A meta-modern business case

Business and human futures often seem in conflict. Can for profit enterprise inherently help to deliver dignity, personal growth, responsibility? Can it enhance our faith in a better tomorrow and alleviate oceans of suffering for all sentient beings?

Maybe.

Major changes are underway in the way we do business. Together, with society and human developmental shifts it is likely a new system is on its way.

This is not a simple move. It is a step change. A system-wide step change ushering in solutions with climate, sustainability, care, personal wellbeing and socially synthesised business models. 

We’re increasingly able to piece together the evidence that such a society programming shift is underway. It is bringing about new society coding, business reimagined — meta-modern business.

What is so different? 

Synergy is a key difference. Today’s common procedures tend to be about social add-ons or environmental solutions with technology and transforming materials. Such actions seek greater efficiency, using less resources, cheaper material inputs and minimise labour for productivity and profit.

If this sounds good that’s your very fine modern trained business brain talking! However, it’s not a different paradigm from current day thinking and the way we created today’s messes.

What does it look like when the more profitable a business is it cannot avoid helping to reverse global warming? If the more it sells it can’t help but increase social cohesion?

Business futures

The evidence for a next step — meta-modern business — is around us. There have been similar shifts in the past.

The industrial revolution swept away old production models. It was not just machinery. Innovators and entrepreneurs worked out how to harness the efforts of many people. Tasks were structured simply and repetitively delivering good quality and low costs with semi and unskilled labour.

Similarly, the iDevice and Information revolution is with us now. Exponentially cheaper materials alongside desires for individualism fuel disruptive change.

However, it is hard to see such change in the early stages. Just ask Nokia, Kodak and Motorola’s Iridium. We often miss paradigm shifts while they are starting. For example, see Salim Ismail’s Exponential Organisations for a succinct description of how Nokia tried to shore up its position using conventional thinking and failed spectacularly.

The history of such society step changes goes back well beyond industry and information. Today, when I look, I can find the signs that show we’re on our way to another shift. A few examples are Interface, Flogro and Allbirds.

Signposts

These companies have integrated models. These can, ever more  beneficially, improve environmental and social factors with profit and scale. Potential perverse outcomes aside.

Critically, this is beyond technology — social, community, emotional and care connections are part of delivery, part of success.

At the same time these companies are signposts. I am not claiming they are necessarily meta-modern businesses. And, to be clear, such meta-modern concepts are not a utopia. However, they go well beyond business as usual. The whole company concepts transcend traditional business productivity models. Social, environmental and economic answers are an integrated part of success. That’s different thinking and characteristic of an societal upshift.

What entity wants to be the next Kodak, Nokia or Iridium? Allbirds, Interface and Flogro are far more attractive.

Exponential

We’re in a world of many types of fast change. We’re experiencing  exponential shifts across multiple measurable and more subtle fields of work and thought.  We have global imperatives to address pressing problems.

These are some of the trends supporting meta-modern business. It is a synthesis: synergistic social, environmental and economic models delivering a whole that is more than the sum of each of the indivdual parts.

Articles and books

For a compelling read, including the state of likelihood for such a shift to meta-modern, see Hanzi Freinacht’s book The Listening Society. It is “a dangerous book” making the case for substantive change based on human development and ongoing step changes in society’s programming code.

* Thomas is Founder of Ekskäret Foundation, Stockholm and Co-founder of Perspectiva Institute, London. The quote is from his Medium article on The Market Myth.

For a great article on What Is Metamodernism? see Seth Abramson’s Huffington Post piece.

In Kyiv this September (2019)? See the MetaModern Arts Festival.