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  • The Real Cost of the Employment Rights Act – Ep 75

    The Real Cost of the Employment Rights Act – Ep 75
    2026/06/22
    The government's own impact assessment puts the cost of the Employment Rights Act at up to £5 billion a year, with small firms hit hardest.In this episode, Matt and Charlie walk through what the Act actually changes on the ground. Statutory sick pay from day one. The unfair dismissal qualifying period dropping from two years to six months. Zero-hours reform, fire-and-rehire restrictions, and a stack of new admin duties landing in stages over the next year.They talk about the real-world impact, not just the headline figures. The bartender who calls in sick after a night out. The pub landlord covering the cost. The warehouse manager trying to staff a shift he can no longer cancel. And the productivity question nobody in government seems to want to answer.It is a blunt, honest take on hiring, firing, and why Matt is now leaning towards offshoring rather than carrying more risk in the UK. Plus why a good HR partner has gone from nice-to-have to essential.Takeaways:🤒 Why day-one sick pay changes the maths on every hire⏱️ The two-year rule dropping to six months and what it means📋 The new admin and compliance burden landing on small firms🚪 Why fire-and-rehire and zero-hours reform make staffing harder🌍 The uncomfortable case for offshoring over UK hiringFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    55 分
  • The Books Are About to Go Public – Ep 74

    The Books Are About to Go Public – Ep 74
    2026/06/15
    From April 2028, the profit and loss account you currently keep private goes onto the public record for anyone to read.In this episode, Matt and Charlie break down the Companies House shake-up that will force small and micro businesses to file full P&L accounts. No more filleted or abridged figures. Your margins, your labour spend, your bottom line, all of it visible.They get into who actually benefits from this. Suppliers spotting room to push prices up. Competitors studying where you spend. Banks, recruiters, and the nosy bloke down the road, all able to form a view off numbers that are already well over a year out of date.Along the way they cover how success gets judged in this country, the sacrifice behind the numbers nobody sees, and why this feels like state interference on something that wasn't broken.Takeaways:📂 What the 2028 Companies House change actually means for your business💷 Why suppliers seeing your margins could cost you on price🔍 How competitors and recruiters might read your accounts🏦 The knock-on effect for credit, borrowing, and supplier trust🤐 Why a private limited company should get to stay privateFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    46 分
  • The VAT Cut That Misses the Point — Ep 73

    The VAT Cut That Misses the Point — Ep 73
    2026/06/08
    The government just announced a VAT cut for hospitality. Read the small print and it looks a lot less generous than the headline.In this episode, Matt and Charlie pull apart the Great British Summer Savings VAT cut: ten weeks at 5% on a narrow band of qualifying supplies, running from 25 June to 1 September. It sounds like a lifeline. The detail tells a different story.They get into why a ten-week window doesn't even cover a single VAT quarter, how the measure quietly picks winners inside the sector, and why the pubs and restaurants on their knees see almost nothing from it.Along the way: whether business owners ever really switch off on holiday, the treadmill feeling when growth doesn't show up in the numbers, and why doing well in Britain still feels like something you're meant to apologise for.Takeaways:📉 Why a ten-week VAT cut doesn't even cover one VAT quarter🍽️ How the small print leaves out most pubs and restaurants🎢 The way the measure quietly picks winners inside hospitality💷 What rising wage costs are really doing to the sector🔁 Why real support needs to run all year, not ten weeksFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    46 分
  • What We'd Tell Ourselves Five Years Ago — Ep 72

    What We'd Tell Ourselves Five Years Ago — Ep 72
    2026/06/01
    Five years ago we were coming out of a pandemic, growing too fast, and not stopping to think. Now we'd handle the same problems with half the stress — but we never sit down long enough to notice how far we've come.In Ep 72, Matt and Charlie look backwards properly. What they'd do differently, what they wish they'd done sooner, and the patience and perspective that only experience buys.They unpack a brutal stat — almost 40% of UK businesses incorporated between 2020 and 2024 have already closed, and just 40% of UK small businesses are still trading after five years — and ask why anyone takes the leap at all when the odds look like that.Along the way, they get into personal guarantees, the cost of risk-taking in the UK, hires made too late, kit bought too soon, and why kids and your mid-thirties seem to flip the switch from "I've got time" to "this has to happen now."Takeaways:⏳ Why founders never stop to look back — and what it costs them📉 What 40% five-year survival rates say about the UK climate🔥 Where the fire actually comes from (and why it shows up late)💰 Money mistakes you only see clearly with hindsight🪜 Why the problems don't shrink as you grow — they just change shapeFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    50 分
  • When the Internet Has an Opinion — Ep 71

