The following projections focusing on major change expectations were part of an article I have written & submitted* 10 years ago, in fall 2008. At this time of the year during holiday season, a retrospective look might give us more confidence going forward…
“It seems that the capitalist society is crashing. When the free market system emerged & supply-demand balance formed the basis of liberal economies, it should have looked like a quite reasonable & in fact natural balance.
Yet, contrary to its core promise, capitalist system – at least on a massive scale – placed corporations at the center not the individual, and human stayed as an ordinary resource, or factor of production if you wish, to use. Among others, i believe, this is one of the fundamental defects of economic liberalism.
On the other hand, alternative doctrine of the socialist school was not able to provide individual with enough incentive, as the primary goal being the protection of the dominant order for the collective benefit of the whole.
What did the individual do then? Well, reacted to both. Because the first option was indeed against their rationality whereas the second one was restricting the field of action by default.
At the end of the day, all this experience & the dilemma on hand signals a fast-approaching collapse of every such non-humanitarian framework. And the brand-new order will most probably be like a human-centered synthesis of capitalism & socialism that takes advantage of all the individual rational, incentive compatible but most importantly humanitarian elements of the argument set of the two.
This socio-economic paradigm shift will of course directly impact the business world. With the cultural codes of postmodernism being substituted for a more humanitarian form, human-centered working order will just become inevitable.
To keep up with this transformation, the business processes will be re-designed in the right way, and far better than how they are today. With the innovative & open-minded atmosphere fostered by the ongoing transformation, individuals will become much more aware of their potentials & entrepreneurship will become a very common practice.
We need to see the emergence of value networks / pools comprised of individuals, who utilize their unique talent set & expertise in contributing to – most probably multiple simultaneous – engagements. These value networks / pools will be the new powerhouse to accelerate the development of the business world.
We will witness a boost in both the number & quality of start-ups & SMEs, which have always been the dynamo of economic development. As more people already began to understand, start-ups & SMEs will gain the well-deserved recognition as they start leading the global business.
On the other hand, due to their resistance to such a transformation & change together with the shortage of talented associates as a result of the entrepreneurial spirit, today's giant corporations will be struggling to survive. Hence, just as in the political scene, the polarized power structure of the business world will also turn into a more homogeneously distributed & balanced one.
This socio-economic transformation, at the core of which lays human-centricity, will be completed with the rise of environmental consciousness that will gradually be turning into a must-have. And all these developments will ensure the ability to address sustainable development, the main concern of the 21st century.
The business world needs to be prepared for all these changes. The ideal operating condition for any system is to be on some sort of a balance with regards to its internal dynamics, instead of forcing its limits on a continued basis. The transformation of business will be nothing but to achieve this balance & quitting what is forcing the limit, especially on the human-capital front.
In other words, business world will reorganize itself, set new standards & way of working, will be good in the end, and more importantly, understand that the search for the better should be a constant effort.
Turkey has already started experiencing this transformation & change process. Just like a start-up or an SME, its potential originating from its cultural wealth & dynamism is enabling it to adopt this process much faster than resistant developed economies. Therefore, from a business perspective, Turkey will maintain its increasing importance in this journey.”
Now, just a reminder first: 2008 was a year when today’s biggest social network was just starting to get popular & the first real ancestor of the phone you are most probably using right now was just released.
Considering the above projections while living in 2018, why not take your time to think about examples of what happened in this last decade, including but not limited to,
the rise of the “end of capitalism” discussions,
more & more people reacting to corporate lifestyle & to the notion of living to work,
increased search for a rural, simple, non-corporate life to be able to escape from all the complexity of the urban,
new flexibilities introduced related to working hours, locations, and benefits in trying to ensure a better work-life balance,
“crowd-sourcing” & “sharing economy” as new means of accessing & using resources,
connectedness & democratization provided by social media while this new media itself becoming a marketing & income generating asset,
the spread of solopreneurship & freelancers working & collaborating for multiple simultaneous projects via online networks / channels,
global start-up ecosystem where start-ups of 10-years-ago became tech giants of today,
talent shortage threat to large corporations,
former giants losing their ranks in Global 500 lists,
international system turning from a unipolar world order into a multipolar one,
environmental awareness reaching its peak, with some new binding regulations on emissions & waste as well as incentives to businesses for going green,
and Istanbul - Turkey drawing increased attention of especially global tech corporations as a potential hub of innovation & start-up network, while also experiencing most of the above shifts on a local scale…
All these developments are in favor of human, global business, and the world, i believe. More is to come in 2019. Stay tuned, and happy New Year…
* The above projections constituted a sub-section of the article – New Business – that is submitted (originally in Turkish) to a dissertation competition organized by Deloitte Academy in fall 2008.