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We all know the “Sunday scaries”—that creeping anxiety as the weekend winds down. But what you might not realize is that leaders experience it too. As a CEO, I’ve found that the best way to fend off Sunday dread is by fully unplugging. At least once a week, I do a digital detox, shutting off my devices to be fully present with my wife and kids. Sometimes, we turn on the radio and play board games; other times, we stay in pajamas and take on a new cooking or baking challenge. It’s our version of søndagshygge—the Danish idea of embracing cozy Sundays with tea, books, music, blankets, and other at-home rituals. While personal rituals can help, leaders can also play a role in easing their team members’ back-to-work anxiety. The question becomes: How can we support employees in making that transition? While there’s no silver bullet, I’ve found a few strategies that make a meaningful difference. Leading with empathy When it comes to facing challenges, togetherness is one of the most powerful antidotes to managing stress. It’s like heading into a storm in a rowboat—having just one person by your side, paddling with you and understanding your perspective, can make all the difference. That’s what empathy is about—demonstrating to others that you truly identify with and understand their thoughts, emotions, and perspectives. Empathetic leaders show they care about their employees through words and through actions—checking in with them, actively listening, and acknowledging each person’s unique circumstances. The result is a workplace where employees feel psychologically safe, fostering open and honest discussions. Studies have shown that employees with highly empathetic leaders are more engaged at work—and more innovative, too. When a leader listens and genuinely makes an effort to understand their team’s perspective, it builds trust and fosters collaboration. Knowing that this kind of supportive, understanding environment exists beyond the weekend can go a long way toward quelling the Sunday scaries. Promoting a healthy work-life balance Respecting each employee’s need to maintain a work-life balance is an essential part of an empathetic work environment. That means treating employees as individuals, not just cogs in a machine. I reflect on my own experience when my wife and I had our children. For me, it was crucial to be able to delegate responsibilities and take parental leave. Each time I returned to the office (admittedly a bit tired, as newborns don’t care about your sleep schedule) I was ready to dive back in. I aim to offer the same flexibility and understanding to our team members. Research backs up the idea that supporting employees’ work-life balance can have a major positive impact. A 2023 survey from the American Psychological Association found that 92% of workers believe it’s important to work for an organization that values their emotional and psychological well-being. Studies conducted by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health have shown that when managers are trained to respect work-life harmony, employee job satisfaction increases and turnover decreases. Offering flexibility based on personal circumstances—whether that means allowing employees to fully unplug for the evening or weekend, or taking a few hours off to attend their child’s soccer game—has helped us to maintain a low turnover rate at Jotform. When employees return refreshed, they might not whistle every moment while they work, but they seem genuinely engaged and content to be back at their desks on Monday. Gamifying the workplace It’s hard to explain why adding a game-like dimension to an everyday activity can fuel motivation, but it does. Why else would brands like Nike and Fitbit offer users personalized feedback, social interaction, and even some friendly competition? Knowing you’ll earn that badge or publicly top your personal best pushes you to clock that extra mile. Experts call it gamification—leveraging game-like mechanisms, like the ones you’d find in video games, to make real-world activities more engaging. Gamification has been shown to increase motivation and engagement. It makes employees more willing to take on repetitive tasks, engage in risks, and even fail. Surveys have found that gamification provides a sense of belonging and connection in the workplace. Employees report being more productive and happier at work. In short, gamification makes work, including the occasional mundane task, more fun. When employees participate in incentivized tasks, they’re not just motivated, they’re also excited. This excitement helps counteract the Sunday scaries. Instead of dreading the workweek ahead, employees are looking forward to the challenges and rewards of gamified tasks. Whether it’s earning points for hitting targets or engaging in friendly competitions with coworkers, the gamified experience gives them something to anticipate. And with AI making gamification more accessible and fun than ever, there’s no reason why leaders can’t bring this kind of excitement to the workplace, helping employees feel energized and eager to start their week—on Monday and beyond. View the full article

Tehran’s foreign minister says Washington has issued contradictory signals about reaching a deal View the full article

Not so long ago, a book deal and a live tour marked the outer limits of how far a hot podcast could hope to expand its horizons. These days, they’re only the beginning. Especially at Wondery, the fast-growing podcast network based in West Hollywood, California. Wondery has more than 240 podcasts, and more than 55 of them have hit the No. 1 spot on Apple Podcasts. The first book adapted from the network’s hit survival podcast Against the Odds is set for publication this June, but a better example of where things might be headed is the line of toys Wondery just launched for the family-friendly science show Wow in the World or the immersive cruise inspired by its Exhibit C true-crime vertical, which is in the works for 2026. As the network continues pushing audio-first intellectual property into uncharted new territory, it’s starting to look like Wondery can turn podcasts into just about anything. “We’ve got this Hollywood-style approach to storytelling,” says Nicole Blake, chief brand officer at Wondery, the network that perfected the podcast-to-streaming-series pipeline with scripted pods like Dying for Sex, Dirty John, and Dr. Death. “So now, we’re trying to take a Hollywood-style approach to IP-building and apply it to podcasting.” The holy grail of branding Some brands are practically inescapable. Whether you’re flipping through channels, stuck in traffic, or taking a Pilates class, they stalk you like prey. Blake has a term for brands like that. “The holy grail is a 360-degree IP—something the fans are seeing at many touch points, all the time,” she says. “It’s not an on-and-off relationship, it’s an always-on relationship.” One brand that certainly qualifies is the Harry Potter movie franchise, whose development Blake steered during her tenure as a senior vice president at Warner Bros. in the 2010s. Beyond all the books, movies, and spinoffs, Harry Potter’s tentacles have extended to clothing lines, food items, Lego sets, video games, theatrical plays, and theme park rides. Though the phenomenon factor of Harry Potter may be singular, the brand’s breadth exemplifies the inventive approach to market saturation Blake is exploring for Wondery’s podcasts. So far, the show that seems furthest along the path to 360-degree IP is Wow in the World, the kid-focused science series with more than 100 million downloads. Designed in Pixar-fashion to appeal to parents listening along, it has steadily cultivated a devoted following, who call themselves Wowsers. The show has long since spawned the requisite live tours and book deals, along with an array of clothing and accessories that includes shirts, pillows, and backpacks. Where the show’s extension breaks new ground, however, beyond a push into the classroom with a Next Generation Science Standards-aligned curriculum, is its new line of STEM kits like an Everlasting Volcano and Dino Dig & Diorama. Though character-driven pods like Welcome to Night Vale and the D&D-based Critical Role have spun off plush toys and action figures, Wow in the World’s offerings may be the first line of podcast-inspired toys in the STEM space. (“I like firsts,” Blake notes.) Wondery partnered with science publishers Thames and Kosmos to launch this first wave of toys last fall, and they’re coming this month to Walmart. But it’s not just kids connecting with Wondery’s podcasts at such a deep level. Why podcasts are poised to become 360-degree IP That podcasts can become as colossally popular and highly valued as more traditional media is old news. Since Joe Rogan made the first $100 million podcast deal with Spotify in 2020, for instance, several similar deals have followed—including one last fall between Wondery and NFL star sibling podcasters Jason and Travis Kelce. However, eye-poppingly lucrative deals and astronomic numbers of downloads don’t paint the full picture of what popularity means for these shows. The main reason podcasts appear poised to become 360-IP, according to Blake, is because of the unique connection they foster with fans. There’s a certain intimacy inherent to the medium. It casts a spell on listeners, creating the illusion that they’re quietly participating in an ongoing conversation, rather than overhearing it. When someone falls in love with a podcast, they fall hard—as Wondery recently demonstrated with a study on fandom conducted with Dentsu and Edison Research. According to its findings, 71% of podcast fans feel they are friends with the hosts of their favorite shows, while 46% claim they are more a fan of their favorite podcast than any other form of entertainment. The biggest podcasts don’t just inspire affinity but loyalty. Their fans are willing to follow them anywhere. What helps present more branding possibilities, though, according to Blake, is the fact that podcasts follow their listeners everywhere. “Podcasts, unlike any other media, complement a person’s day,” she says. “You can listen to a podcast while taking a walk, cooking, or doing arts and crafts. They can go with you on every step of your day; and as such, they provide plenty of opportunities for extensions into other areas such as apparel and consumer products.” Wondery spent years coordinating the rollout of a line of toys for the Wowsers to play with while listening to Wow in the World together after school. But the network does not apply the same long-lead approach to product development for each of its shows. One size does not fit all The first step to a successful brand extension for podcast IP, Blake says, is gathering research and insights to understand the DNA of the show and what people love about it. Beyond that, it can go any number of ways. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach to building a podcast’s brand. The weekly nature of some podcasts creates a lot of opportunities for rapid response. Blake’s team always monitors how fans react to Wondery’s podcasts, ready to pounce on, say, a popular segment or catchphrase that emerges from the Kelce brothers’ New Heights podcast; or create a special T-shirt immediately after Jason Kelce’s former team, the Philadelphia Eagles, won the Super Bowl back in February. Similarly, the team also noticed that fans of MrBallen, a beloved mystery storyteller, were talking a lot on social media about Lungy, a frog character the host developed on the show. It seemed like they wanted more of Lungy, and “more” is what any aspiring 360-degree IP should have on tap at all times. Wonndery quickly turned around a Lungy the Frog pin, which sold out right away, paving the way for future frog-centric apparel. Of course, some ideas need more time to incubate. In order to arrive at the planned Exhibit C cruise for 2026—an immersive experience for fans of Wondery true-crime shows like Morbid and Scamfluencers—the team had to first experiment. In 2023, the network staged Exhibit C: A True Crime Experience Live at New York’s Gotham Hall, a sort of podcastapalooza, bringing together an Avengers of in-house true-crime show hosts. The interactive event got such tremendous feedback from fans, it proved the demand existed for even more outlandish events like the upcoming mystery cruise. Just how far can Wondery push its podcast IP beyond the high seas? According to Blake, anything is possible. “There is nowhere traditional media has been extended,” she says, “that you won’t see a podcast go in the future.” View the full article

The The President administration is working to lift regulations on coal-fired power plants in the hopes of making its energy less expensive. But while cost is one important aspect, utilities have a lot more to consider when they choose their power sources. Different technologies play different roles in the power system. Some sources, like nuclear energy, are reliable but inflexible. Other sources, like oil, are flexible but expensive and polluting. How utilities choose which power source to invest in depends in large part on two key aspects: price and reliability. Power prices One way to compare power sources is by their levelized cost of electricity. This shows how much it costs to produce one unit of electricity on average over the life of the generator. The asset management firm Lazard has produced levelized cost of electricity calculations for the major U.S. electricity sources annually for years, and it has tracked a sharp decline in solar power costs in particular. Coal is one of the more expensive technologies for utilities today, making it less competitive compared with solar, wind and natural gas, by Lazard’s calculations. Only nuclear, offshore wind and “peaker” plants, which are used only during periods of high electricity demand, are more expensive. Land-based wind and solar power have the lowest estimated costs, far below what consumers are paying for electricity today. The National Renewable Energy Lab has found similar levelized costs for renewable energy, though its estimates for nuclear are lower than Lazard’s. https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/Lh38M/3 Upfront costs are also important and can make the difference for whether new power projects can be built, as the East Coast has seen lately. Several offshore wind farms planned along the Northeast were canceled in recent years as costs rose due to inflation and supply chain problems during the pandemic. Construction costs for the two newest nuclear generators built in the U.S. also rose considerably as the projects, both in the Southeast, faced delays. Reliability and flexibility matter But cost isn’t the whole story. Utilities must balance a number of criteria when investing in power sources. Most important is matching supply and demand at every moment of the day. Due to the technical characteristics of electricity and how it flows, if the supply of electricity is even a little bit lower than the demand, that can trigger a blackout. This means power companies and consumers need generation that can ramp down when demand is low and ramp up when demand is high. Since wind and solar generation depend on the wind blowing and the sun shining, these sources must be combined with other types of generation or with storage, such as batteries, to ensure the power grid has exactly as much power as it needs at all times. Nuclear and coal are predictable and run reliably, but they’re inflexible—they take time to ramp up and down, and doing so is expensive. Steam turbines are simply not built for flexibility. The multiple days it took to shut down Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant after an earthquake and tsunami damaged its backup power sources in 2011 illustrated the challenges and safety issues related to ramping down nuclear plants. That means coal and nuclear aren’t as helpful on those hot summer days when utilities need a quick power increase to keep air conditioners running. These peaks may only happen a few days a year, but keeping the power on is crucial for human health and the economy. In today’s energy system, the most flexible generation sources are natural gas and hydro. They can quickly adjust to meet changing electricity demand without the safety and cost concerns of coal and nuclear. Hydro can ramp in minutes but can only be built where large dams are feasible. The most cost-effective natural gas technology can ramp up within hours. The big picture, by power source Over the past two decades, natural gas use has risen quickly to overtake coal as the most common fuel for generating electricity in the U.S. The boom was largely driven by the growing use of fracking technology, which allowed producers to extract gas from rock and lowered the price. https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/VRgsO/1 Natural gas’s low price and high flexibility make it an attractive choice. Its rise is a large part of the reason coal use has plummeted. But natural gas has its challenges. Natural gas requires pipelines to carry it across the country, leading to disruptive construction. As Texas saw during its February 2021 blackouts, natural gas equipment can also fail in extreme cold. And like coal, natural gas is a fossil fuel that releases greenhouse gases during combustion, so it is also helping to cause climate change and contributes to air pollution that can harm human health. Nuclear power has been gaining interest recently since it does not contribute to climate change or local air pollution. It also provides a steady baseload of power, which is useful for computing centers as their demand does not fluctuate as much as households. Of course, nuclear has ongoing challenges around the storage of radioactive waste and security concerns, and construction of large nuclear plants takes many years. Coal is more flexible than nuclear, but far less so than natural gas or hydropower. Most concerning, coal is extremely dirty, emitting more climate-change-causing gases, and far more air pollution than natural gas. Solar and wind have grown rapidly in recent years due to their falling costs and environmental benefits. According to Lazard, the cost of solar combined with batteries, which would be as flexible as hydropower, is well below the cost of coal with its limited flexibility. However, wind and solar tend to take up a lot of space, which has led to challenges in local approvals for new sites and transmission lines. In addition, the sheer number of new projects is overwhelming power system operators’ ability to evaluate them, leading to increasing wait times for new generation to come online. What’s ahead? Utilities have another consideration: Federal, state, and local governments can also influence and sometimes limit utilities’ choices. Tariffs, for example, can increase the cost of critical components for new construction. Permitting and regulations can slow down development. Subsidies can artificially lower costs. In our view, policies that are done right can help utilities move toward more reliable and cost-effective choices which are also cleaner. Done wrong, they can be costly to the economy and the environment. Erin Baker is a distinguished professor of industrial engineering and faculty director of The Energy Transition Institute at UMass Amherst and Paola Pimentel Furlanetto is a Ph.D. candidate in power systems at UMass Amherst. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. View the full article

