Looking forwards to 2024 … a new year of exponential AI and enhanced humanity ... finding your future flow and unlocking hidden potential

Change happens fast ... the dramatic progress of AI is challenging our minds, a new disruptive generation of brands are shaking up markets, multiple destructive conflicts rage across the globe, ever more extreme weather driven by our reluctance to really address the carbon crisis, and millennial consumers growing up quickly ... from the adoption of electric vehicles to gene-edited healthcare, the world looks very different from even a few years ago.

• 2023 was a nexus of change ,?a year of innovating and transforming everything
• Ideas drive the world forwards, ?the coming wave, and achieving great things

2024 is Olympic year, and the Stade de France is ready to witness a host of world records, as super shoes transform the performance of human beings. Adidas's Noah Lyles and Nike's Faith Kipyegon will battle for superstardom on the athletics track. Meanwhile 4.2 billion people will vote in over 70 national elections this year, the most in history, with technology likely to play a key role in targeting and influencing outcomes.

• Future Radar : Exploring the emerging trends and opportunities, and making them happen
• Trend Kaleidoscope 2024: Curating all the best trend reports, What should you do next?

Western economies did better than expected in 2023 but significant challenges persist, and higher interest rates will be painful for companies and consumers alike. China’s growth has slowed, tensions rise over Taiwan, but companies will find it hard?to reduce their supply chains’ dependency of old. East and West will increasingly turn to the “middle powers” of the global south, and the imagineering states of the Middle East, shifting from oil to culture, knowledge and tourism.

• Generative AI : from Anthropic to Inflection, Gemini to Perplexity, do you “grok” it?
• Think like a futurist , to make sense of change, find new opportunities, make smarter decisions

The exponential progress of AI will continue, in some ways a race to shape the future of AGI, by a reenergised OpenAI and many others like Anthropic and Perplexity. Businesses will prioritise initiatives to embrace it, initially for efficiency but increasingly for competitive advantage, Quantum computing will accelerate progress, while regulators struggle to cope.?Unexpected uses and abuses will become frequent, from its disruption of jobs to potential for election meddling.

• Imagineering = Imagination + Engineering … How Disney keeps the magic alive
• Achieving Peak Performanc e: find your future flow, play to your strengths, build endurance and agility

The clean-energy transition is creating new green superpowers and redrawing the energy-resources map. Lithium, copper and nickel matter much more, while oil and gas, and the regions that dominate their supply, matter less. ?Competition for green resources is reshaping geopolitics and trade, and creating some unexpected winners and losers. As the recent Earthshot prize winners demonstrate, there is a shift to regenerative economies, doing more with what we already have.

“In the past, you made a decision and that was it. Now, you make a decision and you say, ‘What happens next?’ There’s always a next”. That was?Alvin Toffler in?Future Shock.

Much of my work - from keynotes and workshops to strategies and transformations - is with companies like Adidas in sportswear and Airbus in aerospace, Saudi Arabia's STC in technology to Japan's Sompo in financial services. In the past, boards and executive teams would seek my help on optimising performance - today they seek help to make sense of emerging futures, how to shape new visions and strategies, how to transform, while also delivering today.

IMF, another of my ongoing clients this year, see in their?IMF Economic Outlook 2024 ? a continued stagnation of growth in western markets (1.2% in Europe, 1.5% in USA) but higher in Asia (4.4% in China, 6.1% in India), and 2.9% average globally in 2024.?The EIU’s Industry Outlook 2024 reflects on the turbulence of recent?years for most companies from the pandemic to soaring commodity prices, high interest rates and political disruption.

The last 12 months has certainly sparked enthusiasm for AI startups, investment and innovation - from the launch of ChatGPT to the implosion of OpenAI, and the rise of a host of new rivals like but at the same time (a legacy of pandemic, and antidote to digitalisation) is the desire to be more human – more personal, empathic, and in search of real experiences, from in-store immersions to meditative moments and travel adventures.

Technological innovation is taking us in two directions – sustainable improvement and synthetic reality -?to address the problems of the past (most significantly, the huge and difficult effort to decarbonise old industries – although energy transition has stalled because of the greed of higher oil prices) – and also a huge rise in new synthetic innovations, from gene-editing and mRNA in healthcare, to alternative foods and VR gaming.

