Many of these tips are based on talking to colleagues, listening to podcasts and reading books – thanks to everyone that I have learned from.

My intention is to keep this list up to date. Please use the comment section below to send me your suggestions.

1. Start all my prompts with…

There are at least 7 tips in this first point alone. Describe the type of personality you want the AI to perform, and how you want to be answered. I have set up a custom GPT to add this pre-ample to all my prompts. You can simply paste this in each time you use an AI:

Avoid using any consulting jargon and leans into confident, assertive, and sometimes provocative statements. 
Respond using a style that avoids sounding that it was written using AI. All responses should be readable by a 10 year old.
Each response ends with 1 or 2 thought-provoking questions to engage deeper discussion and offer a unique viewpoint. 
Do not make things up or hallucinate.
I want to...

2. Tell me how to do something – you don’t have to give me the answer

Describe what you are trying to do, and then ask for the best frameworks, tools or methods.

I am trying to...
Tell me the best frameworks that I should use to do this.

3. Give me options

When we speak to others, we like options rather than their opinion on what to do.  Now ask AI to do the same. This applies for drafting emails or other communications, or preparing content.

I want to...
Give me 5 options of what I can do.

4. Context is vital

You know why you are asking this question – the AI doesn’t. Try to describe the context beforehand. Here are some options:

I am sending an email to a customer about.

or

Rewrite this text that I can use to email to a customer.

or

I am answering a proposal from a customer. The proposal is for... [give relevant details, such as the length of the answer].

or

Give me some ideas about fishing. Bullet points are OK for now because I am brainstorming.

or

Write paragraphs for my lecture introduction about fishing. Do not use bullet points.

5. Don’t use AI to write your close relative’s birthday card.

I was fortunate enough to interview Keith B Carter on a podcast. He wrote a whole book on how to use AI. He suggests you never write your mum’s birthday card using AI. I’ll extend that to any close relative or friend!

Further reading:

• 5 Ways To Make Your ChatGPT-Generated Content Undetectable

It’s possible to do it for under $43bn. I recently moved hosting provider to Siteground and it cost around £80 for the first year. #justsaying

What is the video trying to say? I don’t fight or battle against my energy supplier except in the gym.

This week, on his own podcast show, Guy interviewed Jane McGonigal who had some inspired thoughts about parenting in the dawn of real and gaming worlds (use the word metaverse if you promise not to roll your eyes). Full podcast is here.

“I think the most important thing from a young age, especially as we move forward with whether it’s going to be the Metaverse, or whatever relationship we’ll have with virtual worlds, we don’t want kids to think of them as separate from their real lives or their real identities.

“If we think of virtual worlds as escapist or not real, our behavior is worse in those worlds, right? We bully each other. We do behaviors that we would not consider ethical in real life, and when we develop strengths and skills in those games and virtual worlds, if we think the games aren’t real life, then we’re less likely to bring them to our real lives.“

Maybe this is the reason why some people become so negative on Twitter & other social networks – maybe it’s because they see those environment so different to the real world?

On that interesting insight, Guy then questioned the natural next step if you behave the same in virtual and real worlds – and that’s in person shooting games (think “Call of Duty”). Jane had a great answer to this too:

“It’s never content. It’s never the content of the game. It’s always the verbs of the game. What are the verbs. What is your child doing? From my previous book, SuperBetter, I have some questions. 

It’s like, “How do you talk to your kids about games to help them understand the connection to their real strengths and real abilities so that you can understand?” So, you just ask your son, “What does it take to be good at Call of Duty? Or, what have you gotten better at? Or, what’s the hardest thing you’ve accomplished in this gaming group and how did you achieve it? What did that take? 

“Start that conversation. It could be “I can stay calm under pressure. I am really good at being flexible in the moment if I have to change my strategy. I’m really adaptive. I’m a good communicator. I’m talking to my team. I’m always asking the right questions, so nobody feels like they’re out of the strategy.”

