2025 was a year not of decreasing, but increasing uncertainties. The issue on which all trusted analysts agree is that uncertainties will also play a leading role in 2026. Companies that develop strategies suitable for the uncertainty and turbulence created by the hegemonic struggle between great powers in the world, that is, for the "new normal," will have the chance to run ahead. Recently, Vice President Cevdet Yılmaz attended the meeting of the Foundation of Financial Accounts Experts as the main speaker. Yılmaz began his speech with a quote from Antonio Gramsci's Prison Notebooks, which the Italian thinker wrote when he was imprisoned by Mussolini: "The old world is dying, the new world struggles to be born. Now is the time of monsters..."
This quote, which our Vice President referred to while describing today, truly functions as the key that unlocks our understanding of the current period... We are in a special period where what is left behind is more or less clear, but what is coming cannot be clearly discerned by our mind's eye. 2025 was a year that carried strong signs of entering a new era due to increasing geopolitical tensions, global economic inflation fluctuations, and policy uncertainties. Developments that shook the "liberal world order" shaped after World War II from its roots have already begun to be accepted as the "new normal"... In this period, where the paradigm we can define as the dominant "rules of the game" of an era is changing, companies are forced to abandon traditional growth models and turn towards more resilient, agile, and proactive strategies. While minimizing risks, the 5 main topics highlighted for the new strategies of the new paradigm, which prioritizes opportunities focused on sustainability, are as follows:
Risk assessment and monitoring:
Risk assessment and monitoring, or a type of risk literacy, will be one of the rising values of the coming period. Companies must increase their resources to detect geopolitical risks early. This means establishing early warning systems based on risk analyses in the geopolitical and geo-economic fields, as well as the economy, re-mapping supply chains, and conducting scenario planning.
Diversification and localization:
Reducing dependence on a single country or supplier is critically important in this period. Shortening supply chains (near-shoring) and shifting procurement to reliable allied (friend-shoring) locations is shaping up as an inevitable process of change.
Resilience and protective measures:
A protective ring needs to be created to isolate risks that cannot be mitigated. Concentrating data, information technology infrastructure, and operations in a single geography would create a risk-prone structure; therefore, creating virtual backups of these structures will reduce risks.
Rapid response and scenario planning:
Conducting periodic crisis drills against unexpected events and developments will be important. Modeling and updating Best/Average/Worst-case scenarios can play a significant role in gaining faster access to opportunities and overcoming growth limitations.
Leadership, governance, and investment-focused approach:
Not just knowledge and experience, but visionary leadership has become more valuable. The ability to analyze uncertainties and accordingly create effective, flexible, yet consistent strategies is considered an important competitive advantage. In summary, in this period we call the "new normal," success more than ever depends on the capacity to turn risks into opportunities.
This content has been translated using artificial intelligence technology.