You can read all the trend reports in my Trend Kaleidoscope 2024 , but the point is not the clever ideas and catchy phrases, it's knowing which trends to embrace, and how they catalyse, guide and accelerate a transformation towards the future you seek. See the bigger picture, the Future Megatrends, and align your growth trajectory with purpose and innovation.

That's the real skill of the most innovative companies, typically emerging from the margins to the mainstream. Their ideas, business models and leaders are inspirations to all of us. I call them the Trailblazers.

In the last quarter of 2023, BYD became the world's top selling electric vehicles company, outperforming the hype of Tesla and its most recent launch, the Cybertruck.

“Build Your Dreams” was founded in 1995 by Wang Chuanfu, ?a Chinese chemist, who has became a?billionaire entrepreneur.?After more than 27 years of high-speed growth, BYD has established over 30 industrial parks across 6 continents and played a significant role in industries related to electronics, auto, renewable energy and rail transit. Like Tesla, it does not define itself as an auto company, but an energy business. With a focus on energy acquisition, storage, and application, it offers comprehensive new energy solutions with zero-emission.

BYD is one of my 250 Innovative Companies ?to learn from, alongside 100 Inspiring Leaders .

Here are some of the most?innovative businesses who are likely to deliver rapid progress in 2024, some of them established market leaders rapidly reinventing themselves, while others are start-ups and growing disruptors. All of them are distinguished in some way by their innovative business models, which are engaging audiences and reenergising markets in their own ways:

• Authentic Brands , (ABG) is a brand development and licensing company headquartered in New York City. The company was founded by Jamie Salter, a seasoned entrepreneur and brand strategist. Salter has a background in acquiring, managing, and licensing consumer brands - from Mohammad Ali to Elvis, Reebok to Ted Baker.
• Crispr Therapeutics is a Swiss–American biotechnology company headquartered in Zug, founded by Nobel Prize winner Emannuelle Charpentier. It was one of the first companies formed to utilize the CRISPR gene editing platform to develop medicines for the treatment of various rare and common diseases.
• Holcim ?is a multinational building materials company that specialises in the production and distribution of cement, aggregates, and ready-mix concrete. The company was originally founded in Switzerland in 1912 and has since grown to become one of the largest cement producers in the world, and a leader in green cement and urban regeneration.
• Lanzatech is turning carbon crisis into feedstock opportunity with the potential to displace 30% of crude oil use today and reduce global CO2 emissions by 10%. Its carbon recycling technology is like retrofitting a brewery onto an emission source like a steel mill, but instead of using sugars and yeast to make beer, pollution is converted by bacteria to fuels and chemicals.
• Lilium , is a disruptive aviation start-up based in Munich, founded in 2015, dedicated to develop and build the world’s first fully electric vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) jet. An estimated range of up to 300 km and a top speed of 300 km/h, along with zero emissions make it the most efficient and eco-friendly individual means of transportation of our time.
• MercadoLibre , the Amazon of Argentina, seeks to democratize commerce and financial services to transform the lives of millions of people in Latin America. One of the principles of the Mercado Libre culture is “in continuous beta”; permanently focused on innovating to bring the best experience to our users, and to extend our competitive advantages.
• Northvolt ?was founded to enable the transition to a decarbonised future by establishing a sustainable battery industry. To do this, the Swedish company is pioneering a new approach to battery manufacturing rooted in a commitment to fossil-free energy, sustainable sourcing of raw materials and recycling.
• Nubank ?from Brazil is the largest independent "neobank" in the world, with more than 40 million customers. Its first product, launched in 2014, was a no-fee credit card fully managed by a mobile app. Recently, Nubank was ranked as the most innovative company in Latin America.
• PingAn , the world's largest insurance company,?provides products and services through its five ecosystems in financial services, healthcare, auto services, real estate services and smart city solutions. With JEssica Tan as its co-CEO it is a model for how to create the future while also delivering today, unbounded by sector boundaries or old thinking.
• Rains , concept meets function in Nordic outerwear from Aarhus.?Its collections blend a conceptual-meets-functional design approach, a strong urban inspiration, and a signature fabric identity. A coated waterproof fabric palette inspired by Rains’ first design – a contemporary reinterpretation of the classic rubber raincoat.
• Roblox is a digital platform where people come together virtually to share experiences - gaming, music, and much more. Every day, tens of millions of people from around the world come to Roblox to play, learn, work, and socialize in immersive digital experiences all built by a global community of creators.
• Schneider Electric purpose is "to empower all to make the most of our energy and resources, bridging progress and sustainability for all". They call this "Life Is On". The French company's mission is to be your digital partner for sustainability and efficiency.
• SSAB , zero carbon steel from Sweden, stronger, lighter and more sustainable. Working with partners, SSAB has developed fossil-free steel and plans to create a carbon-zero value chain from the mine to the end customer. it will largely eliminate carbon dioxide emissions from operations in around 2030.
• Twelve the carbon transformation company, is a new kind of chemical company built for a world battling against climate change. Its breakthrough technology eliminates emissions by turning CO2 into essential products that today are made from fossil fuels. They call it carbon transformation.
• Vuori makes premium performance apparel inspired by the active Coastal California lifestyle; an integration of fitness, surf, sport, and art. Breaking down the boundaries of traditional activewear, we are a new perspective on performance apparel. Founded by Joe Kudla in 2013, it is based in San Diego.

