My thoughts on The Next Decade: A World in Motion

The future isn’t sneaking in quietly — it’s arriving like a hurricane, reshaping how we live, work, connect, and even measure success.

Some of these shifts are exciting, others are unsettling, but all of them demand one thing from us: adaptability.

Here’s where I believe we’re heading — and why it matters.

1. Experiences Are the New Status Symbol

We’re firmly in the experience economy. People are willing to spend more on moments than on material things.

Look at the rise of F1 Arcade in Boston, Putt Shack, the Museum of Ice Cream, Color Factory, Sky trampoline parks, and Tiger Woods’ PopStroke putting concept. These aren’t just attractions — they’re cultural playgrounds where people connect, compete, and share stories worth telling.

Even networking has evolved into something more experiential. It’s no longer just business breakfasts or golf — it’s hosting clients in suites at NBA games, inviting them to pickleball tournaments, or sharing front-row access at a Formula 1 event. Deals are being built in environments that energize people and make them open up.

In the years ahead, expect experience-based relationship-building to dominate business development.

2. Wellness, Longevity, and the Human Upgrade

People aren’t just chasing more years — they’re chasing better years. Longevity clinics, biohacking, boutique fitness, and healthy luxury travel are booming.

Sports like pickleball have exploded because they combine fun, social interaction, and physical activity. Fine dining is evolving into immersive culinary journeys. The wellness space is no longer a niche — it’s a status industry.

Brands that can connect to health, energy, and quality of life will have an emotional edge over those that don’t.

3. The Attention Rebellion

I’ll never forget reading Information Overload in the early 2000s. It argued that even back then — before social media had taken over — it was already hard to stand out in the flood of news articles and blog posts.

Today, that challenge has multiplied a hundredfold.

The average person is bombarded with thousands of marketing messages every single day. We skip, scroll, mute, and block at lightning speed.

Cold marketing is dying. The new game is relevance marketing: being in the right place, at the right time, with the right message. Hyper-segmentation, personalization, and emotional storytelling aren’t luxuries — they’re survival tools.

4. The Trust Economy

In an era of deepfakes, spam, and automation, trust is worth more than attention.

That’s why sales is swinging back toward old-school relationship building: face-to-face conversations, shared meals, and personal referrals. It’s not nostalgia — it’s necessity.

People will buy faster from someone they trust than from someone with the perfect marketing funnel. The businesses that win will invest in long-term relationship capital, not just quick conversions.

5. AI as the Great Rearranger

Artificial Intelligence isn’t coming for “a few jobs” — it’s quietly rearranging entire industries.

What started with text and image generation is now moving into coding, customer service, design, and even complex decision-making. We already have AI writing ad copy, debugging code, designing products, and answering customer questions with eerie accuracy.

In hospitality, AI-powered robots are cleaning rooms. In transportation, autonomous vehicles are logging millions of miles. In creative industries, generative AI is producing marketing campaigns, music, and even films in days instead of months.

For professionals, this means two urgent realities:

The repetitive, rule-based parts of your work will be automated.
Your value will shift to creativity, critical thinking, and human connection — the things machines can’t (yet) replicate.

The winners will use AI as leverage, not see it as competition.

6. Climate Reality and Resilience

Extreme weather isn’t a rare event anymore — it’s part of our annual calendar. Hurricanes, floods, and wildfires disrupt not just lives, but entire economies.

This will drive a push for resilient infrastructure, sustainable supply chains, and eco-conscious brands. Companies that can’t prove they’re sustainable risk being left behind.

7. The North American Manufacturing Moment

The U.S., Canada, and Mexico have a historic opportunity: to bring manufacturing closer to home.

With global supply chain fragility exposed during recent years, nearshoring isn’t just smart — it’s strategic. A strong North American manufacturing alliance could trigger an economic boom and reduce dependency on overseas production.

8. Reinvention or Irrelevance

No company is safe just because it’s been profitable for decades. The pace of change is too fast.

Blockbuster, Kodak, and countless others learned the hard way: if you don’t disrupt yourself, someone else will. That means modernizing legacy systems, rethinking your customer experience, and being willing to pivot before the market forces you to.

The Big Picture

These aren’t separate trends — they’re connected threads in the same story. The future is about meaningful human connection in an increasingly automated, distracted, and unpredictable world.

The businesses — and people — who thrive will master the balance:

Leverage technology to create efficiency, but invest in experiences, trust, and relevance that only humans can deliver.

The next decade will reward those who adapt with speed, lead with authenticity, and create moments worth remembering. Everyone else will be playing catch-up.