What's on Your Mind?

If you ride along a bike path in the U.K. city of Leeds and approach a street, the traffic light can automatically turn green for you—or stay green if you’re already midway across. The city is one of a growing number testing technology that uses sensors, anonymous data, and AI to make it easier to cross streets. Made by a company called VivaCity (known as Viva in the U.S.), the sensors can detect cyclists and pedestrians from more than 200 feet away. In some cases, someone on a bike might not need to stop at the corner. Pedestrians can keep walking without breaking their stride. (Cities can choose to program traffic signals to give cyclists either a shorter wait or f…

Headwinds across the business world challenge any leader striving to make an impact beyond shareholder value. Few organizations know this struggle better than the B Team, born out of Richard Branson’s drive to elevate the role and responsibility of business in society. CEO Leah Seligmann shares why some leaders are pulling back, where others are pressing forward, and which actions can have the greatest impact—from climate change to diversity. This is an abridged transcript of an interview from Rapid Response, hosted by Robert Safian, former editor-in-chief of Fast Company. From the team behind the Masters of Scale podcast, Rapid Response features candid conversations …

While most museums have some kind of store—a place to buy a postcard or mug and help their respective institutions squeeze a few more bucks from its visitors—few are actually outstanding places to shop. The notable exception is MoMA. The MoMA Store has become a brand in and of itself to the point where there are shoppers who know the acronym and logo but not necessarily the history behind them. And while retail has helped MoMA gain name recognition, the museum wants it to become a more effective ambassador for the flagship art institution. The recent renovation of MoMA’s SoHo design store, which recently reopened after months of renovations, exemplifies this new appro…

Since our return from Davos, Switzerland, earlier this year, we have been dissecting the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025. The WEF surveyed more than 1,000 companies from 22 different industries across 55 countries to attempt to predict and paint a picture of what work will look like in 2030. The encouraging news is that there are projected to be 170 million new jobs globally by 2030; however, 92 million jobs are expected to be eliminated due to AI automation. That is a net gain of 78 million jobs by 2030. To get a true understanding of why and how this shift will occur, here is a look at the story beneath the story. 4 factors reshaping the glo…

If you listen to the CEOs of elite AI companies or take even a passing glance at the U.S. economy, it’s abundantly obvious that AI excitement is everywhere. America’s biggest tech companies have spent over $100 billion on AI so far this year, and Deutsche Bank reports that AI spending is the only thing keeping the United States out of a recession. Yet if you look at the average non-tech company, AI is nowhere to be found. Goldman Sachs reports that only 14% of large companies have deployed AI in a meaningful way. What gives? If AI is really such a big deal, why is there a multi-billion-dollar mismatch between excitement over AI and the tech’s actual boots…

Everlane made waves for being among the first brands to eradicate virgin plastic from its supply chain. In 2019, after years of work, the startup managed to switch out new plastic with recycled plastic, largely made from discarded water bottles. It began incorporating them into jackets and fleece sweaters and bodysuits. It was a big step towards sustainability, since recycled polyester has a lower carbon footprint and diverts plastic from landfills. In the years that followed, many other brands on the market—from H&M to Prada—followed in Everlane’s footsteps, but it didn’t solve the bigger problem of what happens when people decide to get rid of their recycled ga…

Anyone who’s visited a contemporary art museum in the past 75 years has almost certainly encountered the artwork of Alexander Calder. His delicately balanced mobiles and swooping steel sculptures are mainstays of American abstract art. But in most of those museums, from the Whitney to Pompidou Centre to the Reina Sofia, Calder’s pieces haven’t had their intended presentation. For artworks that are meant to move or be moved through, Calder’s kinetic works and supersized sculptures are often given the default museum treatment of being static, separate from visitors, or both. A new art space in Calder’s birth city of Philadelphia aims to correct that. Calder Gardens…

Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! I’m Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning. When Brian Doubles became CEO of Synchrony in 2021, a global pandemic had upended the way companies thought about work. Remote options became ubiquitous, and many employees, when possible, were given the tools they needed to do their jobs from anywhere. Now, even as other financial servi…

