(post was written for Talarforum in Swedish)

Euro crisis, stock crisis, job crisis, climate crisis …

It’s easy to feel concerned when thinking about the future so let me remind you that change is something positive. Change is a sign of life and crisis usually make way for new, fresh life that clears out the old.

No one knows how the future will be, but by studying behavioral changes we can identify trends that affect us when creating our future. Two such trends are globalization and information technology, together they mean change comes much faster. That is a fact.
And since the events that affect us the most often are those that were impossible to predict, speed and willingness to change is increasingly crucial. So..

It depends on how fast you are
Entrepreneurial organizations with employees focused on problem solving and a desire to test thing is a growing threat to slow moving dinosaurs wasting their time in meetings.
Companies with a culture that not only allows failures but embrace them as essential to success will increasingly win against those who seek their answers in best practices and thus choose to do what was right yesterday. “Life is a beta” as they say at Google.
2012 fast companies beat slow ones.

It depends on whom you want to beat
Many of us go to work to do the same things we did yesterday. We glance at competitors mainly to ensure no one does anything unexpected, and seldom think about if the needs we satisfy could be met in other new ways.
Why didn’t a record company give us Spotify? Why is Klarna not by a bank? Why didn’t a telecom company invent Skype?
2012 belongs to those who focus on beating themself.

It depends on which way you look
Getting closer to the customer is a mantra we recognize from all companies and industries. But as customers, we paradoxically feel, further and further away from many of the companies we deal with. I know companies with better customer relations as their main objective and an outsourced customer service at the same time..
Remember what Henry Ford said, “If I’d asked customers what they want, they’d said faster horses”.
You need to improve the customer experience before the customer asks for it.
2012 will be amazing if you look outside in.

It depends on if you cooperate
In business we are used to a kind of destructive competition in a constant quest to dominate, own, protect, control. But unless you are best at everything in the world there are people out there who could add something and help you achieve much more.
Inspiring examples of new forms of collaboration and transparency are everywhere and the question today is rather who can afford to try on his own?
2012 will be larger and more exciting if you open up for cooperation.

It depends on whether you are doing something meaningful
The Arab spring and Occupy Wall street have much in common. One important lesson for anyone who wants to lead is that oppressed people no longer feel alone. Consumers in the Western world accounts for 2/3 of our entire economy and the Internet, for the first time in history, give us the power to organize ourselves. Companies who misjudge consumer power as a trend are facing major and unpleasant surprises, and those who do things right will never have to pay for advertising. The gap is growing every day.
2012 will be brilliant for those who make a difference.

Are you fast and willing to experiment, even challenge your own models by focusing on customer experiences, and open up for new collaborations with visions that make the world better?

In that case, 2012 will be a truly Happy New Year!

You know the boiling frog story; If you put a frog in boiling water, it will struggle to jump out. But if you put the frog in cold water that is slowly heated, it will not perceive the danger and be cooked to death.

Swedish historian Peter Englund wrote about the collapse of the Roman empire and asked us a question (back in 1992..). I think it’s even more relevant today: “Maybe the question about when the west will fall is irrelevant. What if we’ve already fallen?”

Our current lifestyle need 2-5 earths (check your Ecological Footprint here, mine is 2,7). And still we try to solve our problems with solutions focused solely on more consumption and economic growth.

Frogs don’t know how to read a thermometer, but what’s our excuse? Do we really want the water to start boiling before we try to jump?
And what if someone say it’s already boiling?

Mediafront, one of Europe’s leading interactive agencies invited me for a coffee and q&a:

We invite colleagues, competitors, clients and other skilled people from (or relevant for) the industry, for a coffee. Todays guest is Stefan Hyttfors, a Social Capitalistic Business Nomad. Stefan works as a speaker, writer and consultant on topics such as network society, business development and customer centricity.

What inspires you?
We’re all scared. So much that can go wrong and so much to lose.
Yet some people have the courage to follow their dreams, hunt for the unknown and embrace change.
Their creations, their stories and their courage inspire me.

