Decision Maker Panel

The proposal draws on work to better understand conditions facing British businesses by the universities of Nottingham and Stanford, who established the Decision Maker Panel (DMP) in partnership with the Bank of England (Bank) in 2016. This was funded by the ESRC through standard grants from 2017 - 2022 and it is recognized within HM Government as essential data infrastructure. To date, DMP has been essential to gaining a better understanding of the effects of Brexit, Covid and the Ukraine war during a period of enormous economic, geo-political and social change, delivering actionable insights for policymakers at the highest levels of government. It has delivered policy-focused research that is an essential resource for the Bank of England, HM Treasury, 10 Downing St and the Cabinet Office, Office for National Statistics (ONS) and the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) since 2016. It has received the ESRC Celebrating Impact Prize (second prize) 2021, it was described by the Deputy National Statistician as 'a game changer for business surveys', and 'world leading' 4* impact case study by REF2021.

The ability to maintain a large, representative survey of senior business executives and to address the impacts and longer term effects of economic disruptions has made it vital infrastructure for policy. It maintains a corpus of questions that provide longitudinal quantitative information on business conditions, expectations and uncertainty and has the flexibility to adapt survey questions to new conditions as they emerge e.g. during Covid. The DMP has developed into a strategic data asset that we have made accessible to researchers beyond the core DMP team.

In this proposal we will i) gather data from key decision makers in business; ii) provide a delivery plan to analyze the data for actionable insights; and iii) make the data available to other researchers. We will build capacity in survey data collection and analysis that sustains and expands economic and societal impact.

The grant will support ongoing data collection of DMP data making it:
> One of the largest business surveys in the UK, which is maintained by minimizing attrition and continuously recruiting new firms.
> A regular source of information to businesses, journalists and academics through monthly letters sent to all the participants and the website www.decisionmakerpanel.co.uk
> An essential input to Bank of England Policy Committees (MPC, FPC), HM Treasury, BEIS and OBR drawing on DMP research analysis to support the actions and communication of policy

The research we undertake will address six vital questions:
1. What are the effects of Brexit on employment, investment, R&D, productivity growth, trade, prices, and wages of UK firms?
2. What are the uncertainty impacts of the COVID pandemic on firms?
3. How will firms respond to the resurgence of inflation?
4. How will investment growth policies announced in several Budgets and fiscal statements incentivize UK firms?
5. What effects will climate change make to firm investment and risk exposure?
6. What effect does CEO leadership have on performance?

We draw on a highly-experienced established team of international researchers that have created a 'world-leading' survey to address We draw on a highly-experienced established team of international researchers that have created 'world-leading' surveys to address similar policy related research since 2016 in collaboration with the Bank of England, HM Government and the Office for National Statistics. Drawing on senior academics from Nottingham and Stanford we offer benefits to academics and users of the research through academic papers in top five economics journals, blogs, podcasts and media outputs, impact for policy making. We will create a publicly accessible dataset and build capacity in survey design and analysis by training a new cohort of early career researchers, giving them opportunities for secondment and career advancement.