Davos 2023 got down to business. This, against the backdrop of the opening day’s Global Economist Outlook released by World Economic Forum on Monday, is why we are here – business.

With around a third of the world expected to hit a recession this year according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the continuing pressures on an already strained and outdated financial system, coupled with the destabilisation of the geopolitical landscape, I think it’s fair to say that we are in for a rocky ride in the short to medium term.

I do not mean to be the voice of doom and gloom; I am by nature an optimist. But I am also a realist and realistically, we’re in trouble. We all know this, from the ground up and the top down, yet we appear to be powerless to move forward in concert.

For me, the answer is simple. We need to communicate better and listen better. Put ourselves in someone else’s shoes and experience how they live – if even for a day. While technology and the Metaverse platform have enabled us to suspend our lives and experience a virtual reality (the Global Collaboration Village was also launched on day two), I am a firm believer in eye contact – face-to-face, look me in the eye conversation. In this way we should once again start to generate some basic respect and trust for one another. Because that’s what’s needed – respect, tolerance, and the ability to believe again.

Nevertheless, we now find ourselves in a technology-driven world where we have firmly embraced the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) and put trust in it to fix our woes and provide for the future. But technology is not a panacea for all our ills. Although it can provide the means to connect with friends, family, business, education – anywhere in the world – much of where we find ourselves now is because of ‘us’ and it ‘us’ that will need to rise to the occasion to fix the mess we have made.

Technology will, however, pave the way for a more informed society, critical if we are to all understand one another, and allow for multi-stakeholder communication and collaboration. For this to happen and succeed, there needs to be universal access to the internet.

Threatening our digital liberty, though, is the ever-present danger of information hijacking, begging the question whether it is time for the world to collaborate to regulate the internet, or will that bring about the end of freedom of speech?

Tackling some of these issues and calling for a more transparent and co-operative use of IoT (the internet of things) for the benefit of all in society , the World Economic Forum Council on the Connected World released its latest report this afternoon.

With more people on the planet and fewer jobs, entrepreneurship will be another key factor in propelling us (as a world) forward to better times. As humans, we are resourceful – survival is deeply ingrained in our cellular make-up. Providing the right conditions for innovation to flourish is what governments must focus on. Africa, for example, has the greatest population of young people under 35 in the world. It already has a reputation for developing creative solutions to challenges – it has had no other choice.

The more developed world who now face unprecedented issues such as an energy crisis, a shortage of clean water, the need to explore different food types and an ever-shrinking fiscus with which to support the people who rely on it for benefits, are ill-prepared to change their habits. Yet they must.

Innovation is key here, as is the necessary collaboration between all stakeholders in the future success of the endeavour.

The environment was a key topic at WEF on day two, with the term ‘nature positive’ now accepted and which mindset is vital to achieve not only nature’s own version of net zero, as was remarked on in the session, but what I term ‘life plus’, that puts the environment at the core of all decision-making.

Underpinning everything we are at present and what we are striving for, is nature itself and which holds the ultimate solution. For, in protecting our natural resources instead of depleting them, and working to replace and even enhance what we once had, we can grow that idyllic and elusive sustainable future we are all looking for.

In short, collaboration and co-operation or not, if it is going to harm (anything or anyone) – just don’t do it. It’s simple, really. It doesn’t matter how much money one has or doesn’t have, when the water runs out, it runs out … just as time is for making the right decisions and getting out of the boardroom and into the world to ‘do’.

Fortunately, making those correct decisions is not down to just one person or one entity, which is why organisations and meetings such as the WEF are important. Here there is a confluence of the minds for the common good, tempered by the reality of practical implementation of the suggested solutions, including the identified need to attract, retain and nurture those with the necessary intellectual capital to make it all happen.