What's on Your Mind?

Over the past few weeks, I’ve traveled across the U.S. and Europe, attending back-to-back leadership conferences. These weren’t your average networking events; they were filled with C-suite executives asking difficult questions in a particularly charged moment: What’s next for DEI? How do we adapt and innovate when it comes to AI? How do we steer employees in a politically divided country? On stage, speakers repeated polished points, but to me, the most important part of what these gatherings offered wasn’t the panel talks—it was the smaller, informal meetings taking place, the standing around high-tops, and the walks to the various meals. In these candid conversation…

Welcome to Pressing Questions, Fast Company’s workplace advice column. Every week, deputy editor Kathleen Davis, host of The New Way We Work podcast, will answer the biggest and most pressing workplace questions. Q: How do I make a good first impression? A: Since this is a work-life advice column I’ll focus mostly on how you can make a good impression at work, but many of these tips work for other situations in life. Be interested: Ask questions It’s a simple truism of most conversations and human interactions: People like to feel like they’re interesting and important. If you know whom you’ll be meeting, you can go one step further and do a little research in ad…

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. As I’ve been closely tracking in ResiClub’s monthly metro- and county-level housing inventory analysis, over the past year the supply-demand equilibrium—measured by shifts and levels in active housing inventory and months of supply—has shifted directionally in favor of homebuyers. That doesn’t mean buyers have all the leverage, or that the picture is the same in every market. Directionally, however, homebuyers in most markets have gained leverage compared to the 2024 spring housing market. This shift is also showing up in the pricing data—specificall…

Disability is often framed as something to accommodate instead of celebrate. But Visible Voices, a new digital platform launching today on Global Accessibility Awareness Day 2025, is challenging that mindset. The platform is part magazine, part gallery, and part curated e-shop. As a whole, it’s repositioning disability as a source of culture, creativity, and style, fueled by the belief that accessibility and aesthetics should not be at odds. Cofounded by journalist Bérénice Magistretti and creative entrepreneur Reuben Selby, both of whom live with invisible disabilities, Visible Voices is the platform they wish existed when they were first navigating those identi…

As automakers look to get more people in electric vehicles, they continue to make advancements in EV batteries—developments that add range, speed up charging times, or lower costs, all of which entice customer adoption. Now, General Motors says it has developed a new kind of EV battery that provides a higher range at a more affordable price, and that it aims to become the first carmaker to deploy the technology. Called lithium manganese-rich (LMR) prismatic battery cells, these batteries use a higher amount of less-expensive minerals, like magnesium, rather than more of the most expensive minerals like cobalt and nickel. Most EVs in the U.S. use lithium-ion batteries…

Natural disasters—from tornadoes across the South and Midwest, to the fires in Los Angeles to Hurricane Helene’s devastation in North Carolina—have upended communities, with small businesses among the hardest hit. As extreme weather events become more frequent, these businesses have emerged as vital anchors of community recovery. While urban enterprises navigate complex rebuilding amid dense infrastructure, rural businesses face distinct challenges in disaster response. Yet across geographies, small businesses play a critical role in stabilizing and revitalizing their communities after catastrophe. Rural small businesses, in particular, serve a dual role: They’re not …

After weeks of searching and applying, you’ve made it to the interview stage, a victory in and of itself. But what happens if you land multiple interviews with different companies at the same time? While it’s certainly a good problem to have, it’s still one that needs to be handled with care—especially if one of the companies asks whether you’re interviewing elsewhere. But does interviewing with multiple companies make you seem like a more desirable candidate—or someone less committed? What if you get a job offer from one company, but are midway through the hiring process at another? These questions are common, and how you handle them can impact not only you…

It’s been less than a year since the world’s largest dam removal project was completed along 420 miles of the Klamath River, near the border of Oregon and California. But if you look at the river now, you might not know that four dams had ever been in place. Instead of concrete walls and artificial reservoirs, the river is now free-flowing—and parts of the former infrastructure have been replaced by wildflowers that are in bloom. Los Angeles Times “It’s been an incredible transition,” says Ann Willis, California regional director at American Rivers, a nonprofit that supported Native American tribes in a decades-long fight to take out the dams. “It’s really strange …

Amid polarization, AI disruption, and eroding trust in institutions, retired four-star General Stanley McChrystal argues that what leaders need now more than ever is character. Head of the business consulting firm McChrystal Group, he has written a new book on character, drawing from his decades of experience. From AI ethics and modern warfare to hot-button issues like Signalgate and transgender service in the military, McChrystal explains why character is the foundation of lasting leadership. This is an abridged transcript of an interview from Rapid Response, hosted by the former editor-in-chief of Fast Company Bob Safian. From the team behind the Masters of Scale p…

Dr. Drew Ramsey is a board-certified psychiatrist and psychotherapist. He is a leading voice in nutritional psychiatry and integrative mental health. He is a fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and the founder of the Brain Food Clinic and Spruce Mental Health. For 20 years, he was an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Columbia University. His book Eat to Beat Depression and Anxiety was an international bestseller, and his work has been featured by The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, the Today show, NPR, and other outlets. What’s the big idea? The time to start working on positive mental health outcomes should not be when a mental heal…

