Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

Curiosity isn’t just a valuable personality trait—it’s a leadership superpower. In a business environment where innovation dictates success, curiosity serves as the catalyst for breakthroughs and industry reinvention. Yet, despite its transformative potential, curiosity remains one of the most undervalued tools in leadership today. According to a Harvard Business Review study, curiosity fosters openness and collaboration while reducing decision-making errors. Yet only 24% of organizations actively encourage it, leaving a wealth of untapped potential on the table. The best leaders don’t just seek answers; they reframe problems. Instead of asking, “How do we fix this?” th…

The World Health Organization (WHO) has confirmed that a worrying mystery illness is spreading in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The unknown disease has so far sickened hundreds and killed dozens since reports of it first emerged in early January. Here’s what to know about the outbreaks so far. What is the disease? At this time, health officials do not know what the disease is. In the WHO’s weekly bulletin for the February 10- 16 period, the agency says the unknown disease “poses a significant public health threat.” The disease is currently active in two regional clusters, according to the report, and worryingly, of those who have died from it, nea…

The closing days of February were not good ones for job security in the tech industry. Over the month’s final week, major industry players, including HP, Grubhub, and Autodesk announced plans to reduce their workforce, while another startup seems to be shutting down entirely. Here’s what you need to know about the latest round of tech layoffs. HP to cut up to 2,000 workers Without a doubt, the largest number of job cuts over the last week of February was announced by computer maker HP. In a Form 8-K filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), dated February 27, HP revealed it will eliminate between 1,000 and 2,000 of its workers. The layoffs …

Nearly all job growth since 1980 has been in occupations that are social-skill intensive. Teamwork, for instance, is now considered “very” or “extremely” important in eight of 10 occupations. Not surprisingly, a Stanford study shows that people working collaboratively persist on a task for 64% longer than those working individually on the same task, and they exhibit higher levels of engagement. According to the platform LinkedIn, the most in-demand skills in 2024 include “teamwork” and “communication.” Jobs that require high levels of analytical and mathematical reasoning but low levels of relational skills have been declining because they are easier to automate. As a r…

When you reach the role of manager in an organization (particularly for the first time), you have often been there a while. Chances are, you’re managing people who had roles like the one you had before you started to supervise others. The rhythms and routines of work are familiar. Despite your feelings of closeness to team members on the front lines, you’re likely to forget three key issues that can hamper your ability to succeed. These factors can be a particular problem when working with people who are new to the organization. Now you’re one of ‘them’ When you become a manager, you don’t feel much different than you did before your promotion. In fact, when yo…

There’s a cat-and-mouse game between those using generative AI chatbots to produce text undetected and those trying to catch them. Many believe they know the telltale signs—though as a journalist fond of the word “delve” and prone to em-dashes, I’m not so sure. Researchers at four U.S. universities, however, have taken a more rigorous approach, identifying linguistic fingerprints that reveal which large language model (LLM) produced a given text. “All these chatbots are coming out every day, and we interact with them, but we don’t really understand the differences between them,” says Mingjie Sun, a researcher at Carnegie Mellon University and lead author of the st…

Music is everywhere—playing in coffee shops, on hold lines, in Ubers, behind YouTube ads, and of course, in your earbuds while you work. It’s so constant, we often treat it like harmless background noise. But the brain doesn’t. Whether we realize it or not, music is processed across multiple brain regions tied to attention, memory, and emotion—meaning even passive listening can impact how we focus, feel, and make decisions. “Background music” is never truly in the background. It either supports or competes with your mental state. And that means we have a choice. In today’s fast-paced work culture, where multitasking is the norm and focus is scarce, how we use music can …

** NEEDS JUSTIN POT BYLINE ** Have you ever opened your favorite music-streaming app and wondered why all your playlists have the same five songs? It can be annoying, even if they happen to be five songs you’re really into right now. And, make no mistake, they will be five songs you’re really into right now, because that’s how many of these services work—and it’s not because everyone else has the same taste in music as you. For instance, any Spotify playlist that says “created for” in the header is catered to the individual user, based on their listening history. There’s nothing wrong with that, necessarily—it can be nice to know you’re going to hear songs you lik…