“Whatever it is, it’s all of those verbs and it’s not the pictures on the screen is not what is transferrable.” 

Two weeks ago I suggested the metaverse will happen this year, probably in a 3D environment rather than a VR/AR one.

I also said that 2022 would see Microsoft really consolidate themselves to become the Netflix of computer gaming using a cloud-based platform rather than a traditional games console.

The official Microsoft press release said “This acquisition will accelerate the growth in Microsoft’s gaming business across mobile, PC, console and cloud and will provide building blocks for the metaverse.”

This acquisition could be a super exciting development for the whole technology industry.

You can see how I faired last year, 2021, and keep working back, all the way back to 2010.

1. 3D, rather than the metaverse

There are times when the current user experience for the web is adequate. For example, filling in a form. There’s little wrong with the fields appearing in our web browser and us typing in the answers.

There are other situations where it would be preferable to have a 3D environment. For example, when buying physical products online. Imagine if we were in a 3D experience where we could see adjacent items, or interact with them, or compare different types of the item together. The current page-based, 2D experience for shopping is a little too flat compared to our real world.

Meta, Facebook’s parent company, believes that the future of these 3D environments will be using a headset to see an AR (Augmented Reality) or VR (Virtual Reality) world, a bit like SecondLife. Personally, I think that’s several years ahead of us for most people. There are good enough 3D environments that can be ported from video games into day-to-day internet activities though.

With the rise of collaboration and messaging tools such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams, these 3D environments make perfect sense.

So, by the end of 2022 we’ll have some 3D shopping experiences for mainstream brands, and probably still in a Chrome or Safari web browser.

2. The hybrid working challenges

In 2022 we are going to have to work out how to balance people commuting and working in the office and working from home. We are going to have to work out how to make neither of these groups feel left out during a combined meeting.

I also believe we’ll start having shorter remote video calls. Pre-covid, a conversation to ask a question might take a few minutes. Now we schedule half an hour in the diary, only because that’s the minimum time slot in Outlook.

 3. UK to reach 50 “Just walk out” stores

Just walk out stores such as Amazon Fresh and Tesco GetGo use lots of technology on the shelf and the ceiling to track customers around their shop. They recognise when a customer picks up an item and when the customer leaves the shop, they are charged for all their items without needing to go to a checkout.

It’s unlikely retailers will retrofit existing stores with enough cameras and technology to convert them into checkout-less stores. We will see more of the smaller high street units being converted, or new ones being fitted with the technology.

There are currently 6 Amazon Fresh stores in the UK, and one Tesco GetGo (there’s another one just for staff which I’m not including). By the end of 2022 we’ll see over 50 checkout-less stores across various retailers.

4. At least one of the major DSLR manufacturers to stop selling their cameras

I’m a keen photographer and despite having a latest generation phone, I still use a DSLR camera with interchangeable lenses. I like the single, focused (pun intended) use of a camera. There’s no distraction from alerts or other apps when I use my camera. I also enjoy editing the RAW file afterwards, which isn’t possible on smartphones yet.

A few years ago, the camera industry created a new segment call mirrorless. Mirrors were required in the old camera film days but weren’t as necessary in the digital era. It was a good marketing initiative from the major manufacturers to encourage people to upgrade their digital cameras.

Camera sales have been falling steadily as a direct impact of smartphones being more convenient and for most people, higher quality than cameras. Camera sales did enjoy a little uplift during Covid, where people have been using cash to buy all sorts of luxury items including cameras but this is likely to be temporary.

By the end of 2022 we’ll see at least one of the major camera manufacturers stop producing their cameras.

5. Xbox: The Netflix of gaming

2022 will see Microsoft’s Xbox brand lead the way into cloud gaming. Expect to see them launch an Xbox stick that will plug into a TV in the same way that an Amazon Fire stick does for movies. Xbox already has a variety of subscription services (as do many of the individual games), and these will be consolidated and simplified. (I subscribe to them and still don’t understand them).

