The Future of Almost Everything Read online

  Praise for The Future of Almost Everything

  ‘Absolutely brilliant. I love this man’s exhilarating thinking and writing. Here are fast, far-sighted insights into the tangible and intangible horizons of future change, underpinned by wisdom about its ultimate driving force – human nature.’

  Nigel Nicholson, Professor of Organisational Behaviour, London Business School

  ‘A brilliant guide to our future, which should be read by every decision-maker; packed with deep insights on a huge number of trends. Patrick Dixon has a great track record over many years in forecasting opportunities, risks and challenges that will affect us all.’

  Sir Brian Souter, chairman, Stagecoach Group Plc

  ‘Insightful views about the global trends that could shape our future. A thought-provoking tome which should help businesses think differently about the markets of the future.’

  Linda Yueh, Adjunct Professor of Economics at London Business School; Visiting Professor of Economics at Beijing University

  ‘Every leader needs to keep ahead of major trends. Think radically and read this book to keep ahead of the future!’

  Sinclair Beecham, co-founder, Pret A Manger

  ‘Brilliant! Patrick Dixon’s insights into the future are compelling, engaging and thought provoking. Tomorrow framed by the expert.’

  Baba Awopetu, group strategy and marketing director, Optegra eye healthcare

  Praise for previous books by Patrick Dixon

  Futurewise

  ‘The best book on future trends I have ever read.’

  Hans-Dieter Vontobel, chairman, Bank Vontobel

  ‘A must-read for anyone keen to understand what the future holds for them.’

  Lynda Gratton, associate professor, London Business School

  ‘A momentous achievement.’

  Zuhayr Mikdashi, professor, School of Business Studies, University of Lausanne

  Sustainability

  ‘An excellent book that talks about actions and solutions. A good, practical view of future challenges.’

  Frank Appel, CEO, Deutsche Post DHL

  ‘Everyone who worries about how we will be able to afford new, greener, technologies should read this book.’

  Maud Olofsson, Deputy Prime Minister of Sweden

  ‘The missing handbook for life and business in the 21st century; an essential guide that points a clear path to a fantastic future.’

  Philip DesAutels, director, Microsoft

  ‘Every government involved in responding to climate change should read this book.’

  Valdis Dombrovskis, Prime Minister of Latvia

  ‘An optimistic, innovative yet technologically realistic vision of the future, which breaks from the luddites and doom merchants.’

  Professor Edmund King, president of the Automobile Association

  ‘Sustainability will change how you see the future. Every business leader should read it. Full of new ideas, business opportunities, and practical insights about solving many of the world’s greatest challenges in a profitable way.’

  Sir Peter Vardy, former chairman of Vardy Group Plc

  Building a Better Business

  ‘One of the most stimulating and challenging reads in this field for a very long time.’

  Sir Digby Jones, director-general, Confederation of British Industry

  ‘A really helpful guide to success. Essential reading for anyone running a business.’

  Brent Hoberman, co-founder and CEO, Last-Minute.com

  ‘Excellent management books should spur you into action. This one does! A thoroughly enjoyable and refreshing read.’

  Lord Leitch, chairman of the Employment Panel; former CEO of Zurich Financial Services in UK and Asia; former chairman of the Association of British Insurers

  ‘Patrick Dixon is first among equals in “how-to” business writings. This brilliant book reveals how passion for your customers and your mission is vital in developing strong brands.’

  Professor Liping Cai, director, Purdue Tourism & Hospitality Research Center, Purdue University, USA

  ‘A perfect summary of all important factors that contribute to success in business and private life. What a potential for better results – and ultimately success!’

  Robert Salzl, CEO, Arabella Hotel Holding International GmbH and Co.

  ‘Reading a book like Building a Better Business can be a little scary. So much of it resonates instantly with one’s own personal and business circumstances and experience. It is also comforting to realise that none of us is alone in trying to build better businesses and more particularly, as Patrick Dixon says, a better world.’

  Paul O’Toole, chief executive, Tourism Ireland

  ‘If you want to be a great leader, you need to read this book. A vital guide to management and business success.’

  Professor Prabhu Guptara, Director of Executive Learning, Wolfsburg, subsidiary of UBS

  ‘A message that every business leader needs to listen to and turn into action.’

  Professor Derek Abell, president, European School of Management and Technology, Berlin

  The global changes that will affect every business and all of our lives

  PATRICK DIXON

  First published in Great Britain in 2015 by

  Profile Books Ltd

  3 Holford Yard

  Bevin Way

  London WC1X 9HD

  www.profilebooks.com

  Copyright © Patrick Dixon 2015

  The right of Patrick Dixon to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998.

