Book "No Ordinary Disruption" (No Ordinary Disruption): The Four Global Forces That Break All Trends

Authors:
Richard Dobbs, James Manyika, and Jonathan Woetzel
(Richard Dobbs, James Manyika, Jonathan Woetzel)

The Idea in a Number

3000!
The transformations the world is undergoing today happen at a speed that is 10 times faster than the Industrial Revolution, and on a scale that exceeds it by 300 times.
When you multiply these two numbers, we realize that the power of change and economic impact we are experiencing today equals 3000 times what the world witnessed during the Industrial Revolution!
This number tells us clearly that what we learned from the past is no longer valid for predicting the future.

The Big Idea

We are going through a radical transformation that breaks all patterns and trends we are accustomed to. Leaders and decision-makers built their "business intuition" on data from the second half of the twentieth century, but this intuition is now "wrong".
There are four major global forces reshaping everything:
Rapid urbanization in emerging markets,
The stunning acceleration of technology,
The aging of the world's population,
And deep global connectivity.
To survive this era, you must "completely reset your intuition."

3 Life Lessons From This Book

  • Resetting Intuition (Resetting Intuition):
    Do not rely on what worked for you in the past decade.
    The economic models and assumptions that were correct 20 years ago are now misleading.
    Successful leaders are those with the courage to abandon their old beliefs, adopt strategies built on new data and figures, not old habits.
  • The Shift Towards Emerging Markets:
    The center of global economic gravity is rapidly shifting toward the East and South.
    Mid-sized cities in China and India (whose names many may not even know) have become the new engine of growth.
    Companies that do not place emerging markets at the heart of their strategy will soon find themselves on the margins of the global economy.
  • Preparing for the Demographic Shift:
    For the first time in human history, the world is aging faster than it is growing.
    Declining birth rates and increasing life expectancy mean the workforce will shrink in many countries.
    This forces institutions to rely more on technology to compensate for reduced productivity, and to innovate services and products that meet the needs of a growing elderly population.

Unforgettable Quotes

"The intuition that served us well in the past has become today a guide that leads us to the abyss."

"We are not living in an era of change, but in a change of eras."

Who Is This Book For?

For executives, strategic planners, investors, and entrepreneurs who want to understand the "big picture" of the forces that will control the global economy in the coming decades, and learn how to avoid surprises and build flexible strategies capable of enduring amid violent disruptions.