Picture this: 1994, an apartment in central Stockholm. I'm 13 years old, sitting in front of a computer screen, eyes glued to a pixelated football pitch. Championship Manager (later Football Manager). Every day, without fail. The dream? To become a successful football manager like Arsène Wenger—to be part of something bigger than myself, to help shape the future of a club at the highest level.
Fast forward three decades, and I'm at the afterparty at the Star in Sydney, celebrating with the Brisbane Broncos players, Board, and Executive Leadership Team. They'd just won the NRL Premiership at Sydney Olympic Stadium after 19 years. Not as the manager I once dreamed of becoming, but as something I couldn't have imagined back then: a futurist-in-residence who's been working with the club since the beginning of 2025, helping them scenario plan and future-proof their vision toward 2032 and the Brisbane Olympics.
And here's what that 13-year-old kid in a Stockholm apartment has learned about high performance, resilience, and why the future belongs to those brave enough to plan for it (and create it)...
Let me paint the picture: The Brisbane Broncos last won a premiership in 2006. Since then, they've experienced the kind of drought that tests everything—patience, culture, belief, identity.
They came agonizingly close in 2023, losing the Grand Final. Then crashed to 12th place in 2024. The kind of fall that breaks organizations.
But here's where the story gets interesting.
In September 2024, the Broncos made a choice. They hired Michael "Madge" Maguire—a coach known for brutal training methods, uncompromising standards, and something more important: a proven ability to break droughts. He'd done it at Wigan (12 years), South Sydney (43 years), and with NSW State of Origin (3 years).
Around the same time, under new CEO Dave Donaghy's leadership, they made another important choice (in my mind ;): to bring in a futurist-in-residence. Not to score game-winning tries or complete match-saving tackles (though I would have loved to help with that 80th-minute defensive effort by Reece Walsh), but to help the organization think differently about what the future in 2032 could look like—on the field, organizationally, commercially, and in the community.
The fact that they were willing to engage with long-range scenario planning during a rebuild? That says everything about the winning culture being built at Red Hill by Dave Donaghy and his team.
Fast forward to October 2025: Both the men's and women's teams are premiers. A complete organizational sweep.
And midway through the men's season? They were sitting 11th with 5 wins from 12 games. The media was brutal. The doubters were loud.
Then something remarkable happened.
Here's what I've learned working with CEO Dave Donaghy, Head of Strategy Kate Cullen, the entire Executive Leadership Team, and Chairman Karl Morris' Board since the beginning of 2025: The magic wasn't just in the tactics. It was in the belief system and the strategic vision.
When organizations sit down to plan toward milestones like 2032—the kind of long-range thinking we explored in our work together—the most important work isn't in the spreadsheets or org charts. It's in exploring both utopias and dystopias. What does sustained success look like? What could derail it? How do you build resilience into the organizational DNA?
But here's the critical insight: You can't just play the long game. You have to play multiple horizons simultaneously. The near-horizon future (next season, next quarter) and the far-horizon future (2032 and beyond) aren't separate strategies—they're interconnected realities that demand equal attention.
And watching them lift the trophy at Sydney Olympic Stadium, then celebrating with the players and leadership at the Star afterward—I felt an immense pride in seeing an organization that understands this. They're executing brilliantly in the present while building deliberately for a near-decade ahead.
Here's the thing: Strategy is science fiction with a deadline. You imagine futures that don't exist yet, then work backwards to make them real. But sometimes—when an entire organization pulls in the same direction, when near-term execution and long-term vision align—you achieve those goals even sooner than you dared to imagine.
The Broncos' 2025 story is a masterclass in what I call "future-ready resilience." I love it when clients "get it" and when they win! These wins were well-deserved and many years in the making, but sometimes stars align even faster than you might think...
Three principles that turned everything around:
1. They Embraced Uncomfortable Truths
Maguire didn't sugarcoat anything. He pushed players out of comfort zones with police-style boot camps and relentless fitness standards. Players said he demanded honesty—"just being men about being honest and up front to each other."
In our scenario planning work, we do the same thing. We don't just plan for the best-case future. We imagine failure scenarios, identify warning signals, and build the organizational muscle to respond before crisis hits.
2. They Built Belief Through Pattern Recognition
At halftime of the Grand Final, down 22-12, Maguire's message was simple: "Your best half is about to come. You've been doing it for the past month. You know what you need to do."
He wasn't giving them new tactics. He was reminding them of a pattern they'd already established—three consecutive comeback wins in the finals. Pattern recognition creates belief. Belief creates performance.
3. They Invested in Multiple Horizons
Here's the part most people miss: This wasn't just about winning in 2025 (although I love that they did!). It was about building something sustainable toward 2032 and beyond—while simultaneously executing flawlessly in the present.
The willingness of CEO Dave Donaghy and his leadership team to invest in both near-horizon and far-horizon thinking—that willingness to look beyond the next game while still winning the next game—that's what separates winning cultures from everyone else.
Most organizations play one horizon at a time. They're either obsessed with quarterly results or they're lost in ten-year visions with no execution. The rare ones—the ones that truly transform—play both simultaneously.
