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"Audit" and "transformation" shouldn't contradict each other. The Disrupters With Liz Farr Go PRO for members-only access to more Liz Farr. View the full article

Vice-president Luis de Guindos says Washington’s volatile trade policies and reduced co-operation also threaten stabilityView the full article

Curiosity is one of the most consequential forces in human history. Every scientific breakthrough, technological leap, and cultural advance begins not with knowledge, but the desire to know. At its core, curiosity drives us to close the gap between what we know and what we want to know, a cognitive itch triggered by uncertainty and resolved through learning and the pursuit of meaning. Curiosity as an evolutionary advantage Early humans who explored their environments, experimented with tools, and learned from novel stimuli were more likely to secure resources, avoid threats, and pass on their genes. As a result, curiosity became embedded in our biology, reinforced by neural reward systems that make learning intrinsically pleasurable. In line, neuroscientific research shows that curiosity activates the brain’s dopaminergic pathways, the same circuits involved in motivation and reward, which explains the positive correlation between curiosity and impulsivity. When we encounter a gap in our knowledge, we experience a mild form of cognitive discomfort. Resolving that gap produces satisfaction, reinforcing future exploration. In that sense, curiosity is a built-in, biologically coded feedback loop for learning. But evolution also imposed constraints. Curiosity, like any adaptive trait, is beneficial only within limits. For example, there are many scenarios in which too much exploration could prove fatal. A hunter-gatherer wandering too far from their tribe risked encountering predators or hostile groups. In such contexts, restraint was adaptive. Curiosity had to be expressed with caution. This tension between exploration and exploitation remains with us today. We are wired both to seek novelty and to prefer predictability. The familiar is efficient but boring; the unknown is exciting but costly. History offers similar patterns. During periods of intellectual repression, such as the Inquisition, curiosity was actively punished, making individual inquiry dangerous. By contrast, the Enlightenment celebrated curiosity as a virtue, unleashing scientific and philosophical progress. The same underlying human drive manifested differently depending on cultural conditions. Curiosity, then, is universal, but its expression is highly variable. The paradox of AI: A triumph that threatens its own foundation Fast forward to the present, and we are witnessing one of humanity’s greatest achievements: artificial intelligence. The convergence of mathematics, computer science, and data has enabled machines to simulate aspects of human cognition. We have, in effect, built systems that can approximate, emulate, and even surpass our thinking. Even if AI stopped evolving tomorrow (which seems unlikely), its implications are already profound. AI can augment human capability, accelerate problem-solving, and democratize access to knowledge. It functions as a cognitive copilot, allowing individuals to perform tasks that once required entire teams. But every technological advance also carries unintended consequences. And in the case of AI, the risks are not just economic and ethical, but psychological, too. Specifically, AI threatens to erode curiosity. The erosion of curiosity in the age of artificial certainty Curiosity depends on uncertainty. It requires a gap between what we know and what we want to know. AI, by design, collapses that gap. When answers are instantly available, prepackaged, and delivered with confidence, the motivation to explore diminishes. Why struggle with a problem when a machine can solve it in seconds? Why engage in deep learning when surface-level understanding is sufficient to get by? This is what I have described elsewhere as “artificial certainty.” AI does not just provide answers; it creates the illusion that we understand them. The output is coherent, fluent, and persuasive. But coherence is not comprehension. The result is a shift from active to passive cognition. We consume knowledge rather than generate it. We outsource thinking rather than exercise it. A useful analogy is physical fitness. Imagine a world where machines do all the lifting for you. Your muscles would atrophy. The same applies to the mind. Curiosity is a mental muscle, and like any muscle, it weakens with disuse. In this sense, AI is the equivalent of a microwave for ideas. It delivers fast, convenient results, but often at the expense of depth and craftsmanship. We move from “slow thinking,” which is effortful and reflective, to “fast consumption,” which is effortless but shallow. There is also a linguistic irony worth noting. “Deep learning,” once a human aspiration, is now primarily associated with machines. Meanwhile, human learning risks becoming increasingly superficial, if not dormant. To be sure, such concerns may ultimately prove overstated, as they often have in the past. Socrates, after all, warned that writing would erode memory, fearing that reliance on external tools would weaken internal capacities. Yet history also suggests that overcorrection is safer than complacency. There are, in fact, good reasons to be vigilant: When effort is removed from the learning process, engagement tends to decline; when answers are readily available, the incentive to question diminishes; and when cognition is outsourced too readily, the underlying skills can atrophy. The point is not to resist technological progress, but to ensure that convenience does not quietly displace the very mental habits that made such progress possible in the first place. What the science says about cultivating curiosity If curiosity is both essential and at risk, the obvious question is: Can it be developed? The answer is yes, but not in the simplistic way often suggested. Curiosity is influenced by both stable traits and situational factors. While some individuals are naturally more curious than others, environments and habits play a critical role. Before diving into what to do, it is worth pausing on a more basic question: How curious are you, really? The first step is a proper self-assessment. Not the flattering version you might hold of yourself, but a more objective view grounded in data and external feedback. Curiosity is closely linked to well-established personality traits, particularly openness to experience, one of the Big Five, which captures intellectual curiosity, imagination, and a preference for novelty. Science-based assessments can provide a reliable baseline here. So can 360-degree feedback, which often reveals a gap between how curious we think we are and how we are experienced by others. Even informal input from colleagues, friends, or mentors can be illuminating, especially when it highlights whether you ask thoughtful questions, challenge assumptions, or genuinely engage with new ideas. Equally important is specificity. Curiosity is not a uniform trait. People are rarely equally curious about everything. Reflect on where your curiosity naturally shows up and where it does not. You may be deeply inquisitive about ideas but indifferent to people, or fascinated by technology but incurious about history, culture, or opposing viewpoints. Mapping these patterns matters, because developing curiosity is not about becoming universally interested in everything. It is about understanding your blind spots and deliberately expanding into areas where your instinct is to disengage. First, intrinsic motivation matters. Studies grounded in self-determination theory show that curiosity flourishes when individuals feel autonomous, competent, and connected to others. In practical terms, this means people are more curious when they pursue topics that genuinely interest them, rather than those imposed externally. The implication for organizations is clear: forced learning rarely produces genuine curiosity. Second, exposure to novelty is key. Curiosity thrives on diversity