Berghs Students Explore the Future of Sustainable Communication
Two months ago, who would have thought that the world’s richest man, the figurehead of both SpaceX and Tesla, would make a “Roman salute” during the inauguration of the 47th President of the United States? Or that Greenland would suddenly find itself centre-stage of international security politics. The distance between a (bad) idea and action is shrinking more rapidly than the speed of human thought.
That the world is becoming increasingly VUCA—a landscape defined by Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity—is an undeniable reality that both today’s and tomorrow’s communicators must learn to navigate. This very challenge was at the heart of the 2024 edition of Explore Sustainability, a course designed to immerse Berghs’ full-time students in the art of balancing sustainable development with commercial imperatives.
For this iteration, we adopted a fresh and unconventional approach: we tasked students with crafting communication for the year 2050, using social, economic, or ecological sustainability as their launchpad. Each group’s vision of 2050 was shaped with the assistance of ChatGPT, drawing upon contemporary datasets and forward-looking projections. Their final concepts were unveiled over two days in the school’s auditorium, presented before program directors and guest experts from the communications industry and Vinnova.
One might reasonably ask: “Shouldn’t students at a vocational school be tackling more immediate challenges—ones that closely mirror the realities they’ll face after graduation?” To answer this, let’s take a step back.
All communication is shaped by the context in which it is received—one of the fundamental tenets of the discipline. For decades, we’ve been able to devise communication strategies by analyzing current societal trends, making reasonably sound predictions about how they might evolve in the near future.
Yet, as the world grows more unpredictable and seismic shifts occur with ever-increasing speed and frequency, this approach becomes fraught with uncertainty. Carefully laid communication strategies and brand-building efforts—seemingly well-founded at their inception—can be rendered obsolete in an instant. Against this backdrop, we sought to challenge our students to develop communication that is both thought-provoking and impactful, addressing real-world issues even when all other variables—except for the (relatively) timeless nature of human behavior—remain unknown.
The results of the twenty-four groups’ work can be explored here. Please note that these projects were developed independently, without input from the respective brands, and as student work, they may contain unlicensed materials.
If this resonates with you, and you’re intrigued by the prospect of shaping the future of sustainable communication alongside us—don’t hesitate to reach out.