What's on Your Mind?

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Let’s hear it for the frazzled. Those multitasking, multiskilled superhero women (and let’s be honest, they’re almost always women) whose days are packed to the brim—juggling leadership roles and caregiving, studying in between appointments, work calls, and late-night birthday party prep. They’re keeping it all going and doing it well, even if they feel like they’re barely holding it together. Procrastination? They don’t have time for it. In my new book Small Moves, Big Life, I lay out clear, accessible daily practices for dialing down overwhelm, especially for women in high-performance positions. It’s all about small, repeatable actions that keep you productive, focu…

When asked, 88% of Americans will say they’re above average drivers. In the ability to get along with others, 25% of students rate themselves in the top 1%. When couples are asked to estimate their individual contributions to household work, the combined total routinely exceeds 100%. These are all statistical impossibilities. They’re also great examples of how we’re predisposed to overrate our abilities and contributions. As an aspiring CEO candidate, it’s important to have the humility to recognize your inherent, self-serving bias and counteract it through the following steps: Objectively assess your capabilities versus what’s needed Fill your skill gaps and gaug…

Glen Powell has proven that he can hold it down as the star of blockbuster movies, from Twisters to Hit Man. But on October 3, in his hometown of Austin, he was holding down the grill at the parking lot of his local Walmart. Powell’s grill work was pulling double duty as promotion for his new TV comedy, Chad Powers, and for Smash Kitchen, his clean food brand, which launched at Walmart in April. The brand debuted with a suite of condiments including ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, and barbecue sauce that look and taste on par with heritage brands but are made with all-organic ingredients. Priced from $1.97 to $4.97, they’re just pennies more expensive than their legacy …

After weeks (or months) of applying and interviewing for jobs, you finally land the role made for you. It’s a moment of celebration and relief—this feels like the finish line. But what happens if, mere days after starting, you think: Did I just make a huge mistake? Maybe the job description was misleading, maybe the culture feels off, or maybe you just can’t shake the sense that you simply made the wrong move. Should you immediately look for the exit? Or is it possible to turn things around and make the role work? Early job regret can be a common experience, but it’s also one that needs to be handled carefully, both for your career growth and your profession…

We’re more than half a decade removed from pandemic lockdowns—when remote work profoundly upended the 9-to-5—yet the preference for workday flexibility endures, a new report shows. According to the recently released ninth annual State of Hybrid Work report from Owl Labs, a video conference tech company, 65% of workers are interested in a concept the report refers to as “microshifting”: “structured flexibility with short, nonlinear work blocks matched to your energy, duties, or productivity.” In other words: breaking up your work shift into a bunch of tiny ones. Perhaps you log on at 6 a.m. to get a head start, then take a break for a midmorning Pilates class befo…

Below, Ann Tashi Slater shares five key insights from her new book, Traveling in Bardo: The Art of Living in an Impermanent World. Slater has published fiction, essays, and interviews in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Guernica, and Granta, among others, as well as in The Penguin Book of Modern Tibetan Essays and American Dragons (HarperCollins). Her speaking and teaching engagements include Princeton, Columbia, Oxford, the American University of Paris, the Rubin Museum of Art, and Asia Society. What’s the big idea? Traveling in Bardo interweaves explorations of impermanence in our everyday existence with Slater’s girl…

Digital tools are a necessary part of work life for just about any office gig. But using too many apps, communication platforms, and other tools can be massively frustrating. And according to newly released research, switching back and forth between online systems is also a time thief. Localization platform Lokalise recently surveyed 1,000 U.S. white-collar workers from 11 industries to examine how digital tools impact professionals and how they feel about using a variety of online systems. Overwhelmingly, the report found that workers are frustrated by having to use many different platforms. Some 17% of workers say they have to switch platforms more than 100 ti…

OpenAI’s announcements at its third annual developer conference told a lot about where the company is in its evolution. In the past, the company’s executives talked mainly about new models that were smarter, cheaper, or more efficient. At the event in San Francisco on October 6, the company’s leaders said relatively little about their latest models, and nothing about AGI or superintelligence. Instead, they discussed new ways to make the AI do real work that matters. Building functional agents One of the keys to enterprise customers realizing a return on their investment in AI is the creation of intelligent agents capable of completing complex business tasks. …

Last week, subscribers of Microsoft’s Game Pass were in an uproar over plans to hike the price from $19.99 per month to $29.99. One of the most surprising reactions, however, came not from gamers, but from retail partner GameStop. While you’ll pay $30 per month if you sign up for Game Pass Ultimate directly with Microsoft, you’ll get the same old price — for some indefinite period — if you stick with GameStop. “Xbox Game Pass Ultimate is still $19.99 a month with us. You’re welcome,” the retailer wrote in a social media post. Gamers can subscribe to GamePass directly from their XBox, via their PC, and on the web. Those who plan to take advantage of the lower price …