    When the Internet Has an Opinion — Ep 71
    2026/05/25
    When a podcast clip goes semi-viral on Instagram, the comments tell you more about how the public sees business owners than any survey ever could.In Ep 71, Matt and Charlie unpack the fallout from a reel asking what businesses would do if minimum wage jumped overnight to £15 an hour — 20,000 views, 100+ comments, and a real-time look at the gap between operator reality and online opinion.They get into why so many people think SMEs are interchangeable with multinationals, the rising cost stack founders are absorbing quietly, and what the backlash says about respect (or lack of it) for the people taking the risk.Along the way, they talk about social media as a double-edged sword for SMEs — when your following gets bigger than your business, when "looking busy" online costs you support, and why most of us still aren't consistent enough with it.Takeaways:📱 What a semi-viral reel exposes about how the public sees business owners💷 Why an overnight 18% wage jump isn't the same conversation as fair pay🧾 The cost stack founders absorb that nobody outside business sees🪞 When your social presence over-eggs the reality of the business🎯 Why consistency on content beats clever every single timeFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    42 分
  • The £15 Minimum Wage Problem — Ep 70

    The £15 Minimum Wage Problem — Ep 70
    2026/05/18
    161 UK pubs shut their doors in Q1 2026 alone — one publican turning the lights out every 13 hours. And the pressure isn't easing.In this episode, Matt and Charlie unpack two damning stats from the British Beer and Pub Association and UK Hospitality, before tearing into the Green Party's proposal to push the national living wage from £12.71 to £15 an hour — an 18% jump in a single year.They debate what a hike like that would actually do to small businesses already buckling under April's 4.1% wage rise, employer NI at 15%, and a £1.4bn cost increase across hospitality alone. Spoiler: it's not the politicians who pick up the bill.Along the way, they get into youth unemployment, the death of the middle-market restaurant, why this only accelerates AI adoption and offshoring, and what it really takes to keep moving forward when the game keeps changing underneath you.Takeaways:📉 Why 161 pub closures in one quarter is a warning shot for every SME💷 What an 18% minimum wage jump would actually cost small business🤖 Why higher labour costs only speed up AI and offshoring decisions👷 The youth unemployment problem nobody in Westminster is solving🔪 Why Matt thinks the next 12 months are about taking market share, not playing safeFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    1 時間 6 分
  • Is AI Coming for UK SME Jobs? — Ep 69

    Is AI Coming for UK SME Jobs? — Ep 69
    2026/05/11
    UK job vacancies have just dropped to 711,000 — the lowest level since the pandemic, and now below pre-pandemic levels. At the same time, unemployment has climbed to 4.9%, with 206,000 more people out of work than a year ago. Something's shifting.Matt and Charlie unpack what's really going on. Meta, Amazon, Oracle, Citigroup, Accenture and Block have all confirmed major redundancies in recent weeks — and most of them are citing AI as the reason. The question is whether that trend is about to trickle down to UK SMEs.Matt shares a conversation he had with a Manchester recruiter who's just made 25% of his own team redundant — because his clients have stopped hiring. Charlie pushes back on the AI narrative and asks whether some of this is just big businesses using the moment to trim fat. They get into employment costs, the April 2026 NI hikes, offshoring, and why hiring at home has become a last resort for so many UK founders.If you run a UK business and you're trying to work out what hiring looks like over the next 12 months — or whether you should be hiring at all — this one is for you.Takeaways:📉 Why UK job vacancies have hit their lowest level since the pandemic🤖 The big-name companies citing AI as the reason for layoffs💼 What a Manchester recruiter is seeing inside his own client base💷 How rising employment costs are pushing UK founders to offshore🔍 What the next hiring cycle could look like for SMEsFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    58 分
  • Claude Check-In: What's Working, What's Not — Ep 68

    Claude Check-In: What's Working, What's Not — Ep 68
    2026/05/04
    Failing to prepare is preparing to fail — Matt learned that the hard way at the Manchester Marathon on Sunday.In this Claude Check-In, Matt and Charlie sit down with their favourite AI co-worker for an honest update on what's actually working and what isn't. Charlie's gone deep — using Claude to build a full direct-to-consumer safety footwear website, front end and back end, on a shoestring budget. Matt's been too busy to touch it for two weeks, and openly admits it.They get into the difference between LLMs, agentic AI, and automation — and why most founders are still treating AI like a chatbot when it can now run their browser, build their websites, and stress-test their plans. Plus the British Business Bank stat that poor planning is a top three reason UK small businesses fail in year one — and what that has in common with running a marathon you didn't train for.Takeaways:🏃 Why "failing to prepare" applies as much to business as it does to a marathon🤖 The difference between LLMs, agentic AI, and automation — and why it matters🛠️ How Charlie used Claude to build a full D2C website without big budget📋 Why a SWOT analysis is the best starting point for using AI in your business📓 Matt's two-diary system for separating day-to-day from big-picture ideasFollow Matt:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrmattholland/📱 TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mrmattholland❌ X - https://x.com/mrmattholland1Follow Charlie:📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/
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    58 分