For last decade or so, we have often mentioned that we are operating in and living through what we believed were uncertain times. Economic downturn. Inflation. Recovery. Recession again, followed by revival, of period of sustained growth. It’s a new world order where economic uncertainty has seemingly become the new normal. Many of us even started referring to this and connecting it with the acronym VUCA to describe the more volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world.
Digitization, technology transformation, changing geopolitics, evolving business models, and a changing consensus on globalization and trade have further accentuated the theory of uncertainty.
But the COVID-19 pandemic, has changed–our collective calculus of uncertainty. There has never been a time human world may have faced such a complex situation. There have been flu pandemics. There was the 2008 financial crisis. And there have been threats and disasters with local and/or national implications: Chernobyl, the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, 9/11, Hurricane Katrina. COVID-19 pandemic turned out to be more global in scope, frightfully impactful on economy and society, and more complex than any other crisis that today’s decision-makers have experienced or contemplated.
Widely described as the “next normal” – EMBRACING uncertainty and complexity has to be an integral part of our decision-making.
Consumers too have started reacting to uncertainties with different coping strategies; and we as marketers will need to respond to this, and more importantly keep this as an essential influential factor in chalking our future business strategies. The unprecedented rate at which consumer behaviour shifts is weakening the predictive power of historical data. This means predictive models built on historical data must be replaced by near-real-time alternatives, acknowledging shifts and adapting to them as they happen.
Today, the power of scenario-thinking and building sensing capabilities in EMBRACING UNCERTAINTIES is the key.
There is a fine balance between the opportunities created by uncertainty and the comforts provided by certainty. Leaders who achieve the balance will unravel growth. Uncertainty can ultimately enrich your life, or diminish it. Instead of getting intimidated by it, embrace it.
