Age of New Possibilities: How Humane Values and an Entrepreneurial Spirit Will Lead Us Into the Future

We live in an exciting and rapidly changing time—every day it seems new inventions and innovations that change our way of life arrive on the scene. But while our day-to-day lives have become easier, the larger picture is now more complicated. Businesses are also faced with this quandary. Change is occurring in the economic sphere as quickly and often as it is in our individual lives, and the new global economy is presenting even more challenges to companies that must operate in an often unfamiliar worldwide arena. As a result, the modern business world is in dire need of a complete overhaul if companies are to adapt to an environment that is far different from the one in which they initially achieved success.

Enter Reinhard Mohn, the innovative entrepreneur who built Bertelsmann into a global powerhouse. Drawing on his more than fifty years of experience in the private sector, Mohn explains how entrepreneurial leaders have a unique ability to lead businesses into the future by adapting to new socioeconomic realities. He shows how private businesses have become increasingly connected to both politics and the public sector, making the need for constant change necessary to the survival and success of all companies. Furthermore, Mohn demonstrates why, in order to thrive in the future, businesses—as well as governmental and social organizations—must abandon the obsolete practices they have long relied on, creating instead new ways of doing business to adapt to our ever more mutable world.

With a career’s worth of knowledge gained by guiding Bertelsmann to become one of the foremost media companies in the world, Mohn offers invaluable insights in An Age of New Possibilities, making this an essential read for anyone with a taste for the incredible challenge of doing business in the twenty-first century.

REINHARD MOHN has served as chairman of the executive board and the supervisory board of Bertelsmann, one of the largest media companies in the world. Mohn also founded the Bertelsmann Foundation, which is one of the biggest and most renowned think tanks in Europe. Currently, he is Chairman Emeritus of the Bertelsmann Supervisory Board.