Some good news on the weight-loss front: Customers can now go to Costco to get Ozempic and Wegovy, brand-name injectable prescription drugs manufactured by drug maker Novo Nordisk, which contain the same active ingredient: semaglutide. The Danish pharmaceutical firm announced Friday that both are available at the big-box retailer’s pharmacies nationwide, for $499 for a month’s supply—the same price as sold in CVS, Walmart, and the company’s direct-to-consumer website. You’ll still need a prescription to buy the drugs. Fast Company has reached out to both Costco and Novo Nordisk for comment. Also—Costco is offering a 2% discount for both Costco executive member…

According to the company’s annual analysis, this year’s shopping season won’t just break records—it’ll rewrite the playbook. AI assistants are set to steer how people search, shop, and spend, while buy-now-pay-later plans help stretched consumers keep the holiday magic alive. Each year, Adobe uses data from its Adobe Analytics platform to predict what the shopping landscape and consumer behavior will look like between November 1 and December 31. According to Adobe’s description, the data includes inputs from many of the top 100 retailers in the U.S., covering over 1 trillion visits to retail sites, 100 million SKUs, and 18 product categories. In 2025, Adobe says …

Some flavor crazes flirt with us and fade. Others stay and make themselves at home. It’s too soon to tell for sure, but the Dubai chocolate movement seems to have put down roots and is spreading at a brisk clip. The sweet flavors and thick texture that have made Dubai chocolate bars a hit are morphing into other kinds of confections too. Let’s back up for a minute. The original and now-classic Dubai chocolate bar was created by Fix Chocolatier in the United Arab Emirates in 2021, and by 2023 had exploded on social media. Rich and indulgent, it features a thick, milk chocolate shell usually encasing a creamy pistachio (and often tahini) filling mixed with crispy, s…

It’s the life of a saleswoman. Taylor Swift’s 12th studio album, “The Life of a Showgirl,” sold 2.7 million copies in traditional album sales — which include physical and digital formats — in its first day in the U.S. That’s according to Luminate, an industry data and analytics company. The album was released Friday. The sales are impressive for a number of reasons. Swift has broken her record for most first-week sales… in one day. Her last album, 2024’s “The Tortured Poets Department,” amassed 2.61 million equivalent album units in the U.S. in its first week. “The Life of a Showgirl” has also become the second-largest sales week for any album in the modern er…

For its 50th anniversary, Zara has partnered with 50 designers and creators for a collection you might not expect from a fast-fashion mall brand. The Spanish fashion retailer unveiled its 50th anniversary collection at Paris Fashion Week with collaborators that include photographer Annie Leibovitz, supermodel Cindy Crawford, stage designer Es Devlin, and musician Robbie Williams. Available worldwide beginning Oct. 6, the collection does include plenty to wear (Leibovitz contributed a photo for a t-shirt), but what stands out most are the non-apparel items. This is about a whole lot more than clothes. Devlin, whose build stages for artists like Adele, Beyoncé, …

Semiconductor maker AMD will supply its chips to artificial intelligence company OpenAI as part of an agreement to team up on building AI infrastructure, the companies said Monday. OpenAI will also get the option to buy as much as a 10% stake in AMD, according to a joint statement announcing the deal. It’s the latest deal for the ChatGPT maker as it races to beef up its AI computing resources. Under the terms of the deal, OpenAI will buy the latest version of the company’s high performance graphics chips, the Instinct MI450, which is expected to debut next year. The agreement calls for supplying 6 gigawatts of computing power for OpenAI’s “next generation” AI …

The list of retailers that have yanked pasta products from their shelves continues to grow in the wake of a deadly Listeria outbreak. On October 4, grocery retailer Kroger Co voluntarily recalled deli pasta salads sold at Kroger-owned locations including Ralphs, Smith’s, and Fred Meyer, in addition to Kroger stores. The products were recalled due to a risk of contamination with Listeria monocytogenes. The recall notice was published to the website of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Saturday. To date, no illnesses have been reported in connection with this recall. However, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the USDA’s Food Safety and …

Six years ago, I wrote (with colleague Jennifer Riel) a Harvard Business Review article on functional strategy. But the questions about functional strategy keep coming unabated. It is a vexatious issue for CEOs, functional leaders, and boards of directors. So, I thought it would make sense to dedicate a Playing to Win/Practitioner Insights (PTW/PI) to Functional Strategy: The Three Key Functional Leader Tasks. And as always, you can find all the previous PTW/PI here. How Did We Get Here? In the business world today, there are great differences of opinion as to what functional strategy is or even whether functions should have strategies. A prevalent view holds that …

Empathy is not just a “nice-to-have” soft skill—it is a foundation of how children and adults regulate emotions, build friendships, and learn from one another. Between the ages of 6 and 9, children begin shifting from being self-centered to noticing the emotions and perspectives of others. This makes early childhood one of the most important periods for developing empathy and other social-emotional skills. Traditionally, pretend play has been a natural way to practice empathy. Many adults can remember acting out scenes as doctor and patient, or using sticks and leaves as imaginary currency. Those playful moments were not just entertainment—they were early lessons …