COVID-19, A Big Grey Rhino With A Litter Of Weak Signals
Everything started last April 29 when I found out a close family member had passed away because of COVID-19. This day was also the first time I put a mask on to do some shopping, which has been the only reason for us to leave home since the COVID-19 outbreak. On this day, however, the need to get some air was way more urgent than that of buying some groceries. Ironically, getting some air became an unexpectedly daunting task, with the mask and my anxiety levels so high. Luckily, I managed to calm down, and take my mind and my emotions for a therapeutic stroll. The result is what you are reading, and a set of articles that will follow.
Writing has helped me to process what currently is going on and also make better decisions. But I think it would be of even greater use if I made these thoughts publicly available. It may help others in their own process of understanding what is going on, but, more importantly, it may spark a conversation, where different views and perspectives will help us find answers and viable solutions for these uncertain times.
A Common Theme
All these articles will be grouped under a common theme: A Big Grey Rhino With a Litter of Weak Signals.
Now, Grey Rhinos and Weak Signals are terms that maybe not everybody is familiar with, which is why I decided to start with this introductory article that explains them before I dive into analysing each of the weak signals I am discovering, day after day.
Grey Rhinos, Black Swans and Weak Signals
For those not familiar with what a Grey Rhino or a Weak Signal is, this article is for you so you can enjoy the others that will follow. I learned about Grey Rhinos, Black Swans, and Weak Signals at Laurea University of Applied Science, for a Futures Thinking and Foresight Methodologies module, as part of my MBA in Service Innovation and Design.
Grey Rhinos are, as the author, Michele Wucker coined it in her book with the same name, a highly probable, high-impact yet neglected threat. Examples of grey rhinos are cybersecurity failures, geopolitical clashes, climate change or COVID-19.
At the other extreme, we have Black Swans, which is a term coined by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, in his book also going by the same name. There he described them as an extreme, rare event that can be human or nature-induced with potentially significant societal implications.
Finally, Weak Signals, ‘early warning indicators’, ‘emerging issues’, ‘germs’, or ‘wild cards’ are characterised as being phenomena whose probability of happening is low, but whose impacts on society are dramatic. Weak Signals involve a high degree of uncertainty and lag time. At first, we have no fully-formed relevant information about their consequences, but they indicate future changes and can lead to serious transformations in the current social and economic situation.
COVID-19, a Big Grey Rhino
According to these definitions, COVID-19 is a Grey Rhino and not a Black Swan.
A Grey Rhino because COVID-19 was a highly probable, high-impact yet neglected threat, predicted already by many people, including Nassim Nicholas in his book way back in 2007, Bill Gates in 2015 on the occasion of his quite influential TED Talk, but also quite recently, a year ago actually, by Samuel Brannen and Kathleen Hicks, as this article explains.
COVID-19 is not a Black Swan, as Nassim says in this interview with BBC 4 or in this article for the New Yorker because this epidemic was wholly predictable.
So, now that we’ve cleared up what animal it is, what comes next?
A Litter of Weak Signals
Perhaps, in my opinion, this Big Grey Rhino will give birth to a litter of Weak Signals, and their likeliness to exponentially grow and become megatrends will depend very much on decisions we do or don’t make on a global scale in the following weeks and months.
As for who’s who in this litter of Weak Signals, I’ll identify and cover them one article at a time. The next one will be about Remote Work and Going Rural.
I look forward to reading your comments as I believe the seam of gold at the heart of this initiative would spark a fruitful and diverse conversation, where different views come together to create value for all.
