Humbug: What 2012 tells us about 2013
The turn of the year gives everyone cause to pause and take stock. This is particularly true of those of us in the trends and forecasting business who are invited to make public next years forecasts and, occasionally, reflect more privately on forecasts from days gone by!
In one sense, especially the UK, it has been a year of tremendous highs. The huge celebrations around London 2012 and the Diamond Jubilee reveal our continued to determination to enjoy relevant, authentic experiences, even in the midst of the most protracted economic downturn.
But, looking back on 2012 and forward to 2013, I hope it is not too unseasonably miserable of me to suggest that it is the tremendous lows of the last 12 months that offer the greater insights for our clients. Here in the UK one institution after another has stumbled into crises of their own making, be that the police over Hillsborough, the press over phone hacking, the BBC over Newsnight and/or Jimmy Saville or the Church of England over women bishops. Further afield, in developed economies around the world, governments struggle to preserve their credibility and public support as austerity bites hard into the quality of peoples' lives. In emerging economies, many of which are blighted by corruption, the public are starting to find their voice as evidenced by events in Russia, India and China in 2012.
I think there is a common thread here. In tough and uncertain times people are less willing to tolerate 'bad' behaviour by institutions. This is also true for businesses, as Amazon, Google and Starbucks have recently discovered. Those of you who have read our recent work on the 'Self-Preservation society' and 'C-Suite Scrutiny' will know that we think we are in for more of the same in 2013. Disgruntled consumers are increasingly willing to cut themselves some slack on ethical issues, and more likely to deny it to others. This is not the boom fuelled 'altruistic' corporate social responsibility agenda of 2007, but the hard-nosed blame and shame CSR of the future.
As Michael Willmott and I said in our 2009 article for Harvard Business Review: "The financial crisis has put a spotlight on corporate governance, in particular the malfeasance of some executives and the complicity of their companies' boards. Misbehaviour that boards might get away with in good times arouses ire when the economy goes south....The growing interest in the boardroom builds on an older instinct, the public's well-established reflex to punish companies for unethical labour or customer practices is potent. This trend should accelerate through the recession...".
Reflecting now, I would like to think that this is one forecast where we were spot on. And, this message is not as unseasonably gloomy as it might first appear. There are great opportunities for businesses that grasp the new realities of the self-preservation society.
Merry Christmas to you all
