Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

Meetings in corporate America are broken—and only breaking down more. Globally, people sit in three times as many meetings as they did before the pandemic, 60% of meetings are ad hoc, rather than scheduled, and 71% of people regularly multitask through them. When poorly-run meetings become the norm, people begin to see them as a time with little value. But meetings are an opportunity to shape organizational culture, and not enough leaders are taking advantage of it. Most high-performing teams build strong relationships, show care for the whole person, have open and honest communications, listen to each other, clarify processes, and collaborate. These are all beha…

“Who am I to tell them how to make decisions?” This anxiety-induced thought played like a broken record in my head as my first leadership training event approached in my new role as a training director. Talking in front of 40 leaders, most of whom were older than my ripe old age of 30 at the time felt like the perfect opportunity for them to see right through my lack of expertise and expose me as the fraud I was. Years ago, while working at a regional bank, I was promoted from trainer to leading a training team in another department. My prior roles as a sales trainer and human resources consultant allowed me to build a company-wide reputation as an expert on compl…

At first glance, your Kindle might seem like a no-frills reading device: straightforward, minimal, and focused on the basics. Kind of like an actual book, huh? But beneath its simple exterior lies a surprising range of features, tools, and tricks designed to make reading smoother, smarter, and more enjoyable. So, whether you’re a seasoned reader or new to Kindle, here are five hidden gems to take your reading experience to the next level. Double-Tap to Turn PagesAmazon may have killed off physical buttons, there’s a new feature that might help ease the pain. If you’ve got the most recent Kindle Paperwhite or the new Kindle Colorsoft, you now have access to double-tap func…

Exhaustion. Mental fatigue. Difficulty concentrating. Irritability. Dreading your next calendar appointment. Nobody likes showing up to work with a hangover. But these days, you don’t need a long night of drinking to feel the effects. Instead, you might be suffering from a meeting hangover—the lingering exhaustion, disengagement, and productivity drain that follow an unproductive meeting. Studies show that 28% of workplace meetings leave employees feeling drained, with more than 90% of workers experiencing meeting hangovers at least occasionally. Nearly half (47%) report feeling less engaged with their work afterward, while more than half say these hangovers…

The cost of a multistep skincare routine can quickly add up. But have you ever wondered what would happen if you simply stopped? This weekend, a TikTok creator went viral for discussing her controversial “Caveman Method,” which she claims is helping restore her skin barrier after years of picking at her skin. In a video that has since racked up nearly 10 million views, Tia Zakher announced she had cut out everything from her beauty routine—even water. “What you are seeing is dead skin that’s going to flake off eventually while healthy skin forms underneath,” she posted in response to questions about the texture on her face. In a separate video, she explain…

If you’ve ever cracked open an ice-cold Sprite on a hot summer day, or taken a sip of the soda fresh from a McDonald’s machine, you’ve probably experienced that eye-widening first moment that the extra-fizzy, citrusy beverage hits your tongue. That exact second is what Sprite is trying to capture with its new brand refresh, which includes the return of a beloved brand symbol, an updated logo, new visuals, and the brand’s first-ever signature sound. These updates are part of a broader campaign called “It’s That Fresh,” which Sprite says is designed to appeal to younger consumers by strengthening the brand’s presence in music, food, and sports spheres (Sprite also reveal…

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. While homebuyers and home sellers still see headlines telling them it’s a seller’s market and national home prices are reaching all-time highs, a deeper look reveals that several regional housing markets have shifted, giving homebuyers some power. During the Pandemic Housing Boom, from summer 2020 to spring 2022, the number of active homes for sale in most housing markets plummeted as homebuyer demand quickly absorbed almost everything that came up for sale. Fast-forward to the current housing market, and the places where active inventory has rebounded to …

Wake up, go to class, grab a panini, then go to work. The day in the life of students James Haupt, Caroline Pirtle, and George Small seemed nothing out of the ordinary, except “going to work” meant entering restricted buildings in the Vatican, and reporting on what was happening at the papacy, just a few minutes away from the Holy See. As part of Villanova University’s 22-year-old Vatican and Rome Internship Program, which over the years has helped boost the Pope’s social media presence, the three students were on exchange for nearly five months. Small and Pirtle, both computing sciences majors, were stationed at the Vatican Museum and the Vatican Media Office respect…

For many years, women have been told that they needed to “step-up” to lead. You know the narrative—speak more assertively, be less emotional, less sensitive and toughen up. In essence, to “fit the mold.” The trouble is, that mold was never created with them in mind. It was built in an era where leadership equalled hierarchy, control, dominance, and outdated power dynamics. This has fueled countless burnout cases, while women have mastered leading within these “rules.” Now though, there’s a shift. That shift is birthing the realization that the old rulebook no longer applies. The old leadership model is expensive and commercially outdated. The command-and-control paradig…

Do you know where your drinking water comes from? In South Florida, drinking water comes from the Everglades, a vast landscape of wetlands that has long filtered the water relied on by millions of people. But as the Everglades has shrunk over the past century, the region’s water supply and water quality have become increasingly threatened, including by harmful algal blooms fueled by agriculture runoff. Now, the water supply faces another rising challenge: saltwater intrusion. FlickrCC BY-ND 2.0 Protecting South Florida’s water hinges on restoring the Everglades. That’s why, 25 years ago, the federal government and universities launched the world’s largest e…

