How to turn uncertainty into a game plan | Verena Kuen | TEDxTUWien

The speaker begins by highlighting that nearly two-thirds of companies worldwide are experiencing disruption to their core business, based on a survey of over 3,000 CEOs. She illustrates the rapid pace of change by describing an AI conference where a woman presented a digital twin of her deceased husband, showing how science fiction is becoming reality. Kuen argues we've reached the most profound transformation since the Industrial Revolution, with technology acceleration, geopolitical fractures, social transformation, and environmental problems creating a 'gigantic global flywheel' that makes prediction extremely difficult. When faced with uncertainty and fear, she identifies three typical responses: running away, waiting for clarity, or stepping up to the challenge. She advocates for the third option, introducing Nassim Taleb's concept of 'anti-fragility' - the ability to thrive in chaos, going beyond resilience by turning stress and shock into opportunity through experimentation, failure, learning, and iteration. Drawing from her personal experience of not fitting in as a child and her 17-year career in innovation management, she developed a practical foresight model when traditional scenario planning became too complex. Working with healthcare leaders, she created a simplified approach mapping two extremes: an apocalypse scenario (collapsed public healthcare, big tech dominance, digitized self-services for data, treatments only for the wealthy) versus a utopia scenario (ethical digitization, public digital services, individual data ownership, focus on education and prevention). This model helped identify three major drivers for desired healthcare futures: shift toward self-responsibility and prevention, smart data use with individual ownership, and AI-driven digital backbone services. She concludes by inviting everyone to use this simple model to shape their desired future through small personal actions.