And here's the thing about engaging a futurist-in-residence (without any delusions of grandure): I can't score the game-winning try. I can't make that match-saving tackle in the 80th minute. But organizations that are willing to explore multiple futures through trend reports and scenario planning—utopias and dystopias alike—while simultaneously executing in the present? That's rare. That's special. It sends a symbolic message to everyone to get serious about the future. And I love this chutzpah!
Let me share three moments from 2025 that embody everything I believe about high performance:
The 80th Minute Tackle: Down by 4 points with seconds left, Melbourne broke through the Broncos' defense. Fullback Reece Walsh—who'd already scored, assisted three tries, and carried his team—sprinted across to make a game-saving tackle on Ryan Papenhuyzen. Fitness. Belief. Preparation meeting opportunity.
The Gehamat Shibasaki Story: Twelve months before the Grand Final, centre Gehamat Shibasaki was working a regular job, playing Queensland Cup, and preparing to sign with Wynnum-Manly on a train-and-trial contract. He thought his NRL career was over. But teammate Pat Carrigan gave him a pep talk and convinced him to give it one more shot at the Broncos—also on a train-and-trial deal. By October 2025, he'd scored two tries in the Grand Final, earned State of Origin selection, and was named to the Australian Kangaroos squad for the Ashes tour. The organization saw potential others didn't and invested in his future when he couldn't see it himself.
The Double Premiership: The women's team won their fourth title, first since 2020. They'd lost only one game all season—to the Roosters in Round 3. That loss stayed with them, fueled them, shaped them. In the Grand Final, when the Roosters scored three tries in 10 minutes to take the lead, the Broncos didn't panic. They remembered the pattern. They came back. They won.
You don't have to be running a sports franchise to apply these lessons. Whether you're leading a company, building a team, or navigating your own personal transformation, the principles are the same:
Embrace the uncomfortable pre-mortem. What does failure look like in 2030? What patterns are you ignoring today that could derail you tomorrow? Name them. Plan for them. Build resilience before you need it.
Invest in culture when things are hardest. The Broncos could have panicked at 11th place. Instead, they doubled down on belief, honesty, and preparation. Your darkest moments are when culture matters most.
Think in decades, not quarters. The Broncos aren't just planning for next season. They're building toward 2032. What does your 2032 look like? What foundations are you laying today?
Recognize your patterns. When you're down at halftime—in business, in relationships, in life—remember what you've already overcome. You have more pattern recognition than you think.
That 13-year-old playing Football Manager in Sweden, dreaming of becoming the next Arsène Wenger, thought management was about control—transfers, tactics, training schedules. He thought if he could just plan everything perfectly, success would follow.
Three decades later, working with Dave, Kate, Karl, and the entire Broncos leadership team as a futurist-in-residence, I've learned something different: Leadership isn't about controlling the future. It's about building the capacity to thrive in multiple futures—and playing multiple horizons simultaneously.
We explore utopias and dystopias together through scenario planning and trend analysis. We don't just plan for success—we imagine failure, identify warning signals, and build the organizational muscle to respond before crisis hits. Long-range trend analysis and near-term execution shouldn't exist in isolation—they're part of the same strategic conversation..
We can't predict whether the Broncos will win again in 2026. But we can hopefully help build an organization that's ready for whatever comes next. That plays the near-horizon and far-horizon futures with equal skill. That plans for multiple scenarios. That maintains belief when circumstances change. That invests in culture even when results lag.
And that's exactly what they did in 2025.
Nineteen years is a long time to wait. But the wait built something more valuable than a trophy—it built a blueprint for sustained excellence.
What's your 19-year challenge? What drought are you trying to break? What does your 2032 look like?
More importantly: What are you doing today to build the resilience, culture, and belief systems that will get you there?
Tell me:
Your stories of resilience, comebacks, and long-game thinking fuel these newsletters. Share them. I read every email. Let's learn from each other's patterns.
And if this resonated:
📺 Subscribe to my YouTube channel for weekly insights on future thinking, high performance, and the signals that separate winners from wishful thinkers. This isn't theory—it's what I'm seeing work in real time with world-class organizations.
💌 Share this newsletter with someone who's in their own 11th-place moment. Someone who needs to remember that the best half might be about to come. That comebacks aren't miracles—they're built on patterns we choose to create.
The future isn't something that happens to you. It's something you design, one honest conversation, one uncomfortable training session, one long-range plan at a time.
Here's to your comeback. Here's to your 2032 (and 2025).
With belief in what's possible,
Anders Sörman-Nilsson
Futurist-in-Residence
P.S. That Swedish kid dreaming of becoming Arsène Wenger would tell you the most unrealistic part of Football Manager was how easy it made everything look. Real transformation is messier, slower, and requires more courage than any simulation could capture. But it's also more rewarding than any trophy you could win on a screen. If you're in the messy middle of building something that matters—exploring your own utopias and dystopias, investing in futures you might not live to see—you're exactly where you need to be.