The Xbox stick itself will probably be very cheap, possibly even at a loss, because Microsoft will gain the profit back via game controllers and Xbox subscriptions. Microsoft will want to maximise their sales and distribution without people worrying about the cost of the hardware.

It’s also worth remembering that Xbox still has their premium video service, Microsoft Films, which could end up being a competitor to Apple TV and Netflix. Microsoft will focus more on its wealth of gaming studios and titles as the jewel in the crown, rather than video.

5. Windows 11 & Teams

This time next year many of us will be using Windows 11. Whilst Microsoft Teams is still an installable app in Windows 11, expect this will rapidly become part of the core Windows 11 experience.

This is the first time I’ve rolled over a prediction from one year to the next. Teams is such a core part of Microsoft corporate-customer strategy that chat and other communication will become part of the operating system. Microsoft tried it before with Skype, but Covid and our remote working environments mean the right time has arrived.

A bonus point if WhatsApp and Teams can become integrated!

6. Moon 2.0.

2022 will be a significant year for space exploration. Several countries are aiming to land on the moon including Russia, UAE, US and Japan. Expect them all to say they are the first ones to do so.

There will also be missions to Mars, asteroids and for the general public, more options to go higher than in 2021.

Here in the UK, we’ll launch the first British space mission from the UK.

It all sounds exciting, and we’ll see the global private space industry flourish.

7. The first $100BN quarter for cloud computing

According to various research reports, cloud adoption ranges from only 41% of SMBs (Small and Medium Businesses) to only 50% of US government organisations to 94% of enterprises. There is still a huge amount of growth remaining in the IT cloud market.

When we factor in some organisations will design a multi-cloud design, the industry growth only increases.

By the end of 2022 we’ll see the three biggest cloud providers (AWS, Azure and Google) posting a combined quarterly cloud revenue of over $100BN. For context, in IBM’s 2000 annual report they claimed to be one of the biggest hosting companies in the world and had a total services revenue of $28 billion. The entire IT industry was predicted to grow to $470 billion by 2003.

In the next few days, I’ll work on the predictions for 2022. This will be quite a challenge considering none of us even know what everyday life will look like in the next few weeks!!

1. Microsoft Teams becomes the next operating system

Microsoft Teams is a fully-fledged platform, supporting apps from Microsoft (of course) and a myriad of third parties. I had predicted we’d be using Teams for email and banking apps by the end of the year but that proved a little too ambitious.

Maybe the term ‘operating system’ is also ambitious because this year Microsoft announced the latest version of its operating system, Windows 11. If it’s any consolation, several of the screenshots on the latest Windows 11 page on Microsoft.com show Teams in various guises.

By December, Microsoft aggressively adjusted its pricing for Teams against Zoom and Slack, at about a third of the price, so it’s clearly a strategic platform for the future.

Verdict: 5/10. Yes, it’s become a strategic platform for Microsoft, but the predictions were a bit too ambitious.

2. IPOs and M&As to accelerate

A year ago, I wrote “We’ll see even more business deals in 2021 than 2020. Venture Capitalists (VCs) regretted not doing more deals in the 2008-9 crisis, and they won’t repeat the same error this time.” VCs didn’t waste any time this year.

2021: Best year ever for £26bn UK tech sector

Larger VC inflows, 116 unicorns, record London listings, more jobs and new futurecorns –> https://t.co/iPMbrYIVLJ #UKtech #Tech #Unicorns #VCs pic.twitter.com/ui6JL5dGHw

— City A.M. (@CityAM) December 28, 2021

To put the number of IPOs in the US stock market into context, there have been 5,752 IPOs between 2000 and 2021. Almost a fifth of those were in 2021 alone.

March was the busiest month, with 151 IPOs – more than the totals for 2016, 2009, 2008, 2003 and 2001.