Salesforce is buying AI-powered cloud data management company Informatica in an approximately $8 billion deal. Informatica’s shareholders will receive $25 per share, a premium of about 11% from Friday’s closing price of $22.55. The transaction will give Salesforce access to Informatica’s data management capabilities. Informatica was taken private in 2015 by private equity firm Permira and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board for about $5.3 billion. It went public again in 2021. “Joining forces with Salesforce represents a significant leap forward in our journey to bring data and AI to life by empowering businesses with the transformative power of their most critic…

Appointing a chief of staff is a critical first step for any CEO looking to make impactful leadership decisions. But an executive who merely utilizes their chief of staff as an administrative extra set of hands risks missing out on meaningful transformation opportunities. The critical decision to position a chief of staff as a true executive partner, when executed well, can be a bold investment that impacts a CEO’s legacy. Based on my own experience as a chief of staff for a Series A unicorn-to-be and my current work coaching and placing these professionals, I’ve seen firsthand that today’s chiefs of staff act as leadership amplifiers. They occupy a unique position at…

Fun fact: The saying “work smarter, not harder” is coming up on its 100th birthday. Coined in the 1930s by industrial engineer Allen Morgenstern, this simple, pithy directive is arguably more achievable today than ever before. Thanks to generative AI chatbots such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, and Anthropic’s Claude, it’s never been easier to quickly create text, images, code, and more. Here are few practical ways you can leverage them to power up your productivity. Create content If you spend any time crafting marketing copy, drafting emails, outlining blog posts, or even brainstorming ideas, generative AI tools can save you an incredible amount of tim…

Starbucks plans to lay off 1,100 corporate employees and eliminate hundreds of open and unfilled positions, CEO Brian Niccol said on Monday. In a memo, Niccol said the cuts will remove duplication “to create smaller, more nimble teams,” and the company will inform employees who are being laid off by midday Tuesday. Starbucks, which has 16,000 corporate employees, said the cuts will not affect staff at cafés. “We believe it’s a necessary change to position Starbucks for future success,” Niccol said in the statement. “Our intent is to operate more efficiently, increase accountability, reduce complexity, and drive better integration.” Shares of the coffee giant (…

Han Jong-Hee, a senior Samsung Electronics executive credited with elevating the company’s television business, died Tuesday, the company said. He was 63. Han, a co-chief executive who oversaw the company’s consumer electronics and mobile devices businesses, died at a hospital after being treated for a heart attack, Samsung said. Han joined Samsung in 1988 and spent most of his career in TV-related divisions, during which the company became the world’s leading TV manufacturer. He was appointed co-vice chairman and CEO in 2022. Samsung, one of the world’s largest technology companies, has dual strengths in components and finished consumer products. The company had separ…

Featuring Alexis Garcia, Cofounder, Brass Knuckle Films and Robert Rodriguez, Cofounder, Brass Knuckle Films. Moderated by Kc Ifeanyi, Executive Director of Editorial Programming, Fast Company. Robert Rodriguez, film director and founder of production company Troublemaker Studios, has certainly made an impact in Hollywood with films including El Mariachi, From Dusk Till Dawn, Spy Kids, Sin City, and many more. And now he’s looking to redirect that impact back to his home state. Rodriguez is part of a larger push to make Texas the film capital of the world—a bold proposition that’s not without its challenges. Find out how Rodriguez plans to make that goal a reality—and…

Starbucks baristas will soon have a new dress code that’s meant to center the coffee chain’s signature brand color. Beginning May 12, employees will be required to wear solid black tops along with bottoms that are khaki, black, or blue denim under the coffee chain’s longtime signature-green apron. Starbucks Green is a rich, earthy green that appears in Starbucks partner aprons going back to 1987, and it’s also the color of its well-known Siren logo. The company calls the color its “most identifiable asset,” and by putting the color at the center of its new dress code, the coffee chain is extending its brand guidelines around Starbucks Green to employee dress as the co…

As AI takes on a greater role in our media ecosystem, many journalists look at it like a farmer sees an invasive species: as a force that threatens to slowly choke, kill, and replace their work, potentially threatening their livelihood. There’s good reason for this: For reporters and editors, AI represents an assault on multiple fronts. Not only can large language models (LLMs) take over many tasks within journalistic work—research, writing, editing—AI systems also threaten to substitute media publications entirely. The more readers get their information from AI, the less reason they have to engage with publishers or journalists directly. Ask a journalist how it’s goi…

