(English) Diplomatic World – The next chapter of western economy starts in Brussels

 By 2025, 1/3 of the jobs are going to disappear, and another 1/3 will completely change. It is the biggest shift in the history of economy since the industrial revolution. One difference: the speed. In 5-7 years, world economy will be unrecognizeable. Most companies and governments have no idea what to do, nor where to go. In the best case, they focus on digitalisation. With the vulnerability to hacking today, building whole businesses exclusively on robots, AI, IOT, and digital revolutions is very risky.

On the other hand, numerous new approaches to value creation are emerging everywhere – mostly under the radar. From Brussels, we have been gathering all these tendencies, mapping, clustering, analyzing and extrapolating them horizon 2025.

WHY BRUSSELS ?

It is the geographic center of Europe, the HQ of most lobbies, federations, Nato, European Union, and multinational companies. But above all, Belgium has a skill to deal with multicultural issues and multiple agendas, through a blend of germanic culture, latin and Anglo-Saxon, and 140 others – combined with a culture of humble hard work and global engineering (Belgium was the world’s second economic power till 100 years ago).

Belgians are welcome anywhere in the world, unlike some other nationalities. Embassies in Brussels are staffed by the best diplomats on the planet, with open lines with their heads of state. Moreover, all the good ideas pass through Brussels sooner or later. It is ideal to export new economic visions and models. The sandbox of those economic models will find their markets mostly abroad, as Belgium is quite conservative. Especially emerging economies with young populations, eager to learn and empower the next generation of humanist entrepreneurship serving global challenges.

A FUTURISTIC SANDBOX

We need to experiment and empower collaboration between the players who have the most resources to create change: large corporations. They start to realize, little by little, that they cannot innovate on their own. They will not be able to shift drastically before 2025. So, in short, they are big ships, aware of the iceberg, its size and position, but unable to turn the wheel in time. Two things should be done:

1. Trim the ship for impact, get down to the basics
2. Prepare the lifeboats.

The lifeboats are new businesses, based on the new paradigms (collaborative, serving multiple challenges), and they will be able to swim in between the icebergs. These new businesses should be crisis-proof, bringing new coherence between people and economic activities. They will thus be able to tackle historical challenges in systemic, instead of linear ways. A few examples: sustainable rental housing, waste recycling, next generation education systems, senior population and sustainable pension funds, illness prevention, sustainable agriculture and food, greening deserts, etc.

This experiment was started in Brussels. Half a dozen companies, twenty extrapreneurs of multiple backgrounds and generations, were trained on the next economic paradigms (24 days of action-training), hands-on creating the next generation businesses. In four months, they came up with new businesses, validated by stakeholders and market, all of them fully scalable. In combination with new systemic thinking and a top-down vision on the next generation macro-economic models, we have the DNA of transition.

We have to mobilize the early adopters of new ways of creating value – those who did try internal innovation, incubators, without substantial success. Those large companies are now ready to open the box and share their resources with others to create the next generation businesses. We exfiltrate them in a dedicated space, and train their managers – together with a next generation entrepreneurs – to a new economic philosophy with brand- new tools. The first experiment of Extrapreneurs in Brussels is now ready to be franchised and scaled up.

A NEW SCHOOL OF ECONOMIC THINKING – CLUB OF BRUSSELS

The next chapter of economic thinking is now being written all over the world. Thousands of experiments and studies are done and in process. We are compiling them with the “Club of Brussels,” and projecting economic vision on 5-10 years. We qualify and quantify job destructions and creations, and prepare a road book for governments to help their economies resist global recession, and facilitate the emergence of new economic spaces. Social economy, digital economy, sharing- and collaborative economy, green and circular economies are the big winners. Public authorities, services, trade, industry are the big losers (studies to be found in « Shifting Economy », Brussels 2017, by Mossay-de Kemmeter).

Thousands of studies have been made on economic transition, but only very partially. It is now time to put all of them together to create a new holistic vision on economy. Following the paradigm shits going on as we speak, it looks like public services will be made more efficient with digital tools, thus cheaper. Healthcare cost will go down, thanks to more prevention and education. Education will move to more peer-to-peer learning; it will be much more hands-on, efficient and cheaper. Mobility will be more shared and thus cheaper and with lower impact.

That culture will create much more societal value and rely less on public finances. We should quantify all these systemic shifts to make the figures work. Our taxes should lower, the value created should be higher, and thus global progress can be triggered. But we should not be naive. Such majors shift will take time. We can – at best – stimulate the creation of « islands of resilience », interconnect them, and inspire others to shift also. This global shift follows the logic of organic mutation. We will not wake up some morning, in a new world. Shift happens one by one, company after company, community after community, city after city. The beauty of it is that everyone of us can be part of it – nothing will be decided for us by some higher power.

Another good news is that there will be probably as many new jobs created in the new economic spaces, than jobs destructed in the old ones. Boring jobs will be replaced by empowering ones – much more in tune with peoples’ excellences. Over 75% of the people working do jobs they don’t like. Burnout and depression rise exponentially. No surprise. This is just a sign that we do something wrong… A new coherence is expected to empower people. On micro/ personal level, on company level, on national levels and on global levels. This is what Club of Brussels will map and calculate. Create an efficient tool to pilot our economies through this giant mutation.