The 2025 NFL Draft is next week, and the front-runner for the No. 1 overall pick, University of Miami quarterback Cam Ward, is an anomaly. In any other year, the top prospect being a journeyman who attended three schools in five years and ended his career by losing the Pop Tarts Bowl would be nearly impossible. But now it may be the new reality of the college-to-pro transition. The impact of the transfer portal and name, image, and likeness (NIL) legislation means the traditional “stay or go pro” dilemma is no longer binary. There’s now a third path: Transfer strategically, build your brand, enhance your draft value, and collect NIL checks along the way—all while staying in college. The age of player mobility and monetization For decades, college athletes were not allowed to make money in any way, shape, or form related to their sport or likeness without sacrificing their amateur status. That changed in 2021, when NIL legislation empowered athletes to sign endorsement deals, monetize their social media, and collect appearance fees, ending the era in which players could lose eligibility for something as simple as eating too much pasta at a team banquet. Now, players in marquee positions at top schools can average between $75,000 and $800,000 in NIL dollars annually. In 2024, University of Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders led all college football with $6.2 million in NIL deals—something that likely factored into his decision to forgo last year’s NFL draft and return to Colorado for his senior season. Meanwhile, the transfer portal now allows players to transfer freely between schools without having to sit out a year, as was previously required (think free agency, but for college). Under these new rules, FBS scholarship transfers rose from 1,946 in 2021-22 to 2,303 in 2022-23, reaching 2,707 in 2023-24, according to NBC Sports. In 2023-24 alone, the total number of NCAA football players across all divisions who entered the portal exceeded 11,000. Already this year, more than 400 players have entered the spring portal since it opened on Wednesday, meaning more players are using it every year to take control of their college careers and future NFL prospects. Case study No. 1: Cam Ward Ward and Sanders, this year’s top two quarterback prospects, took different routes to the draft, yet are each a product of the new landscape. Ward finished high school as an unknown zero-star prospect who went to the only school that wanted him: the University of the Incarnate Word, an FCS program in Texas. Two years and 71 touchdowns later, having made a name for himself, Ward transferred to Washington State, further elevating his national profile over two seasons before declaring for the 2024 NFL Draft. The problem was that some experts didn’t even consider him a top-100 prospect at the time. So with the opportunity to improve his draft stock—and the promise of NIL dollars—he chose to return to school, transferring for a second time in three years, this time to Miami. As a Hurricane, Ward was a Heisman Trophy finalist and won the Davey O’Brien Award, given to the nation’s top quarterback. He also landed $2 million in NIL deals along the way while positioning himself as the potential No. 1 overall pick, where he is likely to match or exceed the $39.5 million fully guaranteed contract last year’s No. 1 pick, University of Southern California quarterback Caleb Williams, signed with the Chicago Bears. According to one NFL evaluator, had Ward stayed at Incarnate Word, as he would have in a pre-transfer portal world, he would likely be a fifth-round pick at best. Case Study No. 2: Shedeur Sanders Projected to go as high as eighth overall in the 2024 draft, Sanders, who transferred to Colorado from Jackson State before his junior year, passed on the NFL and returned to college, where he earned $6.5 million in NIL deals. The Atlanta Falcons selected Michael Penix Jr. eighth overall in that draft. Had Sanders been that pick, we can assume he would have received something akin to Penix Jr.’s four-year, fully guaranteed rookie contract worth $22.88 million with a $13.46 million signing bonus. This year, Sanders has been projected to go as high as No. 3 to the New York Giants, with whom he held a private workout this week. Should that happen, he could expect to receive at least what University of North Carolina quarterback Drake Maye received at the No. 3 slot last year—a fully guaranteed four-year, $36.63 million deal with the New England Patriots (with a $23.46 million signing bonus). If that’s how Sanders’s chips fall on Thursday, his net gain will be roughly $13.75 million in NFL contract dollars, plus the $6.5 million in NIL money, meaning he will effectively have netted more than $20 million just for staying in school. But Sanders’s gamble carries risk. Recent mock drafts show Sanders sliding, with some analysts predicting he could fall outside the top 10. If that happens, his decision to skip last year’s draft might prove a financial miscalculation, even with his NIL earnings. This is the calculus today’s college stars face—immediate pro security versus betting on themselves while earning NIL money. It’s a high-stakes game with career-defining consequences. Risky for players, good for the NFL NFL draft analysts project only 55 to 65 underclassmen in the 2025 draft, down from the typical 90 to 110 in previous years. The minimum base salary for NFL rookies for 2025 is $840,000, typical for late-round picks. Many of these players can, according to some NFL executives, likely achieve that in NIL dollars if they return to school. So, more mid-to-late-round picks are betting on themselves and staying in school to improve their stock while earning NIL money. This shift transforms the later rounds of the draft. Instead of raw underclassmen taking early swings based on potential, teams now find more experienced players who have exhausted their eligibility. NFL teams are embracing this new reality. The NIL and transfer portal era delivers more polished prospects with real-world business experience from managing personal brands and finances. The transfer portal creates natural experiments demonstrating adaptability across different systems and competition levels. Though scouting becomes more complex with prospects bouncing between programs, teams gain invaluable insights into character development, seeing how players handle wealth and fame before investing millions in draft capital. Beyond the NFL While NIL reshapes football’s talent pipeline, its impact on basketball—particularly women’s basketball—reveals how different sport economies create vastly different career decisions. Consider Olivia Miles, who was projected as the No. 2 prospect in the 2025 WNBA draft. Instead of going pro, Miles entered the transfer portal to play one final college season, leaving Notre Dame for Texas Christian University, and taking her lucrative NIL deals with her. If Miles were selected with the No. 2 pick in this year’s draft, she would have signed a four-year, $348,198 deal, an average annual value of $87,050. While her NIL valuation is undisclosed, the current top earner in women’s college basketball (Louisiana State University’s Flau’jae Johnson) has $1.5 million in NIL deals, far exceeding what Miles would make in the WNBA in 2025. Delaying her WNBA entry also helps Miles avoid a four-year fixed rookie contract while the league negotiates a new collective bargaining agreement. With the WNBA’s $2.2 billion media deal taking effect in 2026, players are seeking significant pay increases, and Miles is betting that rookies entering next year will receive substantially better compensation than those locked into legacy rookie contracts. Even USC’s JuJu Watkins, perhaps women’s basketball’s most talented player, has no financial reason to rush her ACL recovery and enter the WNBA draft early. Her NIL deals continue during rehab, providing security that previous generations of athletes never had. Cooper Flagg is a special case The case of Duke’s Cooper Flagg illustrates the stark contrast between men’s and women’s basketball. Flagg, just 18, is expected to be the No. 1 NBA draft pick after just one college season and could earn roughly $13.8 million as a rookie, escalating to $19.2 million by year four. After his rookie contract, he would be eligible for a five-year max extension worth an estimated $328.3 million, and if he makes an All-NBA Team along the way, that max extension would approach $400 million. If Flagg returns to Duke, experts estimate he could earn between $6 million and $8 million in NIL money. Given his earning potential in his rookie year and the possibility of delaying starting the clock toward a possible $400 million max extension, returning to school would be financially irrational, making Flagg an exception to what has otherwise become a popular rule among prospects. The future is now As the landscape continues to evolve and amateurism becomes more professionalized, the relationship between college athletics and pro leagues will follow suit. The traditional talent pipeline has been reengineered, and it will be on full display at Thursday’s NFL draft. Ward and Sanders aren’t just prospects. They’re prototypes of a new business model. Players now operate like startups, leveraging strategic pivots (transfers) and funding rounds (NIL deals) to maximize their valuation before acquisition (the draft). Ward’s journey from zero-star recruit to potential first-overall pick represents the ultimate minimum viable product transformation, while Sanders’s $6.5 million NIL portfolio demonstrates the power of calculated patience and brand development. The talent acquisition game in sports has changed forever. The only question remaining is which teams and players are creative enough to use that to their advantage. View the full article

Trying to get from point A to point B? If only it were that simple! With any manner of travel these days, you’ve got options: planes, trains, buses, ferries, and beyond. And finding the best path to embark on isn’t always easy. Even finding all the available options can sometimes be a pain. But it doesn’t have to be. For over a decade, I’ve been using a tool that demystifies how to get from one location to another. It’s a great way to see all the available travel options in a single spot—complete with estimated prices and travel times. Notably, there’s absolutely no AI at play here. AI travel tools may be interesting for brainstorming ideas, but this tool will show you only real transportation options with up-to-date information. Let’s get moving. Psst: If you love these types of tools as much as I do, check out my free Cool Tools newsletter from The Intelligence. You’ll be the first to find all sorts of simple tech treasures! Google Maps who? The next time you encounter a complicated web of route options, remember a site called ​Rome2Rio​. ➜ Rome2Rio shows every last possible travel option in a single streamlined place. It even finds routes Google Maps misses—that’s the main point. To get started, head to the ​Rome2Rio website​. You can also install the free app for your ​Android​ device or ​iPhone​, if you’d rather. Whichever path you pick, you won’t need to create an account or jump through any silly hoops to get going. Just plug in the destination you’re starting from, the destination you’re headed to—and that’s it. You’ll instantly see all your options, with prices attached. The site will even provide options that string together multiple modes of travel. If the best method available for a given trip is to take a train, board an airplane, and then jump on a ferry, Rome2Rio will tell you. You can actually book your travel through Rome2Rio, too, but I’ve always just used it as a search engine and a starting point for my travel planning. Ultimately, Rome2Rio is a huge, regularly updated database that does one thing and does it exceptionally well. It even beats most AI-powered travel tools in 2025, assuming you just want to know concrete ways to get from A to B. Rome2Rio is available ​on the web​, as ​an Android app​, and as ​an iPhone app​. The service is completely free. (It makes money with ads and affiliate links, if you use it to book travel.) Rome2Rio’s ​privacy policy​ says the service will never sell your personal information. And again, you don’t even need an account to use it. Navigate your way to even more productivity-boosting goodness with my free Cool Tools newsletter. You’ll get an instant introduction to an incredible audio app and a new off-the-beaten-path gem in your inbox every Wednesday! View the full article