Did everyone get the Microsoft 365 rate-hike notice? The personal plan is going from $70 a year to $100 a year. According to the email, my financial commitment is getting me “secure cloud storage, advanced security for your data and devices, and cutting-edge AI-powered features,” among other goodies. But the real reason I subscribe? Microsoft Word. We’ve all used it and many of us rely on it. But many people even aren’t using all the bells and whistles that come with Word and the larger Microsoft 365 package. So as Microsoft hits us with a price hike to go along with all the other price hikes consumers have been facing in the past year, now might be the perfec…

It took decades, but Rachael Kelly broke the insidious cycle of abuse she’d been stuck in since childhood. At the time, she was leading human resources at a restaurant group in 2020. “I’m new in this job, and my toxic marriage start[ed] to peak,” she says. Meanwhile, she was trying to help the employees at her restaurant who were suffering through the trauma and joblessness of the COVID-19 pandemic. Ending her marriage to an abusive husband while helping those workers establish safety nets made her think: “How do we package [what I’m doing here] and model it forward?” Kelly ended up doing just that by first launching her nonprofit HiveStrong, which helps survivors of int…

Eat this, not that. This one food will cure everything. That food is poison. Cut this food out. Try this diet. Don’t eat at these times. Eat this food and you’ll lose weight. With society’s obsession with food, health, and weight, statements like these are all over social media, gyms, and even healthcare offices. But do you need to follow rules like these to be healthy? Most often the answer is no, because health and nutrition is much more complex and nuanced than a simple list of what to eat and what to avoid. Despite this, rules about health and nutrition are so common because of diet culture—a morality imposed by society that sees falling outside the arbitrary idea…

The startup playbook that built Uber, Airbnb, and DoorDash is becoming obsolete in real-time. As AI compresses jobs that once required hundreds of employees into algorithms, we’re witnessing the birth of a new company archetype—capital-efficient, immediately profitable, and surprisingly small. With a variety of software to use for all aspects of building a business—from Shopify for e-commerce to Stripe for payments—and low operating costs, innovation just keeps making everything that much more efficient. Advancements in AI are turbocharging this even further. Now, companies not only need less software and less capital for solutions to get off the ground, but they also si…

The Great Gatsby, Maintaining relevance after 100 years in the public consciousness is no small feat, but that’s exactly what the American novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald has managed to do. First published by Charles Scribner’s Sons on April 10, 1925, it initially received mixed reviews and was a commercial failure. As this now-beloved novel celebrates its centennial, how did it finally find an audience and what are its most-enduring themes? Also, here’s to maybe catch a bit of the bash. From failure to required reading Fitzgerald died in 1940 from a heart attack thinking he had failed as a writer. What he didn’t know was that Gatsby had been chosen by the …

Wind-driven wildfires that were among South Korea’s worst ever have ravaged the country’s southern regions, killing 24 people, destroying more than 200 structures and forcing 27,000 residents to evacuate, officials said Wednesday. The death toll included a pilot who died after a helicopter crashed during efforts to contain a blaze in the southeastern town of Uiseong, one of the hardest-hit areas. The aircraft had no other crew members. Police said that most of the dead are those in their 60s and 70s. The National Fire Agency said at least 26 people sustained varying degrees of injuries. An ancient Buddhist temple, houses, factories and vehicles were destroyed in the wi…

Layoffs. Corporate restructuring. Leadership changes. New market strategy. Chances are that you’ll go through at least one significant company upheaval in your career (if not more than one). Employees are expected to adapt quickly, often with little support. While you may not be able to prevent internal changes, you can be prepared—and protect yourself. Get clarification on your job responsibilities One of the biggest impacts on your day-to-day might be changes in your job responsibilities. As soon as possible, you’ll want to discuss any changes with your boss. Ask directly, “Do I have any new responsibilities?” and “How will my performance be evaluated no…

Sales of graphic novels have doubled over the past five years, to some parents’ dismay. But data shows these books can have a positive lifelong impact on young readers. View the full article

In business and sports, team dynamics impact outcomes. Whether you’re pursuing profits or championships, knowing what triggers your teammates can help you avoid conflict and stay on task. The problem is that taking time to better understand each other isn’t always our default setting, say John Eliot and Jim Guinn, authors of How To Get Along with Anyone: The Playbook for Predicting and Preventing Conflict at Work and at Home. “Blowups appear to be substance-driven, but they’re actually people-driven,” says Eliot. “The first step toward preventing and resolving conflict is to focus on figuring out the people participating in it not the underlying ‘problem.’” To wor…