PARADIGM SHIFTS AND COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS

The economic challenges are only the top of the iceberg. The true challenge is the shift in global consciousness. People start to realize they are one, on a planet which is their common « mother ». That they cannot go on killing each other day after day, and destroying their mother earth. Big words. But what does it mean? It is multidimensional. We are mutating as humanity. (1) From patriarchal societies to a combination of patriarchal and matriarchal, integrating as such, both polarities. Masculine and feminine. (2) Shifting from dependance models, based on fear, to autonomy models, based on personal power and love. (3) From hierarchies to ecosystems. (4) From linear models (exhausting people and planet) to systemic models (nourishing people and planet). (5) From formatting and automation to individual and unique empowerment. (6) From ownership models to shared and collaborative models. We can go on and on. Everything is shifting. The only way we can follow these, understand them and act coherently, is a personal choice of consciousness. Decide to go beyond appearances, and use your talents to serve common good. Beyond ego and possession. It is – in a way – to be individually and collectively reborn as a fully grown human being. Humanity is little by little leaving behind childish behavior. In economy, it has fundamental impacts, and the first movers, enlightened leaders, are economically very successful. The all will tell you the same kind of stories…

THE NEXT MODEL – SYSTEMIC, HOLISTIC AND PEOPLE-CENTERED

Humanity starts to realize it is a part of the (whole) specter of life. Humanity has the possibility to act consciously, unlike animal, vegetal and mineral reigns. As such, it has the capacity to connect reigns and to fulfill itself at its best potential. In its more mature behavior, humanity can inspire from the logic of nature, and implement optimal natural value creation. Studies show that collaboration on existing resources allow 4 to 5 times better (economic) results. Like in nature, with 100% efficiency and 0% waste. Those models have a new intelligence: systemics. It shows and empowers 3D connexions between stakeholders – answering needs and sharing resources on multiple levels.

Economy, in its basic etymology, « managing household », has multiple value creation loops. Monetary transactions only account for a small part of the economic domain. Systemics allow to map and empower those connexions. It also takes into account the positive or negative collateral effects of economic exchanges. Systemic human intelligence is located in the prefrontal brain. Its neurons are 3-dimensional, it has a creative interconnecting function – there where in the conditioned/ structured brain, the neurons are linear. Human beings only use around 10% of its brain capacity. Shifting to higher potential is key here, as a priority, before using Artificial Intelligence. The risk is that our IQ and discernment lowers by using more technology, without personal development and consciousness enhancement. Moreover, relying on too much technology will create a very new unexpected vulnerability of our businesses to unreliable and fragile technology. Hacking, fake news, electricity blackouts, or hyper complexity could cost entire companies. Very dangerous.

The next model will ask to develop the capacity of holistic view. Like walking up the stairs to the first floor, whilst water and mud is rising at the ground floor and everybody there struggles to survive. We need to develop the skill to see things from higher, as well as dive into concrete matters and make new systemic models work with natural intelligence.

A FEW SECRET INGREDIENTS

Of course, the whole operation has a series of ingredients for success. Constant humble personal development, constant research on new philosophies of value creation, learn from the most diverse horizons, search for coherence and alignment, be aware of emerging potential, understandable vocabulary and semantics, sense of timing, empowering systemic links, a strong and coherent validated methodology… in other words, a new enlighten leadership based as much on common sense than on sense of purpose serving common good. I know those people are there, sometimes under the radar. Maybe you too. Dare to come up with your deeper intuitions and fulfill your teams. It is the time to show and mobilize the best.

A STRONG VISION

The big « country » winners will be the countries with creativity, with young population, with a willpower to serve common good, cultures who are able to collaborate openly. The big employment winners in « economic models » will be, horizon 2025 : social business (will double), green economy (more than double), circular economy (also more than double), digital economy and robotisation will only gain +/-50%, knowledge economy will also gain around 50%, agro-ecology will tenfold. Sharing and collaborative economy will twentyfold – with the open question of employment and taxes… The big losers in employment will be services and trade (-50%), industrial agriculture (-60%), industry, energy and extraction will lose around 40%. Public services will lose between 10 and 70%, depending on the political choices made by their governments.

The next chapter of world economy could be written from Brussels, in collective intelligence with the best global visionaries and experts. Eclectic, we need sociologues, psychologues, scientists, next generation leaders, and even artists and spiritual leaders, to assist our expert economists. The outcome will be a true « Growth Explorer » to help governments to pilot the mutation of their economies. Coaching the emergence of the new. But let us not be naive, it will take decennia till the whole economy is tuned into a new and strong coherence. It will happen in stages, through the emergence of « islands of resilience ». Those can be cities, companies, communities, based on new vision, autonomy and personal leadership. The rest will be more and more based on fear, stress and dependance. Little by little, people will diverge from a system they cannot survive inside, and do their personal coming out, connecting purpose, passion and new expected competences – to participate in the most fascinating adventure in human history.

Michel de Kemmeter
www.extrapreneurs.org – www.wiseholding.net – michel@wiseholding.net