In 2017, Nathan Cozzolino started Rose, a “farm to edibles” brand based in Los Angeles. Cozzolino and his team cultivated organic hemp and marijuana, produced its own low-dose gummies with natural organic ingredients, and sold the product to licensed dispensaries. This structure required overhead that cost upwards of $80,000 a month. Six years in, the brand wasn’t able to sell enough products to cover its expenses despite being sold in more than 100 retailers. That changed in July of 2023 when Rose switched the entirety of its production to hemp. “We did it because it was that or go out of business,” Cozzolino says. He let go of his cannabis licenses, downsized his facilities, and within 60 days built a website where he could sell directly to customers. Within the first month of online sales, Rose was able to break even. Now, the company is selling more products than it’s able to make, and Cozzolino and his team can focus on the part of the business they love most: the agricultural and culinary work, and sharing the therapeutic benefits of cannabis. “Being able to sell online directly to our customer in a responsible way has been what Rose has needed to fully realize our potential as a company and to be able to pursue everything that we dreamed of doing,” Cozzolino says. “And that always brings us back to the farm, investing in the land, and seeing how we can make our product more interesting, starting with the agricultural component of it.” Rose is part of a bigger shift in the cannabis industry toward hemp-derived edibles, which can give users much of the same effects as cannabis-derived THC at lower dosages. As customers increasingly search out low-dose options, they’re finding that these products, from gummies to chocolate to mints and beverages, can be legally shipped right to their door with a few clicks online, circumventing the need to visit a licensed dispensary. The recreational cannabis landscape has been rapidly changing in recent years. While flower and vapes still account for the majority of the market, edibles are becoming a fast-growing category, especially in the United States. The market generated $10.6 billion in 2024—a figure that’s expected to reach $47.1 billion in 2043, according to a recent report from Research and Markets. And within the edibles market, a growing number of brands are using hemp-derived THC, which is biochemically the same as cannabis-derived THC, in their products. “The explosion of hemp-derived cannabis products has helped quicken the normalization of cannabis,” says John Kagia, the director of cannabis policy in New York and an industry analyst. There are a few reasons for this: Cannabis companies have found that low-dose edibles are extremely popular with their customers. Meanwhile, the 2018 Farm Bill that removed hemp containing up to 0.3% THC from the federal list of controlled substances has made it easier for cannabis companies to meet the demand. Brands are betting that curious cannabis users will be intrigued enough by gummies and seltzers to eventually become loyal shoppers and daily cannabis users. The Edible Future of Cannabis To people in the cannabis space, the mainstreaming of edibles is a natural next step for recreational and medicinal weed. “They’re very universal,” says Verena von Pfetten, a cofounder, with David Weiner, of Gossamer, a cannabis media platform. “You don’t have to learn how to roll a joint, you don’t need to buy a piece.” Plus, clearly labeled doses make it easy to measure just how much THC you’re ingesting. These aren’t the mystery brownies that might knock you out for an entire afternoon. Gummies account for 72% of the edibles market, and “a gummy vitamin is something people are comfortable with,” von Pfetten adds. When Weiner and von Pfetten, who have media backgrounds, launched Gossamer in 2017, they saw an opportunity to make cannabis more accessible to people who were interested in the effects of THC but were alienated by the stereotypical stoner branding or expert-level discussions about strains. “Everything was ‘verity’ or ‘green’ or ‘canna’ something,” Weiner says. “It was just kind of like, surely there’s a more sophisticated way of tapping into this.” The marketing around edibles tends to be approachable, with brands playing into the desired effect that someone might want to achieve, like better sleep, more energy, or relaxation. “The customer we want to reach, and that we believe is actually the largest customer base across the board, doesn’t make their lives revolve around cannabis; they incorporate cannabis into their lives,” von Pfetten says. “And so how can we help them do that?” Gossamer’s online store, which began offering hemp-derived edibles in 2024, sells everything from THC tinctures to gummies to pre-rolls. The bestsellers are, by far, one- and two-milligram products. The Business of Edibles Edibles also make business sense for cannabis producers. The THC in these products can be derived from hemp, a variety of the same plant species as marijuana that contains a lower concentration of THC. The 2018 Farm Bill legalized the industrial production of hemp containing up to 0.3% THC. It also declassified the plant and cannabinoids derived from it, as a controlled substance. This means that products made with hemp can cross state lines and don’t need to be sold in regulated dispensaries, opening the market to states where recreational marijuana use is prohibited so long as they don’t have regulations against hemp. Despite more states legalizing recreational cannabis, companies in this space haven’t been growing as quickly or as easily as they anticipated. Just 27% of cannabis businesses are profitable. The regulated adult-use market across the country is fragmented, with each state having slightly different rules about retail. Since hemp- and marijuana-derived THC are biochemically the same, edibles brands have been switching to hemp-derived THC in their products, which has helped their businesses remain viable. “A significant advantage that the hemp-derived ecosystem has is centralized production,” Kagia says. “It’s much cheaper for these brands to build in one place and ship nationally than to build in every individual market like they would have to do in the adult-use space.” Additionally, Kagia is seeing the strongest growth in demand for hemp-derived edibles in states that have not legalized medical or recreational marijuana. “What the industry needed was to be able to have a small operation, with little overhead, still working in a regulated way using third party labs for testing,” Cozzolino of Rose says. “But they needed to be able to sell directly to their customers without a storefront and with an online business the way the rest of the world works.” The most popular edibles brands have also quietly shifted to hemp-derived THC for their low-dose edibles, including Wyld (the best seller in most states); Kiva, a portfolio of brands that makes chocolates, gummies, and mints; the chewables brand Sundae School; and Cann, the beverage company. The move is paying off. Aaron Nosbisch, the founder of Brez, a maker of beverages infused with hemp-derived cannabis and mushrooms, posted on LinkedIn that 83% of its sales were DTC and that the brand is pacing to make over $50 million in revenue this year. Selling Edibles, Without the Dispensary With more edibles on the market, the retail landscape is changing, too. Before, these brands were at the mercy of dispensaries, which often paid wholesale prices based on the amount of THC in a product and not the overall quality of experience. (For example, a package of 20 microdose gummies from Rose retails for $40 and has 20 mg of THC total while a tin of pre-rolls with 1,635 mg THC total sells for $45 at MedMen.) Additionally, the brand communication could be uneven depending on how familiar dispensary staff was with a product. It wasn’t the best environment for low-dose options. “Most brands from the get-go have said, we think people want a lower dose edible,” von Pfetten says. “And then the struggle has been getting dispensaries and the general industry on board with selling them at that price point. The hemp-derived market allowed brands to sell the products that they always wanted to make direct-to-consumer.” And despite big investments in retail design, dispensaries remain alienating for some shoppers—or just inconvenient. “The experience that retailers are providing is not speaking to individuals,” Cozzolino says. Meanwhile, gas stations and corner stores have also begun to sell these products, leading to confusion about what is actually being sold and how safe it is. “This is still such a young market that we don’t yet have a good sense of how consumers are processing the difference between these two products,” Kagia says, referring to hemp-derived THC and marijuana-derived THC. Von Pfetten compares the public level of knowledge about the cannabis industry and all the products available to skincare in the 1960s. “If you talked to women about AHAs, retinol, salicylic acid, and hyaluronic acid, I think most women would be like, ‘What the fuck are you talking about? I use cold cream,’” she explains. “We are just barely getting to that point in cannabis. People are like, oh, weed gets you high, but then you start talking about CBD, CBG, and terpenes and PHC. So there’s all this education that needs to happen in order for customers to really understand the benefits of the products, and a lot of that education is happening online.” In addition to direct-to-consumer sales, online shops specializing in edibles, like Gossamer, are now entering the marketplace to balance a trustworthy, reliable retail experience with convenience. “You still need some guardrails,” von Pfetten says, noting that a fully DTC market isn’t sustainable since brands need multiple points of discovery. “How do I know that this is vetted and curated?” Edible Arrangements, the fruit basket company, launched Edibles.com, a marketplace for hemp-based THC products in March. It now sells to customers in Texas, which has not legalized recreational cannabis, and is using its existing franchise locations as delivery hubs. It essentially layered another product onto its logistics infrastructure. It plans to expand to Florida, the Carolinas, and Georgia next. Soon, Edibles.com will also build a physical retail location in Atlanta. “An interesting strategic thing for us to solve is how do we alleviate some of the barriers to entry and how do we give trust and education to our consumers that will then translate into permission to say, ‘You know what, maybe I will try these products,’” says Thomas Winstanley, the chief marketing officer for Edibles.com. “Because if it’s coming from Edible Brands, then maybe I can take it a little bit more seriously than what I see at a gas station.” The Complicated Future of Hemp-Derived Edibles While hemp-based edibles continue to gain popularity, some states are beginning to regulate the product, citing public health concerns. Meanwhile, cannabis interest groups are lobbying the government to regulate hemp-based products and “close the loophole” in the Farm Bill, as U.S. Cannabis Council (USCC) Executive Director Edward Conklin wrote in a letter to Congress last year. The alcohol industry is also lobbying for more restrictions on hemp-based edibles. As states roll out more regulations around hemp-derived THC, the online shops and brands have stopped shipping to them. In 2023, Washington State created a new law that said any product containing THC is considered cannabis and must be sold in licensed dispensaries. In September of 2024, California enacted temporary emergency regulations to ban hemp products with detectable levels of THC and recently extended the policy to June 2025. In New York, where edibles constitute 15% of licensed cannabis sales, there are now potency limits on the sale of hemp-derived edibles. Anything over one milligram per dose, or 10 milligrams per package, must be sold in a dispensary. According to Kagia, New York set the limits based on potential intoxication risk. Kagia hopes that there is more clarity on the federal level about the production and distribution of hemp-derived THC products as a matter of public health and safety and for business efficiency reasons, too. “It would be unfortunate if we ended up with another patchwork national model for hemp-derived products just as we have for the adult use ecosystem,” he says. “I don’t think it serves the cannabis economy writ large to have these bifurcated models where functionally the same products can be sold in one context but not in another. And so we are looking forward to robust discussion with our national lawmakers on the governance of hemp-derived cannabinoids moving forward.” Cannabis companies are cautiously watching the space. Von Pfetten believes that dispensary customers will and should continue to shop in licensed facilities for high-dose edibles but “as long as the right guardrails in place are in place in terms of shipping, age gating, and vetting, someone should be able to buy a one-milligram or a two-milligram edible online or receive it direct in a store.” To Cozzolino, the regulatory discussion about low-dose edibles is missing the fact that these products are about a culture of cannabis, not intoxication. “If the people regulating [cannabis] try to force us back into a three-tiered system, then they’re inhibiting that and ultimately they are decreasing the value of what people in the world can experience with cannabis,” he says. So while low-dose edibles might be the future of cannabis, anxiety about the category looms. Luckily, there’s a gummy for that. View the full article