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  eISBN 978 1 78283 181 5

  Contents

  Introduction

  1 Fast

  2 Urban

  3 Tribal

  4 Universal

  5 Radical

  6 Ethical

  7 Shaping your future

  About the author

  Acknowledgements

  Index

  Introduction

  The truth about the future

  My job is to live in the future and to see tomorrow as history. Global companies use me as a guide to the truth about life in years to come: what to expect, how to respond, how to provoke fresh thinking. Here is what I tell them, about the future of almost everything, about the things that really matter.

  We face the greatest threats to survival in human history, while new technologies will give us the greatest opportunities ever known to create a better world. Some decisions made today will affect life on earth for a thousand years.

  This is an extraordinary time to be alive. Our world is being shaken by seismic events, which are overtaking governments and corporations. At the same time, many trends are developing relatively slowly, people’s lives are evolving rather gradually, and history shows that the most shocking predictions are usually wrong. So we need to pay close attention to what is most likely and plan for the unexpected.

  Either you see the future as something to prepare for, or as a world to shape by your own actions. This book is therefore about being futuristic rather than fatalistic. Take hold of the future or the future will take hold of you.

  You may have the greatest strategy on the planet, but if the world changes unexpectedly, you just travel even faster in the wrong direction. As I learned in my first career as a cancer doctor looking after the dying, life is too short to lose a single day doing things that are a complete waste of time, or that we don’t believe in, so we need to know where we are going.

  The greatest risk is institutional blindness

  Media headlines are full of sensational, confusing and nonsensical predictions, so where do true foresight and insight come from?

  Over many years, I have seen time and again that the greatest risk of all to any organisation is institutional blindness. When bankers spend too much time with other bankers, the result is soon a banking crisis.

  When IT people spend too much time with other IT people, the result can be a major system weakness. When military commanders spend too much time playing war games with their colleagues, the result can be…

  The scariest audience I have ever addressed

  I give up to sixty keynotes a year, in many nations, but the scariest audience I have ever addressed was the Pentagon. My task was to give a trends lecture to 500 senior military leaders, and suggest ways in which they could use their vast military powers to reduce international tension, improve the image of America, prevent future wars, and eliminate national security threats.

  The people in my audience were commanders of a major part of the world’s greatest force of warships, fighter planes, submarines, nuclear weapons, cruise missiles, drones, tanks, artillery, troops, military intelligence, and so on. Some of the most powerful people on earth.

  I wandered around the exhibition hall outside the auditorium, looking for some last-minute inspiration. It was packed with impressive displays of military hardware. Sales teams of global arms companies were explaining to me how to target and kill large numbers of people even more e
fficiently, with even less effort and risk, using their exotic technologies.

  It struck me how last century it all felt. The capability of such hardware was truly shocking, and their technologies were awesome, but owning clever weapons can never build trust, nor deal with underlying causes of conflict, nor repair the heart of broken nations.

  How to trigger a major conflict in seconds

  In future, the defining issue for a commander will not be as simple as how many missiles, or drones, or other forces he controls. It may be something like whether he should give an order, in the next few seconds, to shoot dead a six-year-old child who right now is walking slowly towards a US army checkpoint, who might just conceivably be carrying a bomb – and all in full view of live TV news feeds.

  A child whose death could spark local outrage, widespread civil unrest, and further bloodshed, as well as global condemnation, especially if no bomb is later found. The entire might of a military superpower is completely useless in such a moment.

  What worried me most of all as I paced outside that hall was that I had been strongly warned that I was the first non-American that had ever been allowed to address that regular military assembly. Their policy had been that only the voices of American citizens were worth hearing. So it was a unique privilege to be there, and as it turned out, they were very gracious in their willingness to listen to someone with a different world view.

  Trapped in a narrow vision

  Any organisation can be affected by a mild form of collective madness – the inability to see the wider context. Leaders lose perspective, narrow their vision, fail to understand new competitors, lack insight into how consumers or nations really feel, and become over-complacent or rigid in thinking.

  Each of us reads the world around us through our own set of glasses, which distort our perception and reactions, shaped by our culture, birthplace, history and experiences. Therefore the most important step in accurate Futuring is to take off your own glasses, and create mental space to put on other people’s, to see the world through very different eyes.

  A personal journey

  My own life journey, to try to see the future of our world in new ways, has taken me to 54 countries. I have talked with leaders of corporations and governments; engaged with every industry; met innovators and entrepreneurs; advised the super-wealthy; and worked with the poorest of the poor, whether in megacity slums, refugee camps or remote rural villages.

