GTFS: Global Trends and Future Scenarios Index

The Future Report 2011

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Executive Summary Excerpt

A great deal has changed in how we conduct business, where our economic activity takes place and where our markets are over the past few decades. We’ve seen information technology revolutionise our business and communications processes and today, the internet, social media, the cloud and an explosion of data are transforming our view of how we will do business in the next few years. Seismic shifts in our perception of continuity take place every now and again, such as the ash cloud from
Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland, the Tsunami off the Japanese coast and our human failings in the fi eld of fi nancial services, that led to the global credit crisis and Great Recession. These reassure us that we have only faint claim to being able to control our complex physical and economic environments. The recent eruption of Grímsvötn volcano in Iceland has done nothing to settle well founded views that there really are things we have no control over in our world. We do however, have the ability to look ahead – to examine what’s coming next – and we have a duty to do this for ourselves, our family, our shareholders, employees and business partners.

Change creates opportunities for new markets, products, services and economies to emerge. In the past 100 years of recessions, depressions and panics, as they were once called, many of the largest corporations we know today, were incubated and launched. Change is uncomfortable, but good for innovation and accelerated growth. It’s also dangerous for leading players in their fields, as upstart, new entrants, take market share. Key drivers of change and their potential consequences, are laid bare in this report for you to consider and respond to.