What's on Your Mind?

A few weeks ago, I led a leadership workshop for a group of executive women leaders in Birmingham, Alabama. Before I begin leadership workshops, I ask the participants what they want out of our time together. This year, one answer has emerged consistently on top: connection. This isn’t surprising. As executives rise to higher levels of leadership, they often report increased feelings of loneliness. One Harvard Business Review survey found that 55% of CEOs acknowledge experiencing moderate but significant bouts of loneliness, while 25% report frequent feelings of loneliness. As your expertise becomes more specialized, it can be harder to find other leaders who understand …

The recent announcement by McKinsey & Company that it plans to cut roughly 10% of its workforce has sent ripples through the consulting world, reigniting debate about the future of the industry. This is not about one firm, one round of layoffs, or one business cycle. It signals an irreversible shift in how value is created in consulting. Having spent a significant part of my career at McKinsey, I saw it grow and flourish in an era when information was scarce. Even basic market intelligence required large teams working for months to gather and synthesize data. The digital age brought a data explosion and democratized access, and McKinsey adapted again by expanding …

Resilience is a much-needed skill in today’s tough job market. Despite the headlines lambasting young employees as “lazy” and “entitled”, a Big Four consulting firm is taking matters into its own hands and offering training for recent grads. PwC will give its new young hires “resilience” training to toughen them up for careers as management consultants. The firm has introduced the initiative in the UK to help Gen Z brush up on their “human skills,” including communication with clients and handling day-to-day work dynamics, like pressure or criticism. “Quite often we are struck that the graduates that join us… don’t always have the resilience; they don’t always h…

A group of college students braved the frigid New England weather on Dec. 13, 2025, to attend a late afternoon review session at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. Eleven of those students were struck by gunfire when a shooter entered the lecture hall. Two didn’t survive. Shortly after, a petition circulated calling for better security for Brown students, including ID-card entry to campus buildings and improved surveillance cameras. As often happens in the aftermath of tragedy, the conversation turned to lessons for the future, especially in terms of school security. There has been rapid growth of the nation’s now US$4 billion school security industry. …

At 10:24 p.m., while brushing his teeth, my husband’s phone pings. It’s not an emergency. No one is bleeding. No building is on fire. It’s an email that begins with the words, “Just circling back.” In France, this would be illegal. Or at least deeply frowned upon. Since 2017, French workers at companies with more than 50 employees have had a legally protected right to disconnect. That means, employers can’t expect workers to answer emails or messages after hours. Similar policies exist across Europe, including Spain, Belgium, and Greece. Meanwhile, in America, we’re circling back at bedtime. The Country That Turned “Always On” Into a Personality Trait …

As the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) returns to Las Vegas from Jan. 6 to 9, the tech industry is gearing up for its annual spectacle of prototypes, silicon benchmarks and AI-branded gadgets. But one of the most consequential shifts in enterprise technology over the coming year will unfold far from the keynote stages and demo floors. HP, the 85-year-old Silicon Valley company long defined by PCs, printers, and enterprise hardware, is repositioning itself as a work-intelligence platform—where devices learn continuously, services anticipate needs, and AI dissolves the traditional boundaries between hardware, software, and the cloud. Under Jim Nottingham, senior vice p…

Everybody loves the idea of feedback, defined broadly as information provided to someone about their performance, behavior, or actions. This makes a great deal of sense. Indeed, many studies have consistently shown that feedback from others plays an important role in helping us understand who we are, including how we differ from others. It is vital for improving managers’ and leaders’ performance and for helping people evolve and develop, both professionally and personally. Conversely, being feedback-deprived, or having a tendency to ignore it, increases the gap between how good you think you are, and how good you actually are—at times, to painfully delusional lev…

In November, Apple laid off dozens of sales employees in a rather unexpected move for the tech giant. Apple is the rare tech company that has steered clear of mass layoffs, particularly among its peers in the trillion-dollar club. The layoffs “came as a surprise” for those who lost their jobs, according to a Bloomberg report—and they impacted some employees who had been with the company for decades. The post-pandemic job market has come to be defined by layoffs, in tech and beyond: A Glassdoor analysis finds that there was a peak in 2023, but layoffs have since continued at a more frequent cadence relative to the years prior. A variety of sectors have been hit hard—a…

