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The business world’s most exclusive club has always been the boardroom. For decades, it has operated as a roped-off circle of experience, where pattern recognition, war stories, and collective gut instinct guided the biggest decisions. But the most recent quarterly earnings calls and 2026 spending projections across industries from tech to finance make it clear: That era is ending. As business complexity explodes and competitive cycles compress, those old methods are showing their limits. Artificial intelligence is exposing blind spots, surfacing inconvenient truths, and rewriting how boards govern, challenge, and lead. The transformation goes beyond adding new to…

Burnout and boredom are the two dreaded b-words of the modern workplace. We fear one, dismiss the other, and often fail to see how easily they trade places. Too often, boredom masquerades as burnout. To the untrained eye, exhaustion and disengagement can look identical. Boredom is typically a form of cognitive under-stimulation, while burnout is emotional and physical overextension. Both can leave people feeling unmotivated and fatigued. But here’s the twist: in cultures that tend to glamorize busyness, many employees feel safer saying they’re burned out than bored. Burnout signals you worked “too hard.” Bored, on the other hand, signals the opposite. Recent repor…

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has long encouraged people to use their phones, whether through the forsaken Poke on Facebook or uploading Reels on Instagram. But the company’s newest idea for how and when to take out your phone might be too big an ask for some cinema lovers: Meta wants people to use their phones in movie theaters, specifically for its chatbot Movie Mate. The chatbot, which Meta has reportedly claimed will “get audiences back in theaters,” works by sending moviegoers trivia, quips, and questions about the movie, according to the New York Times. The catch? All of this happens while the film plays in front of them. Fast Company has reached out to Meta fo…

A lot has been written about how AI is coming for your job, but EY’s latest AI survey found some surprising results. Out of 500 top executives at major U.S. companies who said artificial intelligence was boosting productivity at their companies, only 17% of those polled actually turned around and laid off workers or cut their jobs. Instead, the new survey found they are reinvesting those gains back into the company. “Executives are plowing productivity gains right back into more AI tools and more talented people,” EY America’s consulting leader Colm Sparks Austin said. “The real breakthrough isn’t automation—it’s amplification. Leading companies are using AI …

Home ownership is receding further out of reach for most Americans as elevated mortgage rates and rising prices stretch the limits of what buyers can afford. A homebuyer now needs to earn at least $114,000 a year to afford a $431,250 home—the national median listing price in April, according to data released Thursday by Realtor.com The analysis assumes that a homebuyer will make a 20% down payment, finance the rest of the purchase with a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage, and that the buyer’s housing costs won’t exceed 30% of their gross monthly income—an often-used barometer of housing affordability. Based off the latest U.S. median home listing price, homebuyers need to ea…

Apollo, the humanoid robot, stands nearly 6 feet tall. It can lift up to 55 pounds and operate 22 hours a day, seven days a week. Apptronik’s design is meant to fit into preexisting workspaces, which means Apollo can help with everything from warehouse labor to household chores. Mercedes-Benz and electronics manufacturer Jabil have already deployed it alongside their human employees—and your workplace may be next. The Apollo is a winner of Fast Company’s 2025 Innovation by Design Awards. View the full article

Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, who was just elected as the new leader of the Catholic Church, seems to have similar views on the environment as his predecessor, Pope Francis. Prevost, who is taking the name Pope Leo XIV, has been outspoken about the need for urgent climate action and voiced his support for the use of climate technology such as solar panels and EVs. Pope Francis, who died in April, made the climate crisis a central issue of his papacy. He urged fossil fuel executives to transition to clean energy, calling the rising greenhouse gas levels “disturbing and a cause for real concern”; he declared a global climate emergency; and he launched a project to po…

Threads is testing a simpler way for people to nudge their feed in a specific direction without digging through settings or retraining the algorithm long term. The new feature, called Dear Algo, lets users tell Threads what they want to see more or less of for a short period of time. Instead of relying only on likes, follows, and past behavior, you can now directly ask the app to adjust what shows up in your feed. It works by writing a public post that starts with “Dear Algo,” followed by your request. For instance, “Dear Algo, show me more posts about podcasts,” or “Dear Algo, show me fewer posts about spoilers for Heated Rivalry.” After you post it, Threads adju…