Over the past three decades, a wealth of research has shown that psychological safety—the perception that it is safe to speak up and take risks without fear of embarrassment, rejection, or retribution—is one of the most consistent and important predictors of leadership competence and team effectiveness. As one of us (Amy Edmondson) has illustrated in The Fearless Organization, when team members trust that their voice will be heard and valued, they are more willing to take the kinds of interpersonal risks that innovation requires. Unsurprisingly, this matters enormously in today’s organizations. Whether the challenge is developing a new product, responding to a shiftin…

October ushers in changing foliage, cooler temperatures, and the spooky season made eerier with less daylight. Costumes are donned and even the night sky wants to help set the mood. Much to the dismay of werewolves, October’s Harvest supermoon will peak tonight (Monday, October 6) at 11:47 p.m. ET, according to the Farmer’s Almanac. Let’s break down the science behind this nighttime spectacle and take a look at future events. Why is October’s full moon called the Harvest Moon? The full moon closest to the autumnal equinox gets the moniker Harvest Moon. September’s offering took place on September 7 and the equinox took place on September 22 in the Norther…

Uniqlo, the Japanese retailer known for its monochromatic casual wear and accessories, is gearing up to significantly expand its U.S. physical footprint next year. The brand will open 11 new stores across seven cities in spring and summer 2026, Uniqlo told Fast Company. The expanded fleet will include four new stores in New York City: three in Manhattan and an additional location in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. The new locations come two decades after Uniqlo opened its first U.S. store in Manhattan’s Soho neighborhood in 2006. For fans of Uniqlo’s ultra-stretch jackets, Pufftech vests, and functional backpacks, it gets even better: The company is al…

Republican and Democratic lawmakers at an impasse on reopening the federal government provided few public signs Sunday of meaningful negotiations taking place to end what is about to be a six-day shutdown — with President Donald The President saying that layoffs are occurring. Asked on Sunday night when federal workers would be fired as he has threatened to do, The President told reporters: “It’s taking place right now and it’s all because of the Democrats.” “The Democrats are causing the loss of a lot of jobs,” The President added, declining to answer a question about which agencies are subject to the cuts. The possibility of layoffs would escalate an already tense si…

American scientists Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell and Shimon Sakaguchi from Japan won the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine on Monday for work shedding light on how the immune system spares healthy cells, creating openings for possible new autoimmune disease and cancer treatments. This year’s prize relates to peripheral immune tolerance, or “how we keep our immune system under control so we can fight all imaginable microbes and still avoid autoimmune disease”, said Marie Wahren-Herlenius, a rheumatology professor at the Karolinska Institute. Sakaguchi told reporters outside his university laboratory that “I feel it is a tremendous honour,” Kyodo news age…

Wall Street is hanging near its records on Monday, as technology stocks keep rising. The S&P 500 rose 0.3%, coming off its latest all-time high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 17 points, or less than 0.1%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.4% higher. Advanced Micro Devices soared 32.6% to help lead the market after announcing a deal where OpenAI will use its chips to power artificial-intelligence infrastructure. As part of the deal, OpenAI could own up to 160 million shares of AMD if it hits certain milestones. A frenzy around AI has been one of the main reasons Wall Street has been hitting record after record, though that’s also …

Fifth Third on Monday agreed to buy regional lender Comerica in an all-stock deal valued at $10.9 billion, creating the ninth-largest U.S. lender with a robust presence in the Midwest. Regional lenders are looking to diversify revenue streams, strengthen balance sheets and expand into faster-growing markets as they recover from an industry-wide crisis in 2023 that shook investor confidence and exposed the risks of bank runs and troubles in commercial real estate. Analysts have said consolidation is crucial for smaller lenders to compete with the nation’s largest banks, with several banks looking to take advantage of a potentially lighter regulatory environment und…

U.S. Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr. could deliver a policy win for the The President administration in just a few months after the Food and Drug Administration enlisted GSK to help it fast-track approval of a decades-old drug to treat an autism-related disorder. The FDA’s unusual move will allow it to bypass a lengthy label update for generic versions of the drug, leucovorin, or new clinical trials, a tactic academics, lawyers and doctors questioned. A GSK spokesperson told Reuters it plans to complete the new use application for the branded version of leucovorin “as quickly as possible.” Once the British drugmaker does that work, the FDA would normally…