If you have investments in the stock market, the past several weeks have probably felt a little worrisome. (And by “a little worrisome” I mean “just barely keeping oneself from sobbing in the bathtub with a pint of Ben & Jerry’s.”) U.S. and global markets have yo-yoed in reaction to the current administration’s inexplicable tariff wars. And since this market volatility is a direct result of America’s foreign economic policy rather than “normal” economic fluctuation, it’s difficult to know what to expect. There’s no promise of fiscal unicorns and rainbows when we get to the other end of this trade war—but before you cash out your 401(k) and bury the money in your backyard, keep these important facts in mind. Yes, this does feel different If it feels like this market turbulence is different from others in recent memory, that’s because it is. The current market instability stems from the president’s tariffs rather than a market crash (like the 2008 housing bubble collapse) or a disruptive global event (like the 2020 COVID-related market downturn). That’s significant because economists and investors know what to expect from market crashes, which are relatively common and repeat on a somewhat predictable 7-to-10-year pattern, followed by an average recovery time of 1.4 years. While the 2020 market shenanigans also felt unprecedented at the time—since none of us had ever lived through a global pandemic before—the recovery within four months of the market’s lowest point made it clear that everyone wanted to get back to business as soon as possible post-COVID. In both of those cases, it made sense to “HANK TOUGH!” and stay the course through the market downturns, since there was a long history of the market rebounding from similar situations. But our current heartburn-inducing market ride stems from America’s global retaliatory trade war, and we can’t necessarily count on the “natural” rebound that has occurred after every other destabilizing market event in recent memory. Any countries angry about U.S.-imposed tariffs could make long-term financial or policy changes that will continue to affect our domestic market for years. There is simply no way of knowing what long-term effects there will be on our investments. But there is a precedent Just because we have never lived through a tariff-triggered market downturn doesn’t mean our current situation is unprecedented. Almost 100 years ago, isolationist tariffs introduced by Utah Senator Reed Smoot (yes, that was really his name) and Oregon Representative Willis Hawley exacerbated an existing financial crisis. You may only remember the Smoot-Hawley tariffs of 1930 as part of the mind-numbing lecture Ferris Bueller missed on his day off, but this act raised import duties in an attempt to protect American farmers and businesses. Unfortunately, the Smoot-Hawley tariffs prompted retaliatory tariffs, and the American economy suffered for nearly a decade. Thankfully, we are in a much better situation than our ancestors were. The Great Depression started with the 1929 stock market crash—before Smoot and Hawley teamed up, ammonia and bleach style, to impose tariffs. As of February 2025, the U.S. was enjoying a robust economy with a growing GDP, while the 1930 tariffs introduced by Smoot and Hawley kicked the wounded economy when it had already been sucker punched by the market crash. The drop in your investment portfolio over the past couple of weeks was nausea-inducing in part because it was falling from a high point. But investors in the 1930s saw their money lose value in the crash and then lose more value from the tariff wars. No one wants to hear a financial expert say, “It could be worse—and here are some examples of when it was!” However, recognizing that the recent turbulence is rocking an economy that had otherwise been stable can help fend off the worst of the panic. Planning for the unexpected Any financial adviser worth their salt will tell you that past performance is no guarantee of future returns, but understanding how markets have reacted in the past can offer some perspective on how markets may react in the future. Since we can look back to the 1930s and see how other countries reacted to America’s isolationist financial and foreign policy—and how the market responded to tariffs being flung back and forth across borders like a game of hot potato—we can make plans and predictions based on the worst-case scenario. We know from Smoot and Hawley that tariffs often lead to retaliatory tariffs, which can have a negative impact on the market. Even though there is no way of knowing what will happen, it’s probably a good idea for investors to buckle up for a bumpy ride. Here’s how: Remember that the market will eventually recover For anyone who is 10 or more years out from retirement, you can feel confident that things will improve. Unless we’re in a “dogs and cats living together—mass hysteria!” type of extinction-level event, consider ignoring your 401(k) balance for a little while. Your investments will do better if you slowly back away from your portfolio and let the market recover. Forewarned is forearmed Just because the market will return to some semblance of normalcy without any effort on your part doesn’t mean you should do nothing. Now is the time to shore up your finances by paying off high-interest debt, setting aside money in an emergency fund, finding ways to lower your expenses, and starting some secondary income streams in case of job loss or involuntary retirement. All of these actions will help your finances whether we’re in for a long stretch of market nastiness or things are about to come up roses. Invest conservatively as you get closer to retirement Your asset allocation is supposed to get less risky as you approach retirement, since that will protect your principal in case of a market downturn at the wrong time. If you’re planning to retire in the next few years, you can make sure any new contributions you make to your retirement accounts are invested in low-risk-lower-return assets, like bonds, treasury funds, CDs, or other cash equivalents. While these investments aren’t going to grow like the market normally would, the market also may not grow like it normally would. Stashing your contributions into these kinds of investments will offer you more peace of mind that the money will be waiting for your retirement. You still have time for market recovery Once you’re no longer in the flush of youth, you may assume you don’t have the luxury of investing for the long term. It’s not like a 60-year-old can afford to wait out the market like a 30-year-old can. But you can invest like you have decades ahead of you. Because you do! As you approach retirement and even during your retirement, you will keep a portion of your portfolio invested for the long haul. When you retire, you don’t need all of your money right away. You’ll keep a significant chunk invested for a longer time horizon, which helps ensure that your money will last your entire life. How to respond if you’re already retired By far, retirees are the most vulnerable to a protracted market plunge. Going back to work and/or waiting out the market weirdness is generally off the table for retirees, so it can feel like there are no good choices. But that doesn’t mean retirees are helpless in the face of larger economic forces. As with current workers and near-retirees, retirees can make plans now for the worst-case scenario. This might include: Reducing expenses: This is easier said than done, considering the price of eggs and everything else, but start thinking about ways to downsize your costs. Selling items: If you have a lifetime’s worth of home goods, collectibles, or Precious Moments figurines sitting around, you may want to start selling some off. This could be a good way to increase your retirement income without having to take money from your investments. Considering a reverse mortgage: Since your home is likely your most valuable asset, a reverse mortgage could be a decent way to access cash from something other than your investments. Don’t panic—plan Panic is the leading cause of selling at the market’s low point. Instead of selling off your investments to staunch the flow of tariff-induced anxiety, make a plan instead. If you assume the market may be bumpy for the foreseeable future, how will that change your financial decisions? Making investment choices based on that assumption will serve you well no matter what happens. In the best-case scenario, things will recover sooner than expected and this will be a footnote in your investing career. But even in the worst-case scenario, planning for volatility will help you make more rational decisions—and protect you from making your paper losses real by getting out of the market. It may be a bit of a grim sounding win-win, but it’s a heck of a lot better than crying into a pint of Chunky Monkey in the bathtub. View the full article

With music streaming, users have gotten used to being at the mercy of algorithms. But French music streamer Deezer is making it easier for its subscribers to make the algorithm work for them. The company unveiled an update to its mobile experience that doubles down on its emphasis on personalization and sharing to set it apart from larger competitors like Spotify and Apple Music. “The new features we’re introducing today give users more control over their algorithm, greater flexibility to personalize their experience, and easy ways to share content with their friends, even beyond Deezer,” CEO Alexis Lanternier said in a press release. Rolling out over the next two months, the update includes enhancements to Deezer’s Flow feature, more options for interface personalization, a monthly Spotify Wrapped-style listening roundup called “My Deezer Month,” and a universal sharing function to share songs with users on other music platforms. With Flow, listeners can set certain songs as favorites and ban others, effectively steering the algorithm in the direction they choose. From there, they can even tune in to specific “moods,” like “chill,” “sad,” or “party.” The app’s interface can be personalized as well. Deezer had previously rolled out a personalized homepage to a subset of users, but now all subscribers will have the ability to decide what they see featured on their Favorites page, making it easier to navigate to their preferred tracks, playlists, and albums. Users can further customize the way the app looks with photos and stickers for their playlist covers. For fans of Spotify’s annual Wrapped feature, My Deezer Month ups the ante with more frequency, providing a monthly breakdown of users’ listening habits delivered in highly shareable form. This feature builds on the strong engagement growth the platform said it saw in 2024 for its annual wrap-up, My Deezer Year. Alongside its full-year earnings in March, Deezer said engagement and social media shares of the feature were up 27% and 75% year over year, respectively, in 2024. But what fun would these features be if you couldn’t share them? The app’s Shaker feature has long allowed users to make playlists with users across platforms; now they can also share tracks with users on different platforms thanks to Deezer’s unique universal sharing link. The company has stepped up efforts to stand out in a competitive streaming landscape with both users and artists. In 2023, Deezer was one of the first platforms to adopt what it calls an “artist-centric” payment model that set a minimum number of monthly streams a song needs before it can start earning royalties (Spotify followed suit with a similar policy later that year). It has also invested in AI tools, including AI-powered playlists and a tool for identifying AI-generated songs, which Deezer says make up roughly 18% of all songs submitted to streaming platforms. So far Deezer is also the only music streaming service to sign the Statement on AI Training that promises not to allow its music data to train AI models. “Generative AI has the potential to positively impact music creation and consumption,” Aurélien Hérault, Deezer’s chief innovation officer, said in a press release. “But we need to approach the development with responsibility and care in order to safeguard the rights and revenues of artists and songwriters while maintaining transparency for the fans.” View the full article

Robert Bordone is a negotiation, mediation, and conflict resolution expert who founded Harvard Law School’s Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program as well as the Cambridge Negotiation Institute. He was a professor at Harvard for many years and is currently a senior fellow at Harvard Law School. Dr. Joel Salinas is a behavioral neurologist and scientist. He was formerly a faculty member at Harvard Medical School and a clinical associate professor of neurology at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine. He was the founded and was chief medical officer at Isaac Health. What’s the big idea? Instead of seeing conflict as a battle to win or a mess to avoid, disagreement can be navigated in a way that creates connection and positive outcomes—on both a business financial level and a relational one. There is value to emerging from our cocoons of comfort in search of the benefits that honest, direct, and courageous engagement with conflict can bring. Conflict Resilience provides usable and scientifically validated strategies to negotiate disagreements with greater confidence and clarity. Whether it’s in your workplace, family, or community, learning to sit with and grow from conflict can create value in every aspect of your life. Below, coauthors Bordone and Salinas share five key insights from their new book, Conflict Resilience: Negotiating Disagreement Without Giving Up or Giving In. Listen to the audio version—read by both authors—in the Next Big Idea app. 1. Your brain treats conflict like a physical threat. When faced with conflict, the brain reacts as if we’re under physical attack. The same neural circuits that process physical pain are involved when we experience social rejection or disagreement. This can trigger our fight-flight-freeze-fawn-fester responses, making us either overly aggressive, avoidant, or stuck in rumination. From a Darwinian perspective, these five responses could have a lot of value when under attack with an existential threat. But in the context of modern day-to-day relationships with family, friends, or colleagues, these brain responses can backfire. The brain’s automatic effort to protect us from discomfort in the moment prevents us from responding in ways that better serve our longer-term interests. The key to conflict resilience is recognizing these automatic reactions, being able to pause and assess whether the in-the-moment threat is real or just discomfort, and then being able to deploy strategies to sit with the discomfort because of what we call the Bigger Better Offer on the other side of conflict. 2. Conflict avoidance makes things worse. When we avoid the discomfort of disagreement by walking away, canceling plans, or changing the topic, we often just amplify the problem over time. It’s understandable why you might shy away from tough conversations with your cousin about conflicting political views. You value the relationship and wish to prevent the disagreement from causing harm. While this strategy may help us navigate Thanksgiving dinner, in the long run, avoidance leaves us feeling less connected to that cousin. Prolonged avoidance makes us feel that we don’t even know each other. Spending time with them feels painful and fake. Eventually, the connection fades. The instinct to avoid for the sake of preserving a relationship ends up being the long-term kill. Our society is set up to aid and abet the avoidance tendency—social media, demographic changes, trigger warnings, cancel culture—all make it super easy to avoid and just hang out with those who think like us. As we see in our polarized world, this path dehumanizes and distances. Just like avoiding exercise weakens muscles, avoiding difficult conversations weakens our ability to navigate disagreements. By learning to name what’s happening—our emotions, triggers, and fears—we can take control instead of letting conflict control us. 3. Curiosity is your best conflict tool. We tend to enter conflict assuming we already know the other person’s perspective. But true conflict resilience comes from curiosity. Instead of debating or defending, try exploring: Ask open-ended questions, listen deeply, and seek to understand before being understood. When people feel heard, difficult conversations become more productive. It’s easy to say be curious, but it’s hard to do when we feel like we really do know what the other side thinks. Psychological biases tend to make us certain about how those we disagree with think, even when the truth is that we are often missing a lot of important information that can unlock the door to how they think, what matters to them, how to persuade them, and how better to connect with them. In our book, we share real-life examples of how cultivating curiosity led to breakthroughs in relationships, negotiations, and deal-making. As we explore the deeper perspectives of those with whom we disagree, the possibilities for connection grow, even if we still don’t see eye-to-eye. 4. Discomfort is not damaging. One of the biggest myths about conflict is that it’s inherently bad or destructive. In our professional work, we are constantly frustrated when people talk about “eliminating” or “reducing” conflict. Healthy conflict is a sign that folks feel free enough to be themselves and that there is enough diversity in the room to make life interesting and vibrant. Disagreement itself doesn’t have to lead to division. Tension can lead to growth—both personally and in relationships. We talk about how to stay in conflict to achieve the Bigger Better Offer. We also offer evidence-based tools to help you decide when to commit to stay engaged and when to draw the line between discomfort for growth and submitting yourself to ongoing harm or trauma. It’s a hard line to draw, but an important one. 5. Resilience is a skill you can build. Conflict resilience isn’t something we’re naturally good at. Each of us may be more or less conflict-resilient because of our upbringing, personality, and disposition. But whether you think you are super conflict-resilient or completely avoidant, you can get better with practice. Through small, daily actions—like pausing before reacting, naming your emotions, and shifting from defensiveness to curiosity—you can transform conflict from a source of stress into an opportunity for connection and change. The more you practice, the more you’ll see improved relationships, connections, and outcomes. And the more you practice, the easier it becomes. This article originally appeared in Next Big Idea Club magazine and is reprinted with permission. View the full article

