Plenty of pundits have predicted the big stories for the coming year, but few have done more than extrapolate recent trends. It’s time to think more radically, says Mallen Baker

Perhaps like me, you started 2013 reading the inevitable predictions for the coming year, for what will happen both in corporate responsibility and in many other aspects of life.

We’re always interested to read them. We hope to get some insider’s insight that will put us ahead of the curve.

But by and large, these predictions fail to deliver. By that, I don’t mean they’re necessarily wrong. Many of the predictions go on to actually happen.

They fail to deliver because they don’t provide insight. They don’t tip you off to the forthcoming unexpected event. All they do is to review current, existing, well-identified trends and extrapolate them forwards.

So guess what? Human rights in supply chains will continue to be important in 2013. And how much tax companies pay will be a feature of 2013. Oh, and business leaders will continue to face a crisis of trust.

It would be more of a surprise if the opposite were true for any of the above. Which rather renders those predictions, if not worthless then at least unadventurous.

The thing is, even when there are obviously predictable things in the future, if they go against the current short-term trend we – as a species – seem to be terrible at actually taking them seriously.

But whenever we get a step change – something so dramatic it changes the rules of the game from that point onwards – it’s generally the case that the elements that led to it taking place were widely noted and acknowledged. But predicting that this will be the year that step change takes place – that is the tricky bit.

We still remember, after all, Chuck Prince of (then) Citigroup proclaiming that one day the music would stop, but until that day people like him had to continue to dance. The fact that the music would one day stop (less poetically known as global financial meltdown) was recognised. But hopefully it wouldn’t happen this year, the forecasters said.

Some alternatives

If I were to take a punt, these are some of the things that I think could be on the cards for 2013 that I bet you won’t have read anywhere else.

(1) Business leaders in the US publicly turn against each other in an unprecedented way as some begin to line up to more seriously push action on climate change and/or gun control, and others with an ideological or short-term self-interest brief begin to push back.

(2) One or more global food companies find themselves the target of violent riots over food prices in certain parts of the world as more record-breaking climatic events disrupt global food production for a second year in a row.

(3) A leading light company of the corporate responsibility movement will be caught out unambiguously behaving in a way that is completely alien to its professed values. I don’t mean some grey-area aspect, but something major – like complicity in violent action against an NGO, or something similar.

(4) There will be an explosive crisis of democratic legitimacy in China, and a leading Chinese company will establish itself as a corporate responsibility leader in the aftermath.

All four of these have two things in common.

First, when you read them you probably thought “nah, that’s not going to happen”. That’s a sign that there is genuine speculation in there, not just the extrapolation of current trends.

Second, if any one of them takes place, people will be able to look at them and identify the underlying trends that made, in retrospect, their occurrence inevitable and they will wonder how people could have failed to see it coming.

This shows that current prevailing trends are represented in there as causation – but some imagination is being applied to how that may play itself out as cause creates conflict, and conflict creates change.

It’s all good fun – but is there any serious takeaway from this exercise that any company would actually benefit from taking action?

Maybe. Looking back at my list, the common theme is scenarios where companies are more directly called upon – for good or for ill – to take an activist role in the public policy and action arena. This really is emerging as a theme in recent years, and it would be worth any proactive company reviewing its position and activity in this area.

In any case, why not have a go at your own “step change” predictions for 2013? I would be fascinated to hear them.

Mallen Baker is managing director of Daisywheel Interactive and a contributing editor to Ethical Corporation.