me to run a workshop on how to generate press coverage and media attention. No problem, happy to help. However, the interesting thing is that with over 100 people in the audience here and well over 1,250 online, there are a few folk who are less keen. speak on the same bill as Piers. In fact, I used this to promote the fact that I was speaking. Using a simple poll on social media, I asked a simple question: “Piers Morgan, love him, loath him or leave him?” On, Facebook, the comments were pretty evenly split but there was very little apathy, i.e. very few said “leave.” However, on LinkedIn, the split was very much in one direction and it surprised me… Over 1,000 were floating around on the poll and I had hundreds of replies, the vast majority say they LOVE Piers. Interesting. I dug a little deeper and the Publicity, positioning, Piers, and me By Greg Simpson, founder of Press for Attention PR and the PR and Communications Ambassador for the IoD in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire Spoiler alert, it isn’t about me! It turns out Piers is something of a divisive figure. Who knew?! I’ve just discovered that 5 members of the group (which has thousands across the globe) have actually terminated their membership purely because Piers is on the bill. They refuse to be associated with him. That’s their call, I’ve no problem with that. I’m not his biggest fan either but I do know that I might learn something from him that I can apply to my business or my clients’ businesses. I suspected the division might happen when I accepted the opportunity to 46-47.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 16:01 Page 1www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 47 PUBLIC RELATIONS main reason was because he appears to say what he thinks. Now, I tend not to agree with what he thinks and says but it seems he is respected for that. This might suggest that the fence-sitters, typically broadcasters, and let’s face it, politicians, are actually getting nowhere fast. There’s a phrase I heard the other day: “There’s no money in the middle.” There’s also another around the idea that if you remain in the middle of the road, you’ll get run over. Nice. But it has got me thinking. You don’t have to be liked by everyone. You don’t need everyone to buy from you. You need the right people to like you and your product or service. That is where your focus should be, not on trying to be all things to all people. Now, that doesn’t mean you should start to antagonise people (I’m looking at you Piers), but you can begin to stand FOR something and AGAINST something else. Me? I want to break PR. I want to level the playing field so that any business can play the media game. Will that annoy people? Yep, mainly other PR consultants and agencies, but I’m cool with that, I know who I want to help. A former business journalist, Greg Simpson is the author of The Small Business Guide to PR and has been recognised as one of the UK’s top 5 PR consultants, having set up Press for Attention PR in 2008. He has worked for FTSE 100 firms, charities and start-ups and conducted press conferences with Sir Richard Branson and James Caan. His background ensures a deep understanding of every facet of a successful PR campaign – from a journalist’s, client’s, and consultant’s perspective. 46-47.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 16:01 Page 248 East Midlands Business Link www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk CORPORATE HOSPITALITY A company that can boast a motivated and enthused workforce is more likely to be a company that can innovate and react to new challenges – especially in the current fast-moving business world. Although individual departments may well work brilliantly on their own, a business can’t excel unless there’s synergy, utilising the skills of all employees in a fluid and flexible fashion. Hence the importance of team building to create new links between otherwise isolated staff members. Despite its importance, however, employees (and employers) can sometimes resent team building as unnecessary – particularly during tough times like this where they may be working that little bit harder. This is often not because of any fault among the team, but because of a rather odd feeling that team building is done at the expense of the employee, where the opposite should be the case. It’s not unusual for unscrupulous companies to hold team building on weekends or outside of work hours, and for it to be events or challenges that employees might find demeaning or patronising. This, however, is not only the wrong way to go about team building but is also something stylised more on television and comedy. Traditional team building, and companies that focus on it, tend to advocate a more enjoyable approach. After all, is not simply having team members have fun around one another the best way to promote synergy? It doesn’t matter how quickly they can untie a sailor’s knot or scale an obstacle course if there is bad blood between them. This is doubly important after stressful times or a long absence like lockdown, which may have left some teams apart for well over a year! You can’t expect people to come back and have the same degree of teamwork they did before, when they’ve not been working together for so long. That is often why staff parties are thrown at various times in the year as well, because these events – as casual as they might seem – help to build social bonds and reinforce teamwork. This is commonly seen among the animal kingdom too, where creatures who live and work in a pack have a higher chance of survival. To improve pack bonds, animals regularly engage in social Building teamwork Across every industry, teams who spend time with one another outside of work show improved performance, and yet despite this – businesses still consider team building an unnecessary luxury. 48-49.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 16:02 Page 1www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 49 CORPORATE HOSPITALITY behaviour such as preening, cleaning or play. While no one in the business world wants to advocate mutual cleaning of fleas as a method to improve teamwork, the lessons are still the same; those who form strong bonds with their team tend to work better together. If a team has individually strong members but seems to fall behind on targets, then it might be worth looking at boosting team morale instead, perhaps with a fun or entertaining dinner or night out. The key is to do something unusual and memorable, and something that the staff likely won’t be doing on their own terms. A visit to a casino could be a good option, especially if it’s for an event or the business can provide chips for them to use. This offers a guilt-free chance for the team to win and lose together, have fun and build stronger bonds. This improved teamwork is likely to translate well into the office, especially when there is next a discussion which might otherwise have ended in an argument. Team building is often seen as something unnecessary by both employees and employers alike. Some refer to them as a waste of both money and time, teamwork being something that can be built at the desk as easily as it can be on some expensive away trip. Yet if that’s truly the case, why is it that the top companies in the world, from Google to Apple, all the way down to banks and multi-nationals, all adhere and stand by such trips? The simple answer is that these things work, and there’s plenty of research, both into humans and animals to support this. As businesses, we already invest much into our workforce, but it remains the case that they provide back in return, as without them no revenue would be made. To then suggest that a team- building session is “too much” feels a little off. The smallest and most local car garage will likely have staff that go out and drink together, while professional football teams worth hundreds of millions will still encourage their staff to spend time with one another outside of training; all because it makes them play better on the field. If every other performance-related team in the world seems to see the benefit of this, what excuse do employers have to call it a waste of time? © Shutterstock /REDPIXEL.PL 48-49.qxp_Layout 1 01/06/2021 16:02 Page 2Next >