If real Easter eggs aren’t your thing this weekend, you may find hunting for digital ones more enjoyable. And there are some cool ones to find at your fingertips, provided you have an iPhone or Mac. Apple has packed the iOS and macOS operating systems with several fun little references, many harking back to the legacy of the company or other companies in the tech industry. Microsoft’s Blue Screen of Death This one’s been around for a while, and it’s a fan favorite. The Finder on your Mac can show other computers connected to the same network. These computers are represented by icons. If the connected computers are other Macs, you’ll see icons that accurately represent the shape of the computer, such as a modern MacBook Pro or even an old G4 iMac from the early 2000s. But if the connected computers are Windows PCs, you’ll see the same icon for them all: an ugly beige CRT monitor with the infamous Windows Blue Screen of Death—the screen PC users see when something has gone seriously wrong with the Windows operating system. The icon choice is Apple’s subtle dig at its once archnemesis, and it has been an Easter egg in the Mac’s operating systems for a few decades now. iPhone Voice Memo app icon In this case, the Easter egg is an iPhone app icon itself. The waveform in the Voice Memos app icon may not be just a random glyph. Instead, SiliconRepublic says, the waveform’s shape is the one you get when you use Voice Memos to record the word “Apple.” In my tests, it’s pretty accurate, but your mileage may vary depending on how you enunciate words. Safari Reading List icon Apple has snuck a few direct references to Steve Jobs in its operating systems. The first can be found in the Safari app on iPhone. Open up Safari and then tap the bookmarks icon at the bottom of the screen. See the “Reading List” icon in the center of the pop-up? Those are a pair of eyeglasses—but not just any. They look remarkably identical to the round spectacles Steve Jobs made iconic. Record label with Steve Jobs’s phrases There’s another reported Steve Jobs reference in Apple’s software. This one is in macOS. If you open the System Settings app, click Users & Groups, and then click on your profile picture to edit it, you’ll notice that under the “Suggestions” folder full of icons, you can select an icon of a record turntable. Well, if you go to where the icon image file is actually stored in macOS (Macintosh HD>Library>User Pictures>Instruments) and open the “Turntable.heic” file, you’ll see the record on the turntable lists four tracks on its label: “1. Magic 2. Revolution 3. Boom! 4. Unbelievable.” These were all words Jobs frequently exclaimed during his keynote speeches and demos, notes iDropNews. “Here’s to the crazy ones” Next to its seminal “1984” ad, Apple’s most iconic campaign was probably “Think Different”, from the late 1990s. That campaign features a poem called “Here’s to the crazy ones.” Apple has commemorated that poem in two places in its operating systems. The first is in the System Settings app in macOS. Click on the Display preferences panel, and you’ll notice the text size adjustment icons display the opening text from the poem. “Here’s to the crazy ones” can also be found printed on the pages of the open book emoji found in iOS and macOS. Let It Snow (in the Apple Store app) Finally, back in 2021, Apple snuck a little Easter egg into its Apple Store app for iPhone, noted AppleInsider. If you type in “let it snow” in the search field of the Apple Store app, the app will then display digital falling snow across your screen. While this Easter egg isn’t a direct reference to Apple, it’s a fun one to trigger during the winter holidays. A history of Apple Easter eggs During my research for this story, I consulted several older Apple Easter egg roundups—such as the ones published by iDropNews, MacRumors, and Mental Floss—to make sure that I had forgotten any big ones. I discovered that Apple has actually removed a fair amount of them from its operating systems. These removals include former Easter eggs that allowed you to play Tetris in the Terminal app or watch Star Wars reenacted in ASCII. There also used to be a Bitcoin Easter egg in macOS, but Apple has now removed that, too. I also remember from back in the day that when you typed “evil empire” into the OS X Dictionary app, you would find the entry for Microsoft. But that seems to be gone from macOS now, too. In other words, it seems like Apple has been cracking down on Easter eggs in recent years, so enjoy the above while you can. View the full article

Venice is charging day-trippers to the famed canal city an arrivals tax for the second year starting Friday, a measure aimed at combating the kind of overtourism that put the city’s UNESCO World Cultural Heritage status at risk. A UNESCO body decided against putting Venice on its list of cultural heritage sites deemed in danger after the tax was announced. But opponents of the day-tripper fee say it has done nothing to discourage tourists from visiting Venice even on high-traffic days. Here’s a look at Venice’s battle with overtourism by the numbers: 5–10 euros (about $6–$11) The fee charged to visitors who are not overnighting in Venice to enter its historic center during the second year of the day-tripper tax. Visitors who download a QR code at least three days in advance will pay 5 euros ($5.69)—the same amount charged last year throughout the pilot program. But those who make last-minute plans pay double. The QR code is required from 8:30 a.m. until 4 p.m. and is checked at entry points to the city, including the Santa Lucia train station, the Piazzale Roma bus depot and the Tronchetto parking garage. 54 The number of days this year that day visitors to Venice will be charged a fee to enter the historic center. They include mostly weekends and holidays from April 18 to July 27. That is up from 29 last year. The new calendar covers entire weeks over key holidays and extends the weekend period to include Fridays. 2.4 million euros That is the amount Venice took in during a 2024 pilot program for the tax. The city’s top budget official, Michele Zuin, said last year the running costs for the new system ran to 2.7 million euros, overshooting the total fees collected. This year, Zuin projects a surplus of about 1 million euros to 1.5 million euros, which will be used to offset the cost of trash collection and other services for residents. 450,000 The number of day-trippers who paid the tax in 2024. Officials say 8,000 day-trippers paid in advance to enter the city on Friday, among the 77,000 who have already registered so far to enter the city this year. Another 117,000 have registered for exemptions, which apply to anyone born in Venice, those paying property taxes in the city, studying or working in the historic center, or living in the wider Veneto region, among others. 75,000 The average number of daily visitors on the first 11 days of 2024 that Venice charged day-trippers. That’s about 10,000 people more than the number of tourists recorded on each of the three important holidays during the previous year. City council member Giovanni Andrea Martini, an opponent of the measure, said the figures show the project has not deterred visitors. 48,283 The number of official residents in Venice’s historic center composed of over 100 islands connected by footbridges and traversed by its famed canals. The population peaked at 174,000 in 1951, when Venice was home to thriving industries. The number shrank during Italy’s postwar economic boom as residents moved to the mainland for more modern housing—including indoor plumbing, which was lacking in Venice. It has been shrinking dramatically over recent decades as local industry lost traction, families sought mainland conveniences, and housing prices rose. Activists also blame the “mono-culture” of tourism, which they say has emptied the city of basic services like shops for everyday goods and medical care. 51,129 The number of beds for tourists in Venice’s historic center, including 12,627 in the less regulated short-term rental market, according to April data from the Ocio housing activist group. The number of tourist beds surpassed the number of permanent residents in 2023, according to Ocio’s monitor. Anyone staying in a hotel within the city limits, including on the mainland districts of Mestre and Marghera, pays a lodging tax and is therefore exempt from the day-tripper tax. 25 to 30 million The number of annual arrivals of both day-trippers and overnight guests roughly confirmed by cellphone data tracked from a Smart Control Room since 2020, according to city officials. —Colleen Barry, Associated Press View the full article

Westport makes the world’s entire supply of the anti-wrinkle drug — now it fears production could move to the US View the full article

Growth is worthwhile in itself — but it’s not a cure for populismView the full article

As the US president’s rollercoaster tariff policy creates global financial chaos, Tim Harford asks: is he in a fight he can’t win?View the full article

While the current President implements his “on again off again” tariffs, small businesses will still have to deal with the highest tariffs on imported goods in the last 80 years. On The Small Business Radio Show this week. I talked with Dominick Miserandino, who is the CEO of Retail Tech Media Nexus. He breaks down what the tariffs are, how they will affect consumers and what actions small businesses need to take. Understanding Tariffs What Are Tariffs? I begin the episode by asking Dominic to explain tariffs in simple terms for small business owners. Dominic clarifies that a tariff is essentially a tax imposed on imported goods. When a small business imports products, they must pay a percentage of the product’s cost as a tariff to the U.S. government. This cost is typically passed on to consumers, leading to higher prices for goods. Key Takeaways: Definition: A tariff is a fee paid on imported goods. Impact on Prices: The cost of tariffs is usually passed on to consumers, resulting in higher prices. The Intent Behind Tariffs I ask whether the intention behind these tariffs is to encourage domestic production, which could potentially lower costs. Dominic acknowledges that while tariffs can incentivize domestic production, the reality is more complex. For certain products, like coffee, increasing domestic production is not feasible due to factors like climate and labor costs. Key Takeaways: Domestic Production: Tariffs aim to encourage domestic production but are not always practical for all products. Feasibility Issues: Some products cannot be produced domestically due to environmental and economic constraints. Tariff Calculation and Disparities Methodology Behind Tariff Calculations The conversation shifts to how tariffs are calculated. Barry mentions a chart from the White House that outlines reciprocal tariffs, and Dominic critiques its simplistic approach. He explains that tariffs are not typically determined through a straightforward formula and that disparities in trade can complicate the situation. For example, countries like Bangladesh may export more than they can import due to their economic status, leading to skewed tariff implications. Key Takeaways: Complex Calculations: Tariff calculations are complex and not always straightforward. Trade Disparities: Economic disparities between countries can lead to uneven tariff impacts. Market Reactions and Panic Buying Market Reactions to Tariffs I raise concerns about market reactions to the tariffs, noting reports of panic buying among small business owners who may be stocking up on inventory before prices rise further. Dominic agrees, stating that the nature of the business will dictate whether owners can afford to buy in advance. He emphasizes the uncertainty created by tariffs, which complicates business planning and decision-making. Key Takeaways: Panic Buying: Some businesses may stock up on inventory to avoid future price increases. Uncertainty: Tariffs create uncertainty, making it difficult for businesses to plan effectively. The Broader Economic Impact Financial Strain on Businesses I share a personal anecdote about building a guest house and negotiating a fixed price with his builder to avoid tariff-related cost increases. Dominic points out that the unpredictability of tariffs can lead to significant financial strain on businesses, as they struggle to maintain profitability amidst rising costs. Key Takeaways: Cost Increases: Tariffs can lead to unexpected cost increases for businesses. Profitability Challenges: Maintaining profitability becomes more challenging with rising costs. Negotiation Tactics and Market Disruption Motivations Behind Tariffs The conversation then delves into the motivations behind the tariffs. I speculate whether they are negotiating tactics or a means to offset tax cuts. Dominic suggests that the situation is complex, with many moving parts. He warns that the market has already been disrupted, and reversing the effects of tariffs will be challenging. Key Takeaways: Complex Motivations: The motivations behind tariffs are multifaceted and complex. Market Disruption: Tariffs have already disrupted the market, making it difficult to reverse their effects. Listen to the entire interview on The Small Business Radio Show This article, "Tariffs and Small Businesses: The Economic Tug-of-War You Can’t Ignore" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