You’ve landed. You leave the chaos of the airport behind and drop into the chaos of a new city. It’s big, loud, and full of opportunities . . . and tourists. If you want to experience this new city like someone who actually lives there, you need tools that help you skip the lines, ditch the tourist traps, and navigate the local landscape with insider confidence. Forget the default maps and review sites everyone uses. Here are three genuinely free, under-the-radar apps that will transform you from a wide-eyed visitor into a savvy urban explorer. Atlas Obscura The biggest mistake a traveler makes is sticking to the big red arrow on the generic tourist map…

I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again: Our built environment contributes to a mental health crisis. The built environment as we know it—buildings and the spaces between—does direct damage to our minds. Communities developed slowly for thousands of years, but in 20th century America, the end of World War II introduced a massive population and construction boom. Land use planning has had devastating impacts on Americans—economically, socially, and culturally. But I’m not a doomer and I know these things are fixable. Not overnight reversible, but certainly fixable. Spreading us out Typical land use rules are written, updated, and enforced at the …

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When Santa Claus is done delivering presents on Christmas Eve, he must get back home to the North Pole, even if it’s snowing so hard that the reindeer can’t see the way. He could use a compass, but then he has a challenge: He has to be able to find the right North Pole. There are actually two North Poles—the geographic North Pole you see on maps and the magnetic North Pole that the compass relies on. They aren’t the same. The two North Poles The geographic North Pole, also called true north, is the point at one end of the Earth’s axis of rotation. Try taking a tennis ball in your right hand, putting your thumb on the bottom and your middle finger on the…

Costco’s latest promotional offering just dropped, but members aren’t rushing to claim it. At select warehouse club locations, members can now take home complimentary 3-pound bags of Gala apples. The shopping warehouse’s unique business model, wherein membership fees contribute largely to its revenue, means that it focuses on plugging its membership more than advertising specific products. Costco puts significant effort into encouraging people to join, or upgrade and renew, existing memberships. In the past, Costco has offered enticing items like tote bags to coax customers into automatic membership renewals, but the promotional bag of apples is not as appealing…

As the year winds down, many leaders find themselves in a familiar ritual: closing the books, reviewing revenue targets, and drafting ambitious financial goals for the year ahead. These practices are important. But after years of designing teams and advising organizations at different stages of growth, I’ve come to believe that the most valuable year-end ritual has little to do with money alone. Instead, it’s about setting nonfinancial metrics alongside your financial ones. Revenue tells you where your business landed. Nonfinancial metrics tell you why and whether the success you’re chasing is sustainable. They reveal the health of your organization from the insid…

For 10 years, I obsessed over finding a ’70s-era corduroy car coat like the one Wynona Ryder wears in the first season of Stranger Things. Not a “vintage inspired” fashion version, but an American classic turned velvety with wear. That meant thrifting at resale shops. Always on the lookout, I never scored because the outerwear selection in my size (large) was bleak. But today I am thrifting in the age of Ozempic, when women jettison entire wardrobes as an act of reinvention after dramatic weight loss, often monetizing through consignment and resale. As a result of all the larger sizes flowing into stores, I finally possess my unicorn: a heritage LL Bean corduroy coat…

Never before has the CMO position been more complex—or more essential to driving business results. The mark of success for any chief marketing officer is their impact on the long-term trajectory of a beloved brand. So, what does that look like in a year as chaotic as 2025, where there’s been on-again, off-again tariffs, massive holding company mergers, and the continued rise of AI across the board? I reached out to CMOs from Hinge, McDonald’s, Crayola, State Farm, and Kraft Heinz, five marketing leaders operating at the top of their game, navigating the chaos, and getting results. We talked about what lessons they’ve learned from the past year, issues they’ll be…

There’s something incredibly compelling about a brand-new year. A fresh start beckons, with each day untroubled by your past decisions. Whatever mistakes you made in 2025 are old news. They were sooo last year. You’re a new person now with new priorities, new habits, and new strategies. It’s in this spirit of new-leaf-turning-over that nearly a third of American adults—and almost half of 18- to 29-year-olds—decide to make New Year’s resolutions for the coming year. Unfortunately, making resolutions doesn’t work. Baylor College of Medicine reported in January 2024 that 88% of people who make resolutions abandon them within two weeks. That doesn’t mean change or imp…