of input. Interacting with people from different backgrounds, disciplines, and perspectives increases the likelihood of encountering information gaps. This is why interdisciplinary environments are often more innovative. They create friction between ideas. Third, habits of reflection enhance curiosity. Research on learning and memory suggests that active engagement, such as writing, teaching, or debating, deepens understanding and sustains curiosity. Passive consumption, by contrast, leads to the illusion of knowledge without real insight. Fourth, time allocation matters. Curiosity requires cognitive space. In environments dominated by urgency and efficiency, there is little room for exploration. Scheduling time for reading, thinking, and unstructured inquiry is not a luxury; it is a necessity. Fifth, tolerance for uncertainty is crucial. Individuals with a high need for cognitive closure prefer quick answers and are less likely to engage in open-ended exploration. Developing comfort with ambiguity, through practices such as Socratic questioning or deliberate exposure to complex problems, can enhance curiosity. Finally, there is evidence that curiosity can be trained through small behavioral interventions. For example, prompting individuals to generate questions before receiving answers increases engagement and retention. Similarly, framing tasks as puzzles or challenges can activate curiosity-driven motivation. These findings align with the broader argument that curiosity is not a fixed trait but a dynamic capability shaped by both internal and external factors. The role of leaders in modeling curiosity While individual strategies matter, curiosity is ultimately a social phenomenon. It is shaped, amplified, or suppressed by cultural norms. From early childhood, curiosity is not simply an individual trait but a product of developmental context. Parents, teachers, and early environmental experiences play a decisive role in shaping how, and whether, curiosity endures into adulthood. Research in developmental psychology shows that children whose caregivers respond contingently to their questions, encourage exploration, and tolerate uncertainty tend to develop higher levels of intrinsic curiosity. Conversely, environments that emphasize compliance, correct answers, and performance over inquiry can suppress exploratory behavior over time. Educational studies also find that classroom climates prioritizing rote learning and standardized outcomes often erode students’ natural inquisitiveness, even when baseline curiosity is high. Longitudinal evidence suggests that these early patterns persist, shaping adult tendencies toward intellectual risk-taking, openness, and lifelong learning. In short, curiosity is cultivated or constrained early, but its trajectory can be reinforced or reversed later, especially through social and organizational contexts. This is where leadership becomes critical. Leaders set the tone for what is valued. If they prioritize certainty, speed, and efficiency above all else, curiosity will decline. Employees will learn to avoid questions, minimize exploration, and focus on immediate outputs. Conversely, leaders who model curiosity create environments where inquiry is rewarded. This does not mean celebrating randomness or distraction. It means demonstrating intellectual humility, asking better questions, and showing a willingness to challenge assumptions. One of the most powerful signals a leader can send is admitting what they do not know. This reduces the perceived cost of ignorance and encourages others to engage in learning. It also counteracts overconfidence, which is one of the main barriers to curiosity. Leaders can also design systems that embed curiosity into workflows. This includes allocating time for experimentation, encouraging cross-functional collaboration, and measuring not just outcomes but learning processes. Importantly, curiosity must be linked to performance. It is not about asking more questions for their own sake, but about asking better questions that lead to better decisions. In the age of AI, this becomes even more important. As machines take over routine cognitive tasks, the human advantage shifts to areas that require judgment, interpretation, and creativity. These are all downstream of curiosity. But judgment without experience is meaningless. AI can simulate answers, but it cannot substitute for the depth that comes from actually engaging with the world. There is a difference between consuming a microwaved meal and cooking one from scratch, sourcing ingredients, understanding how they interact, and adjusting along the way. The former is efficient and convenient; the latter builds intuition, tacit knowledge, and real expertise. In the same way, relying on AI-generated outputs without cultivating firsthand learning experiences produces a thin version of competence, what might be called artificial understanding. Curiosity, when acted upon, pushes us into those richer experiences that give judgment its substance and make our thinking genuinely our own. Curiosity as a strategic imperative The rise of AI has not just expanded access to information; it has quietly eroded the premium once attached to possessing it. When virtually all answers are instant, abundant, and convincingly packaged, the differentiator is no longer what you know, but how you engage with what can be known. In that sense, the economics of expertise are shifting. Knowledge, at least in its most accessible forms, is becoming commoditized, while the capacity to interrogate, refine, and build on that knowledge is becoming scarcer and more valuable. This is where curiosity earns its value, not as a soft or “nice to have” trait, but as the underlying mechanism that sustains learning over time. Without curiosity, the risk is not ignorance, but something more insidious: the illusion of understanding. AI can generate coherent explanations, summarize complexity, and produce plausible insights at scale. But unless these outputs are met with questioning, skepticism, and a desire to go beyond what is given, they are unlikely to translate into genuine insight or better decisions. The danger, then, is not that machines will think for us, but that we will gradually outsource the very effort required to think well, confusing fluency with depth and access with mastery. This places a different kind of demand on individuals and organizations. The task is no longer simply to adopt AI tools or increase their usage, but to integrate them in ways that augment rather than atrophy human judgment. At the individual level, this implies a degree of intentionality that is often underestimated: cultivating habits that prioritize inquiry over convenience, depth over speed, and exploration over closure. At the organizational level, it requires more than rhetoric about innovation. It calls for environments where questioning is not penalized by the pressures of efficiency, and where time spent exploring is not automatically seen as time wasted. And at the leadership level, it demands a visible commitment to curiosity as a norm, expressed less through slogans and more through behavior: the questions senior exeuctives ask, the uncertainty they tolerate, and the assumptions they are willing to revisit, will all shape the organization’s level of curiosity and appetite for learning. There is an obvious irony here. The more capable our machines become at producing answers, the more valuable it becomes to remain interested in the questions. This is not a nostalgic defense of human uniqueness, but a pragmatic recognition of where advantage now lies. In a world where everyone has access to the same tools, and AI becomes as ubiquitous as smartphones, Wi-Fi, or electricity, the differentiating factor shifts to how those tools are used, and that, in turn, depends on the quality of human curiosity brought to bear on them. Seen in this light, curiosity becomes a strategic necessity, one that shapes not only how individuals learn, but how organizations adapt and compete in an environment where knowing is easy, but understanding remains hard, and is quietly becoming a niche pursuit. View the full article