While the current President implements his “on again off again” tariffs, small businesses will still have to deal with the highest tariffs on imported goods in the last 80 years. On The Small Business Radio Show this week. I talked with Dominick Miserandino, who is the CEO of Retail Tech Media Nexus. He breaks down what the tariffs are, how they will affect consumers and what actions small businesses need to take. Understanding Tariffs What Are Tariffs? I begin the episode by asking Dominic to explain tariffs in simple terms for small business owners. Dominic clarifies that a tariff is essentially a tax imposed on imported goods. When a small business imports products, they must pay a percentage of the product’s cost as a tariff to the U.S. government. This cost is typically passed on to consumers, leading to higher prices for goods. Key Takeaways: Definition: A tariff is a fee paid on imported goods. Impact on Prices: The cost of tariffs is usually passed on to consumers, resulting in higher prices. The Intent Behind Tariffs I ask whether the intention behind these tariffs is to encourage domestic production, which could potentially lower costs. Dominic acknowledges that while tariffs can incentivize domestic production, the reality is more complex. For certain products, like coffee, increasing domestic production is not feasible due to factors like climate and labor costs. Key Takeaways: Domestic Production: Tariffs aim to encourage domestic production but are not always practical for all products. Feasibility Issues: Some products cannot be produced domestically due to environmental and economic constraints. Tariff Calculation and Disparities Methodology Behind Tariff Calculations The conversation shifts to how tariffs are calculated. Barry mentions a chart from the White House that outlines reciprocal tariffs, and Dominic critiques its simplistic approach. He explains that tariffs are not typically determined through a straightforward formula and that disparities in trade can complicate the situation. For example, countries like Bangladesh may export more than they can import due to their economic status, leading to skewed tariff implications. Key Takeaways: Complex Calculations: Tariff calculations are complex and not always straightforward. Trade Disparities: Economic disparities between countries can lead to uneven tariff impacts. Market Reactions and Panic Buying Market Reactions to Tariffs I raise concerns about market reactions to the tariffs, noting reports of panic buying among small business owners who may be stocking up on inventory before prices rise further. Dominic agrees, stating that the nature of the business will dictate whether owners can afford to buy in advance. He emphasizes the uncertainty created by tariffs, which complicates business planning and decision-making. Key Takeaways: Panic Buying: Some businesses may stock up on inventory to avoid future price increases. Uncertainty: Tariffs create uncertainty, making it difficult for businesses to plan effectively. The Broader Economic Impact Financial Strain on Businesses I share a personal anecdote about building a guest house and negotiating a fixed price with his builder to avoid tariff-related cost increases. Dominic points out that the unpredictability of tariffs can lead to significant financial strain on businesses, as they struggle to maintain profitability amidst rising costs. Key Takeaways: Cost Increases: Tariffs can lead to unexpected cost increases for businesses. Profitability Challenges: Maintaining profitability becomes more challenging with rising costs. Negotiation Tactics and Market Disruption Motivations Behind Tariffs The conversation then delves into the motivations behind the tariffs. I speculate whether they are negotiating tactics or a means to offset tax cuts. Dominic suggests that the situation is complex, with many moving parts. He warns that the market has already been disrupted, and reversing the effects of tariffs will be challenging. Key Takeaways: Complex Motivations: The motivations behind tariffs are multifaceted and complex. Market Disruption: Tariffs have already disrupted the market, making it difficult to reverse their effects. Listen to the entire interview on The Small Business Radio Show This article, "Tariffs and Small Businesses: The Economic Tug-of-War You Can’t Ignore" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Key Takeaways Talent Shortage Impact: Small businesses are grappling with a talent shortage that adversely affects growth, operational efficiency, and the ability to attract qualified candidates. Root Causes: Economic factors, a significant skills gap, and a competitive job market are principal contributors to the talent shortage small businesses face. Operational Challenges: Approximately 40% of small business owners report unfilled positions, leading to increased workloads and strain on existing staff, which may affect productivity and team dynamics. Financial Implications: High turnover rates due to recruitment difficulties result in increased labor costs and potential revenue loss from unfinished projects, emphasizing the need for effective staffing strategies. Recruitment and Retention Strategies: Implementing clear recruitment practices, robust employee development programs, and a strong company culture can help mitigate challenges related to talent acquisition and retention. In today’s competitive landscape, small businesses face a pressing challenge: a talent shortage that threatens their growth and sustainability. With the job market shifting and skilled workers in high demand, many entrepreneurs find themselves struggling to attract and retain the right talent. This issue isn’t just a minor inconvenience; it can significantly impact your bottom line and overall success. Understanding the root causes of this talent shortage is crucial for navigating the evolving employment landscape. From the rise of remote work to changing employee expectations, various factors contribute to the difficulties small businesses encounter. By recognizing these challenges, you can take proactive steps to build a strong team that drives your business forward. Understanding Small Business Talent Shortage Small businesses experience a talent shortage that impacts their growth potential. This shortage stems from various factors, including shifts in the job market and evolving employee expectations. Definition of Talent Shortage A talent shortage refers to the gap between the skills required by employers and the skills possessed by available job candidates. For small businesses, this shortage creates significant hurdles in the recruitment process. As qualified applicants become scarce, hiring managers face challenges in identifying candidates who fit their staffing requirements. This dynamic often leads to prolonged job openings, increased turnover, and heightened competition for talent within the job market. Importance for Small Businesses Addressing the talent shortage is crucial for small businesses. A strong workforce directly influences operational efficiency, employee engagement, and overall organizational success. By developing an effective recruitment strategy, you enhance your ability to attract a diverse talent pool. Additionally, prioritizing employee retention helps reduce staffing costs and turnover rates associated with continuous hiring. Establishing robust employee development and training programs contributes to a positive workplace culture, aligning with employee expectations for growth and satisfaction. Ultimately, prioritizing talent acquisition strengthens your business’s foundation, ensuring long-term sustainability and competitive advantage. Causes of Small Business Talent Shortage Understanding the causes of the talent shortage affecting small businesses is critical for addressing recruitment challenges. Several key factors contribute to this shortage. Economic Factors Economic conditions significantly impact small business staffing. High inflation rates and rapid economic growth lead to increased demand for skilled workers. When the economy expands, you face heightened competition for labor, which exacerbates the gap between available job candidates and your staffing requirements. High inflation also drives up living costs, limiting your ability to offer competitive compensation and employee benefits. These economic pressures can deter potential applicants, making recruitment more difficult. Skills Gap A notable skills gap exists between the competencies employers require and those possessed by job candidates. Many candidates lack essential skills needed for specific roles, resulting in prolonged job openings. The rapid pace of technological change worsens this gap, as candidates may not receive adequate training in emerging fields. You can enhance your recruitment strategy by clearly defining job descriptions and necessary skill sets. Focusing on training and workforce development initiatives can also help bridge the skills gap within your team. Competitive Job Market The competitive job market further complicates talent acquisition for small businesses. As larger corporations attract potential hires with higher salaries and comprehensive HR policies, you might struggle to compete. To mitigate this, enhance your workplace culture and employee engagement efforts. Offering flexible work arrangements, such as remote options, can also appeal to part-time and full-time employees seeking better work-life balance. Prioritizing employee satisfaction and recognition fosters loyalty and can reduce staff turnover, tailoring your staffing solutions to maintain a strong talent pool. Impact on Small Businesses The talent shortage significantly impacts small businesses, hindering their operational efficiency and growth potential. Understanding the ramifications helps you adapt your strategies for better outcomes. Operational Challenges Small business staffing remains a challenge as 40% of owners report unfilled job openings. The recruitment process falters due to a lack of qualified job candidates, forcing you to manage increased workloads with limited resources. High industry-specific demands, particularly in construction, transportation, and manufacturing, exacerbate these operational challenges. In March 2025, job openings in the transportation sector rose to 53%, highlighting the fierce competition for talent. This scarcity can lead to strained team dynamics, reduced employee motivation, and diminished project quality. Financial Implications Financial implications arise from the inability to fill positions effectively. Increased staff turnover drives labor costs higher due to the need for constant recruitment and training of new employees. Investing in recruitment strategies and onboarding processes becomes essential for retaining quality talent. Moreover, the potential for lost revenue from unfinished projects or overworked employees underscores the importance of aligning your staffing budget with your business goals. Growth Constraints Growth constraints manifest as a direct result of the talent shortage. With limited access to skilled workers, you may face obstacles in expanding your operations, launching new products, or entering new markets. Insufficient employee development and performance reviews can erode workplace culture, ultimately hampering employee engagement and satisfaction. Building a diverse talent pool becomes critical for fostering innovation and adapting to changing market conditions. Prioritizing effective recruitment and employee management strategies can help alleviate these constraints and position your small business for future success. Strategies to Mitigate Talent Shortage Implementing effective strategies to address the talent shortage can significantly enhance your small business staffing efforts. Focusing on recruitment, employee development, and company culture will help you attract and retain the right talent. Effective Recruitment Practices Enhance your recruitment process by prioritizing skills over traditional qualifications. Use recruitment software to streamline job postings and candidate screening, making it easier to identify individuals with the necessary skill set. Leverage diverse recruitment channels, including social media and staffing agencies, to expand your talent pool. Create clear job descriptions that outline specific requirements, ensuring that candidates understand your staffing requirements right from the start. Employee Development Programs Implement robust employee development initiatives to boost retention and foster growth. Offer training programs tailored to individual needs that help employees enhance their skills and engage in their professional growth. Conduct regular performance reviews to align employee goals with business objectives, fostering a culture of continuous improvement. Investing in employee growth demonstrates commitment to their career paths, which can enhance employee motivation and reduce staff turnover. Strengthening Company Culture Cultivating a strong workplace culture nurtures employee satisfaction and encourages engagement. Foster open communication, promote work-life balance, and recognize employee contributions regularly. Engage in team-building activities that encourage collaboration among full-time and part-time employees alike. Align your company values with employee expectations to create a supportive environment that attracts top talent in a competitive job market. Prioritizing employee wellness initiatives can also contribute to a positive atmosphere, supporting overall employee relations and performance. Conclusion Navigating the talent shortage is essential for your small business’s success. By understanding the underlying factors and implementing effective strategies, you can attract and retain the skilled workers you need. Focus on enhancing your recruitment practices and fostering a positive company culture to create an environment where employees thrive. Remember that investing in employee development not only boosts retention but also strengthens your team’s capabilities. As you tackle these challenges head-on, you’ll position your business for sustainable growth and a competitive edge in the marketplace. Your proactive approach can turn this talent shortage into an opportunity for innovation and success. Frequently Asked Questions What is a talent shortage? A talent shortage occurs when there is a gap between the skills needed by employers and those possessed by available job candidates. This results in prolonged job openings and high turnover, making it challenging for small businesses to find and retain talent. What causes the talent shortage for small businesses? The talent shortage is driven by several factors, including economic conditions, a skills gap, and a competitive job market. High inflation and rapid growth increase the demand for skilled workers, while smaller companies often struggle to offer competitive pay and benefits. How does the talent shortage impact small businesses? The talent shortage can severely hinder small businesses by limiting operational efficiency and growth potential. Unfilled positions lead to increased workloads, financial strain from high turnover, and constraints on expansion efforts, affecting overall success. What strategies can small businesses use to overcome the talent shortage? Small businesses can mitigate the talent shortage by enhancing their recruitment practices, focusing on employee development, and cultivating a strong company culture. Approaches include prioritizing skills in hiring, using recruitment software, and creating robust development programs for employees. Why is company culture important in addressing talent shortages? A strong company culture nurtures employee satisfaction and engagement, making it easier for small businesses to retain talent. When employees feel valued and connected to the company mission, they are more likely to remain, reducing turnover rates and recruitment costs. Image Via Envato This article, "Tackling the Small Business Talent Shortage: Strategies for Success" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Key Takeaways Talent Shortage Impact: Small businesses are grappling with a talent shortage that adversely affects growth, operational efficiency, and the ability to attract qualified candidates. Root Causes: Economic factors, a significant skills gap, and a competitive job market are principal contributors to the talent shortage small businesses face. Operational Challenges: Approximately 40% of small business owners report unfilled positions, leading to increased workloads and strain on existing staff, which may affect productivity and team dynamics. Financial Implications: High turnover rates due to recruitment difficulties result in increased labor costs and potential revenue loss from unfinished projects, emphasizing the need for effective staffing strategies. Recruitment and Retention Strategies: Implementing clear recruitment practices, robust employee development programs, and a strong company culture can help mitigate challenges related to talent acquisition and retention. In today’s competitive landscape, small businesses face a pressing challenge: a talent shortage that threatens their growth and sustainability. With the job market shifting and skilled workers in high demand, many entrepreneurs find themselves struggling to attract and retain the right talent. This issue isn’t just a minor inconvenience; it can significantly impact your bottom line and overall success. Understanding the root causes of this talent shortage is crucial for navigating the evolving employment landscape. From the rise of remote work to changing employee expectations, various factors contribute to the difficulties small businesses encounter. By recognizing these challenges, you can take proactive steps to build a strong team that drives your business forward. Understanding Small Business Talent Shortage Small businesses experience a talent shortage that impacts their growth potential. This shortage stems from various factors, including shifts in the job market and evolving employee expectations. Definition of Talent Shortage A talent shortage refers to the gap between the skills required by employers and the skills possessed by available job candidates. For small businesses, this shortage creates significant hurdles in the recruitment process. As qualified applicants become scarce, hiring managers face challenges in identifying candidates who fit their staffing requirements. This dynamic often leads to prolonged job openings, increased turnover, and heightened competition for talent within the job market. Importance for Small Businesses Addressing the talent shortage is crucial for small