Last updated on March 26th, 2021
by Eric Pereira / staff writer
Industry professionals should expect massive disruption, continued uncertainty and an unlikely return to the “old normal,” according to Chris Riddell, keynote speaker at the 2021 Annual Meat Conference.
In his Monday address, titled “Business Beyond 2030,” Chris Riddell focused on the greatest disruption of 2020 – the COVID-19 pandemic – and how companies had to adapt to working around no face-to-face interaction.
“Thank God we had digital, because 2020 became the greatest digital stress test of the century,” said Riddell, an industry-recognized speaker on the future of humanity and digital and a global emerging trend spotter for businesses.
Envisioning a “Before Corona” and “After Corona” timeline, he told attendees they need to consider that the “old normal” might be gone forever.
“The question then becomes what’s going to replace it? The truth is, we actually don’t know,” Riddell said. “And this…is the most important thing we have to get used to going into the future – this constant level of uncertainty about the future.”
Ridell said he thinks 2020 outcomes and implications were just a “warm-up act” and that businesses and the world in general must brace for seismic shocks.
While some of those will be technological in nature, Ridell said the industry also is in a “biological seismic shock of epic proportions,” which could have a profound impact on how people live and work.
“We’ve now seen a huge number of global organizations that have had an enormous impact on their financial performance through 2020,” he said. “But at the same time, we see that the world is actually more bullish than ever before. The Chinese stock market hit an all-time high of more than $10 trillion. One thing is clear, in all the confusion and the haze, we have seen enormous amounts of volatility and shifting as a result of these seismic shocks.”
“Here’s my view for the future. If it took a decade for digital to become normal, then the real disruption is yet to happen,” he said. “Strap in and brace yourself for the next decade, because we’re going to see fundamental disruption in health and energy and food and agriculture.”
Riddell mentioned four characteristics that companies should focus on – superfluidity, elasticity, innovation and experimentation.
“If you’re planning beyond 2021, make sure you’ve got elasticity, be obsessive about creativity, create as much velocity as you can and push yourself toward being brave and innovate with as many new ideas as possible.”
Riddell took a few questions from the audience as well. In response to a question about online purchasing trends in the meat industry producing small players or large sellers, he said the main factor to consider is intertwining offline and online experience.
“They aren’t separate anymore,” Riddell said. “We’re not separating those two worlds. They are absolutely interconnected. And it’s no good anymore just having a good online and a good offline. If you can’t…intrinsically make those work together backwards and forwards, that’s where you’re going to miss out to the competition.”
The Annual Meat Conference continues through March 25.
