We like to think we get our campaigns spot on most of the time, but the minute you relax and take things for granted is when it all starts to fall apart like the proverbial house of cards. I guess, to some extent, that is what Future 5 is all about. Not taking anything for granted, and making a genuine attempt to find out what needs to be happening next with our industry, making sure that we are doing it - and doing it well!

There are many companies that invest billions into analysing the future direction of their respective industries. We don't have billions of pounds, and unfortunately we don't have a time-travelling DeLorean. What we do have, however, are some of the brightest and most capable minds within the comms industry at our beck and call - which turned out to be more than enough when hosting our "Future 5 Breakfast Briefing" with PR Week.

The morning was a great success. This was all helped along with Haymarket's Philip Smith pithy chairing of the event; our very own Jon Lonsdale dealing with the cut and thrust of a questioning audience; and two further great presentations from Steve Kirk at Honda and Jamie Harley of Deloitte.

More details on the Future 5 trends/campaigns can be found here.

Feedback from the guests was brilliant, and I know that the majority of people in attendance were pleased to know their comms programs were starting to head in the right direction but also saw areas that they knew they could improve on.

However, one thing that did strike me was how hard some of our brand-side peers have to fight to get experimental and innovative ideas through. Agency side, you kind of take it for granted that you are encouraged to be as creative as possible, but this is sadly not always the case with our friends across the divide.

I hope Future 5 has showed our guests that to be brave you sometimes have to be willing to put your neck on the line and think differently.

At the risk of sounding like a Honda advert, one of Steve Kirk's remarks stayed with me that day - a quote from their founder, Mr. Soichiro Honda. "99% of success is failure." Basically, don't be afraid to make mistakes as long as you learn from them. Be brave, pick yourself up and be prepared to (boldly) go where no PR has gone before - that is what Future 5 is all about.

Julian