In our quarterly email newsletter (subscribe here), we feature a Q&A with one of our employees or someone in our community about topics that warrant a bit more perspective. For our Winter 2025 edition, the responses we received were too good not to feature in their entirety.
In a world of AI agents, we’re doubling down on human intelligence. Here are some observations from some of the most creative and interesting people we know about the year ahead.
Q: What trend or shift do you consider the most impactful for the next generation of brand innovation?
“The impact of technology and social media on consumer behavior in younger buyers has altered their perception and expectations of brand interactions. Simply posting more content will not be the answer. Brands must anticipate AI algorithms impacting queries and buying habits and innovate by incorporating personalized content to engage these consumers. In addition, influencers have a strong hold on the value or perceived value of brands, and it is a rapidly changing landscape with a need for data analytics, popular social trends, and competition.”
Karen Rumble-Needel
Senior Director of Sales and Customer Support Services at Accenture
“Most of tech and culture have ignored, hidden, or been ashamed of talking about mental health. Technologists treated the soft sciences like they were easy and rocket science was the hard stuff. But as Nobel-winning physicist Richard Feynman said about quantum mechanics, “We’re lucky atoms don’t have personalities.” The soft sciences are the hardest sciences of all. We’ve seen the misapplication and misunderstanding of that sort of science with the dark patterns found in some apps and social media platforms and how norms can be shifted almost overnight with a barrage of algorithmic oppression. Cory Doctorow coined a word for the negative side of this trend, “enshittification.”
The positive side is found in the emerging field of transformation mental wealth tech and the science of embodied cognition and pro-social design patterns pioneered by the likes of Elinor Ostrom, Nichol Bradford, Roslyn Picard, and David Sloan Wilson. I suspect brands that help build mental wealth will stand apart from those that amplify our worst nature.”
Mickey McManus
Visiting Scholar at Tufts University, Senior Advisor and Leadership Coach at BCG
“Feeling overwhelmed is now the baseline of participating in the world, along with a painful awareness that we are being sold to at all times on all channels, including those that were promised to be social. Even when a message is authentic, we’re so burned out on signaling and absurd corporate pivots made in changing political winds that any claim of authenticity feels fraudulent or just exhausting. I think a lot about explainability and trust right now: we have to have a simple, clear logic of why we do what we do. If you’re selling a product, just be upfront about that. If you’re mission-driven, show what you’ve done in clear terms and what you’re going to continue to do. Make reasonable promises, keep them, and build trust over time.
Generative AI tools can possibly help with this, because training an AI well demands discipline. What are we asking it to do, and why? What examples did we provide? Why did we select those examples, and how often do we update them? We can define processes well so they act like a blockchain for our decisions, allowing them to be traced to their origins and show everyone involved where things came from. When they are explainable, they are broadly accessible. When our processes can be discussed, refined, and corrected, it creates trust.”
Tony Ruth, Principal at Early Mammal
“Today’s cultural shifts around technology are primarily centered around a desire for frictionless togetherness. Guests and visitors gravitate toward group activities with low barriers of entry, asking the question: can brands develop smooth, fast interactions that deliver lasting impacts that groups can discuss long after their experience has finished?”
Mike Wallace, Principal at Weaver 4 Studios
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