Understand the role Reddit plays in AI answers and how brands can capitalize on community signals to enhance visibility. The post Why LLMs Cite Reddit Instead Of Your Brand: A Practical AI Visibility Audit [Webinar] appeared first on Search Engine Journal. View the full article

As 7.4 million Americans sit unemployed, the path to employment has completely changed. Amid fake listings, AI filtering of candidates and widening talent pools, job seekers believe that they’re competing against a hiring ecosystem that penalizes honesty and rewards perception. The result? A hiring environment where the signals employers have traditionally relied on to evaluate candidates have become deeply unreliable. Now, both sides are operating with diminishing trust in each other. What’s Driving the Deception? Hiring today is not facing a character problem, but a structural one. When candidates believe that presenting themselves accurately will cost them a job offer, the rational response is to become the person they think the employer is looking for. But when this approach becomes standard, those who still choose to tell the truth take on an “honesty tax,” the systemic disadvantage honest candidates face when exaggeration becomes the market norm. GCheck’s Trust in Hiring Report revealed that 93% of job seekers have lied or embellished their experience during the hiring process, while 60% do not believe they would have been hired had they presented their qualifications more accurately. This is beyond a confession—it’s a market signal. Part of what drives this dynamic is opacity on the employer side. When candidates do not know what will be verified, they assume the answer is minimal, and they calibrate their self-presentation accordingly. In fact, GCheck found that although 88% of job seekers believe misrepresentation puts businesses at risk, 53% assumed employers wouldn’t verify their claims and only about a quarter (26%) report ever being caught lying or exaggerating. Verification that is invisible to candidates is not a deterrent. It is permission. And thanks to artificial intelligence, candidates can disguise their true skills and identity almost instantaneously. AI Accelerates Dishonesty in Hiring LinkedIn’s 2025 Work Change Report estimates that 70% of the skills used in most jobs will change by 2030, driven largely by AI. When job seekers navigate a market where the definition of “qualified” is constantly shifting, the pressure to appear more capable than they are significantly intensifies. AI has not created that pressure, but it has handed candidates sophisticated tools to act on it at every stage of the hiring process. Employer concerns have moved beyond job seekers’ using AI to compile resumes or assist with writing. Now, the degree to which AI has migrated into live interviews and assessments is worrisome. GCheck found that 61% of candidates have used AI to rehearse interview answers until they sounded more impressive than authentic, and 25% reported deploying an AI avatar in place of their own face during a virtual interview. ​ The result is a hiring process where trust is eroding on both sides. On one hand, candidates feel pressure to optimize and automate their performance in a highly mediated, virtual environment; on the other, employers struggle to assess who is genuinely behind the screen. When interviews are increasingly remote, scripted and technology driven, the lines between preparation and performance become blurred. This highlights how broken and transactional the modern hiring process has become. There’s also an emerging phenomenon of systematic embellishment, distortion or fabrication of professional qualifications across resumes, interviews, and references as a deliberate competitive strategy driven by market pressure and weak verification expectations. It’s been dubbed “careerfishing,” and it’s no longer the behavior of a fringe group. What Employers Must Do to Rebuild Trust Rebuilding trust in hiring is not only a technology problem, but also a standards and transparency issue. Employers who treat verification as a confidential back-end process get exactly what opacity produces: candidates who assume they can game the system, largely because they can. Three leadership-level shifts matter most here: Make verification standards visible. Communicate what will be checked before a candidate applies. Transparency disrupts embellishment at its source, not after the offer. The FTC’s guidance on employment background checks under the FCRA already mandates disclosure at specific stages. Moving that clarity upstream changes candidate behavior earlier in the process in measurable ways. For example, candidates who know credentials or work samples will be actually verified are less likely to exaggerate or rely on AI-generated materials they cannot defend later. Make screening decisions reviewable by a person. Candidates who know a human will review findings, not only an algorithm, engage with the process more honestly. Make verification proportionate to actual risk. Applying the same screening depth to every role signals to candidates that the process is performative. Calibrating scope to genuine role risk makes verification more credible, more defensible, and more likely to deter the embellishment it is meant to catch. In recent years, hiring integrity has evolved from a checkbox exercise into a strategic priority. When AI-driven careerfishing corrupts the foundational data a company uses to build its workforce, the damage surfaces in performance gaps. The goal is not to catch more people lying. The goal is to build a hiring environment where honesty carries a genuine advantage rather than a competitive penalty. When employers operate transparently and verify consistently, they stop performing diligence and start practicing it. That distinction is what separates organizations that attract trustworthy people from those that inadvertently select for the most convincing ones. View the full article