  In this global process, I have also explored many future decades, sometimes far into the 22nd century and beyond.

  Market research can’t tell you the future

  One of the first truths I learned is that market research is a completely useless and dangerous guide to the future. Companies and governments waste much of the $40bn they spend on it a year, asking questions about how people think they will behave in future. But moods can change in hours, in response to new products, social media, atrocities, sporting events, huge scandals or the death of a national hero.

  Market research is still important, however. We do need to pay the closest attention to our customers, and how they feel. Listen carefully to what they say, and sort out any problems they see. But don’t believe them when it comes to the future. Study your customers well, and then imagine how they may change, in a world far beyond their horizons. That is why all designers and innovators rely on genius rather than market research, and why our journey is so important.

  One word will drive the future

  Another truth I learned is this. One single factor will drive the future more than events, economics, innovations, technology, demographics, religion or politics.

  This one thing has driven all human history and will determine the direction of humankind for the next 10,000 years. It will dominate every customer decision and government election, every relationship and every leisure activity, and is the hidden force within every major trend.

  Leaders often focus on metrics, data, financials, analysis, processes, customers, competitors, investors, public opinion and regulations – but this misses the point. All these things matter but there is one central element, which is even more important in shaping tomorrow.

  Markets are driven by investor mood. Wars are triggered by anger. Leadership is based on trust. Uptake of new technologies is linked to customer engagement and pleasure. Regulations are driven by activism. Elections are won by conviction. Team performance is driven by motivation. Relationships are formed by human needs, passions and desires.

  So if we wish to explore the future, we need to look at how people are likely to FEEL, as well as what they will THINK. The single word that will drive the future is EMOTION. As we will see in every chapter of this book, emotional reactions are usually far more significant than events themselves. All leadership has to connect with emotion, which is why robots cannot lead.

  How far do you need to see?

  Whenever I am asked to give a lecture on the future, I always ask the same question: How far ahead do you want me to take you, and into what areas?

  If you are a share trader, you need only to see 3 milliseconds further than the rest of the market to make billions of dollars in high-frequency trading – which accounts for 50% of all buying and selling on the American market.

  If you are a fashion house, 6 months ahead may be far enough. If you are a bank, your future horizon is probably no more than 5 years. If you are a major insurer, your view will stretch to a decade or more.

  My pharma clients need 25-year vision, because it takes them 15 years to bring a new drug to market, and patents expire after 25 years. So the CEO has to work out what health care will be like 25 years from now, and what government budgets will be.

  Energy companies want to look even further. Not long ago I was talking to a senior executive who signed contracts a decade earlier to extract oil and gas from under the Caspian Sea. It will take at least another decade to get those fields operational, with a lifetime of 30 years or more beyond that. So at the moment of signing, she had to take a 50-year view of future energy prices.

  How do you guess the future?

  How on earth do you begin to guess the average price for a barrel of oil from 2040 to 2050? How do you take a view of what the French government will be forced to spend on prostate cancer in 2040?

  I will share with you a methodology to make sense of your own future, one which has stood the test of time for more than 17 years, as a comprehensive and balanced structure, meshing together every global trend. But first we need to look at the basis of all forecasting, how all trends connect, and why so many changes are more predictable than you might have thought.

  Some people tell me that it is impossible and completely pointless to try to predict the future. All we can do is prepare for uncertainty. My own experience, over three decades, shows that such a view is ignorant, dangerous, naïve, foolish and fatalistic nonsense when it comes to the longer term and the wider picture. It all depends, of course, on what you are trying to predict, and in what detail.

  Yes, it is true that history proves no one can consistently predict short-term swings in market prices or exchange rates, and we can never be certain what tomorrow will bring, but that is not what our journey is all about. It is perfectly logical and vitally important for every decision-maker to have well-reasoned expectations of what he or she thinks is most likely to happen – while also considering the possibility of alternative scenarios, to manage their risk of being wrong.

  Long-term trends are often very predictable

  All reliable, long-range forecasting is based on powerful megatrends that have been driving profound, consistent and therefore relatively predictable change over the last 30 years. Such trends are the basis of every well-constructed corporate strategy and government policy. Here are just a few of many hundreds of examples:

  gradually falling rates of growth in world population

  people choosing to marry later, or not at all, leading to fewer children

  fall in price of digital technology, telecoms and networking

  rapid growth of all kinds of wireless/mobile devices

  connectivity between people, companies and machines

  rapid growth of emerging market economies

  rapid growth of emerging market middle-class consumers

  hundreds of millions of people moving to cities