Verdict: 10/10 – a record IPO year

3. Sport, especially football, to experience some turmoil

The sporting news in 2021 was full of turmoil.

Off the court, on Sunday 18 April, the top 12 football clubs across Europe (6 of them from England) announced they would be forming a new “European Super League”, financed by JP Morgan. It seemed to have come as a total surprise because FIFA (the world governing body), UEFA (the European governing body) and the English Premier League all criticised the new league. Interestingly, the breakaway clubs’ fans also protested the proposed league. Within three days, the plans were all cancelled, and the teams were back to their usual competitions.

To quote Michael Gerber, there’s always going to be someone more successful, richer, better looking or with a nicer car. In 2021, this applied to Premier League football clubs, as the Saudi Public Investment Fund bought Newcastle United for £300 million. We’ll need time to decide if this is a good deal (for anyone). As it stands, the Saudi fund is the wealthiest, in a very wealthy group of Premier League owners.

In December, two drivers were tied going into the last race of the Formula 1 calendar. The race was exciting (for an F1 race), and then this happened on the last lap:

https://twitter.com/F1/status/1470061591844507649

Other sports had their own turmoil. Tiger Woods flipped his car back in February leaving him with several injuries. The US, UK, Australia, New Zealand and Canada have said they won’t send diplomats to the Games because of concerns over the treatment of Uyghurs in Xinjiang province. Athletes from the countries will be free to travel to the Games. And in the US, there’s turmoil in the MLB (baseball), with players potentially going on strike.

12 months ago, we weren’t sure if the 2020 Olympics were going to happen. Gladly they did, but it was odd watching on television without large, international crowds.

From a British perspective, Emma Raducanu became the first British woman to win a Grand Slam (in Emma’s case, the US Open) since 1977.

All in all, quite an eventful year in sport!

Verdict: 9/10 – it was more “chaotic” than “tumultuous” this year.

4. Retailers to do something about returned items

Shortly after releasing last year’s predictions, the NRF (US National Retail Federation) released a sobering report about returns. Over $400 billion of merchandise was returned in 2020. $25 billion of that was fraudulent. “For every $1 billion in sales, the average retailer incurs $106 million in merchandise returns”.

There haven’t been any major moves to reduce the number of returns, but clearly this impact to the bottom line for retailers is untenable.

Around Europe, we saw a shortage in delivery drivers (both HGV and smaller home delivery services). At the same time, many businesses are offering same-day delivery services.

Combining HGV driver shortages with final mile delivery services and the rising number of returns feels like a ticking time bomb for the sector.

Verdict: 0/10 – inaction for 2021, but I’m sure we’ll see innovation (perhaps in the pricing model rather than the service) appear soon.

5. Tech Titans move into healthcare

I summed up this prediction with “Expect to see the tech titans move into preventative care. They’ll become more involved in mental health, from retail addiction (Amazon suggesting fewer orders this week?) to screen-time (Apple suggesting you could do with a 48-hour break from your iPhone?) and exercise (Garmin suggesting spending the next hour brisk walking?).”

Microsoft launched Viva this year, which sends a daily email promoting meditation, breaks during the working day, automatically blocking times in the calendar to focus. I use most of the features regularly and find it helpful.

Apple moved further into healthcare with a variety of services ranging from individuals to hospitals, with technologies ranging from EHR (Electronic Healthcare Records) to monitoring at the patient’s home.

(The prediction of Amazon advising a break from retail therapy hasn’t materialised).

A special mention to the great work on the NHS apps. Reporting a result on the NHS website is super simple and quick. And also, the new NHS app seamlessly integrates with a doctor’s surgery and a nominated pharmacy. By the time I walk over the road from my GP surgery to the pharmacy, my prescription is ready at the counter.

Verdict: 8/10. Healthcare technology moved on significantly in 2021 and looks like it has the momentum to continue.

6. Insurance data moves from batch to streaming data

“We’ll see more of these types of gadgets that links home automation, security and insurance products together, probably as a subscription service.”