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. I cry when people give me compliments So … the subject line kind of says it all. I cry when people give me compliments. Not a “you look nice today” kind of compliment, but the sincere, drawn-out, vulnerable kind. I always have and I’m not sure why, other than maybe I’m just a Very Emotional Person, although I’m generally even-keeled and not prone to emotional outbursts. I am a manager whose department is going through a reorganization, so I am switching teams and direct reports. I’ve worked with my current team for about three years and they are a wonderful group. I think I have very healthy boundaries, but also when you’ve been someone’s manager for three years, it’s hard not to develop some kind of attachment to them. People have shared very private and personal things with me, I’ve done what I can to support them through intensely difficult times, etc. The transition phase for this reorg was deliberately a bit lengthy, so it’s been a very drawn-out goodbye. At the last couple of team retros, some of the team members have talked about what I’ve meant to the team, how much they’ll miss me, the impact I’ve had, etc. I cried both times. Then I’ve been doing a round of last 1:1s and one of my employees really opened their heart up about how much they’ve enjoyed working with me. And I cried then too. I am glad to hear the feedback and happy to know that our working relationship was positive for them too. But I’m so mortified that I cry! And trust me, I do not have a pretty cry face (does anybody?). I wish I could just say, “Thank you, that means a lot” and get on with my life the way everyone else seems to. I’ve apologized for crying and told them I’m embarrassed, but they just say things like, “Don’t be embarrassed! It’s because you care so much that it’s emotional for you, and that level of care is what makes you such a great manager!” which has triggered more crying. I don’t want to tell them to not express their appreciation. So maybe I should talk to a therapist about why I cry at compliments? Or just embrace the sensitive and sentimental side of myself? Or try really hard to disassociate when people give me compliments? Aw, I think it’s okay that you’re crying in these situations. But you’re probably making it more awkward than it needs to be when you tell people you’re embarrassed by it, so I’d stop doing that. You can just say, “Thank you, that means a lot to me — as you can see!” I’d be more concerned if you were crying in other situations, like when someone disagrees with you or you get difficult feedback, because that can make people reluctant to have those conversations with you in the future and can make it seem like you can’t handle pretty routine parts of professional life. But crying because someone has moved you with an expression of appreciation is a different thing. I’m assuming you’re not, like, sobbing when this happens — if you are, then yes, that’s something worth talking with a therapist about. But getting a little teary? Totally fine in this context, and you might find it less embarrassing if you decide to just be matter-of-fact about it! 2. Was I wrong to say I’d miss a deadline if I was assigned more work? I work at a small web development company with about 20 employees. I’m a regular employee, not a manager or even a senior employee. We work 32 hours a week but are paid for 35. We’re supposed to have Fridays off, but we need to remain available for “emergencies.” I have mixed feelings about this: since we’re paid for 35 hours, it’s hard to complain if we end up working three hours on a Friday, but it also means we can’t plan anything for that day. From March through April, I was assigned to a stressful project with unrealistic deadlines. During those eight weeks, I worked at least 35 hours every week, and on two consecutive weeks I worked 40 hours. Any hours above 35 went into a time bank to be used later for appointments and such. I was doing my part to get the project delivered. During the final week of the project, my project manager asked during a daily stand-up how she could support me through the end of the project. I replied, “Everything is on track. The only thing I need is not to be assigned additional tasks or projects until the go-live.” I probably added a nervous laugh too. Two weeks after the project ended, I had my annual review with my manager, Fergus, who is also a developer. Fergus told me I shouldn’t have said that in the stand-up meeting. He said it was insensitive to say I didn’t want more tasks without knowing whether other employees were also working Fridays and overtime. I replied that I had answered honestly because that was genuinely what I needed, and that delivering the project successfully was my priority. He didn’t push the point further, and we moved on with the review. This has stuck with me. Should I not say what kind of support I need when my project manager asks directly? That feels completely backwards to me. I don’t really know whether my coworkers were also struggling with their workload, but it’s not my responsibility to monitor that. I help when asked and I step in during stand-ups when I can contribute. Was this just Fergus, tired of working Fridays himself, projecting on me because I tried to assert myself? Your wording seems fine to me. You weren’t saying, “You can’t under any circumstances assign me anything else.” You were saying, “Everything is on track as long as nothing additional gets added on to my plate; if it is, that would change my ability to make the go-live date.” Is Fergus generally someone who nitpicks wording or has rigid expectations about how people should communicate? If not, I’d chalk this up to him being stressed during a period of high workload, or just a miscommunication where he thought you were refusing to take on anything else, not just explaining how it would affect the first project. (Also, if you’re exempt, this pay set-up is legal, but if you’re non-exempt, they’re legally required to pay you for all the hours you work — so if you’re paid for 35 hours but work 40 hours, those hours need to be added to your paycheck, not banked for use later.) 