The AI arms race turned a new page on Monday, as OpenAI and chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) announced that the two have agreed to a new partnership to create new data centers powered by AMD’s chips. The deal could also see OpenAI take a roughly 10% stake in AMD. Specifically, the partnership sees OpenAI committing to buying 6 gigawatts of AMD GPU chips, with the initial gigawatt deployment scheduled for the second half of 2026. The deal will ultimately see OpenAI deploy the remaining gigawatts over multiple years and multiple hardware generations. The deal also sees AMD issuing a warrant for as many as 160 million shares of AMD stock to OpenAI. Those shares…

Verizon just announced that its current CEO, Hans Vestberg, is stepping down—and the wireless carrier is pulling another seasoned leader out of retirement to take its helm. In a press release published on October 6, Verizon announced that former PayPal CEO Dan Schulman will be leading the company, effective immediately. In the meantime, Vestberg (who has held the title since 2018) will stay on as a special adviser at the company until October 4, 2026. Schulman has served on Verizon’s board of directors since 2018, and was elected lead independent director in December 2024. “Dan is a seasoned and decisive leader with a unique set of experiences, and a proven re…

The plan started coming together inside a luxury box at MetLife Stadium. As the Premier League’s Chelsea was on its way to a shutout victory at the Club World Cup final in July, President Donald The President and FIFA President Gianni Infantino were deep in discussion at the New Jersey sports complex outside New York City on another matter: where the draw for next year’s World Cup would be held. The high-drama spectacle decides which teams will face each other in the group stage of soccer’s most prestigious tournament, along with the schedule for competition. It was widely expected to unfold in Las Vegas, home to the 1994 draw when the U.S. last hosted the World Cup and…

For actors, it’s the Golden Globes. Musicians, it’s the Grammys. Now, content creators have their own award to aspire to. Introducing Instagram Rings. As social media’s place in the entertainment ecosystem grows, the new award program from Instagram is meant to honor those creatives “who don’t just participate in culture – but shift it, break through whatever barrier holds them back to realize their ambitions,” according to a blog post about the launch. Judged by a panel of creatives spanning fashion and makeup to sports and entertainment, each nominated their own longlist of favorite creators and voted on which 25 of Instagram’s three billion users will be…

A group of countries that are part of the OPEC+ alliance of oil-exporting countries has agreed to a small boost in oil production, citing a steady global economic outlook. The group said after a virtual meeting on Sunday that it will raise oil production by 137,000 barrels per day in November, the same amount it announced for October. The group has been raising output slightly in a series of boosts all year, after announcing cuts in 2023 and 2024. In a statement, the group said the move was due to “a steady global economic outlook and current healthy market fundamentals.” It added the production adjustments may be paused or reversed as market conditions evolve. …

Below, Tim Higgins shares five key insights from his new book, iWar: Fortnite, Elon Musk, Spotify, WeChat, and Laying Siege to Apple’s Empire. Tim is a business columnist for the Wall Street Journal, where he covers Silicon Valley and writes about the world’s most influential business leaders. He is also a frequent contributor to CNBC and has previously written for Bloomberg News. What’s the big idea? Those who operate in the digital world accessed by the iPhone have no choice but to operate by Apple’s rules—or do they? Objections that Apple has overstepped fair play in the app economy resulted in pushbacks, including one of the biggest antitrust battles of the…

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 …

As top congressional Republican and Democratic leaders dig in their heels—a signal that the ongoing federal government shutdown may continue for a while—many older Americans are wondering if they will still get their Social Security checks, and questioning how a prolonged showdown will affect their future benefits. Currently, thousands of federal employees are working without pay and President Donald The President is threatening mass federal layoffs. During the shutdown, the Social Security Administration (SSA) is continuing to issue retirement and disability benefits, but is furloughing 12% of its staff, per USA Today. Medicare and Medicaid payments also continue…

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 …