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. During its earnings call on Wednesday, executives at Lennar—a giant homebuilder with a market capitalization of $27 billion—said the federal government is working on a plan to help alleviate strained housing affordability. Lennar executives said federal officials are actively engaging with homebuilders and industry groups to better understand constraints—and to avoid policies that could unintentionally damage supply. While no specific program was outlined, management suggested it would be “surprising” if no meaningful action emerged in 2026, given cu…

Planning to hit the road this holiday season? Or maybe just thinking about an extended drive of some sort for sometime in the new year? The next time you’ve got a driving adventure ahead of you, today’s Cool Tools discovery is exactly the new virtual companion you need. It’s a truly cool app I encountered recently that enhances your standard navigation setup and offers some really smart extras that’ll make whatever trip you’re taking infinitely more interesting—and enjoyable. Lemme show ya what it’s all about. This tip originally appeared in the free Cool Tools newsletter from The Intelligence. Get the next issue in your inbox and get ready to discover all sor…

Have you ever tried quickly looking something up on Wikipedia—just because you’re curious or maybe for work—only to, a half an hour later, wonder why you’re reading about the history of the European Space Agency? In my opinion, Wikipedia is one of the last good websites on the internet. Outside of the occasional fundraiser, there are no ads, no dark patterns, and no clickbait—it’s just information. Which leaves no doubt in my mind that falling into a Wikipedia rabbit hole is healthier than scrolling on social media. Even so, it can be addictive, and links are the reason why. Every Wikipedia article is jam packed with links to other Wikipedia articles, which is exa…

The tech industry has endured another turbulent year, buffeted by the continued rise of artificial intelligence and the economic threats posed by President Donald The President’s tariffs. Even the most prominent companies encountered challenges they never imagined they’d have to face. As 2025 comes to a close, here are Apple’s biggest wins and greatest failures of the year. Apple’s biggest wins of 2025 iPhone 17 series Without a doubt, Apple’s biggest win of 2025 is the iPhone 17 series, which includes the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max. Myriad reports suggest that iPhone 17 series sales have exceeded both Apple’s and investors’ expectations. …

In the Star Trek universe, the audience occasionally gets a glimpse inside schools on the planet Vulcan. Young children stand alone in pods surrounded by 360-degree digital screens. Adults wander among the pods but do not talk to the students. Instead, each child interacts only with a sophisticated artificial intelligence, which peppers them with questions about everything from mathematics to philosophy. This is not the reality in today’s classrooms on Earth. For many technology leaders building modern AI, however, a vision of AI-driven personalized learning holds considerable appeal. Outspoken venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, for example, imagines that “the AI tut…

In today’s corporate landscape, optics often precede outcomes, especially in technology-led transformations. Announcements of new platforms, AI-powered strategies, or “digital-first” pledges frequently come long before the underlying infrastructure to support them. That was Ted’s reality as the chief growth officer at a global bank when his CEO unveiled a high-profile “AI-Powered Growth Strategy” positioned as a bold leap forward. The announcement made headlines and thrilled investors, but behind the scenes, the organization wasn’t prepared. Ted was given a skeletal team of two direct reports, a patchwork of third-party tools, and the mandate to partner with five glo…

UnitedHealth Group has laid off dozens of remote employees in healthcare technology and services marketing from its Optum unit, who were given two weeks notice in November, sources told Health Payer Specialist. Fast Company has reached out to UnitedHealth for confirmation. Those employees were based in “multiple states on the East coast and in the Midwest,” according to that report, and are among UnitedHealth’s roughly 400,000 employees across the U.S. (It is the parent company of UnitedHealthcare, the nation’s largest healthcare insurer.) The healthcare giant is just the latest company in a string of industries to announce layoffs, which have hit almost ever…

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas for the stock market, which may be headed for a “Santa Claus Rally,” according to analysts, including those at Goldman Sachs and Citadel Securities. “Barring any major shocks, it will be hard to fight the overwhelmingly positive seasonal period we are entering and the cleaner positioning set-up,” Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s trading desk team said in a client note, as reported by Bloomberg. “While we don’t necessarily see a dramatic rally, we do think there is room to go up from here into year end.” Scott Rubner of Citadel Securities agreed, noting: “Following a year of strong portfolio returns and record household wealth,…