How do you keep exploring and learning?
By forcing myself to follow my dreams, hunt for the unknown and embrace change. Even though it scares me 

When where you amazed last?
Watching Mark Zuckerberg and his team at the F8 conference last Thursday. While Google capitalized totally on the information phase (1.0), Facebook are the undisputed champions of the interaction phase (2.0). A seven years old company. Truly amazing!

What is your favourite resource library?
A healthy mix of books (read a lot), Twitter (to find what to read) and Google (pull).
TED and Monocle are my favorite publications.

What’s the biggest challenge the digital communications industry is facing right now, and do this lead you to some predictions?
60-70% of all spending in our economy is by consumers – as in us, the people. The Internet means we for the first time ever can get organized to talk about companies who make us and society better of, and the ones who don’t…

As a result I believe:
- All industries will be disrupted.
- The majority of todays dinosaur corporations will die simply because the disruptors come with network society business models.
- This will happen so fast I believe 50% of todays US Fortune 500 companies will be off the list by 2020. (The acronym ROI really means Risk Of Ignorance).

When everything is connected everything will communicate digitally.
Digital communications – just like urbanization – is the foundation and driver for a new kind of society, not an industry per se.

To me you’re the greatest visionary and entrepreneur. Ever.
You’re also one of the most inspiring human beings.

In my mind your speech to Stanford graduates from 2005 is the most valuable piece of information out there and I watch it whenever I’m feeling weak.

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life,” you said.

Thank you Steve Jobs, for doing just that! You will be missed.
From now on we don’t really know what else we will miss..

World economy by nominal GDP doubled in size during this last decade.
But today it seems pretty obvious that while developing countries actually are growing, the economy of the developed (as in not developing anymore) world, is mainly growing by debt.
Another sign of our fake wealth is declining happiness.

I guess we all se the need for change, the question is how. This is my take.

First, forget about politicians and “experts” of the corporate elite. They’re all biased creators of the dysfunctional system. (Watch the great movie Inside Job, if you want the full drama).

Two thirds of our economy is consumer driven. That means WE are the rulers. And since change nowadays goes bottom-up, this is a task for you and me.

Steve Jobs once said “When you’re young, you look at television and think, There’s a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that’s not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That’s a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want.” 

The market is exactly the same. It will give us what we want. So every time you swipe that card to purchase something you also make a micro decision about how the market will act. How society will be in the future.

Do you really want lower prices and larger corporations?
You know it means the market will lower costs, hunt for minimum wage labor and cut wildly in your neighborhood.
It will exploit for short-term profit with no time to think about future generations. It will grow, buy and process food until everything we eat is junk. It will move resources from poor to rich.
The market will continue to increase the gap and society will be torn apart.

Look at the Greeks. The European Central Bank experiment fooled them to borrow money at the same interest rate as Germans (sheissebilligt) and now we blame them for doing just that… Sheissebilligt means nothing but those two words; shit & cheap. Someone always pay the price, in the end you will to.
Shit cheap today, rioting crowds and molotov cocktails in the back yard tomorrow.

The short-term solution I believe in is the opposite of cutbacks (as preached by “experts”). Inflation will have to ”take care” of this debt crisis just like we did it after World War II. If we don’t want to see a new version of the dark ages that is.
But the long-term solution is all about you and me and our everyday decisions.

We are the rulers, and we want beauty, cleverness, simplicity, elegance, humility, directness, truth.
We want first class; the direct opposite of cheap shit.

And for the first time in human history the Internet give us the ability to organize the movement.

Spend your money and time wisely with pride. Give companies, organizations and people you believe do good for society, your support and attention. Tell your network about it.
Punish the ones who do bad and learn how to see through and resist their attempts to manipulate you. Tell your network about it.

I believe this is the great challenge and opportunity of our generation.
I believe this is how we will change.

Why do newscasters say “and now to another story”? What if stock market crisis, unemployment rates and rioting crowds are all connected? If rising national debt and unhappy people is the result of a constitutional crisis rather than isolated topics?

