What's on Your Mind?

Sending LinkedIn DMs—the digital version of cold-calling—can come across as pushy and is becoming a much-less-effective strategy for job seekers. Luckily, there is so much more that LinkedIn is capable of when it comes to facilitating job hunting. Here experts share their advice for engaging with companies, catching recruiters’ attention, and opening doors to new career opportunities, all without sending unsolicited messages. Optimize Your Profile for Recruiter Visibility We see many talented professionals who believe they need to constantly send direct messages to get noticed on LinkedIn, but we find the most effective approach is often more subtle. A fantastic st…

Relationships can feel like both a blessing and the bane of your existence, a source of joy and a source of frustration or resentment. At some point, each of us is faced with a clingy child, a dramatic friend, a partner who recoils at the first hint of intimacy, a volatile parent, or a controlling boss — in short, a difficult relationship. As a psychology professor and relationship scientist, I’ve spent countless hours observing human interactions, in the lab and in the real world, trying to understand what makes relationships work – and what makes them feel utterly intractable. Recently, I teamed up with psychologist Rachel Samson, who helps individuals, couples …

March might be over but the madness continues into April. The NCAA’s 68 Division I men’s college basketball teams have battled it out on the courts in single-elimination play, leaving four teams standing. This year the Final Four have something in common: They all were granted No. 1 seeds on Selection Sunday. Duke, Florida, Auburn, and Houston were all safe bets when filling out a bracket, and they delivered on that promise. Here’s what you need to know heading into the remaining competition, and how to tune in. Do the No. 1 seed teams always make it to the end? The short answer is no. This is only the second time in history this has happened. The last time was 200…

March is kind of a wild month — it’s got a little bit of everything. At first glance, Women’s History Month and March Madness might feel like an odd pairing, but lately, they actually go hand in hand. Thanks to the Caitlin Clark effect (you know the one), women’s college basketball has been booming. In fact, in 2024, the women’s NCAA championship game drew more viewers than the men’s for the first time ever. Will that momentum keep going this year? We’re about to find out. The Final Four is here, and UCLA, South Carolina, Texas, and UConn are all ready to bring it. Here’s what you need to know — and how to catch every minute of the action. When and where is the Women’…

A Thanksgiving tradition since 1924, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade has not quite turned 100 years-old yet. How is this possible you might wonder? Because it was skipped for three years—1942, 1943, and 1944—during World War II. Nevertheless, its 99th anniversary is shaping up to be spectacular. Here’s everything you need to know about the (mostly) annual event in New York City, including how to tune in. The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade by the numbers It takes many people to pull off the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. (Some even do the pulling literally.) There will be more than 5,000 volunteers working hard to make magic happen. This spectacle inclu…

Just four days into the new year, awards season kicked off with the Critics Choice Awards. One week later, it’s time for the Golden Globes to shine. The 83rd edition of this star-studded event—which takes place on Sunday, January 11, in Beverly Hills, California—celebrates greatness in both television and film. Here’s everything you need to know about the big night, including how to tune in. History and past controversy of the Golden Globe Awards The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA), the former organization behind the Golden Globes, was founded in 1943. Under this banner, journalists came together to create an awards ceremony to honor the artists the…

You are going to want to turn up the volume on your television sets. It’s time for the 68th Grammy Awards, which take place on Sunday, February 1. The movers, shakers, and singers of the Recording Academy are primed to put on one heck of a concert at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles. Let’s take a look at the host, nominations, and upcoming changes before we dive into how to tune in and jam. Who is hosting the 2026 Grammy Awards? Trevor Noah is back for his sixth consecutive year as the master of ceremonies. This is going to be his last hurrah, though. In fact, he almost didn’t do the honors this year. Executive producer Ben Winston told the Los Ange…

The fleeting nature of the Olympic Winter Games makes them all the more alluring. The scarcity is almost sacred. Competitors work their whole lifetimes for one shot at glory that takes place over a period of just a few weeks. To celebrate every athletic achievement at the XXV Olympic Winter Games, the closing ceremony will take place Sunday, February 22. Here’s everything you need to know including how to tune in. Where will the Milano Cortina Olympic Closing Ceremony take place? Just like William Shakespeare intended, it’s fair in Verona where we lay our scene. The Milano Cortina Closing Ceremony will be held at the Verona Arena, which many historians believe …

