Some believe it is only a matter of time before China overthrows the USA as the proclaimed world leader. This will not happen in the near future - the Americans are too big for China.

It has been predicted for almost two decades that China will overtake the USA. At first, the forecasts were based on economic performance, then increasingly on its status as a global power. China is ambitious, they say, and China tends to have little regard for its own people. But that is precisely China's greatest weakness. No one can fight their own population and win in the long run. The Nazis failed, Stalin failed, the Soviet Union failed. Dictatorships have always failed in the long run. The fact that the Chinese dictatorship still holds on is due to the dramatically increased prosperity over the past 50 years. Which is not the merit of the Communist Party, the red aristocracy, as the Communists are called, but precisely of the extremely hard-working Chinese population.

Ray Dalio, a successful U.S. hedge fund manager, regularly sings a swan song about his own country. The tenor: All good things must come to an end. In the ascendancy, a country gains competitiveness, among other things, through education, builds up a strong military, does a lot of international trade, trains a strong innovative force, and the currency has a reserve status. All true in this generality. The fall of a nation begins with wealth inequality, declining educational standards, debt bubbles and, in the end, unlimited money printing. The U.S. supposedly reached its peak after World War II. They were a world power even before that. Great Britain was replaced by the U.S. at the turn of the century. So much for Dalio's thesis, which is of course not completely implausible in this generality. However, it does not follow that America will fold.

Economically, China is no longer in the fast lane. Xi's crazy No-Covid policy suggests a severe lack of rational judgement. The Chinese president is brutally shooting his country in the knee with the rigid Corona quarantines and arbitrary supply chain disruptions. After all, once production is gone, it won't come back.

Moreover, for several years now, the percentage of the population of working age has been shrinking. The population as a whole is no longer growing and will decline. This is a major demographic headwind that will most likely continue until 2055. The USA is also getting curve balls thrown at, but the trend is much less pronounced. Moreover, the population continues to grow in principle. If, on the other hand, the population declines, there will be less need for real estate, infrastructure. Exactly what China is facing. The enormous investment boom in infrastructure and real estate is therefore coming to an end in China. Since the sector accounts for almost 30% of economic output, high growth is illusory without an acceleration in this area.

The Russian strike against Ukraine is also inconvenient. China's die-hard loyalty to ailing Russia is clumsy at best. Within days of the start of the Russian war, the world was divided into two blocs. The U.S. is now taking the lead again, uniting its former allies behind it. China and Russia have become outsiders.

A world power is made and supported by allies. Years of decline have suddenly been reversed. China, meanwhile, is coming under increasing pressure. It is precisely the policy of non-interference and investment in the new Silk Road that are putting China in trouble. Sri Lanka is not the first country to fall into a debt trap, not least because it overstretched itself with investments.

Investment and money from China were long welcome because there were no political strings attached. Now more and more countries are realizing that they can't make it financially. Scepticism is growing and China's influence via investment threatens to become a disadvantage. 

The significance of what is happening right now will probably not be fully grasped for a few years. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if 2022 goes down in history as the year China lost out on the chance to replace the U.S. as the world leader.

For those who are interested: I am happy to admit that I would be extremely pleased about that.

We all know the difference between B2B and B2C – but what's B4B?

B2B companies pursue a transactional approach, asking: “How much can we sell to this customer to grow our business?”.

Business-for-business (B4B) on the other hand means asking: “How much can we help our customers grow?” or “What’s the most value we can provide to this business while remaining sustainable?”

Moving from the transactional mindset of B2B to the collaborative mindset of B4B is asking different questions about growth, pricing and value, talent management, and more. B4B companies can increase revenues, customer retention, employee morale, and provide a deeper sense of purpose that ignites innovation and creativity within the organization.

“How many products can I sell to this company?” becomes “How can we – together – create new products with this customer and both grow?”

In the B2B world, firms that compete on price are always vulnerable to larger manufacturers offering better prices. However, when companies adopt a B4B strategy, they stand a better chance of deepening relationships with their customers. Price becomes just one of the criteria by which their customers judge the value of a product, and not the only one. And in many cases it is not even the main criterion.

This is important because, for any business, customers represent a stream of future cash flows. The value of that cash flow depends on two variables: size (how large the cash flow is) and longevity (how many years the business can depend on it). Companies that align their activities to the success of their customers and monitor this as a key metric will generate large and reliable cash flows.

​​Instead of focusing on how to incentivize salespeople to sell more products and services, a B4B company considers how to train them to be knowledgeable, quality business advisors to clients. Rather than wondering what could drive revenue in the current quarter, executives should be asking themselves what new service could complement their product offerings and how they can create so much value for customers that it's becoming very difficult for them to start the company to leave.

Likewise, a key business performance metric may not be how many new offers your company has sent out in a given period of time, but rather how many new customers are reaching out based on what existing customers are saying about you. And instead of asking how to make business development more aggressive, ask yourself how you can make it easier for new clients to find and work with you.

Once you shift your mindset to viewing customer success as key to the long-term strength of your business, you open the door to broader thinking about how your business creates value in all of its relationships.

B2C companies that see their job as working for their customers, not selling to them, will focus their thinking on how to help customers successfully do the jobs they were hired to do - instead of by being fired and replaced by a competitor.

The same principle applies to relationships with suppliers. The business-for-business concept helps companies understand that they are part of an ecosystem and should consider the success of everyone in the system.

In the B4B world, collaboration, cooperation and mutual benefit are becoming the key themes that enhance competitiveness. "Companies working for other companies" is a logic that helps improve the business environment, boost employee morale, and ultimately promote economic growth. As more companies collaborate and share resources, companies become more efficient.

In fact, we believe that when the B4B ethos permeates corporate culture, it can also influence executive decisions in ways that benefit our communities. For example, as the world grapples with climate change, much of which is due to the externalities of companies' operations, a B4B mindset can help direct our efforts to create value for everyone - for other companies, our customers and our communities.

The past two years of witnessing the global COVID-19 pandemic have taught us many lessons about the interconnectedness of the world. Some of us may be tempted to withdraw from this complexity, to focus on ourselves or our organizations and on what we believe we can control. But when we adopt a B4B mentality and focus on helping others, we end up creating much more value - both for ourselves and for the world.