3. A terrible singer in a volunteer choir I’m part of a volunteer choir. While we perform, it’s non-audition so there’s a real focus on having fun. It’s a lovely, fun experience with one exception: one singer in the tenor section sings very loudly and very off-key (in the “peel the enamel from your teeth” fashion), to the point where when he sings I’ve genuinely seen people wince or jump at the sound. It’s like being ambushed by a turkey bashing at a xylophone. He clearly knows that he sings loudly enough to bother other people but doesn’t particularly care about amending his behavior: he’s made jokes a few times to other people that he’s surprised he hasn’t driven them off with his volume. He also makes a point of coming to stand at the front of his section which – because of the layout in which we stand – means everyone is impacted; some of the alto/soprano parts have tactfully asked other tenors to try and get that seat so we’re not so impacted, but so far there have been no takers! (The impact of the sound is also enhanced by the fact that no one else in his voice part sings particularly loudly, so you only ever hear him.) I’m sure he’s a perfectly pleasant guy and it’s not his fault if he’s tone-deaf, but the effect this is starting to have on the rest of us (plus the fact that he’s clearly aware there is at least some issue but doesn’t try to correct it) is really having a negative impact. It’s incredibly distracting when we sing together and is starting to affect people’s enjoyment of the choir. Multiple people have said it bothers them, and some even some said they don’t want to come anymore because of it. We suspect that our choir leaders over the years have been aware of this problem, because the tenors have been having far more generic, “let’s try singing that part again” coaching since Turkey Guy joined our ranks. However no leader has seemed to pull him up on this directly, most likely because we’re non-audition and people are never pulled up on “errors” for that reason. Plenty of people sing rather imperfectly in our choir, but the off-key plus incredibly shrill volume is making this a double whammy. It’s impacting my enjoyment of the choir so much that I’m tempted to lay this out to our choir leader, say how much it bothers multiple people’s enjoyment of the group, and ask if it would be possible to suggest he tone the volume down. As this is a voluntary group though, I don’t know if there’s anything else I should take into account. Any advice? Yes, you can do that! If it’s driving you and others to consider leaving the group, the leader should know that. You’re not making a demand; you’re saying, “This is affecting the enjoyment I get from participating, and since I’m at the point of considering leaving over it, I wanted to bring it to you and see if anything can be done.” In general I’d try to avoid speaking for others — but if other people are telling you unprompted that they might leave over it, you’re allowed to reference that too, so the leader is aware it’s not just one excessively sensitive person. The leader might choose not to do anything about it, but it’s information they should have. And really, dealing with this kind of thing is their responsibility; if it’s the first time a potentially awkward conversation has come up, they’ve been lucky. 4. Should I tell my boss to fire our new hire? We just hired someone for my team who is, to put it lightly, not doing well. I work on a team of analysts who do a lot of technical writing for a niche industry. There are four levels, and he got hired at level three (so fairly advanced). But so far, he has: 1) failed to complete basic tasks on a reasonable timeline despite handholding from me, my boss, and another coworker, 2) provided work that is riddled with spelling and grammar errors and a lack of basic grasp of the technical concepts, and 3) often been unavailable during standard work hours and non-responsive to time-sensitive requests, 4) while exhibiting a real “I’ve got it, no worries” attitude. I’ve given him kind but firm feedback when he messes up things that we work on together, and I’ve also been making pretty pointed comments to my boss about my concerns about his performance. My coworkers have expressed similar frustrations/concerns. Should I straight up suggest to my boss that she should fire him? I’m worried about stepping over the line, but I’m also worried she won’t take action before his probationary period is over, and then we will be stuck with him (it’s very hard to fire people here once they’ve passed that mark). It’s not overstepping to tell your boss that, having worked with the new hire closely, you don’t think he’s able to do the job that your team needs done. For example, you could say: “I’m concerned that Bob isn’t able to do the work we need from his position, even with feedback, and that if he stays past his probationary period, it will cause real problems for the team.” You could add, “I’d love to say I’ve seen improvement or the potential to improve, but everything I’ve seen so far makes me think that’s unlikely.” 5. Do I need to apologize for my email address? I am an elder millennial born in 1988. I still use the email address I made up when I was 12 or 13. I have my birth year in my email. Let’s say it’s MyName88@fakename.com. Recently I found out that the number 88 has an anti-semitic meaning. Had I known or ever heard of this, I would never have put it in my email. My fear was that the “88” in my email will be seen as a dog whistle to certain people. To rectify this, I have made a new email address and am slowly transitioning over to it. But sometimes I forget to use my new one. I recently applied for a job using the old email address. Total accident — just an error in the slow email transition process. I made it through the first virtual interview and my next step is an in-person interview. Should I bring up the 88 in my email address during the in person interview? I’d prefer not to dwell on this, but I value integrity too much to let a suspicion like that go uncorrected. I’d rather squash it now so we can move past it. It’s extremely unlikely that anyone will think that; they’ll assume it’s your birth year or your graduation year or something like that (and I say this as a Jewish person). If you were giving off other signs that you were a giant asshole, then the “88” might be interpreted through that lens, but otherwise you’re fine and no one is likely to suspect you put the number there to let everyone know you hate Jews. You don’t need to bring it up (and shouldn’t). The post I cry when people give me compliments, a terrible singer in a volunteer choir, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