Pope Francis’ funeral mass will be held on Saturday morning in St. Peter’s Square, a large plaza in front of St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City. Francis’ funeral will take place six days after he died of a stroke and heart failure at age 88. It comes after three days of public viewing at St. Peter’s Basilica, where tens of thousands of people flocked to pay their respects to the first Latin American pope. After the mass, the pope’s coffin will be taken to Rome and entombed at St. Mary Major Basilica, near his favorite Madonna icon, making him the first pope to be buried outside of the Vatican in over a century, according to NPR. (Leo XIII was the last pope burie…

December is here, and another year has blown by. Chances are, you’re going to get some time off for the holidays. If so, you may have a week(-ish) to recharge before you have to ramp back up in January. In order to get the most out of your time off, it would be ideal if you could unplug from work completely to give your mind a rest and to focus on family, friends, and yourself. There are a few things you can do to prepare now that will help a lot and will also make your transition back to the office go smoothly. Close as many tasks as possible Research going back almost 100 years finds that when you have a task to complete, you are highly motivated to finish it…

While 40 hours has been the standard workweek for the last few generations, the promise has long been that technology will give us more free time. Yet many Americans still find work spilling over into nights and weekends. Whether you want to cut back your hours to make room for a side hustle, to spend more time with your family, or to pursue your own interests and hobbies, it is possible to complete your full-time job in 30 hours a week. As a time management coach for over 16 years, I’ve worked with a lot of people in a lot of situations. What I’ve seen is that almost everyone can reduce the amount of time they’re working. Getting down to 30 hours or less per week i…

Oscar Wilde famously noted, “Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go.” It is arguably one of the best brief illustrations of emotional intelligence (EQ), a trait that became popular thanks to a nonacademic best-selling book by journalist Daniel Goleman, in which he insinuated that EQ is a more important driver of success than IQ (a claim that has been discredited). And yet, there’s no shortage of evidence for the importance of EQ when it comes to predicting interpersonal effectiveness, defined as the ability to manage yourself and others in everyday life. In fact, long before EQ was coined in academic research (before Goleman popularized the te…

The most frequent mistake companies make when applying? They fail to focus on a single, representative example of internally grown innovation. Here’s some advice on how to produce a more compelling application for Fast Company’s Best Workplaces for Innovators 2025. Get Real Jargon won’t win you any awards. Applications that read as if they were written to appeal primarily to an internal audience are not likely to earn high marks from our judges. Use clear language to describe your innovation programs. We’re looking for companies that do more than just talk the talk. Be Current Focus on a recent or ongoing example. We’re looking for current hotbeds of innovat…

Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies is our flagship franchise and one of our most eagerly awaited editorial projects each year. To determine honorees, our editorial team spends months evaluating organizations that are driving progress across industries and around the world. We track their performance, compare them to competitors, and assess their impact within broader industry and societal trends. The final list serves as both a definitive snapshot of innovation today and a road map for what’s next. Here’s what we’re looking for: Fresh innovation Most Innovative Companies is not a lifetime achievement award. We’re interested in what’s new. Tell us about produc…

I have a confession to make. For most of my career in creative leadership roles, I have contributed to collaboration overload. I believed that bringing everyone together to swap ideas was the surest path to stronger work. If the room was full and the conversation was flowing, I assumed we were headed in the right direction. And I know I’m not alone. Collaboration overload has crept into creative teams everywhere—shaped by hybrid schedules, the pressure to stay visible when we’re apart, and a steady flow of digital tools like Slack and Teams that keep us connected but can slowly chip away at focus. Creative teams have reached a point where we are spending so mu…

The rise of full-body MRI scans has been framed as a victory for consumer empowerment. Skip the referrals. Skip the waiting. Pay out of pocket and finally see what is happening inside your body, before it’s too late. For many, especially women, these scans are compelling. They offer agency in a healthcare system that often feels slow, dismissive, and reactive, rather than preventive. What many women would be surprised to learn, however, is despite the name, many full-body MRI scans do not reliably screen for breast cancer, the most common cancer in women. Women make roughly 80% of healthcare purchasing decisions in the United States. They spend more out of pocket …