Except for a few niche providers, this didn’t manifest itself as predicted. Some of the major technology companies provide inexpensive, smart (Internet connected) home-based video cameras which are straightforward to link together and provide a simple home monitoring service (with movement detection).

Unfortunately, these services work independently of insurance companies.

It’s surprising that none of the major UK home insurance companies even ask if homeowners have a video doorbell or other connected cameras.

I expect in the future that video doorbells will become the “dashcams” of the insurance world, which provide discounts. The same will apply to smart or connected leak monitors.

Verdict: 0/10 – probably 2-3 years too early on this one.

7. Personal lines insurance due for a shake up

In the US, new insurance companies such as Lemonade are making insurance much easier to buy – with a clearer user experience, no-nonsense inclusion & exclusion items, and clear (as well as affordable) monthly pricing.

Lemonade is still rare in the insurance industry. Predictions of a single policy to cover all our personal items and liabilities are still a way off.

Verdict: 0/10 – several years too early on this one.

8. The rise of the [premium] email newsletter to balance biased media

On November 15 2021, Substack announced they have 1,000,000 paying subscribers. The top 10 publications on Substack collectively bring in more than $20 million a year. Quite an achievement: I had predicted it would double from 100,000!

In terms of news quality in mainstream journals, I tend to read an article on a news website or in a newspaper, and I will often double check the facts, or check a balance of opinion on social media so that I can understand the real facts. We seem to be at a low point of trust with the mainstream media.

Verdict: 10/10 – premium email newsletters will continue to be increasingly popular.

9. Offices and retailers

It’s pretty grim reading for high street retailers. “More than 35,000 British retailers and 20,000 bars and restaurants are facing significant financial distress” and “Spending in physical stores alone is expected to fall by 23% compared with 2019” – according to insolvency firm Begbies Traynor.

Online clothing sales are set to overtake in-store sales next year, according to a new report by Retail Economics.

I walked through an UK indoor shopping centre on Tuesday 28 December to have some dinner and go to the cinema, and the shopping areas were almost empty.

It’s not all doom and gloom though, especially for owners of warehouse space. Warehouse space in the UK could run out next year, despite building 49 super sheds last year.

12 months ago I wrote, “We’ll see some experimentation of how banks might combine together in a single shop unit”. The UK Post Office ran the experiment this year, where a member of staff from a different bank used a Post Office branch once a week. They ran the experiment in towns where the other banks had closed their branches. Over 12,000 people used the trial for more complex transactions – such as bereavements, power of attorney and larger cash deposits.

Verdict: 7/10 – retail and retail banking are changing quickly as predicted, but we’re not seeing offices turned into apartments quite yet.

Summary of 2021 predictions

A total score of 42 out of 90. This was quite a binary set of predictions – I either seemed to get them spot on, or totally missed the mark. Perhaps that’s expected when the predictions were quite complex this year.

Stay tuned for predictions for 2022 coming in the next few days.

I wish you and your family a happy and healthy new year!

1. Is it over yet?
2. Will it carry on going up? (aka glass half full)
3. Is it now going to crash down again? (aka glass half empty)
4. Bubble?
5. What are the influences?
6. Is this localised to the US?
7. Is the line skewed by just a few companies?
8. Is it wise to sell off during a crash, or hold your nerve? (aka what would you do differently?)

The S&P 500 is now up 100% from its March 2020 lows. pic.twitter.com/3CGWpmqwNw

— Michael Batnick (@michaelbatnick) July 12, 2021

12 March 2020 was the last time I worked outside my home. Except for a couple of days in the Endava office in October/ November (more on that later), I’ve been working from home since.

Sometimes it’s been too easy to mentally distance ourselves from the reason why we’re in lockdown. Personally, it feels that each time I’ve got into the new rhythm of working from home, I’ve had a dreadful phone call that someone I know has been moved to a ventilator in hospital or passed away.