Bellwether trials are complicated but consequential. Pulled from a morass of claims, they’re designed to test how a jury responds to a broader legal theory. Often, they fall flat. Today in a California court, one did not. Kaley, a 20-year-old who alleged that social media harmed her childhood by addicting her and keeping her on platforms like Instagram for up to 16 hours a day, won $3 million in damages. A jury found Meta and Alphabet liable, assigning 70% of the damages to Meta and 30% to Alphabet. TikTok and Snapchat, also named as defendants, settled before trial without admitting fault. The amount—roughly 0.0015% of Meta’s 2025 revenue, and even less for …

When Andrey Khusid cofounded Miro in 2011, the idea was simple: bring a whiteboard into the browser, and let people collaborate visually, not just with text. Now that digital canvas is evolving into what the CEO calls an “AI Innovation Workspace.” More than 100 million people use Miro these days, so the company’s ventures into AI are quickly reaching more than 250,000 organizations, including GitHub, Prudential, and Cisco. To serve those Fortune 500 companies, Miro now offers a platform for collaborative AI workflows with Sidekicks that work alongside teams on the canvas, and tools for turning rough sketches into clickable prototypes. The company, which sported a $17…

When Taco Bell CEO Sean Tresvant first joined the company as chief brand officer back in 2021, he saw a unique opportunity in the brand’s cultural potential. “Sports, entertainment, music, food…it was like the Beautiful Mind meme with the equations spinning,” he told me in 2024. “They just needed someone to put it on the wall.” None of his moves since embody this idea more than Live Mas LIVE, Taco Bell’s live stage show in the spirit of Apple’s WWDC. The show began in 2024, when Taco Bell fanatics (myself included) traveled to Las Vegas to watch company execs unveil the brand’s new and limited edition menu items for the year. It was an absurdly perfect premise (a…

When it comes to sharing Instagram Reels with friends, the process of three taps to get a Reel from A to B can feel surprisingly tedious. Now, Instagram has addressed that issue with its latest feature: Instagram Blend. Announced on Thursday, Blend lets users create invite-only, personalized Reels feeds with friends. By tapping a new two-emoji-hugging icon (the Blend icon) within a chat, you can start or accept a Blend. Once active, Instagram will begin recommending Reels for both users in a shared feed, powered by an algorithm. The feature works in one-on-one DMs as well as group chats. These recommendations, refreshed daily, are said to be unique to each Blend and b…

The K-shaped economy strikes again. A new report from the Fair Isaac Corp. (FICO), creator of the credit score most lenders use, shows that the average American’s FICO score is now down to 714 – a two point decline over the course of the last year. The current slide in U.S. credit scores began in 2023, when the government ended the temporary pandemic-era freeze on student loan collection. Missed mortgage payments have also ticked up some, contributing to the slide in credit scores. Prior to the latest report, the average American’s credit score had already dropped to 715 between 2024 and 2025, which at the time was the most dramatic decline in scores since the Great Re…

With music streaming, users have gotten used to being at the mercy of algorithms. But French music streamer Deezer is making it easier for its subscribers to make the algorithm work for them. The company unveiled an update to its mobile experience that doubles down on its emphasis on personalization and sharing to set it apart from larger competitors like Spotify and Apple Music. “The new features we’re introducing today give users more control over their algorithm, greater flexibility to personalize their experience, and easy ways to share content with their friends, even beyond Deezer,” CEO Alexis Lanternier said in a press release. Rolling out over the nex…

A few days ago, the electric grid in California hit a new milestone: At 7pm on March 29, batteries provided 12.3 gigawatts of power—roughly as much as six Hoover Dams, or around 43% of the total demand on the grid. Nearly all of that battery storage was built in the last five years. “Until 2020 or 2021, battery storage was still quite expensive, but we’ve seen huge price drops over the last few years,” says Nicolas Fulghum, senior energy and climate data analyst at Ember, a global energy think tank. When it’s paired with solar power, it can “bring some of that excess generation in the middle of the day to where it’s really needed, which is during the peak demand in the e…

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. Here’s the annual U.S. household income needed to purchase the typical valued U.S. home: January 2020: $52,041 January 2021: $52,087 January 2022: $63,111 January 2023: $87,092 January 2024: $93,227 January 2025: $98,900 January 2026: $93,061 While the income needed to buy the median-priced U.S. home is +78.8% higher than it was in January 2020, it’s down -5.9% year over year. Methodology: This Zillow calculation is conservative and assumes a 20% down payment and that the homebuyer spends less than 30% of their monthly inco…

The narrative that women entrepreneurs receive less than 2% of venture capital (VC) funding has been widely circulated. It stems from data provided by Pitchbook, a respected research firm that delivers insights on global capital markets. However, a closer examination of their data reveals a more nuanced perspective. Pitchbook only studies investments funded by VC firms, which is a big part of the market but does not include the very substantial investments made by angel investors. Significant progress has been made in these early stages of the venture market. Twenty years ago, a mere 3% of angel-funded startups were led by women. Fast-forward to today, and women now acco…