The outgoing chair has made some mistakes, but his decision to stand up to The President was heroicView the full article

Chinese territory enjoys surge of investment from mainland as wealthy spread assets across different jurisdictionsView the full article

Andrius Kubilius pushes for governments to open weapons stockpiles to Ukraine View the full article

Despite $17bn in pledges, organisation is stuck in limbo with no money flowing to projects in GazaView the full article

Sovereign borrowers look to issuance in US dollars, Swiss francs and other currenciesView the full article

The technology opens the door for smaller, well-funded challengers to take market share from the Big Four and others View the full article

Agreement with unions ends wrangling over how to share spoils of boom at memory-chip makerView the full article

iPullRank tested Gmail and Photos signals in opted-in AI Mode Personal Intelligence accounts. Gmail showed the strongest brand visibility lift. The post Gmail Content Linked To AI Mode Brand Visibility Lift appeared first on Search Engine Journal. View the full article

Albert Manifold’s behaviour and use of personal devices cited as factors in his removal over conduct and governance concernsView the full article

Hands-on approach was viewed as aggressive by several colleagues at UK oil majorView the full article

Foreign Office announces measures against Huobi among several entities it says helped Russia evade economic pressureView the full article

Last weekend, when Puck announced that the sustainable fashion startup Everlane had been acquired by the Chinese ultra fast fashion retailer Shein, it sent shockwaves throughout the fashion world. Michael Preysman, who founded Everlane in 2011, was just as shocked. “I found out the same time as everyone else,” he said in a LinkedIn post a week ago. “I’m not involved with the company anymore, and like many, am still digesting the news.” Well, Preysman is done digesting. And it seems that he’s ready to do something about it. Preysman just announced stillradical.com, a new venture that we know little about other than the bare bones website it launched with. The website lays out the new vision with brevity: “I started Everlane in 2011. Last week, the current management team sold it to Shein. So we’re starting over. Same principles, but a new take. And this time: no venture capital, no private equity.” The site says you can learn more by signing up for a waitlist. (Preysman did not respond to a request for comment.) Preysman launched Everlane when he was in his mid-20s, after starting his career in finance. His vision was to sell high quality products directly to customers online, without the markup of middlemen like department stores. This helped kickstart the direct-to-consumer movement that dominated the 2010s, producing brands like Away, Warby Parker, Allbirds, and Glossier. To fuel its growth, Everlane took an undisclosed amount of venture capital. A few years in, Preysman turned his attention to the human and environmental impact of the fashion industry. Everlane promised to eradicate virgin plastic from its supply chain, and showed customers inside the factories they used, to highlight how it was paying attention to the working conditions of laborers. All of this was good for business. By 2016, Everlane was valued at $250 million, although it was unclear whether it had ever become profitable. In recent years, its growth slowed. It went through two rounds of layoffs, once during the pandemic and then again in 2023. L. Catterton—the venture capital wing of the luxury conglomerate LVMH—bought a majority stake in Everlane in 2020. Shortly after, Preysman left the company to launch a new supplements brand called Magna in 2024. For many, Everlane’s acquisition by Shein was a disappointing final chapter for a company that stood for optimism and ethics. Clearly, Preysman felt the same way about it. This new business suggests that he hasn’t given up on the idea of sustainable fashion. However, he’s realized that venture capital is not the right tool for launching an apparel business. It will be fascinating to see what lessons Preysman has taken from the rise and fall of Everlane, and how we plans to build his new company differently. View the full article

Victory of flawed Senate candidate Ken Paxton could cement the president’s hold on the party View the full article

Current CEO Rick Thornberry is retiring as Radian shifts to a multi-line business, with former Mr. Cooper President Mike Weinbach taking over on Aug. 13. View the full article

Unlike some of his industry peers, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has been surprisingly skeptical of the notion that AI is displacing workers. In an interview a few months ago, he argued that AI was a convenient scapegoat for some companies, echoing what some economists and experts have expressed about the narrative that AI is driving layoffs across corporate America. “I don’t know what the exact percentage is, but there’s some AI washing where people are blaming AI for layoffs that they would otherwise do. And then there’s some real displacement by AI of different kinds of jobs,” Altman said at the time. In an interview this week, however, Altman made a bolder statement, suggesting there was little evidence AI would do extensive damage to white-collar jobs, despite predictions to the contrary. “I’m delighted to ⁠be wrong about this,” he said on Tuesday during a virtual appearance at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia conference, according to a Reuters report. “I thought there would have been more impact on entry-level white-collar jobs being eliminated by now than ​has actually happened.” “My intuitions were just off,” he added. “People are like, ‘oh, you could have saved the world a lot of fear mongering and a lot of doom and gloom.’ But at the time I was like, ‘I see this is a real risk. We should probably ​talk about it.’” Part of the reason for this realization, Altman claims, is that he underestimated the human element that so many jobs require. He had tried using AI to field emails and Slack chats, but increasingly found himself responding to those messages himself—which apparently led him to believe the impact on jobs will be different than he had originally anticipated. “I don’t think we’re going to have the kind ​of jobs apocalypse that some of the companies in our space advocate or talk about,” he said. While companies have repeatedly cited AI and automation when conducting layoffs, the labor market does not yet reflect a mass reduction in jobs across the workforce. On top of that, even as tech leaders remain bullish about the promise of AI, there are signs that all their spending may not yield the results they are expecting. In another recent interview, an Uber executive cast doubt on the idea that the company’s AI investments had meaningfully boosted productivity, despite blowing through its 2026 AI budget in just a few months. On the Rapid Response podcast, Uber president Andrew Macdonald claimed the growing use of Claude Code tokens had not necessarily resulted in better features for consumers. “That link is not there yet, right? I think maybe implicitly there is more that is getting shipped, but it’s very hard to draw a line between one of those stats and, ‘Okay, now we’re actually producing 25% more useful consumer features,’” he said. Still, that awareness may not help preserve jobs, especially as companies demand greater productivity from their workforce. Whether or not AI can replace workers, tech employers continue making cuts to headcount to offset their sweeping AI investments. Some workers are already feeling the effects of widespread AI adoption, from Amazon warehouse workers to people who hold administrative jobs—and despite the concerns about white-collar employees, researchers have found there could be significant downstream effects for workers without college degrees. For all his talk, even Altman has noted that there’s a chance the fallout from AI could be worse than it seems right now—and that it could eventually come for his job, too. View the full article

Tehran vows to ‘not leave any mischief unanswered’ after the attacks View the full article

Most enterprise generative AI investments have yet to deliver the value companies envisioned, and every day, more leaders are recognizing that people lie at the heart of the struggle. In this year’s AI & Data Leadership Executive Benchmark Survey, 93% of executives leading AI and data efforts identified human issues around culture and change management as the primary obstacle to adoption. McKinsey Global Managing Partner Bob Sternfels put it plainly on HBR’s IdeaCast: “Half if not more of the secret sauce” in getting value from AI, he said, “is organizational change, as opposed to technology implementation.” As such, many leading companies have launched initiatives over the past several months to drive AI adoption across their workforces. These efforts run the gamut from carrot-to-stick approaches, with some rolling out hackathon programs and prizes for innovative uses. Others use weekly logins and token consumption as proxies for performance. A PERFORMATIVE APPROACH Leaders are right to focus on the people side of adoption. They need to be deliberate, however, about what they’re encouraging. I’ve learned something in my three decades helping some of the world’s largest companies through culture transformation. Employees prioritize what leaders model, incentivize, and reward. And initiatives built around shallow metrics can do more harm than good. It’s understandable why many leaders today celebrate deliverables simply because they were made with AI, or reward employees for integrating it into workflows. Facing underwhelming internal adoption metrics, many have come to see any increase in AI usage as a win. At my firm, however, we call this “trophy-style” AI adoption—which is to say, a performative approach focused more on usage than results. It’s focused on participation trophies over proof of impact. Leaders need to be wary of this trap. Because as anyone following the “workslop” problem or the emerging research on cognitive atrophy will know, not all AI use cases are created equal. Trophy-style adoption creates a dangerous illusion of progress, where activity masquerades as impact. In other words, we’re rewarding output over outcomes. A culture built around shallow adoption risks more than struggling to achieve ROI; in some cases, it might leave employees less equipped to meet business needs than prior to AI. IMPACTFUL ADOPTION Impactful AI adoption will look different based on the company, a person’s role, and many other factors. For some, it means deepening the quality of the same work product. For others, it means increasing output without sacrificing quality. And for still others, it means getting the same work done in less time, repurposing time and energy toward new questions and tasks. All the best adoption initiatives, however, will be reverse-engineered from the larger business strategy. They will be built around metrics that connect to it. The process of designing an adoption initiative should start with clarity and specificity around big-picture questions. What does value look like for our organization? How can different roles change to better deliver it? Leaders cannot lose sight of these framing questions as they determine what gets modeled and encouraged. Wise ones will drive for real business impacts that come from the usage. And when they showcase strong use cases, they will not just reward speed or deep integration. Instead, they will keep the focus on the larger picture, taking great care to explain the meaningful organizational outcomes driven by the use case. In Gagen MacDonald’s latest white paper, we dive into what it takes to do this well, and what organizations can do to bridge the separate realities that exist between leaders and employees around AI. Because while the employees who create the most impact with AI will certainly use it frequently, it’s a mistake to think of usage as synonymous with impact. And given how much companies have spent and plan to keep spending on this technology, it’s not a mistake many leaders can afford to make. Maril MacDonald is founder and CEO of Gagen MacDonald. View the full article