The stock price of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH) is sinking yet again this morning after reports that the private healthcare company is now under criminal investigation by the Department of Justice (DOJ) over possible Medicare fraud. The company says it has not been notified by the DOJ about the alleged investigation, which was reported by the Wall Street Journal. As of the time of this writing, UNH shares are currently down over 6% to $289.20 per share in premarket trading. UNH shares have not seen that low since 2020. Before today’s premarket fall, UNH shares had already been hammered since 2025 began. The stock closed at $308 yesterday, marking a more th…

Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has spent its first 100 days slashing government programs and firing employees. Yet Musk views DOGE not just as a downsizing force, but also as a team of technologically elite shock troops tasked with rapidly modernizing outdated government systems. One of DOGE’s primary targets on that front is the Office of Personnel Management’s antiquated retirement application system, which still relies on paper forms and manual processing. The system handles retirement applications and manages benefits for former federal employees and their families, coordinating closely with agency HR teams and payroll centers. DOGE and its…

People and institutions are grappling with the consequences of AI-written text. Teachers want to know whether students’ work reflects their own understanding; consumers want to know whether an advertisement was written by a human or a machine. Writing rules to govern the use of AI-generated content is relatively easy. Enforcing them depends on something much harder: reliably detecting whether a piece of text was generated by artificial intelligence. Some studies have investigated whether humans can detect AI-generated text. For example, people who themselves use AI writing tools heavily have been shown to accurately detect AI-written text. A panel of human evaluat…

When a door broke loose on a new electric bus in Des Moines, Iowa, and nearly fell off, it was one in a long list of problems for the local transit agency. The city began using its fleet of seven electric buses, made by the startup Proterra, in 2021. The vehicles soon showed defects in the suspensions, weatherproofing, and wheelchair ramps. After only 18 months of use—and unsuccessful attempts to get the manufacturer to fix the problems—the agency had to pull them off the road. Other cities had similar issues. In Philadelphia, Proterra buses were sidelined in 2020 after the heavy batteries started to crack the vehicle chassis. (This summer, one of those vehicles s…

Welcome to AI Decoded, Fast Company’s weekly newsletter that breaks down the most important news in the world of AI. I’m Mark Sullivan, a senior writer at Fast Company, covering emerging tech, AI, and tech policy. This week, I’m focusing on the role of NSFW material on AI platforms, which could be complicated when AI platforms turn into social platforms. I also look at a powerful new Anthropic model for free Claude chatbot users. Sign up to receive this newsletter every week via email here. And if you have comments on this issue and/or ideas for future ones, drop me a line at sullivan@fastcompany.com, and follow me on X (formerly Twitter) @thesullivan. Sam Al…

Fast-food companies, beware: Gas stations and convenience stores are coming for your customers. Fireside Market, a Wisconsin convenience store chain, announced a new store concept in Slinger, Wisconsin, designed to sell more burgers and less gas. It has a drive-through, curbside pickup area, and gourmet menu items—and it’s a model of the convenience store of the future. Fireside Market’s burger and sandwich menu is several steps up from the outdated idea of day-old taquitos spinning on a rotating food warmer at the local convenience store. Instead, its menu has items like a burger topped with bacon, pastrami, and balsamic-onion jam, and a grilled-salmon sandwich. …

For all the talk of how artificial intelligence will revolutionize the way we live and work, there are few industries where generative AI has already had a profound impact. Across the education space, however, from K-12 schools to universities, AI has been widely adopted by students and teachers alike. Educators are using AI to create lesson plans and save time on administrative work and even grading. And students now regularly use AI chatbots in the classroom and for help with assignments—to varying results. The rapid clip of AI adoption has raised fraught questions about academic integrity and responsible use of the technology, among both teachers and students. But …