Wednesday 20 May, 2.00pm – 5.00pm
Theatre Royal, Room access via the Green Room Bar and Restaurant on Market Street, 100 Grey Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 6BR
The Accenture Life Trends report is an annual publication that offers a window into people’s behaviours and attitudes toward the world around them, including business, technology, and societal shifts. The report serves as a bellwether, identifying emerging digital trends and outlining actions for businesses, drawing on crowdsourced insights from Accenture’s global network of designers, creatives, technologists, sociologists, and anthropologists.
Accenture Life Trends 2026 highlights a shift toward human-centric growth, where AI enhances human experience rather than dominating it, amid a broader pursuit of stability. The five key trends include:
– Stability Premium: People are prioritising stability, reassurance, and trust in a volatile environment, changing how they make decisions.
– Human Journeys: The focus is shifting toward purpose and mastery, with people prioritising personal progress and meaningful experiences over speed alone.
– Finding Neo: AI must serve human experiences (“Neo”), moving beyond efficiency to create value that feels uniquely human.
– Good Vibrations: Economic value is increasingly tied to joy, play, and positive connections, reshaping how companies engage with consumers.
– Coming of Age: Ambition, energy, and consumption are no longer tied to age, creating new, age-agnostic market opportunities.
In this hands-on, interactive workshop led by TDC25 keynote speaker Erin Kinnee of Accenture, we will explore these Life Trends shaping our world and collaborate to imagine the kind of future we want to live in. We’ll examine our evolving relationship with AI and use a design thinking–based approach to develop bold, future-facing concepts that enable us to live and work alongside AI in ways that feel more human and meaningful.
This workshop is led by Erin Kinnee, an innovation and design thinking leader at Accenture who specialises in emerging technologies, AI, and human-centred innovation. Based in Newcastle, she works with clients and project teams to develop creative solutions that combine technology, collaboration, and transformative ways of working. Erin was also a TDC25 keynote speaker, and we are delighted to welcome her back to TDC in 2026.