{"id":29664,"date":"2026-02-02T11:31:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T11:31:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/?p=29664"},"modified":"2026-02-11T13:04:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T13:04:16","slug":"invitation-understanding-sme-leadership-management-and-productivity-in-the-west-midlands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/invitation-understanding-sme-leadership-management-and-productivity-in-the-west-midlands\/","title":{"rendered":"Invitation: Understanding SME Leadership, Management and Productivity in the West Midlands"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-28746\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/07\/Blog-4.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"970\" height=\"646\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/07\/Blog-4.png 970w, https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/07\/Blog-4-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/07\/Blog-4-768x511.png 768w, https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/07\/Blog-4-250x166.png 250w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px\" \/><\/p>\n<h3>Invitation to Participate<\/h3>\n<p>Public support for small and medium\u2011sized enterprises (SMEs) must respond to the needs of business community.<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>To best achieve this, we will appreciate your participation in a short interview please.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The <strong>West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA)<\/strong> and <strong>City\u2011REDI at the University of Birmingham<\/strong> are carrying out a study to understand the factors shaping <strong>business leadership &amp; management capability and productivity among SMEs across the West Midlands region.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>We are looking for <strong>SME owners and managers<\/strong> who are willing to participate in <u>confidential online interviews (30 minutes) in February &#8211; March 2026<\/u>.<\/p>\n<p>Our study focuses on three core questions:<\/p>\n<table>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"601\">1. <strong>What strategic decisions do SMEs need to make to navigate rapid technological change and economic turbulence?<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"601\">We are exploring how firms approach digital adoption, skills development, market diversification, innovation, and investment planning.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"601\">2. <strong>How do SMEs build leadership and management capability?<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"601\">We want to understand what helps business owners and managers develop the skills, confidence, and strategic mindset needed to grow and adapt.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"601\">3. <strong>How can the regional business support ecosystem help?<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"601\">We are examining the role of local authorities, accelerators, finance providers, Growth Hubs, universities, further education colleges and sector networks in supporting SME capability and productivity.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>Your insights will help shape future WMCA policy, improve the design of business support programmes, and strengthen the region\u2019s innovation, skills and productivity ecosystem.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Please get in touch by emailing: <\/strong><strong><a href=\"mailto:f.kitagawa.1@bham.ac.uk\">Fumi Kitagwa<\/a> &#8211; f.kitagawa.1@bham.ac.uk\u00a0or <a href=\"mailto:j.schwarz@bham.ac.uk\">Juliane Schwarz <\/a>&#8211; j.schwarz@bham.ac.uk.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Invitation to Participate Public support for small and medium\u2011sized enterprises (SMEs) must respond to the needs of business community. To best achieve this, we will appreciate your participation in a short interview please. The West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) and City\u2011REDI at the University of Birmingham are carrying out a study to understand the factors &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/invitation-understanding-sme-leadership-management-and-productivity-in-the-west-midlands\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Invitation: Understanding SME Leadership, Management and Productivity in the West Midlands&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2147,"featured_media":28746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2147"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29664"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29723,"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29664\/revisions\/29723"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.bham.ac.uk\/cityredi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}