A day after Pope Leo XIV released his much anticipated encyclical on AI, the response from the AI community has been mainly positive, with some quibbling over the nature and potential of the technology. The Vatican released the encyclical, titled Magnifica Humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence, in Vatican City on Monday. (An encyclical is a high-importance teaching document issued by the Pope.) Broadly, the document aims to demarcate the fundamental differences between humans and machines and warn about the dangers of allowing AI to be controlled and distributed by a small group of people. The Pope denounced the “culture of power” driving the AI race, referencing the small set of wealthy investors and tech companies currently controlling the development and distribution of the technology. Pope Leo’s concerns also reflect a much broader religious debate around AI that has emerged across faith traditions in recent years. Religious leaders and scholars from Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and Buddhism have wrestled with everything from AI-written sermons and chatbot theologians to the technology’s impact on labor, misinformation, warfare, and the environment. While some communities have embraced AI tools for research, translation, and religious education, many leaders have emphasized that machines cannot replace divine inspiration, moral judgment, or the human relationship to faith. Pope Leo himself recently warned priests against using AI to prepare homilies, arguing that artificial intelligence “will never be able to share faith.” Within the AI research community, the response to Magnifica Humanitas has been mainly positive. One researcher, Chris Olah, participated in the Vatican’s process of shaping the ideas behind the encyclical. “This clearly raises questions beyond computer science,” Olah said in a companion statement to Magnifica Humanitas. “The machinery that makes this possible is the work of math and programming and science. But what character we choose, how it interacts with the world, how it ought to interact with the world—these are more clearly questions for the humanities, for religion, for philosophy, for society at large.” The encyclical, which is 85 pages long, was informed by extensive conversations with scientists, engineers, educators, political leaders, and families, the Vatican said. ‘The Pope is right’ Author and systems architect Daniel Jefferies broadly agreed on X with the Pope’s warning that AI will reflect the values of the people and institutions controlling it. “The Pope is right: AI takes on the characteristics of those who build it, finance it, and regulate it,” Jefferies wrote, before arguing that concentrated corporate control over AI could create “digital oligarchies” resembling modern-day East India Companies. AI pioneer and Turing Award winner Yann LeCun retweeted Jefferies’ post. Another Turing Award winner, Yoshua Bengio, echoed the Pope’s concern over AI’s potentially destructive power. “Like nuclear energy, AI must be at the service of all and of the common good. Decisions about technology must never be separated from conscience and responsibility.” ‘Relatively mundane AI dangers and changes’ Not everyone in the AI community agrees with the Vatican’s view of what AI is, or what it could eventually become. The encyclical draws a firm distinction between AI systems and human beings, arguing that machines cannot possess consciousness, morality, or lived experience. “So-called artificial intelligences do not undergo experiences, do not possess a body, do not feel joy or pain, do not mature through relationships and do not know from within what love, work, friendship or responsibility mean,” the document states. AI commentator Zvi Mowshowitz took issue with that premise.“ The central claim, wherein Pope Leo denies that AIs can think or importantly be minds, is wrong, as Olah points out in his statements,” he wrote on Substack. “Without the understanding of what AI is capable of becoming, the document effectively only deals with relatively mundane AI dangers and changes, although that on its own is still rather quite a lot to deal with and discuss.” AI policy analyst and writer Dean Ball says the church should focus on helping humans flourish as AI evolves further. “Some think I want the Pope to ‘ensoul’ AI or acknowledge AI feelings. I don’t,” Ball posted on X. “What I want is for the Church to contemplate what *humans* should do as we are eclipsed as the smartest entities on the planet, at least for many reasonable people’s definitions of the word ‘smart.’” President Donald The President has yet to post about the encyclical on Truth Social, but his former AI “czar,” David Sacks, weighed in. Sacks isn’t worried about letting a small set of AI companies effectively regulate themselves; he’s worried about giving the government the power to do it. (And who can pass up a couple of literary and historical knowledge flexes when the opportunity presents? Not Sacks.) Writing on X, David Sacks argued that giving governments broad authority over AI in the name of safety could ultimately enable censorship, surveillance, and social control. Invoking both George Orwell and the Latin phrase “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes” (translation: “Who will guard the guardians?”), Sacks wrote that “The oldest questions of human nature and authority don’t disappear in the AI age. They become newly relevant.” (In response to Sacks’ X post, a number of prominent voices in the AI world have since weighed in. Among them was Hugging Face CEO Clem Delangue, who argued that “the most important AI risk is concentration,” and cognitive scientist Gary Marcus, who warned against “leaving unelected private companies the ability to censor, surveil and control citizens.”) The The President administration, influenced by tech nouveau right figures like Sacks and Marc Andreessen, has gone to great lengths to keep the AI industry free of government oversight and regulation. Notably, most of the tech nouveau right crowd has remained silent on the Pope’s treatise. There have been no public comments yet from Elon Musk, Andreessen, Palmer Luckey, Balaji Srinivasan, Keith Rabois, Joe Lonsdale, or Jason Calacanis. View the full article