What if it’s payback time and this is just the beginning?

Maybe then taking advice from the same “experts” who created a great deal of this mess and journalists doing their best to simplify is actually worse than it sounds. And maybe when Mr. CHANGE say ”We have always been and always will be a triple-A country” it is no longer the Chinese who must listen to us, but we to them:

If we do not change our direction, we are likely to end up where we are headed – Chinese Proverb

McKinsey just released a very interesting report on “the Net’s impact on growth, jobs and prosperity“.
No matter what business you’re in I strongly recommend you to take a few minutes, download, read and think about the hard facts of the report and what it means to you.

Some quotes to catch your attention:

- If Internet consumption and expenditure were a sector, its weight in GDP would be bigger than energy, agriculture, or several other critical industries. The Internet’s total contribution to the GDP is bigger than the GDP of Spain or Canada, and it is growing faster than Brazil.

- It took the Internet 15 years to achieve the same increase in GDP per capita as the industrial revolution did in 50 years.

- 75% of Internet impact arises from traditional industries.

- 2,6 jobs are created for every one job lost due to the Internet

- Small end medium businesses heavily using Web technologies grow and export 2x as much as others. They also created more than twice the number of jobs as others.

- Internet contribution to GDP growth in Sweden 2004-09 was 33 percent.

- All business leaders, not just e-CEOs, should put the Internet at the top of their strategic agenda.

First let me agree with professional board member Katarina Bonde (interview in Swedish): “Company boards have disastrously poor knowledge of IT issues.” Second let me just add one thing to the problem; “IT professionals” can’t help them.

Yesterday’s interview illuminates an urgent matter of survival. The Internet is just a teenager and already we can see structural changes in a variety of industries, totally in line with all the visions of the dotcom-era.
The difference this time around is that development comes from behavioral changes rather than technological potential. Today a majority have broadband access, many via mobile devices and we dare to pay online. That was not the case back when the bubble burst.

Companies who can distribute their product digitally were first to go. Leaders of the media industry who only a decade ago differentiated with great content production and distribution are now beaten by baby companies (age and size) who aggregate content and know all about collecting, analyzing and presenting data.
While newspapers administers their closure, new media companies (read: Google, YouTube, Facebook etc) don’t employ their own content producers (eg journalists) nor carry distribution costs. Advertising money accordingly is moving from Europe to California in a dramatic shift which in turn leads to new waves…

The Internet tsunami didn’t lose any power. Travel agents, the mobile phone industry…everything possible on the boundary between digital and physical is already disrupted and forever changed. By now the wave has reached even those who can not distribute their products digitally. Retailers are losing customers to online shops with double-digit growth every quarter. And if we look beyond products to study how consumers make their purchasing decisions all b2c companies by now have wet feet. Put the spotlight on HR-related issues and b2b companies are included as well.

As an adviser focused on business development, I see the constant lack of understanding as the single biggest problem. The subject is often approached like Katarina Bonde puts it as “a technical issue that should be delegated down the organization”.
This gap of knowledge is actually an effective way to illustrate my speeches.
I usually ask the audience to raise their hands if they 1/think Internet is changing society, 2 /think of Internet as a strategic issue and 3/believe the boss understand the Internet. Such a game always result in 100% raised hands down to 90% down to 2% and a great laugh…

Another dilemma though is that I am experiencing this same lack of knowledge from many IT professionals. In fact, they often provide the greatest speed barriers out there, simply because they are so focused on technology and risk. Technology sure changes society but the lack of knowledge is about all but technology. It’s about business models and philosophy.

Business Models and philosophy from B.C (before dotcom) are – just like North African dictatorships – based upon ownership, protecting, controlling… Winners of tomorrow believe in crowdsourcing, partnerships, transparency and cognitive skills.

My simple message to all nominating committees out there is to obey Katarina Bonde’s advice, go hunt for IT-generalists it’s urgent! But remember the word generalist rather than IT.