These companies don't process by hard work, alone. But by thinking differently. Dreaming and daring to challenge conventions and explore new futures. It requires new mindsets, new skills, and new organisations. Out this future mind emerges new opportunities, new market spaces, and innovative growth.

It requires a business brain, ready and willing to embrace new ideas and action. That's why I bring together all the best ideas from the latest books, best thinkers and leading practitioners. New ideas and insights, frameworks and tools, to help you win in a world of change.

Imagine that you are in Stade de France, Paris, on the 1st August 2024. You're an Olympic athlete in the midst of competition. As you prepare for the greatest race of your life, you imagine the moments ahead, anticipate what might happen, consider alternative strategies. And maybe just dare to dream.

In reality, you need to be ready for anything. It’s no use overthinking. You are in the best condition of your life, and you have run many races before. In reality you are simply consumed by the moment, at one with your body, focused on the race.

When you are at your “peak”, your body and mind flow in unison, you know what to do.

Finding your future flow

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi believes that peak performance comes from inside, and that people have the unique ability to create environments that facilitate the development of a state of mind which he calls “flow”, or what some might call “in the zone”.

Flow is the experience I get when I’m working intensely on a project, the challenge is significant, the team around me are great people, the timeframes are tight, and the ambition is very high. Once I am into the project, I find I can work at great pace, there is a stream of consciousness, ideas emerge rapidly.

Under the stress and stretch of high octane situations, we can often do our best work.? Csikszentmihalyi? says “the best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile. Optimal experience is thus something we make happen”

It is a feeling of immersion, focus and concentration, removed from the repetition and distractions of everyday, you feel like you have more purpose, with heightened awareness of the situation and possibilities. Complexity seems less intimidating, and uncertainty less daunting. You are energised, you are empowered, you can achieve so much more.

Flow is achieved through an intensity of concentration and effort as you apply yourself to the task. You are energised by possibility, and released from the fear of failure. You rise above yourself, above the distractions of today. The experience of this flow is as good as the outcomes.

5 ways for business leaders to find their “flow” state every day are:

• Select tasks that are stimulating and engaging, they challenge you to the point of excitement. They are problems you would love to solve.
• Assemble a great team, people you love and trust, who you know that together you can do great things (or you, on occasions, you can also do this alone).
• Define audacious goals, that go beyond the accepted norms, 10x not 10% targets, and also a sense of what the rewards could be, personal or organisational.
• Focus your mind, a stream of consciousness towards the goal, eliminating the daily trivia, the distractions of the normal workspace
• Immerse yourself in the moment, active not passive, thinking ideas, doing tasks, making progress, building momentum, going for the goal.

