A platform economy may add 1,000 times more power and speed at times at 1% of costs.
All over the world, most Government Ministries of Commerce, trade agencies and export promotion bureaus mostly are not there yet; Chambers of commerce and trade associations are also not there yet, websites are not digital platforms, caught in trade wars and worried about their own lingering bureaucracies of industrial age badly struggling to digitize and become butterflies of the future.
Few Chambers and trade agencies have done just that. However, for such critically important trade bodies, the caterpillar’s metamorphosis what took a century, now suddenly has wings; wings of platform economies, flower beds of five billion connected alpha dreamers, the most connected populous ever existed on this planet, and some hundred million SME scattered across 200 nations and in the same mix there are well organized 45 million businesses of sorts as members of the 11,000 Chambers of Commerce of the world. In the same gardens are now the billion new entrepreneurs on the march mostly from Asia and what was once the image supremacy of USA and the West on entrepreneurialism is now a dwindling model… What kind of picture this frames… what kind of future this forecasts and what kind of grassroots prosperity will this paint?
Little room left for deep silence: Debates and discussions are essential, the 50th WEF Forum Davos focused on Stakeholder Capitalism and Climate Change, here such SME topics are abandoned for being too small and too scattered, ignoring the power of assembly on digital platform they may eventually supply the funds and wisdom to tackle climate change issues, while empty treasuries and fake hologramic economies shunting between elections, impeachments and recounts may not have the answers…so why is all this related to Chamber… let’s enter
If the rise of populism and restless citizenry primarily related to lack of local grassroots prosperity therefore the local small medium enterprises are the pillars in waiting for local prosperity, Chambers can help their membership on globally accessible digital platforms… but how?
The Digitized Chamber of Commerce on Global Trade: The 11,000 Chamber strong with 45 million members in 100 countries, The International Chamber of Commerce- ICC under the leadership of Secretary General John Denton said, “The global network of 12,000 chambers of commerce plays a vital role in defending and promoting the interests of business large and small and in delivering the message that business has a part in bringing solutions to address the shared problems we face as a global community…”
Mandated Digital Platforms The new charter for all types of trade groups and bodies must adopt a bold mandate to help local internal prosperity of their large membership because most individual members simply do not have the collective powers and organizational skills to play on global stage with 200 nations. Small medium enterprises have all the talents and expertise on production but to jump to superior innovative excellence and exportability they requires special skills, more than funding. Like national mobilization of entrepreneurialism as a master plan. Imagine a trade group where its entire membership profiled like LinkedIn, details, pictures, good and services and engaging profile of corporate enterprise, interactive with global access and high speed around the clock connectivity with engagements and showcasing of ideas. This is like giving 1000 times power to any national trade group of any major nation a global stage to play the games of superior exportability, like Pentiana project.
The business models of trade groups are always helping local businesses to advance in their vertical markets, often under difficult market conditions. This is where digital refinements of productivity, performance and superior exportability will help national economy. This is where Ministries of Trade & Commerce and Export Promotions Bureaus of the world are struggling today; a platform economy may add 1,000 times more power and speed at times at 1% of costs. This is where Chambers of Commerce and Trade Associations will play a key role. At this junction, some of this may sound like rocket science. It is.
The New Admiralties: When a push of a button on metadata can even create true or false interpretations to differentiate if any election is real or fake, local citizenry must prove enough right skills to understand the outcomes or cope emotional-anarchy and disorder. Data in isolation is simply useless; it only stays alive by constantly consuming other data to stay interconnected and perform on global stage in real time. For such reasons, we will now spend our future creating new smart skilled sailors to discover new lands and glory and as such entire creation of sophisticated naval admiralties all demanding new styles of leadership. The digital platforms will lead and organizations will skilled teams will enjoy the glory. The digital fears must disappear, as Artificial Intelligence is just a friend and National Mobilization of Entrepreneurialism on platform economies fastest ways to uplift massive numbers of enterprises in any region and this is where Chambers and Trade Associations can play a victory game.
(Naseem Javed is a corporate philosopher, Chairman of Expothon Worldwide; a Think tank on Image Supremacy of Innovative Excellence & Entrepreneurial Leadership. He is leading charge on entrepreneurial leadership transformation and a recognized authority on global digital trends, image complexities how they impact business performances and create global age skill shifts. His recent work on Expothon Strategy is getting global attention. His latest new book; Alpha Dreamers; the five billions connected who will change the world. www.expothon.com. He can be connected via LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/naseemjaved.)