businesses. A strong workforce directly influences operational efficiency, employee engagement, and overall organizational success. By developing an effective recruitment strategy, you enhance your ability to attract a diverse talent pool. Additionally, prioritizing employee retention helps reduce staffing costs and turnover rates associated with continuous hiring. Establishing robust employee development and training programs contributes to a positive workplace culture, aligning with employee expectations for growth and satisfaction. Ultimately, prioritizing talent acquisition strengthens your business’s foundation, ensuring long-term sustainability and competitive advantage. Causes of Small Business Talent Shortage Understanding the causes of the talent shortage affecting small businesses is critical for addressing recruitment challenges. Several key factors contribute to this shortage. Economic Factors Economic conditions significantly impact small business staffing. High inflation rates and rapid economic growth lead to increased demand for skilled workers. When the economy expands, you face heightened competition for labor, which exacerbates the gap between available job candidates and your staffing requirements. High inflation also drives up living costs, limiting your ability to offer competitive compensation and employee benefits. These economic pressures can deter potential applicants, making recruitment more difficult. Skills Gap A notable skills gap exists between the competencies employers require and those possessed by job candidates. Many candidates lack essential skills needed for specific roles, resulting in prolonged job openings. The rapid pace of technological change worsens this gap, as candidates may not receive adequate training in emerging fields. You can enhance your recruitment strategy by clearly defining job descriptions and necessary skill sets. Focusing on training and workforce development initiatives can also help bridge the skills gap within your team. Competitive Job Market The competitive job market further complicates talent acquisition for small businesses. As larger corporations attract potential hires with higher salaries and comprehensive HR policies, you might struggle to compete. To mitigate this, enhance your workplace culture and employee engagement efforts. Offering flexible work arrangements, such as remote options, can also appeal to part-time and full-time employees seeking better work-life balance. Prioritizing employee satisfaction and recognition fosters loyalty and can reduce staff turnover, tailoring your staffing solutions to maintain a strong talent pool. Impact on Small Businesses The talent shortage significantly impacts small businesses, hindering their operational efficiency and growth potential. Understanding the ramifications helps you adapt your strategies for better outcomes. Operational Challenges Small business staffing remains a challenge as 40% of owners report unfilled job openings. The recruitment process falters due to a lack of qualified job candidates, forcing you to manage increased workloads with limited resources. High industry-specific demands, particularly in construction, transportation, and manufacturing, exacerbate these operational challenges. In March 2025, job openings in the transportation sector rose to 53%, highlighting the fierce competition for talent. This scarcity can lead to strained team dynamics, reduced employee motivation, and diminished project quality. Financial Implications Financial implications arise from the inability to fill positions effectively. Increased staff turnover drives labor costs higher due to the need for constant recruitment and training of new employees. Investing in recruitment strategies and onboarding processes becomes essential for retaining quality talent. Moreover, the potential for lost revenue from unfinished projects or overworked employees underscores the importance of aligning your staffing budget with your business goals. Growth Constraints Growth constraints manifest as a direct result of the talent shortage. With limited access to skilled workers, you may face obstacles in expanding your operations, launching new products, or entering new markets. Insufficient employee development and performance reviews can erode workplace culture, ultimately hampering employee engagement and satisfaction. Building a diverse talent pool becomes critical for fostering innovation and adapting to changing market conditions. Prioritizing effective recruitment and employee management strategies can help alleviate these constraints and position your small business for future success. Strategies to Mitigate Talent Shortage Implementing effective strategies to address the talent shortage can significantly enhance your small business staffing efforts. Focusing on recruitment, employee development, and company culture will help you attract and retain the right talent. Effective Recruitment Practices Enhance your recruitment process by prioritizing skills over traditional qualifications. Use recruitment software to streamline job postings and candidate screening, making it easier to identify individuals with the necessary skill set. Leverage diverse recruitment channels, including social media and staffing agencies, to expand your talent pool. Create clear job descriptions that outline specific requirements, ensuring that candidates understand your staffing requirements right from the start. Employee Development Programs Implement robust employee development initiatives to boost retention and foster growth. Offer training programs tailored to individual needs that help employees enhance their skills and engage in their professional growth. Conduct regular performance reviews to align employee goals with business objectives, fostering a culture of continuous improvement. Investing in employee growth demonstrates commitment to their career paths, which can enhance employee motivation and reduce staff turnover. Strengthening Company Culture Cultivating a strong workplace culture nurtures employee satisfaction and encourages engagement. Foster open communication, promote work-life balance, and recognize employee contributions regularly. Engage in team-building activities that encourage collaboration among full-time and part-time employees alike. Align your company values with employee expectations to create a supportive environment that attracts top talent in a competitive job market. Prioritizing employee wellness initiatives can also contribute to a positive atmosphere, supporting overall employee relations and performance. Conclusion Navigating the talent shortage is essential for your small business’s success. By understanding the underlying factors and implementing effective strategies, you can attract and retain the skilled workers you need. Focus on enhancing your recruitment practices and fostering a positive company culture to create an environment where employees thrive. Remember that investing in employee development not only boosts retention but also strengthens your team’s capabilities. As you tackle these challenges head-on, you’ll position your business for sustainable growth and a competitive edge in the marketplace. Your proactive approach can turn this talent shortage into an opportunity for innovation and success. Frequently Asked Questions What is a talent shortage? A talent shortage occurs when there is a gap between the skills needed by employers and those possessed by available job candidates. This results in prolonged job openings and high turnover, making it challenging for small businesses to find and retain talent. What causes the talent shortage for small businesses? The talent shortage is driven by several factors, including economic conditions, a skills gap, and a competitive job market. High inflation and rapid growth increase the demand for skilled workers, while smaller companies often struggle to offer competitive pay and benefits. How does the talent shortage impact small businesses? The talent shortage can severely hinder small businesses by limiting operational efficiency and growth potential. Unfilled positions lead to increased workloads, financial strain from high turnover, and constraints on expansion efforts, affecting overall success. What strategies can small businesses use to overcome the talent shortage? Small businesses can mitigate the talent shortage by enhancing their recruitment practices, focusing on employee development, and cultivating a strong company culture. Approaches include prioritizing skills in hiring, using recruitment software, and creating robust development programs for employees. Why is company culture important in addressing talent shortages? A strong company culture nurtures employee satisfaction and engagement, making it easier for small businesses to retain talent. When employees feel valued and connected to the company mission, they are more likely to remain, reducing turnover rates and recruitment costs. Image Via Envato This article, "Tackling the Small Business Talent Shortage: Strategies for Success" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Key Takeaways Growing Demand for Tutoring: The rising need for personalized education makes starting a tutoring business a timely and potentially lucrative venture.Identify Your Niche: Choosing a specific subject or age group to focus on helps tailor your services and marketing strategies, enhancing your business effectiveness.Create a Robust Business Plan: A solid plan that includes goals, budgeting, and financial projections is essential for guiding your tutoring business towards success.Understand Legal Requirements: Properly registering your business and obtaining the necessary insurance protects you from liabilities and ensures compliance with local regulations.Effective Marketing Strategies: Building an online presence and utilizing social media and local advertising are key to attracting clients and establishing credibility in your community.Optimize Your Tutoring Space: Selecting a convenient location and equipping it with essential tools and resources fosters a productive learning environment, benefitting both you and your students. Thinking about starting a tutoring business? You’re not alone. Many people are turning their expertise into a profitable venture, helping students excel while enjoying the flexibility of being their own boss. The demand for personalized education has skyrocketed, making this the perfect time to dive in. Whether you’re a seasoned educator or someone with a passion for teaching, launching a tutoring business can be both rewarding and lucrative. With a bit of planning and the right strategies, you can create a thriving enterprise that not only boosts your income but also makes a real difference in students’ lives. Let’s explore the essential steps to get your tutoring business off the ground and set you on the path to success. Understanding The Tutoring Business Understanding the tutoring business involves knowing its components and making informed decisions to set your startup apart. The tutoring sector shows significant potential for growth, with personalized education becoming increasingly sought after. Types Of Tutoring Services Several types of tutoring services exist, allowing you to choose a model that aligns with your strengths and interests: One-on-One Tutoring – Direct interaction with students enables personalized instruction tailored to individual learning needs. Group Tutoring – Facilitating small groups can enhance peer learning and reduce costs per student, increasing overall income. Online Tutoring – Leveraging digital platforms expands your reach beyond local markets, catering to a broader audience. Specialized Tutoring – Focusing on specific subjects or test preparation, such as SAT or ACT, can attract students targeting specific goals. Homework Help – Providing regular support enables you to build lasting relationships with students and parents. Selecting the right type of tutoring service helps define your business model and target audience effectively. Identifying Your Niche Identifying your niche plays a crucial role in establishing a successful tutoring business. Consider these factors: Subject Expertise – Choose subjects where you excel or have qualifications, ensuring you provide quality instruction. Age Group – Limit your services to a specific age group, like elementary, middle, or high school students, to tailor your marketing strategies. Learning Styles – Recognize different learning preferences such as visual or hands-on. Adapting your methods enhances engagement and effectiveness. Local Demand – Conduct market research to assess community needs. Understanding local demand informs your service offerings and pricing strategies. Innovation – Stay updated on trends in education technology and methodologies that could differentiate your services, such as integrating gamification. By clearly addressing these elements, you establish a strong foundation for your small business, improving customer acquisition and retention. Creating A Business Plan Creating a solid business plan forms the backbone of a successful tutoring business. This plan outlines your vision, operational strategy, and financial objectives, guiding your journey as an entrepreneur. Setting Goals And Objectives Set clear, achievable goals and objectives for your tutoring business. Establish short-term goals, like securing your first five clients, and long-term goals, such as expanding services to include online tutoring. Your objectives should align with your overall mission, helping you focus on your target audience’s specific needs. Use the SMART criteria—Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound—to articulate your goals effectively. For example, aim to increase your student base by 20% in the next six months while sustaining customer satisfaction. Budgeting And Financial Planning Budgeting and financial planning are crucial for long-term viability. Create a budget that includes initial startup costs, ongoing expenses, and projected revenue. Identify funding options, such as loans or crowdfunding, and consider whether to operate as a sole proprietorship, LLC, or corporation based on legal structure implications. Analyze your cash flow to maintain positive profit margins. Track expenses meticulously to avoid overspending. Use accounting software to simplify this process, ensuring tax compliance and effective financial management. Establishing a clear financial plan helps you allocate resources efficiently and supports scalability as your tutoring business grows. Legal Considerations Starting a tutoring business involves addressing critical legal aspects. You must ensure compliance with regulatory requirements to operate effectively. Registering Your Business Registering your business is a fundamental step. You can choose from several legal structures: Sole Proprietorship: Simple and inexpensive to set up, though it exposes personal assets to liability. Partnership: Includes two or more individuals sharing profits, responsibilities, and liabilities. Limited Liability Company (LLC): Combines flexibility with liability protection, separating personal assets from business risks. Corporation: Provides the highest level of liability protection but requires more extensive regulations and record-keeping responsibilities. Select a structure that aligns with your business goals, liability tolerance, and tax considerations. You’ll need to file the appropriate paperwork with your state to register your chosen structure. Insurance and Liability Insurance protects your tutoring business from potential risks. Here are essential insurance types to consider: General Liability Insurance: Covers claims of bodily injury, property damage, and personal injury. Professional Liability Insurance: Protects against claims of negligence or failure to perform your tutoring duties. Business Owner’s Policy (BOP): Bundles general liability and property insurance at a reduced rate. Having the right insurance safeguards your business and enhances your credibility with clients. Research local regulations to determine any additional licenses, permits, or legal advice you may need to remain compliant. Firm financial planning, including budgets and forecasts, is crucial for managing these responsibilities effectively. Marketing Your Tutoring Services Marketing your tutoring services requires strategic planning and execution. Focus on building a strong online presence and leveraging various advertising channels to reach your target audience effectively. Building An Online Presence Creating a professional website acts as the foundation of your online presence. It should include information about your tutoring services, hours, and contact details. Use SEO techniques to optimize your site for local searches, making it easier for potential customers to find you. Consider including testimonials from satisfied clients to build credibility. Additionally, utilize online platforms to showcase your expertise. You can create educational content, such as blogs or videos, that provide value to your audience. This approach reinforces your branding while attracting traffic to your website. Consider integrating e-commerce features if you plan to offer downloadable materials or paid courses. Utilizing Social Media And Local Advertising Use social media channels to engage with your community. