Why it’s easier to get a job at MG than at Costa
MG’s remuneration model is quite unusual – we pay our brilliant team a low base salary, and then every quarter we share out the profit that we’ve jointly generated. While it’s sometimes difficult to explain it to new recruits, it’s a great way to emphasise the collaborative mindset that underpins everything we do – and more prosaically it protects our bottom line from tight quarters, while heavily rewarding the MG family when we’re doing well.
A cool part of our model is that everyone in the team gets £1000 each year to spend on making themselves more interesting. For some this gets spent on something professional – language training, coaching skills – but others think more expansively – singing lessons, cordon bleu cookery and sailing qualifications.
I’m planning to spend some of my budget on Barista training – either with LSC or the brilliant Collona & Smalls. It’s really cheap, just a few hundred pounds to cover everything imaginable, and if things don’t work out at MG, perhaps it’ll support a new career path.
Or not, as it turns out.
The BBC reports today that 8 barista jobs at a Nottingham branch of Costa attracted 1,700 applications. That’s a success ratio of almost 200:1. Contrast that with MG, where we tend to hire 1 in 20 people who enter our process.
I find it incredibly depressing that skilled individuals, with deep experience of retail and customer service are throwing themselves at opportunities like this that barely pay a living wage. Nothing against Costa (although their coffee is terrible), but it’s hardly the best job in the world is it?
Now, more than ever, the UK needs a generation of business creators to step-up and create new wealth, and new value-adding jobs. Last week, nearly 9,000 people took the plunge and started up their own business acrrosing to Startup Britain. Good luck to them – Britain needs you.
Philip Clarke
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