Welcome to the part 2 of my interview with the unique figure that is Jeroen Pliester. He being a trendwatcher I asked him what are the major trends he predicts for the future. Long story short; the way of working will change, country barriers will get blurry as we will go through another rural-urban migration and people will value more craftsmanship.
Aligning employment with entrepreneurship
We already know that the way we work is changing; we can see this happening right in front of our eyes. The new point Jeroen raises is there won’t be solely employees or entrepreneurs. Both things can integrate. You can spend your time working for a major company and in the meanwhile think as an entrepreneur.
For you to open your own company experience in business management is needed. For you to succeed as an employee in a market in constant change you have to be creative, see demands and know how to cope with them, just like an entrepreneur. The same thing goes with collaboration between companies. Big corporations to survive will have to hold hands with smaller and more flexible companies; in that way they can create a smoother flow without compromising themselves.
Countries barriers and the new rural-urban migration
The second trend Jeroen mentioned was that country barriers will change. That is another thing that we can see happening right in front of our eyes. But what we observe is countries now will be mega cities in the future. You can find millions of people in the same country, as Brasil, but being in a metropolitan city as São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Florianópolis makes all the difference when it comes to being connected to the rest of the world. Going a little bit further, urban people from different countries will have more in common with each other than people in the same country.
For this reason more and more people will go from the countryside to the big cities, and then we might have another problem, that has everything to do with our next trend, our connection to the nature and craftsmanship.
Craftsmanship
Recently I watched the Netflix show Flaked. I don’t recommend it. In one of the episodes Christopher Mintz-Plasse, aka McLovin hilariously interprets a .com billionaire who gets obesessed with the main character because he makes stools. He freaks out saying that this is what he needs, something real. Something he can touch, break, build, fix.
With all the advances in technology and being 24/7 connected the human being gets distant from its own nature. We were meant to be social, but we cannot cope with the fast-pace progress. The species we belong to is tactile; we touch, see, understand how things work and where they come from. We feel safe with the tangible. That is where the craftsmanship goes in.
Craftsmanship comes from craftsman. It means a person who makes beautiful objects by hand. Craftsmanship is the act of making them. That is when we know where something comes from and was made especially for you. Taylor made. That is what holds us to the ground when everything else is up in the cloud.
We already see some brands doing this, see Lush for an instance. The company puts in its products a friendly drawing and the name of the person who made the product. In social media they present those people to you, welcoming each new employee of their “kitchen”, the place where the product are developed and created. Is like buying from that neighbour, but all over the world.
According to Jeroen this trend will be bigger than we can realize right now. Just think about the beer you would find in a bar 10 years ago and all the different types you find right now, or the do it yourself movement. Better keep an eye on it.
