Back to the future – 25 years
- ejordan828
- Mar 31
- 4 min read
Written by Adam Campbell, 31 March 2025
The other day, in one of those moments from left field, someone said to me ‘If [the film] Back to the Future was made today, Marty McFly would travel back to 1995!’
By coincidence, 1995 was the publication year of the RSA’s Inquiry: Tomorrow’s Company, a key moment in the Telos story. Our business was formed five years later and March 2025 marks the start of our 25th year.
Hence, the ‘looking back to look forward’ theme of this article.
I will begin with an extract from the Tomorrow’s Company Report:
“… rapid changes in the global market make it increasingly complex and demanding … major forces of change include … technological developments; globalisation; new employment patterns and organisational structures; the growing importance of environmental issues; and the death of deference among employees, consumers and communities.”
Replace ‘globalisation’ with rising national interest and you could be excused for believing that this was written more recently!
Let’s consider more deeply the theme of technology.
As I put out my fortnightly cardboard recycling, I was struck by the fact that Amazon was founded when the Tomorrow’s Company Inquiry was taking place. Our camera doorbell announces the arrival of the next batch of cardboard three or four times a day. During the last 25 years, we have successfully navigated the millennium bug disaster and the burst of the dot-com bubble. We have seen ‘Ask Jeeves’ replaced by ‘Google’. Our CDs have moved from our CD racks onto our computers, our iPods and our smartphones. Similarly for our photography, much to the detriment of Kodak. Friends Reunited and Myspace were displaced by Facebook, whilst YouTube gave birth to a new generation of celebrity entertainment. Digital natives were born. Uploading software and games on to our computers became a thing of the past as we moved everything to streaming and the cloud. We even began to track our movement, our sleep and health. The fourth industrial revolution took hold with the accelerated development of the Internet of Things, the metaverse, AI and advanced robotics. Imagine what the next 25 years will bring.
How to respond to this change? Whilst technological change is ever accelerating, one thing to observe from the last 25 years (and further back still) is that the initial hype of new technology is often over-exaggerated, the adoption is frequently more nuanced, and the fuller impact is revealed over a longer than anticipated time frame. Yet, those who ignore it do so at their peril. So, it would seem true that ‘people and organisations should not rely on technology to create greatness; instead use it to amplify their strengths and accelerate towards their goals.’ (according to Jim Collins: Good to Great, published in 2001!).
And, what of the changing global landscape? In the last 25 years, we have seen the meteoric rise of China and India (less than predicted Brazil and Russia). The 2008 banking crisis highlighted the global interconnectedness of the financial system (similarly, Covid-19 for supply chains). However, these winds have been changing. In 2016, the year of Brexit, at a client conference, a panellist commented ‘We are seeing a trend shift. One away from globalisation towards national interests.’ He posed the question, ‘Are you on the right side of the trend?’. A trend that has continued simmering closer and closer to boiling point.
What will the global picture look like in the next 25 years? Will the world be divided into 3-4 geopolitical blocs as commentators are currently predicting? Will environmental change create further pressure on migratory patterns? Will trade reopen or tighten further? In the pursuit of resilience, it would seem worthwhile for organisations to diversify their supply chains, build regional partnerships and consider their longer-term growth and talent strategies. A similar reflective approach could be taken for each of the drivers of change listed above.
What might we borrow in terms of recommendations from the Tomorrow’s Company Report? Are the lessons of the past still relevant today?
In the face of major change and in pursuit of improved competitiveness, productivity and sustainable success, the report advocated for a stronger emphasis on relationships. The underpinning assertion is that an organisation is a product of its relationships, not the sum of its transactions. Therefore, creating success over the long-term required a more inclusive, reciprocal and partnering approach across all the organisation’s relationships – the interests of customers, people, investors, suppliers, community and planet aligning over time. An approach that requires and benefits from a heightened and authentic focus on purpose, values and performance (in its broadest sense).
These principles have informed our client work for the last 25 years. Will they remain just as relevant for the next 25 years?
We believe so. Whilst the context continues to change, the tools available to organisations evolve and trends come and go, the evidence continues to show those that apply these ‘force for good’ principles perform better over time. They are in tune with the changing needs of their relationships, continually renewing themselves around their purpose and leaning on their values as they initiate, respond to and navigate changes to deliver competitive advantage and performance improvement. And, at a time when technology is on the rise and trust is on the decline, we need to remind ourselves what it means to be human.
‘Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.’
Purpose, values, relationships, culture? Not ‘nice to have’ but essential to performance and longevity. Worth a review in your organisation?
I’m off to track down the hoverboard Steven Spielberg promised!
Purpose, values, relationships, culture? Not ‘nice to have’ but essential to performance and longevity.
Adam Campbell is Senior Partner at Telos Partners, an advisory business focused on long term business success.
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