Lately, I’ve felt weighed down by the constant churn of chaos and uncertainty—like I’m carrying a low-grade tension in my body that never fully lets up. The news is dizzying. The pace of change is relentless. Some days it feels like we’re lurching from one crisis to the next with no time to process, no moment to exhale. I find myself waking up already bracing for what the day might bring. It’s like the ground is constantly shifting, and we’re all being asked to find our footing in real time. And then there are the quieter, internal questions I carry with me—the ones that tug at me in the middle of the night or when I’m trying to make sense of the day: Am I doing enoug…

Navigating the nexus between design innovation and practical application reveals a stark truth: Constraints, not freedoms, often spur the most creative solutions. Our journey into accessible furniture and product design is less about overcoming limitations and more about embracing the profound potential of human-centric design. Imagine designers not just as creators but as researchers, delving deep into the daily lives of older individuals and people with disabilities through intensive ethnographic research. This approach involves hundreds of hours spent observing diverse populations in their most familiar environments—their homes. Here, every interaction and every s…

Ask almost any pediatrician or child expert, and they will tell you: Good nutrition is the foundation for healthy development, especially during the first 1,000 days of a child’s life. When children are well-nourished, they are better able to grow, learn, and engage with their communities, and to be resilient in the face of illness.     Undernutrition is linked to nearly half of all deaths in children under five. Today, an estimated 148 million young children are affected by stunting—being too short for their age as a result of chronic undernutrition, often starting in the womb. Stunting isn’t just about height; it reflects lasting setbacks in brain development, immu…

The 2025 WNBA season is upon us, and it’s already making waves. From Caitlin Clark draining logo threes to Paige Bueckers debuting for the Dallas Wings, and the Golden State Valkyries hitting the court for the first time, pre-season coverage has been electric. For those of us who’ve spent years advocating for women’s sports, the buzz surrounding this season isn’t just exciting, it’s a powerful reflection of the league’s progress and promise. Rising viewership. New sponsorships. Sold-out arenas. Long-overdue increases in minimum salaries making their way into collective bargaining agreements. These are signs that the tide is turning. But let’s not mistake momentum for …

Since its last major redesign in 2022, Airbnb has been all about the destination. Staying in homes so unique or glamorous—from McMansions with amazing pools to surrealist homes in a shoe—that they might be worth a trip unto itself. But starting today, Airbnb is expanding its purview beyond homes…again. It’s launching a new product called Airbnb Services, and redoubling on Airbnb Experiences (first launched in 2016). What are Airbnb Services? Services considers everything you might want to accompany that home you’re renting. Photography. A manicure. A massage or spa treatment. A personal trainer. A private chef or fully catered experience. It’s basically eve…

Everyone has their individual bad memories of the pandemic, but one collective nightmare of the early days of that miserable period is the struggle to find toilet paper at the local store. Now, tariffs are bringing concerns about a toilet paper shortage back to the forefront. Suzano SA is the world’s largest exporter of pulp, the raw material for products like toilet paper. And the company tells Bloomberg it has seen shipments decline from Brazil to the U.S. due to tariffs and worries the shipping disruptions could get worse. It is, to be clear, much too early to know what the impact of pulp shipping disruptions will be. The company said shipments were down 20% in…

On Tuesday, Microsoft said it is cutting less than 3% of its global workforce, including LinkedIn. The company which an estimated 228,000 employees as of last June, meaning the layoffs will affect approximately 6,000 employees. The tech giant, which makes popular software products Windows and Word, will make cuts across various locations, teams, and roles. “We continue to implement organizational changes necessary to best position the company for success in a dynamic marketplace,” a Microsoft spokesperson told Fast Company. The news comes less than two weeks after the Redmond, Washington-based company beat first quarter earnings expectations, driven by its Azure c…

Eleven years after Google first announced its grand unifying theory of design—Material Design—it’s introducing its third major revision to the system. Called Material 3 Expressive, the company will tell you that it’s their most “researched update” ever, promising to help people find what they’re looking for on the screen faster than before. But it’s also the company’s most maximalist design system to date. Still enabling quieter minimalist designs, sure, but embracing bolder colors, more playful animations, and all around more overt approaches to interface. There’s a new roundness to almost every component, right down to the tips of Google’s new default typeface, Google S…

Destination weddings are out, and virtual weddings are in. Rather than traveling to the Amalfi Coast or Provence, Wired recently interviewed a couple who chose to host their nuptials in the place they first met and fell in love: Minecraft. Sarah Nguyen, 24, from Portland, Oregon, and Jamie Patel, 25, from Leicester, England, met at 13 years old on a Minecraft role-play server. “It’s the closest thing we have to a shared home,” Nguyen told Wired. Most of their relationship was long-distance, lived out in the virtual world (the couple now resides together in Portland). Even Patel’s proposal took place atop a scenic mountain in Minecraft, delivered via in-game di…