Everything is connected

Everything is connected

2 September 2025

Many years ago, in the eighties, I heard that everything is connected. That we are one. It was about quantum physics. We are formed by particles and flow freely. It was also related to the Eastern philosophical concepts that came to the West. Books by Fritjof Capra (Capra, 1975) and David Bohm  (Bohm, 1996) explained these ideas. It became known as the Aquarius era and the New Age.

Around the nineties, the internet entered a more mature stage of development, and connectivity took on a new meaning: connecting computers. Nicholas Negroponte's famous declaration, “everything that can be digitized will be digitized”, from his 1995 book Being Digital, expressed his belief in the inevitable shift from physical information formats ("atoms") to digital ones ("bits") (Negroponte, 1999). We became a network society. Organizations turned into network organizations and became increasingly virtual, as Manuel Castells noted in his numerous books.

As we became more digital, we also became more fragmented, and cohesion became an issue. In 2007, Steve Jobs presented the smartphone, and the process of fragmentation and connectivity went to a whole new level (Isaacson, 2011). The infrastructure for social media was created. Social media became the most anti-social media ever. This created many social and mental problems, especially for the young and the elderly. John Naisbitt already predicted in 1999 that the future would be about high tech and high touch (Naisbitt & c.s., 1999). We have lost touch.

There is still another dimension of connectivity. We learn, and the brain develops, by creating connections between neurons. With everything we do, these connections are stimulated. Technology changes the way these connections form. Smartphones and other technologies, such as artificial intelligence, have altered our brains and continue to do so. And it does not seem to make our brains brighter and bigger.

However, the topic I want to address is leadership. One of the primary tasks of leaders is to build bridges that connect with followers, outsiders, and even adversaries. The problem is, we still have leaders who build walls—those who are driven by the idea of “we and them.” We need leaders who build bridges. But we also need followers who want to connect and build bridges.

Miguel Goede