One thing that clients are saying to me again and again: in this age of encroaching AI, human connection has become twice as valuable. In fact the conversation I’m hearing is very much an embrace of both: luddite denial is off the menu. Yet there’s this ongoing sense that interactions within highly curated events are the preferred way of starting or building business relationships.

This was really brought home to me a few times this year. Firstly in April at the NorthWall Capital Investor Day at the Mandarin Oriental in Knightsbridge. A private event for investors, it brought together a unique group of people who shared a common interest in what the firm they’d backed were doing now – and next. Second, at the London Wine Fair at Olympia in May when a sense of taste, of seeing, holding and discussing the new season’s product, was so important. Then thirdly, in October I travelled to Riyadh in Saudi Arabia for the Outliers Builders Summit where innovative founders met to discuss and formulate the Middle Eastern regional business trends of the future.