The Outside World Monitor Q1/2 2024

Translating societal uncertainty into strategic insight

Societal influence on organisations is growing rapidly. Public trust is declining, expectations toward businesses are rising, and social, ecological and economic pressures are becoming increasingly intertwined. For organisations, this makes understanding societal change strategic and necessary.

As a trend analyst at ftrprf, I worked on The Outside World Monitor Q1/2 2024, a biannual analysis of societal developments in the Netherlands. The monitor helps organisations move beyond intuition and headlines, offering a grounded view of what is happening in society and what this means for strategy, responsibility, legitimacy and accountability.

A central theme running through the monitor is growing uncertainty. People face precarious employment, housing shortages, rising costs of living, limited safety nets and a rapidly changing social and ecological environment. At the same time, public trust in government was at its lowest level ever measured. As expectations of public institutions decline, pressure on companies to respond to societal challenges increases.

The monitor maps how this uncertainty plays out across five key societal themes:

• Natural resources

• Human rights

• Energy transition

• Economic inequality

• Corporate governance

Rather than treating these themes in isolation, the analysis highlights how they reinforce one another: ecological pressure feeds inequality, governance failures undermine trust, and human rights concerns increasingly surface in discussions about energy and resource use. The goal was not only to identify trends, but to connect them into a coherent picture of a society under strain and, consequently, of the shifting expectations organisations operate within.

The work combined extensive desk research with large-scale data analysis. We analysed traditional media alongside a broad international news dataset, carefully cleaning and verifying inputs to identify meaningful patterns rather than noise. This made it possible to distinguish structural developments from short-term fluctuations.

What I valued most in this project is how it sits between analysis and narrative. The monitor does not prescribe solutions, but it reframes the context in which organisations make decisions. By making societal uncertainty visible and legible, it helps organisations understand why “business as usual” is increasingly questioned and why strategic responses must engage with societal realities, instead of only relying on market logic.

What I brought to the project

• Conducted and synthesised desk research across multiple societal domains

• Analysed trends related to natural resources, human rights, energy transition, inequality and governance

• Helped translate large datasets and qualitative insights into clear strategic narratives

• Contributed to framing societal uncertainty as a structural, systemic condition rather than a temporary disruption

Skills and strengths demonstrated

• Trend analysis & societal research (qualitative and quantitative)

• Systems thinking (connecting social, ecological and governance dynamics)

• Data-informed sense-making (distinguishing patterns from noise)

• Strategic storytelling (making societal change relevant for organisations)

• Clear communication (turning complexity into accessible insight)