The Scotland Productivity Forum is undertaking a set of interconnected programmes to improve productivity across high‑value industries, regional economies, and public services.
Scotland has strong research institutions, emerging innovation clusters, and national commitments to fair work and sustainability. But long‑standing structural issues continue to hold productivity back. These include fragmented innovation systems, uneven digital adoption, regional disparities in organisational capability and challenges in integrating public services.
Three linked programmes – the Innovation‑Driven Productivity programme, the Unlocking Regional Productivity programme, and the Joining Up Public Services programme –aim to address these issues.
The Innovation‑Driven Productivity programme is a partnership between the Scotland Productivity Forum, University of Glasgow and the Scottish Government. It is creating a productivity methodology tailored to Scotland’s high‑value sectors, including advanced manufacturing, engineering, clean‑tech, energy, water and distilling.
Its framework is built around three pillars: technological innovation, workplace transformation and sustainability. This reflects how productivity depends not only on investment, but also on leadership capability, organisational culture and readiness to adopt and diffuse innovation.
Although Scotland has world‑class universities and emerging clusters in fintech, energy technology, life sciences and digital industries, several systemic barriers limit productivity growth. These include the slow spread of workplace innovation, skills shortages and limited collaboration between research institutions and industry.
The programme addresses these challenges through four strategic areas: workforce and skills development, improved governance, stronger ecosystem collaboration and demonstration pilots. It works with highly innovative businesses, selected for their economic significance and alignment with net zero goals.
The Unlocking Regional Productivity in Scotland programme investigates why productivity varies widely across regions. While Edinburgh outperforms both Scottish and UK averages in Gross Value Added (GVA) per hour, rural areas, the Highlands and Islands, and parts of the South and West lag significantly. These differences are not explained by sector mix alone. They arise from variations in attracting and deploying investment, digital readiness, workforce capability and the strength of local ecosystems.
The programme uses mixed‑methods research to analyse how investment interacts with workplace innovation and sustainability commitments. A key output will be a decision‑support tool aligned with the From Growth to Good agenda (Our Scottish Future, 2023).
The Joining Up Public Services programme focuses on improving productivity in the public sector, particularly health and social care. With rising demand and constrained resources, productivity improvements must come from integrated, person‑centred service delivery rather than efficiency alone.
The programme aims to develop a framework that supports collaboration across organisational boundaries, integrates digital and data systems, and enables co‑designed service models. The programme is working with a Local Authority and Health and Social Care Partnership. It uses co‑creation workshops, service modelling, reflective journals and prototyping to identify how integration can deliver productivity gains. Outputs include a service architecture model, prototype designs and initial productivity measures.