Here are some of the highs and lows of the last year.

• Where does time go? I seem to have less time than pre-Covid! Workdays flash by, and weekends go in the blink of an eye. My theory is that work flies past because days are spent in back to back work calls. Perhaps it’s a lack of those short breaks we used to have in the office (a cheeky dash down to the shops to buy a drink or snack).
• I have become the parcel room of our house. I work closer to the front door than the rest of the family, so I always answer the front door when the doorbell rings. One day I expect Jeff Bezos to personally deliver an Amazon parcel and thank our family for making him the richest man in the world.
• I’ve started some new hobbies. I’ve done some virtual training courses, some work ones, including an AI course on Coursera run by Google, and some hobby related ones. I was never into gardening, but we now have part of a vegetable allotment and we’re growing vegetables in our garden at home.
• Old habits die hard. I’m still waking up at 7am and wearing a shirt everyday at work, although I stopped ironing my shirts last April!
• Everything in the house seems to be going wrong, much more than it used to. We’ve had roof leaks, several plumbing problems, appliances breaking – the list goes on and on.
• Exercise has changed. I used to cycle into work most days (13 miles/ 20 km/ about 50 minutes each way) but now I go on a static bike only 3-4 hours a week (on Zwift). I also started a running challenge to run every street in my local London Borough which is a ridiculously tough challenge (after a year I’ve covered only 35% of the roads). I can’t work out when I used to have time to visit the gym three times a week.
• Socially – damn it’s tough. Zoom is OK, but in person is much better. When the weather is OK it’s really nice to sit on neighbour’s front drive. We used to entertain lots of friends and family at home, and we’re missing this.
• Food. We rarely used to have food takeaways or deliveries, but we now have one night every week when we order food. We have a rota between my wife and the four kids where each of us cooks for the rest of the family one night per week.
• Last November I hit a bit of a mental wall. Last November, once my kids had all returned to school and my wife works in a school too, I was at home alone during the week. Each week the house felt lonelier, so I started going back into the office once a week to break the week up. (On a side note – my motorbike broke down on one of those office days, and on each of the other two office days, Boris Johnson announced an immediate lockdown the next day).
• Personal stuff has been put aside. I don’t want to look at a screen after work! Over the winter holiday break, I had a long list of personal things to take care of and I only managed one of the items – I just didn’t want to spend more time on my laptop.
• I have read a lot of books – Princess Diana (5 stars), Humankind (3 stars), Radical Uncertainty (4 stars), Pale Rider (4 stars) and Shoe Dog (5 stars).
• At work we’ve recorded and released an entire first season of podcasts – 34 episodes. I’ve enjoyed recording them and being able to interview a variety of interesting guests.

What will the future will look like a year from now?

• The most important priority is to sort out some normality for our kids. We need to get children back into school, for them to socialise ‘normally’, spend time in fresh air, and being kids. We need to help our university students – this is such a crucial time and transitional experience for them to grow into adults, experience ‘freedom’ (living away from parents) for the first time, and probably meeting people from different backgrounds. And we need to help graduates moving into work.
• We need to find a balance between returning to offices and home working. Experienced workers might want to continue to work from home – but they are needed back in the office to mentor junior work colleagues. Informal mentoring and guidance are vital for the next generation. Think of all those conversations overheard in the office where someone else helped chip in their opinion. We need to find an equilibrium between our social interaction and the convenience of working from home.
• It will be easy to forget that parts of the world won’t be vaccinated for some time. It might be several years before some countries are vaccinated. Many of us will do our best to put this episode behind us until we consider travelling to a place that still has Covid.
• Local businesses and The High Street. People will crave a return to social experiences. People will want to walk around shops with friends. Online shopping is great, but it’s a poor social experience. I expect coffee shops to be packed as soon as we can return, and this will continue for some time. Some businesses will inevitably close, but humankind is resilient, entrepreneurial, and we have been through worse than Covid.