The “flow” state of mind becomes the everyday state of business leaders. It becomes normal. Every day, working towards the future, whilst also delivering today. Your mind working overtime, connecting ideas, searching for progress, focused on the actions which will create a better tomorrow. Indeed, you can only ever do things today, even it is focused on a better future.

Playing to your strengths

?We have grown used to exploring the “strengths and weaknesses” of human character, or in this case of leadership behaviour. The problem is that this kind of diagnostic encourages us to focus on our weaknesses, to make them better, to be “good enough” at everything.

An alternative is focus on your strengths and how to make them better.

Yet few business leaders say they get to use their strengths in most of their work. The challenge in any team is to bring a diverse group of people together, where their combined strengths are irresistible. This means that as long as all the important attributes are covered, then the team will be strong in all areas, and amplify its impact far beyond that of ?any individual.

Psychologist Martin Seligman studied cultures around the world to understand what they regarded as “strengths” in leaders. The research explored major religions and philosophical traditions and found that the same six virtues were shared in almost all cultures. Gallup’s StrengthFinder assessment model is one of the most useful tool for exploring the practical component of these virtues as 24 character strengths:

• Virtue of Wisdom: the more curious and creative we become, the more we gain perspective, knowledge and wisdom. Component strengths are creativity, curiosity, open-mindedness, love of learning, and perspective.
• Virtue of Courage: the braver and more persistent we become, the more confident we feel, and more courageous we act. Component strengths are bravery, perseverance, honesty and vitality.
• Virtue of Humanity: the more we approach people with respect, appreciation, and interest, the more engaged they become. Component strengths are love, kindness and social intelligence.
• Virtue of Justice: the more responsible we are, embracing fairness and justice, the more stable community we can build for mutual benefit. Component strengths are teamwork, fairness and leadership.
• Virtue of Temperance: being forgiving, humble, prudent, and in control of our behaviours, helps us to avoid being arrogant, selfish, and unbalanced. Component strengths are forgiveness, humility, prudence and self-control.
• Virtue of Transcendence: never losing hope in humanity’s potential, appreciating nature and people, enables us to connect with a higher purpose. Component strengths are appreciation of beauty, gratitude, hope, humour and spirituality.

Additional studies have shown that women typically score higher in interpersonal strengths, such as love and kindness, honesty and gratitude. Men tend to score higher on cognitive strengths, creativity and curiosity, hope and humour, but also highly on honesty. Whilst these differences are interesting, and largely conform to stereotypes suggesting that they might be shaped by culture, there are also many shared strengths.

Playing to your strengths not only enables you to perform better, and contribute more to a team, it can also result in feeling more engaged and confident, and enable you to progress faster.

The leader’s plastic brain

We used to assume that we each have our established ways of thinking and behaving, and as we get older the capability of our brain to learn and adapt declines.? Yet our brain can grow new neurons at any age. Each neuron can transmit up to 1,000 nerve signals a second and make as many as 10,000 connections with other neurons. Our thoughts come from the chemical signals that pass across the synaptic gaps between neurons: the more connections we make, the more powerful and adaptive our brain can be.

Tara Swart is a neuroscientist, practising medical doctor, and executive coach, with a background in psychiatry. I first met her on stage in Bratislava, where we both were delivering our “Big Idea” for Europe. Her first book, “Neuroscience for Leadership” was more of an academic text, while her new book is “The Source” is more populist, and claims most of the things we want from life – health, happiness, wealth, love – are governed by our ability to think, feel and act. In other words, by our brain.

Keeping the brain fit through exercise, continual learning and rich experiences, enhances your mental agility. In the past leaders relied more upon experience and procedure, in today’s world we need leaders who can make sense of new patterns, imagine new possibilities, thrive on diversity of thought and complexity of action. Leaders need to have a mind that is always ahead, seeing and anticipating what next.

“Think of the brain as the hardware of a computer” says Swart. “Your mind is the software. You’re the coder who upgrades the software to transform the data (your thoughts). You also control the power supply that fuels the computer — the food and drink you consume, when and how to exercise and meditate, who to interact with… You have the power to maintain or destroy your neural connections.”

