A BANI world stands for brittleness, anxiety, non-linearity, and incomprehensibility – which kind of sums up 2020.
“I read a fantastic quote today by Mike Tyson the boxer. He said ‘everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face’ and 2020 was that punch in the face.”
Dion Chang, Founder at Flux Trends
Before 2020, pre-pandemic, everyone was worried about digitisation and some technological disruption, he says.
“But then everything literally changed last year, so now we are almost having to wipe the slate clean.”
“People’s strategies are up for grabs and up for reassessment.”
Apparently, we used to live in a VUCA world – Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous – but now we live in a BANI world. What does that mean?
It is quite a mouthful says Chang.
“A BANI world stands for brittleness, anxiety, non-linearity, and incomprehensibility – which kind of sums up 2020.”
He extrapolates on the importance of future-thinking for your business in a radically changed world.
Most businesses had to reimagine, reframe or rethink their business model last year, he says.
But what trends have changed and are unlikely to ever return?
“This whole thing about working from home, and is the office dead or is it not dead? It’s going to be somewhere in the middle.”
“Whether you like it or not, we understand that as humans we need contact and we need to be with each other and socialise – so the office is not dead.
He says the office is not dead, but it will be greatly reduced.
“Even if 20 – 40% of that office space is going to be lost or shed – and it will be in the next 18 months or so – because I don’t think those 9-5 models are going to continue, then that’s going to have an immense ripple effect on commercial property.”
Dion says there already has been a ‘semigration’ of people moving and reshuffling.
“I’ve been saying for many years the 40-hour workweek, the nine-to-five is a quaint relic of the 20th century, and finally, that has been put to rest…and I think that is going to stay and stick.
