The Upside of Down : How Chaos and Uncertainty Breed Opportunity in South Africa

New edition with updated contentIn a world shaped by Covid-19 and characterised by fake news, manipulated feeds of information and divisive social-media agendas, it’s easy to believe that our time is the most challenging in human history.

It’s just not true. It is a time of extraordinary opportunity. But only if you have the right mindset and attitude.

Fear of the future breeds inaction and leads to strategic paralysis.

Problem-solvers thrive in chaotic and uncertain times because they act to change their future.

Winners recognise that in a world of growing uncertainty, you need to resort to actions on things you can control. A robust mindset is the one common characteristic Bruce Whitfield has identified in two decades of interrogating how South Africa’s billionaires and start-up mavericks think differently.

They don’t ignore risk or hope that problems will go away.

They constantly measure, manage, consider and weigh up opportunities in a tumultuous sea of uncertainty and find ways around obstacles. If, as Nobel Prize-winning economist Robert Shiller suggests, the stories we tell affect economic outcomes, then we need to tell different stories amidst the noise and haste of a rapidly evolving world.