MTC Blog Entry April 2009 – Mark Jones, General Manager Macepark Hotels

Is it just me, or have we all finally tired of the never-ending steam of downbeat financial news? Certainly the latest national news seems to be more about political in-fighting and malicious gossip than financial affairs.

In the absence of further financial institutions stuttering; with good news on mortgage completions and with the lowest cost of mortgage repayments in living memory - we can perhaps start to think that we have reached the beginning of the end of the worst period in this particular economic cycle?

I started my career in the 70s in London at a time when we had widespread industrial unrest and secondary picketing on top of which we suffered the London bombing campaign when bomb curtains were being fitted in hotel windows to catch the expected shards of glass; rubbish bins as potential bomb holders were removed from the underground stations never to return - and the industrial situation ended up with the three day week and regular power brown-outs. The capital city of this nation was at one time strewn with uncollected black plastic rubbish bags and the green goddesses were in use by the army as a response to the lack of fire service cover.

None of this chaos and civil disintegration is evident at this time. Indeed it seems to me that the pain and impact of this particular downturn is mainly being felt on an individual and family basis by those losing their livelihoods or living with uncertainly and doubt. However, you can be sure that beneath the surface organisations will come out the other end looking and acting very differently due the shifting of the financial milestones.

After this period there will be dramatic changes within organisations of all sizes and functionality and there will be a period of adjustment that will bring with it a substantial need for training and retraining

In some cases this need will be driven by stringent new financial regulations and guidelines and in other cases driven by the fact that so many people will have changed roles and/or responsibilities.

The changing of roles and the restructuring of teams is certainly already evident. As our Director of Sales & Marketing Michael Stott said to me last week; “We’ve changed more details on our clients and our contacts in the last four weeks than you would normally change in a year!” As building relationships is key to building knowledge and understanding, let’s hope the merry-go-round stops soon.

I personally believe that as a specialist provider of training facilities at both Whittlebury Hall and Scalford Hall – we will be well placed to be of service to those that will need to address their training needs during the immediate future. At a time when it is still difficult to see an upside to this episode in our business history, perhaps we will find ours by doing what we do best and that is to provide the ideal learning environment.

Mark Jones