The new possibility, the new truth

After two days at Davos, it’s positive to see that the mood amongst attendees is more optimistic than previous years. Business confidence levels seem to return to pre-crisis levels.

Yesterday, I listened to WPP’s Sir Martin Sorrell. He managed to induce positivity and a lot of nodding into the crowded conference room when he said: “If you pump $12 trillion into the world economy, there has to be a rebound. That’s what happened in 2010. 2010 was about bouncing back. 2011 will be more balanced and more back to where we were.”

One of the factors that this positivity can be credited to, is the central theme that is shaping the forum – Shared Norms of the New Reality. At the heart of the new reality is the need to collaborate in both developed economies and growth markets.

Today’s growth markets are yesterday’s emerging markets — and tomorrow’s future. A Chief Executive of a Chinese Logistics firm made a bold statement, which echoes similar discussions we’ve had with our customers and partners over the past year. He said that very soon, there will be a shirt label that makes the transition from “made in China” to “created in China” – in other words, traditional emerging economies such as India and China will no longer be known as the outsourcers of the world, but the growth leaders which will make global economic stability a reality.

However, the new reality is becoming increasingly complex, interconnected and competitive for global economies. In order for us to bounce back, we need to share ideas and work together to help struggling economies and also for growth markets to prosper.

However, growth markets’ dependence on knowledge, trade, immigration and employment will continue to exist. Over the past two decades, the improving quality of life in these economies has been heavily dependent on the speed of globalisation.

Given that globalisation has created a quality of life for its citizens, it is vital that markets continue to focus on interconnectivity – with a transparent flow of services, people, information and knowledge between countries – in the future. This is an important strategy to grow the global economy in the long term.

These thoughts, beliefs and sentiments were also the underlying aspects of our conversations with our peers, clients and trusted partners over the past couple of days. Organisations are seeing growth come back across the globe in general and in emerging markets in particular.

To complement this growth, many of them are placing focused effort, time and money on projects centered around compliance and risk management and consequently, collaboration seemed to be low on their agenda.

However, there was a widespread consensus on the fact that collaboration lies in the heart of new reality. Without it, in the long term, global growth will be hindered.

The new reality is an interdependency in itself, but in order to make it successful, we need to create a common understanding that this new reality or new world order, is possible.

This possibility is the new truth and the best way forward.

Pic: World Economic Forumcc2.0