“It
becomes convenient to forget past pain.”
Those
words from global futurist Rohit Talwar are not just a statement of his
opinion, they are at the crux of his message to leaders in travel and tourism –
a message that is equal parts admonition and inspiration.
As
founder and CEO of Fast Future, a research and consulting business based in
London, Talwar helps corporate leaders envision and shape their companies’
futures.
His
strategy is based on helping businesses future proof themselves by developing
foresight – a process he equates to building a muscle that must be strengthened
over time.
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Talwar
says developing this “capacity to explore the future, think the unthinkable and
making it part of everyone’s responsibility to be part of the organization’s
radar for change and innovation” enables a company to be better prepared for
the uncertainties that will, inevitably, arise.
For
travel and tourism, there’s no better case study than the crisis and chaos of
the COVID pandemic. But Talwar is concerned some industry leaders may not be using
those lessons today to prepare for tomorrow.
“The
focus for a lot of people in the industry right now, rightfully, is on trying
to secure business growth in the near term and deal with current
uncertainties,” he says.
“And
there are the exciting World Travel and Tourism Council forecasts that suggest
the industry will return to growing at a higher rate than global GDP, so there
is a sense that we don’t have to worry. But there is another view, which is
that we’ve probably never experienced the situation that we have now, where we
have a polycrisis of large, compounding and accelerating risks coming together
in an unprecedented manner.”
Talwar
defines some of those risks as global economic volatility, persistent inflation,
climate change, rising energy costs and the “savage employment impacts” of the automation
of work.
However, says
Talwar, there is also a “massive opportunity” to face these risks head on,
embrace radical new ideas and secure the future.
On November 15 at The Phocuswright Conference in Phoenix, he will share
concrete ideas of how travel companies can minimize the effects of future chaos
by cultivating forward-focused, creative thinking about developing new sources
of revenue, adopting new ways to reach customers and developing new skills and
behaviors.
And
Talwar argues, this forward-thinking approach must be accompanied by a truly
open mindset.
“We all
say we’re open to innovation,” he says.
“But many
organizations have horrible body language. They have horrible body language
internally to their own people around radical ideas and new propositions and
even more horrible body language toward ideas and innovations in the outside
world.”
And changing that thinking is now an urgent need.
Says Talwar, “Securing
the future is no longer something we can put off until the day after tomorrow. It now needs as much leadership attention as generating today’s revenues.”