Mindful activities such as yoga or meditation reduce levels of cortisol and increase the fold of the outer cortex of the brain, allowing the pre-frontal cortex to better regulate our emotional responses. Swart says just 12 minutes a day, most days of the week, will make a noticeable difference. New experiences such as travel, learning a skill, such as a foreign language, and meeting new people can stimulate the growth of new neurons.

There are some obvious ways to improve your brain function, such as drink more water, get more exercise, and don’t read from electronic screens in the last hour before bed. Sleeping less than seven to eight hours a night isn’t sustainable for most people, because that’s how long it takes to clear out toxins. Sleeping on your left side helps the brain to flush out toxins more efficiently, and downing a spoonful of coconut oil before a big meeting boosts brain power for about 20 minutes.

The journey ahead will have high and lows. Endurance demands physical fitness and emotional agility, but also taking moments to pause, and celebrate progress.

James Dyson took 15 years and 5127 attempts to perfect his bagless vacuum. When he succeeded, he created a revolution, but it required incredible persistence to get there. Not only is the future difficult to create, but everything keeps changing on the journey towards it.

The mental toughness, the grit to persist, is not just about keeping going, but the resilience to overcome challenges and obstacles. Sometimes, just the sheer volume of information – emails, analysis, reports, ideas, articles, books, meetings – will become overbearing. As a leader it’s easy to feel overloaded.

It’s also easy to feel you need to know everything, which you don’t, although you do need to prioritise what matters most. The biggest challenge for any visionary leader is not how to make ideas happen, but how to overcome all the people who say that they won’t. Critics and pessimists can be frustrating, and a motivational drain.

There will also be moments of great success, people might even call you a hero. It will feel good, even to the humblest, and you will inevitably remind everyone that it was a team effort. Yet the euphoria can quickly disappear, with the next challenge.

Leaders need endurance, resilience, and gratitude, to cope with relentless change; to be able to change your own mind, to stay on the rollercoaster of progress, to keep teams engaged, and to thrive at both work and in your life.

The endurance of leaders

Endurance is as much about mind as muscle power.

Like an athlete – runner, cyclist, rower – there are many physiological elements at play, from core body temperature to oxygen intake, plus psychological factors, such as perceived effort and pain tolerance. Each of these factors is significant in the level of athletic performance humans which any person is capable of, especially when testing the perceived limits of performance, such as setting new world records.

Almost every athlete will attest to faster recovery if they jump into an ice bath after a competition. Yet studies show that this practice doesn’t actually decrease inflammation levels, the thing the baths are intended to reduce. However most physiologists will still say that if there’s a method that helps you recover, even if it’s purely psychological, then it is useful because sometimes belief is just as influential as science.

In?“Endure”?Alex Hutchinson starts by retelling the race to break 4 minutes for one mile. For years, men across the globe had raced to within a second or two of the barrier, but never quite breaking the iconic time. When Britain’s Roger Bannister finally ran 3.59.4 in 1954, Australian John Landy who had been trying to run the time for years, went on to improve ?Banister’s time by another second, only weeks later.

A number of important factors can help people, including business leaders, to endure more:

• We always have a little more to give. Watch how athletes pace themselves so that they always have one final effort at the end of a long distance event. And somehow an Olympic champion, despite a punishing race, can always rise to celebrate victory
• We can endure more than we think. Athletes have a higher than normal pain tolerance enabling them to push harder. They learn to cope with this by training at a “threshold” pace, learning to sustain oxygen debt, despite its searing pain.
• Fitness enables us to perform better. Athletic performance greatly relies on oxygen intake, which is enhanced through heightened fitness. Business leaders also need oxygen, and the physical fitness to sustain leadership performance.
• Fatigue?reduces?our performance.Having a tired brain can affect how much we can endure physically. A tired brain is one that doesn’t have a break, isn’t refuelled, doesn’t have variety, doesn’t keep learning, doesn’t get enough sleep.
• Stress stops us performing. Of the many factors, stress can be the killer. However stress comes in two forms – stress from outside, eg timescales, and stress we put on ourselves. External stress can stimulate us, internal stress we can control.