If you read this far the subject of disruptive business models and change probably is your kinda’ tune. Go check Ronnestam’s great manifesto. Johan is one of these generalist (who do know some technology as well;) It’s in swedish so Google Translate will help if you’re not.

They say you need two things in life; love and meaning. As long as you have someone to love and something meaningful to do the rest will follow.
Companies on the contrary, need only one thing to live well; money.

Since most people spend a lot of their time working for companies and most companies need this to make money, the art of money-making should provide love or meaning. But reality as we all know is rather the opposite, a mind-blowing conflict! 84% of americans want to find a new job.

If eight out of ten want to quit, I’d say they get nothing more than money from work (as in the only reason to stay). And if money is all they get, more money is all they will ask for. In the end, unhappy imprisoned people and struggling companies; a loose-loose situation.

You might think I’m wrong, that money is more than a substitute. Some think money is a (THE) great motivator, just watch the ”money market”… But studies clearly show the opposite, when work calls for cognitive skills more money means poorer results(!)

Pay the boy who loves to fish and he’s a fisherman
How do we find love and meaning? What learnings from one is applicable on the other? (How) does it work when money gets involved? What synergies or insights may be of importance to involve money?

Love and meaning are emotional (we can’t define it), personal (different to everyone) and not transferable (I can’t give you mine even if I wanted to. And you can’t call me greedy if I have plenty without sharing). Money on the other hand is rational, universal and transferable.

We look for love in someone, and meaning in something, a task. We do it without getting paid, or rather we are happy to pay for searching; we spend money (and lots of time) on dating people, testing hobbies and activities, studying etc.

In school we try to find suitable subjects by following our interests and skills. A great feeling of passion and curiosity is often with us all the way through job training and internship. This is when we are living our dream and if only someone would pay us the world would be perfect, but then someone does and everything changes. Mondays get dull, the boss is mean and… 84% of americans want to find a new job…

Human needs will stay the same so I think the solution is obvious, it must come from a transformation of business thinking and management. As long as we keep measuring and evaluating business with money characteristics we will continue on the lose-lose-path.

Maybe business managers who think motivated employees is the greatest corporate asset for success can benchmark with nonprofit organizations!? Don’t misread me now, I only suggest that they obviously have something attractive since people join – and stay – without pay.

If you don’t think nonprofit as concept is applicable in business have a look at companies with satisfied employees; These employees rarely claim wages as reason to why they love work.

When we start shaping business to give people love and meaning the black bottom line will follow. So, do what you love and money will follow. And don’t love money because money won’t love you back.

That’s my belief, please share yours!
Or have a look at Simon Sinek in a great speech about leadership

Industrial era capitalism was (is) all about creating imbalances. To dominate.
Exploit resources instead of renew them, block competition instead of share a mission, focus on financial rather than meaningful (to society) payoffs.
Undercount costs and overcount benefits.

Just by questioning the good old recipe for how to ”make it”, you’ll think I’m arguing against capitalism. I’m not.

Capitalism has no challengers. Like democracy, it’s the worst sort of system except for all the others – and that’s exactly why we all have a stake in making it better. - Umair Haque

Sure, companies will go on and be ”smart”; Chase costs and outsource to cheaper labor, create strategy and advanced tax planning, broadcast propaganda and meaningless messages.
To build their palace even greater, at the expense of others.

But the crowd outside is demanding balance and just like old dictators of the Middle East, business dominators who fail to respond, will collapse.
Simply because the crowd won’t buy it – as in not BUY from that company anymore.

Apple, Google and Facebook are by all means dominators… But even though they often act like old dictators they don’t think like them. They have visions, about more than money. They believe in making stuff that truly matter, to others than shareholders. And they know the force is going outside in, never the opposite. They believe in change.

Just like Obama, who obviously think Steve, Eric and Mark are among key players in his quest for American competitiveness.

The picture of the US president making a toast with innovators Jobs, Schmidt & Zuckerberg is symbolic for the new business paradigm. Companies who make people better off will win.

This is the revolution of the western world. Our revolution!