Buzzwords or Business?

In a world of buzzwords, a lot of resources are wasted today on looking for the wrong buzzwords. So how do you find the relevant trends?

Let's get a banality out of the way: It is essential for every top manager and every company to be future-oriented. To adapt to the changing circumstances. New demands in the market, new technologies, new legislation, new cultural currents or suddenly emerging competitors.

No one wants to die like Kodak, who didn't see digitalization. That is the classic case.

But it's not good to look into chaos either. Running after random buzzwords and exciting futurists is a waste of time. And it's downright stupid to throw away all the eggs you have in your hand to grab some new ones that might not even be worth grabbing.

Case in point: The notion of Millenials supposedly being completely different from all other generations, right? No actually not. They tend to be more reflective, but they also value the same things in working life as the generations before them.

The list goes on: Disruption, blockchain, AI? Woke, diversity, ethics? Sustainability, climate, biodiversity? Geopolitics, Ukraine, China? There are many important matters - but which ones are business-relevant, and which ones are mostly about what you find interesting privately?

Prioritizing can be difficult for all of us. But the price is high: in a world of buzzwords today, a lot of resources are wasted on the wrong direction. The board or the management have got an idea and the entire company must immediately deal with both the large merger and all possible ongoing restructuring. New organizational charts, new bosses, new points to measure on.

So how do you avoid the two pitfalls? On the one hand, to avoid the many buzzwords. On the other hand, to adapt to and perhaps even be a market leader in the real market and societal changes.

I would recommend a more strategic approach to prioritizing megatrends. It exists in several formats, and a good example is e.g. 'look around corners' from Bain Futures, which includes completely conventional aspects, such as systematizing data sources over trends, using several different data sources, both technical and humanistic sciences, etc.

These are three classic steps that we can all benefit from, mostly common sense:

• To work comparatively – has this phenomenon appeared elsewhere, in other industries?
• Confronting myths – are these really just buzzwords?
• Avoiding echo chambers – remember the external and different perspective.

The comparative is the first step. In situations where we have limited knowledge, comparative analyzes are really useful. Perhaps there is experience in, for example, the energy sector – in relation to environmental regulation – that will come to pharma a few years later? And so on.

Next, you confront the myths. When we consider a postulated 'megatrend', it is absolutely crucial to zoom in on the data material and the implicit assumptions behind it. Often these assumptions are as simple as linear projections of a shallow current trend.

Urbanization is a good example. Dealing with this one myth alone has, by its very nature, profound consequences for everything from retail and restaurants, to real estate and industrial production.

And finally: Avoid the echo chambers. The crucial thing here is, simply put, to develop an outsider's perspective. In Denmark, too, most top managers look alike. Just finding other types of leaders, other ways of thinking, will give a broader perspective and help with a more comprehensive picture of the future.

It is of course necessary for companies to adapt to the changing circumstances. But the three logics above represent some insights that promote a more critical, open approach to the automatic embrace of any new buzzword.

After that, the next steps follow when we know the relevant changes: How do we relate to them? The strategic change processes in the organisation, the product portfolio, marketing. It is now called, as always, management.