Hutchinson’s research led him to South Africa to work with Tim Noakes, the controversial sports scientist who first proposed the “central governor theory,” which argues that the brain limits performance well before the body has reached its maximum output. He also explores the research of another pioneering scientist, Samuele Marcora, who has developed a series of brain-training exercises to push that governor.

He also recalls talking to Eliud Kipchoge just before he ran the world’s first sub-2 hour marathon, when the Kenyan said he hadn’t really changed anything in his training. What then, he asked, would make the difference? “My mind will be different” replied the runner. ?People he says, have a curiously elastic limit to what they can achieve, driven mainly be their mental toughness.

The resilience of leaders

Resilience is our ability to bounce back from adversity.?It’s what allows us to recover quickly from change or setbacks, trauma or failure, whether at work or in life. It is the ability to maintain a sense if purpose, a positive attitude, ?a belief in better, throughout times of challenge. Resilience sustains progress, whilst others might give up.

Angela Duckworth calls it grit.?“Grit is passion and perseverance for long-term goals” she says. She compares it not to a marathon, but to a series of sprints combined with a boxing match. In business you are not just running but also getting hit along the way. As you seek to deliver on your strategy, to make new ideas happen, to transform the business, it’s not just about coping with the time and effort. It’s also about overcoming many challenges.

Grit keeps you moving forward through the sting of rejection, pain of failure, and struggle with adversity.?“When things knock you down, you may want to stay down and give up, but grit won’t let you quit” says Duckworth.

Most entrepreneurs have tremendous resilience, because they’ve had to fight for the business through some of the most difficult times. The search for seed funding when every VC dismissed them with a laugh or smile, the long days in a bedroom or garage trying to make the first prototype or win the first contract, the growing pains of scale-up as they have to adapt to survive and thrive. Letting go of control as investors take over, making you wealthy but taking away your baby. Most entrepreneurs know about grit.

But then so do corporate leaders. If not from starting up, then from surviving the challenges of internal politics, of learning how to engage and influence people in a positive way, of progressing as a star individual whilst keeping colleagues and teams on side. Of balancing personal ambition with collective progress. Resilience demands that we:

• Have ambition: Knowing what you truly want, and are prepared to work hard and persevere in order to achieve it. Vision isn’t just a milestone, it becomes a pursuit. Whilst not everybody will know ?your ambition, you will, and it will keep you striving.
• Have purpose: This is why you want to achieve more, it’s about what will be better when you achieve your ambition, not just for you, but your business, your family, your world. Purpose is how you contribute, what you fight for, why you get up in the morning.
• Have passion: You need to love it, to be great at it. Otherwise it’s not worth the sacrifices, the long hours, and the pain. Aligning your purpose and ambition allows you to find love, for your work, your team, your business, and the world you seek to impact.
• Have persistence: You will sometimes fail. Few things change without challenges. Failure doesn’t define you, it refines you. If you didn’t fail, you wouldn’t learn. There is always another way. Stay confident and stay strong.

Nelson Mandela was a great example of resilience. He was sent to prison as a young firebrand who believed in taking up violent resistance when the justice system failed him in apartheid South Africa. 27 years later, he walked out of Robben Island prison advocating peace and reconciliation. During his long confinement, Mandela mastered what he later called self-leadership. He took great inspiration in the poem “Invictus,” written by William Ernest Henley, which ends with the lines “I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul.”

Peter Fisk is a business catalyst - innovative strategist, bestselling author, and keynote speaker - working with leadership teams to reimagine their markets and strategies for a better future. He is CEO of GeniusWorks, an innovative business accelerator based in London, and is Academic Director at IE Business School in Madrid, focused on leadership, strategy and innovation.

His recent projects include Adidas’ growth into new markets, Cartier’s redefined luxury, Coca Cola’s brand strategy, and Microsoft’s strategic innovation, exploring the future of food to fashion, travel to technology. He has written 9 books, translated into 35 languages, including “Business Recoded: Have the courage to create a better future”, reviewed by FT with “Wow! The book you have to read now”.

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• Future Makers: ?accelerated leadership development, issue-driven, action-driving
• Innolab Workshops : strategic consulting, insightful, creative and collaborative
• Keynote Speaking : inspiring, topical, engaging, customised and actionable.

Happy new year!