LastPass has come under fire in recent years following a 2022 data breach that compromised user vaults. Despite the controversy, it remains a popular and user-friendly option for saving credentials. But you don't have to stick to LastPass' default setup: If LastPass is your password manager of choice, these are the best hacks to optimize your experience. Use vault identities to keep work and personal credentials separate If you have one LastPass account for both work and personal use, you can separate relevant items into sub-vaults. When you toggle between them, you'll see only the credentials relevant to that identity, and LastPass will suggest only those items for autofill. This reduces confusion and clutter, especially if you have both personal and professional accounts for the same services. You can also create mini-vaults based on category themes (such as travel or shopping) to organize your data. Go to Advanced options > Add identities on the left-hand navigation and click the Add icon. Name the new identity and drag and drop items into it. Then click Save. You can switch identities from the drop-down under your user account. Set up custom fields to save PINs and security questionsIn addition to your username and password, LastPass has custom fields you can use if a website or app requires other inputs—such as a PIN or security question—for logging in. Instead of saving these as text in a notes box, you can specify the name and value in a custom field. Open your password, tap the Edit icon, and select Custom fields > Add custom field. Add the name in the Field label column, then enter the value in the Field content column and tap Save. Use "Favorites" to quickly launch frequently visited sites If you open the same sites over and over—such as your work email, calendar, or project management platform—you can add these to your LastPass favorites and launch them all with one click. This streamlines your morning workflow, so you no longer need to type URLs or open separate bookmarks. Find the item you want to favorite in your vault, hover and tap the Edit icon, and select Star > Save. When you're ready to launch, go to Advanced Options in the sidebar of your web vault and hit Open your favorite sites. Each will open in a new tab, and LastPass can autofill credentials if needed. Use item history to restore old passwords or reverse a lockout If you update credentials on a website or app, password managers will prompt you to automatically save the new version to your vault. Sometimes, though, the site itself glitches or fails to update the password, locking you out of your account. Instead of going through a tedious reset process, you can view the version history in LastPass to grab the most recent password. Open the item and select Edit, tap the History icon, and select View to see the last five changes. Add important documents to Notes for easy access when you travelIf you need access to important documents like your passport, birth certificate, or medical records when you're away from home, but don't want to store them in the cloud unsecured, you can add them to LastPass. The app encrypts each document, so they're accessible only when your vault is unlocked on your device. Attachments can be up to 10 MB each. (Free users have a total storage limit of 50 MB, while LastPass Premium subscribers get 1 GB.) Select Notes in the navigation bar and tap the Add Item icon. Select Attachments and follow the prompts. LastPass supports a variety of file types, including .pdf, .docx, .jpeg, and .txt. Whitelist other countries so you can access your vault abroad (or when using a VPN) By default, LastPass limits logins to your vault to the country where your account was created—a security feature that protects your account from unauthorized access attempts. However, there may be times when you need to access from a different country, such as when you're traveling or using a VPN connection elsewhere in the world. You can whitelist additional countries under Account settings > General > Show Advanced Settings. Under Security > Country Restriction, check Only allow login from selected countries and select the countries you want to add. Then hit Update, enter your master password, and select Continue. Restrict views on shared logins to keep passwords hiddenCredential sharing is a useful feature in most password managers, as it allows you to securely send logins for shared accounts. However, there may be times when you want to grant someone access to an account to complete a task but not allow them to view the password itself—for example, if you have an assistant who uses your social media or billing platforms, or a family member who wants temporary access to a streaming service. When you hide passwords, those you share with can use autofill but not view or copy the plain-text credential. When you share individual items, you can leave Allow Recipient to View Password unchecked; in Shared Folders, you can check Hide Passwords next to the recipient's name. Set up emergency access to pass down your digital estateUnlike some password managers, LastPass has an explicit legacy access feature that allows you to will your vault to a trusted contact if you are incapacitated. Once invited, a trusted contact can request access to your vault. If you don't decline the request within a specified wait time, they will receive an Emergency Access folder in their vault containing all of the items in yours. Vault owners can revoke access later, but this is useful if your trusted contact needs to manage financial accounts or have access to other data, even temporarily. In your vault, go to Emergency access in the left navigation menu and open the People I Trust tab. Tap the plus sign and enter your trusted contact's email. (Note that they must also have a LastPass account or create one.) Specify the wait time, then hit Send Invite. Set up equivalent domains to merge multiple items into one entry If you have a single account you use to log in across multiple domains or subdomains from a single provider, you can merge these items in your LastPass vault instead of maintaining separate entries. For example, you might have a single account used across Apple domains that you'd prefer not to store as individual items. This reduces clutter in your vault and streamlines your autofill options down to one. Go to Advanced options in your vault and select Autofill settings > Equivalent Domains > Add new. In the domain field, enter the domain you want to merge, then tap Add. Add 'Never URLs' to prevent LastPass from autofilling credentials or forms on specific websitesAnother useful advanced setting is "Never URLs," which allows you to disable some (or all) LastPass interaction with certain sites. You can opt to prevent pop-ups prompting you to generate or save a password—which can happen if you're simply entering a two-factor authentication code—or disable autofill if multiple people are using the same device. Go to Advanced options > Autofill settings > Never URLs and select Add new. Enter the URL and select the desired action, then hit Save. View the full article