Rohit Bhargava 97B 97C is on a mission to inspire more non-obvious thinking in the world. The first step, he says, is for you—all of you—to simply put down your phone.

Seriously, put down your phone.

“You have to pay attention to details,” says Bhargava, author of Non-Obvious Megatrends and eight other books, including the newly released The Future Normal. “Anyone can notice things that others miss. You don’t need a PhD. You just need to look up and pay attention to the world.”

Ever since releasing his first Non-Obvious Trends Report online in January 2011, Bhargava has served as a respected and popular prognosticator of what the future, specifically the near future, may hold. His eye for differentiating details, ear for diverse voices and ability to connect the dots between emerging trends on the fringes of society and industry have made him a best-selling author and internationally acclaimed keynote speaker. The fact that he’s a masterful storyteller and a nice guy — really, it says so on his business card — makes his insights into the nonobvious trends shaping our world all the more engaging.

A BROADENING PERSPECTIVE

After earning dual bachelor’s degrees in business administration and English at Emory in 1997, Bhargava made an unexpected choice for a new graduate entering the marketing and advertising field. Instead of heading to New York City like many of his peers, he moved to Sydney, Australia. The big-time Olympics fan was at Emory during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta and was eager to be in Sydney for the build-up to the 2000 Summer Games. “I knew I wanted to travel internationally and that Sydney would have a lot of excitement,” he says.

His five years Down Under broadened his world view, which served him well in his 10-plus years in global advertising with powerhouse agencies Leo Burnett in Sydney and Ogilvy in Washington, D.C. He capitalized on the ever-growing digital and social media landscape, launching one of the internet’s first marketing blogs in 2004.

His agency experience gave him “the ability to switch between industries really fast,” he says. “I would work on a toothpaste brand, an automotive campaign and a cancer-prevention program all in the same day.” This adaptability sharpened his eye for spotting similar trends emerging across diverse markets and categories. He began to recognize patterns that no one else was picking up on.

Those reflections crystalized into the concept of a nonobvious trend, which Bhargava defines as a unique, curated observation of the accelerating present. “By curating, you’re figuring out what is worth paying attention to,” he says. “As for the accelerating present, these are things happening right now.”

When he shared his first Non-Obvious Trends Report in his blog in 2011, it attracted more than 300,000 views within just a few days, huge traffic for that time. It gained significant momentum with each passing year, prompting Bhargava to launch his own publishing company, Ideapress, in 2014 and then the Non-Obvious Company in 2015.

TELLING THE NON-OBVIOUS STORY

In the years since, Bhargava’s endeavors have evolved into a Non-Obvious empire. His weekly Non-Obvious Insights newsletter, which highlights five to six “underappreciated and fascinating” stories each week, has more than 25,000 subscribers and recently won a Webby Award. Recent issues have curated such diverse topics as sleep tips from long-haul truckers and how Lush Cosmetics connected with customers after quitting social media a year ago.   

Ideapress has printed not only Bhargava’s books—three of which have topped the Wall Street Journal’s bestseller list—but also nearly 100 business books from other award-winning authors.

“I’m an author first and publisher second, so our authors know I understand what they’re going through,” Bhargava says. “I’ve spent my whole career in marketing and advertising; I understand that the success of a book isn’t just in the writing but in promoting it. And during my agency days I was surrounded by world-class designers and developed a very specific view and very high bar for what good design should be, so everything that we put out looks beautiful.”

Bhargava is tremendously talented as a storyteller; he taught a class on storytelling at Georgetown University for years. He considered his English studies at Emory foundational — “that was a big part of my identity”— and most appreciated classes that provided crossover between his business and English interests and strengths, as do his keynote speeches that he has delivered in 32 countries. Funny, reflective, and always full of energy, he has inspired thousands of audiences, at venues from South by Southwest to TEDx, for companies from Disney to Microsoft, institutions from NASA to the World Bank, and yes, even Emory students at the Hatchery last October.

He considers his speeches equal part inspiration and action.

Searching for non-obvious trends that matter for your particular industry? In one month, Bhargava addressed executives from a Vodka brand, an enterprise software company, and a financial services brand.

Striving to take an innovative approach to building a more inclusive and diverse team? Bhargava literally wrote the book on the topic: Beyond Diversity.

Looking to sharpen your own powers of observation? Bhargava shares five habits — be observant, be curious, be fickle, be elegant, and be thoughtful — that will make you a “speed understander” who spots opportunities that others miss and better understands the way the world is evolving.

All of this requires not only putting down your phone but also getting outside of your bubble, he says. One of Bhargava’s tried-and-true strategies is to pick up a print magazine aimed a different demographic than his own. The print part is crucial, because the content is not driven by personalized algorithms but is usually the same for every reader. He’s partial to Teen Vogue, Monocle, Modern Farmer and Tricycle: The Buddhist Review. These diverse sources are ripe with actionable insights he would not have discovered otherwise — insights that just might connect with other dots to provide his next non-obvious glimpse into the future normal.

6 HIDDEN TRENDS ON THE HORIZON

In his new book, The Future Normal: How We Will Live, Work and Thrive in the Next Decade (Ideapress Publishing, March 2023), Rohit Bhargava and co-author Henry Coutinho-Mason highlight several non-obvious trends now happening on the edges of industry and society. These are ideas and patterns that hold the potential to become mainstream in the near future — and could change how we’ll live and work and what we value. Here, Bhargava shares some insights into six trends on the near horizon.

For years, our identity was this core, indefinable and singular concept. Now, the promise of multiversal identity is that you can be represent yourself differently on the various platforms that you choose to engage with, Bhargava says. The management of that is going to raise some fascinating and challenging questions. Where do we intentionally choose to show up with a part of ourselves, but maybe not our whole selves? And are we every fully ourselves anywhere? These are issues we will all struggle with in the future, he says.

It may feel kind of obvious that going outside when it’s nice makes you feel better. But the interesting dimension of this is that there is an emerging field of science that is quantifying this, notes Bhargava. Doctors are literally prescribing for people to go outside, just as they would prescribe a medication. As a result, people may be more likely to actually do it

The obvious fear that people have with AI like ChatGPT is that, the better the technology gets, the more it will displace people. The non-obvious perspective is that AI will increasingly augment people’s creativity; making each of us more creative, more prolific and allow us to do it quickly than ever before. It’s not always replacing what we are doing. More often, it can make but it faster and better, according to Bhargava.

For years, corporate social responsibility has always been an add-on or something good that a company does so customers don’t pay attention to this bad thing they are doing at the same time, Bhargava says. “Big brand redemption” is about taking something that used to be pigeonholed and making it part of the ethos, the operating mentality of the entire company. It is about demonstrating what we believe in across everything that we do.

When we talk about innovation and new technology, it’s usually about the early adopters, and so it becomes very city-oriented and rural customers are left out. The real value of drone delivery isn’t going to be in Manhattan but in rural parts of the country, where people couldn’t get access at all or where delivery was much slower, Bhargava believes. Through geolocation platforms that can locate you anywhere (such as what3words.com), even in the middle of a park, you can now deliver emergency supplies or vaccines or anything else to places without conventional addresses. As a result, delivery can finally be more inclusive of those who are too often left behind.

It’s interesting to think that already people are becoming energy entrepreneurs and taking the energy they’re generating through solar panels and sell it back to the grid at a time of peak usage or sell it locally, Bhargava says. You could see the same thing that happens when people buy locally grown produce: people will feel it’s more authentic and they’re going to support what’s generated locally, be it electricity or eggplants.

Photos courtesy of Rohit Bhargava and Getty Images. Design by Elizabeth Hautau Karp.