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn allow you to share updates, promotions, and educational content. Regular interaction with your followers fosters a sense of community and positions you as a trusted educator. Simultaneously, implement local advertising strategies to reach nearby clients. Flyers at community centers, ads in local newspapers, and participation in school events enhance visibility. Attend networking events or workshops related to education to establish connections and build partnerships. Combining online and local advertising ensures a comprehensive marketing strategy that effectively attracts and retains clients, positioning your tutoring business for growth and sustainability. Setting Up Your Tutoring Space Creating an effective tutoring space sets the foundation for your small business. Consider the following aspects to optimize this environment for learning. Choosing A Location Select a location that is accessible and convenient for your target audience. A nearby community center or quiet residential area enhances visibility and client foot traffic. Proximity to schools or educational institutions often attracts more students. If you opt for online tutoring, ensure a stable internet connection and a dedicated, distraction-free area for virtual sessions. Essential Tools And Resources Equip your tutoring space with the necessary tools and resources tailored to the subjects you offer. Consider these essentials: General Equipment: Include whiteboards, markers, books, projectors, and computers to create an engaging learning environment. Subject-Specific Materials: Math tutors may require calculators and squared paper, while geography tutors benefit from maps and atlases. Music tutors need instruments, sheet music, and music software to facilitate lessons. Technology: Utilize educational software and online tools to enhance learning experiences. Online platforms can support your marketing strategy and customer acquisition efforts. Investing in the right tools and setting up the appropriate environment promotes effective learning and supports your business model, fostering the growth of your tutoring enterprise. Conclusion Starting a tutoring business can be a rewarding journey that allows you to make a meaningful impact on students’ lives. By focusing on your niche and developing a solid business plan, you can set yourself up for success. Remember to prioritize marketing strategies that resonate with your audience and create an inviting learning environment. With careful planning and dedication, you can build a thriving tutoring business that not only meets the growing demand for personalized education but also fulfills your passion for teaching. Embrace the challenges and celebrate the victories as you embark on this exciting venture. Your efforts can truly transform the educational experiences of your clients. Frequently Asked Questions What is a tutoring business? A tutoring business offers educational assistance to students of all ages. It provides personalized instruction in various subjects, catering to individual learning styles and needs. This trend has grown due to the increasing demand for personalized education. Who can start a tutoring business? Anyone passionate about teaching or with expertise in a subject can start a tutoring business. Experienced educators and individuals with strong knowledge in specific areas can find great success in this field. What types of tutoring services can I offer? You can offer several types of tutoring services, including one-on-one tutoring, group sessions, online tutoring, specialized tutoring, and homework help. Each type caters to different learning preferences and student needs. How do I identify my niche in tutoring? To identify your tutoring niche, consider factors like your subject expertise, target age group, learning styles, local demand, and innovative teaching methods. A clear focus helps attract the right clients and improve customer retention. Why is a business plan important for a tutoring business? A business plan outlines your vision, operational strategy, and financial goals, serving as the backbone of your tutoring business. It helps you stay organized and focused on achieving specific objectives. What legal considerations should I know before starting a tutoring business? You need to comply with regulatory requirements and choose a suitable legal structure, like a sole proprietorship or LLC. Obtaining insurance, like general liability and professional liability, is also essential to protect your business. How can I market my tutoring services effectively? To market your tutoring business, create a strong online presence with a professional website and engaging content. Use social media to connect with your community and utilize local advertising methods like flyers and school events for greater visibility. What should I consider when setting up a tutoring space? Choose a location that is easily accessible and conducive to learning, such as a quiet home or community center. Ensure a stable internet connection for online sessions and equip the space with necessary materials and technology. How do I ensure financial stability for my tutoring business? To ensure financial stability, create a budget and track expenses. Analyze cash flow regularly and consider potential legal structures that suit your financial goals. Setting clear, achievable financial objectives is also crucial for long-term viability. Image Via Envato This article, "Essential Guide on How to Start a Tutoring Business Successfully" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Key Takeaways Growing Demand for Tutoring: The rising need for personalized education makes starting a tutoring business a timely and potentially lucrative venture.Identify Your Niche: Choosing a specific subject or age group to focus on helps tailor your services and marketing strategies, enhancing your business effectiveness.Create a Robust Business Plan: A solid plan that includes goals, budgeting, and financial projections is essential for guiding your tutoring business towards success.Understand Legal Requirements: Properly registering your business and obtaining the necessary insurance protects you from liabilities and ensures compliance with local regulations.Effective Marketing Strategies: Building an online presence and utilizing social media and local advertising are key to attracting clients and establishing credibility in your community.Optimize Your Tutoring Space: Selecting a convenient location and equipping it with essential tools and resources fosters a productive learning environment, benefitting both you and your students. Thinking about starting a tutoring business? You’re not alone. Many people are turning their expertise into a profitable venture, helping students excel while enjoying the flexibility of being their own boss. The demand for personalized education has skyrocketed, making this the perfect time to dive in. Whether you’re a seasoned educator or someone with a passion for teaching, launching a tutoring business can be both rewarding and lucrative. With a bit of planning and the right strategies, you can create a thriving enterprise that not only boosts your income but also makes a real difference in students’ lives. Let’s explore the essential steps to get your tutoring business off the ground and set you on the path to success. Understanding The Tutoring Business Understanding the tutoring business involves knowing its components and making informed decisions to set your startup apart. The tutoring sector shows significant potential for growth, with personalized education becoming increasingly sought after. Types Of Tutoring Services Several types of tutoring services exist, allowing you to choose a model that aligns with your strengths and interests: One-on-One Tutoring – Direct interaction with students enables personalized instruction tailored to individual learning needs. Group Tutoring – Facilitating small groups can enhance peer learning and reduce costs per student, increasing overall income. Online Tutoring – Leveraging digital platforms expands your reach beyond local markets, catering to a broader audience. Specialized Tutoring – Focusing on specific subjects or test preparation, such as SAT or ACT, can attract students targeting specific goals. Homework Help – Providing regular support enables you to build lasting relationships with students and parents. Selecting the right type of tutoring service helps define your business model and target audience effectively. Identifying Your Niche Identifying your niche plays a crucial role in establishing a successful tutoring business. Consider these factors: Subject Expertise – Choose subjects where you excel or have qualifications, ensuring you provide quality instruction. Age Group – Limit your services to a specific age group, like elementary, middle, or high school students, to tailor your marketing strategies. Learning Styles – Recognize different learning preferences such as visual or hands-on. Adapting your methods enhances engagement and effectiveness. Local Demand – Conduct market research to assess community needs. Understanding local demand informs your service offerings and pricing strategies. Innovation – Stay updated on trends in education technology and methodologies that could differentiate your services, such as integrating gamification. By clearly addressing these elements, you establish a strong foundation for your small business, improving customer acquisition and retention. Creating A Business Plan Creating a solid business plan forms the backbone of a successful tutoring business. This plan outlines your vision, operational strategy, and financial objectives, guiding your journey as an entrepreneur. Setting Goals And Objectives Set clear, achievable goals and objectives for your tutoring business. Establish short-term goals, like securing your first five clients, and long-term goals, such as expanding services to include online tutoring. Your objectives should align with your overall mission, helping you focus on your target audience’s specific needs. Use the SMART criteria—Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound—to articulate your goals effectively. For example, aim to increase your student base by 20% in the next six months while sustaining customer satisfaction. Budgeting And Financial Planning Budgeting and financial planning are crucial for long-term viability. Create a budget that includes initial startup costs, ongoing expenses, and projected revenue. Identify funding options, such as loans or crowdfunding, and consider whether to operate as a sole proprietorship, LLC, or corporation based on legal structure implications. Analyze your cash flow to maintain positive profit margins. Track expenses meticulously to avoid overspending. Use accounting software to simplify this process, ensuring tax compliance and effective financial management. Establishing a clear financial plan helps you allocate resources efficiently and supports scalability as your tutoring business grows. Legal Considerations Starting a tutoring business involves addressing critical legal aspects. You must ensure compliance with regulatory requirements to operate effectively. Registering Your Business Registering your business is a fundamental step. You can choose from several legal structures: Sole Proprietorship: Simple and inexpensive to set up, though it exposes personal assets to liability. Partnership: Includes two or more individuals sharing profits, responsibilities, and liabilities. Limited Liability Company (LLC): Combines flexibility with liability protection, separating personal assets from business risks. Corporation: Provides the highest level of liability protection but requires more extensive regulations and record-keeping responsibilities. Select a structure that aligns with your business goals, liability tolerance, and tax considerations. You’ll need to file the appropriate paperwork with your state to register your chosen structure. Insurance and Liability Insurance protects your tutoring business from potential risks. Here are essential insurance types to consider: General Liability Insurance: Covers claims of bodily injury, property damage, and personal injury. Professional Liability Insurance: Protects against claims of negligence or failure to perform your tutoring duties. Business Owner’s Policy (BOP): Bundles general liability and property insurance at a reduced rate. Having the right insurance safeguards your business and enhances your credibility with clients. Research local regulations to determine any additional licenses, permits, or legal advice you may need to remain compliant. Firm financial planning, including budgets and forecasts, is crucial for managing these responsibilities effectively. Marketing Your Tutoring Services Marketing your tutoring services requires strategic planning and execution. Focus on building a strong online presence and leveraging various advertising channels to reach your target audience effectively. Building An Online Presence Creating a professional website acts as the foundation of your online presence. It should include information about your tutoring services, hours, and contact details. Use SEO techniques to optimize your site for local searches, making it easier for potential customers to find you. Consider including testimonials from satisfied clients to build credibility. Additionally, utilize online platforms to showcase your expertise. You can create educational content, such as blogs or videos, that provide value to your audience. This approach reinforces your branding while attracting traffic to your website. Consider integrating e-commerce features if you plan to offer downloadable materials or paid courses. Utilizing Social Media And Local Advertising Use social media channels to engage with your community. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn allow you to share updates, promotions, and educational content. Regular interaction with your followers fosters a sense of community and positions you as a trusted educator. Simultaneously, implement local advertising strategies to reach nearby clients. Flyers at community centers, ads in local newspapers, and participation in school events enhance visibility. Attend networking events or workshops related to education to establish connections and build partnerships. Combining online and local advertising ensures a comprehensive marketing strategy that effectively attracts and retains clients, positioning your tutoring business for growth and sustainability. Setting Up Your Tutoring Space Creating an effective tutoring space sets the foundation for your small business. Consider the following aspects to optimize this environment for learning. Choosing A Location Select a location that is accessible and convenient for your target audience. A nearby community center or quiet residential area enhances visibility and client foot traffic. Proximity to schools or educational institutions often attracts more students. If you opt for online tutoring, ensure a stable internet connection and a dedicated, distraction-free area for virtual sessions. Essential Tools And Resources Equip your tutoring space with the necessary tools and resources tailored to the subjects you offer. Consider these essentials: General Equipment: Include whiteboards, markers, books, projectors, and computers to create an engaging learning environment. Subject-Specific Materials: Math tutors may require calculators and squared paper, while geography tutors benefit from maps and atlases. Music tutors need instruments, sheet music, and music software to facilitate lessons. Technology: Utilize educational software and online tools to enhance learning experiences. Online platforms can support your marketing strategy and customer acquisition efforts. Investing in the right tools and setting up the appropriate environment promotes effective learning and supports your business model, fostering the growth of your tutoring enterprise. Conclusion Starting a tutoring business can be a rewarding journey that allows you to make a meaningful impact on students’ lives. By focusing on your niche and developing a solid business plan, you can set yourself up for success. Remember to prioritize marketing strategies that resonate with your audience and create an inviting learning environment. With careful planning and dedication, you can build a thriving tutoring business that not only meets the growing demand for personalized education but also fulfills your passion for teaching. Embrace the challenges and celebrate the victories as you embark on this exciting venture. Your efforts can truly transform the educational experiences of your clients. Frequently Asked Questions What is a tutoring business? A tutoring business offers educational assistance to students of all ages. It provides personalized instruction in various subjects, catering to individual learning styles and needs. This trend has grown due to the increasing demand for personalized education. Who can start a tutoring business? Anyone passionate about teaching or with expertise in a subject can start a tutoring business. Experienced educators and individuals with strong knowledge in specific areas can find great success in this field. What types of tutoring services can I offer? You can offer several types of tutoring services, including one-on-one tutoring, group sessions, online tutoring, specialized tutoring, and homework help. Each type caters to different learning preferences and student needs. How do I identify my niche in tutoring? To identify your tutoring niche, consider factors like your subject expertise, target age group, learning styles, local demand, and innovative teaching methods. A clear focus helps attract the right clients and improve customer retention. Why is a business plan important for a tutoring business? A business plan outlines your vision, operational strategy, and financial goals, serving as the backbone of your tutoring business. It helps you stay organized and focused on achieving specific objectives. What legal considerations should I know before starting a tutoring business? You need to comply with regulatory requirements and choose a suitable legal structure, like a sole proprietorship or LLC. Obtaining insurance, like general liability and professional liability, is also essential to protect your business. How can I market my tutoring services effectively? To market your tutoring business, create a strong online presence with a professional website and engaging content. Use social media to connect with your community and utilize local advertising methods like flyers and school events for greater visibility. What should I consider when setting up a tutoring space? Choose a location that is easily accessible and conducive to learning, such as a quiet home or community center. Ensure a stable internet connection for online sessions and equip the space with necessary materials and technology. How do I ensure financial stability for my tutoring business? To ensure financial stability, create a budget and track expenses. Analyze cash flow regularly and consider potential legal structures that suit your financial goals. Setting clear, achievable financial objectives is also crucial for long-term viability. Image Via Envato This article, "Essential Guide on How to Start a Tutoring Business Successfully" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

The Fast Company Impact Council is an invitation-only membership community of leaders, experts, executives, and entrepreneurs who share their insights with our audience. Members pay annual dues for access to peer learning, thought leadership opportunities, events and more. It’s been five years since the intense early days of the COVID-19 pandemic and the first round of lockdowns that mandated work-from-home for companies around the world. Among the debate at the time: concerns about how younger workers and new recruits would cope without access to experienced colleagues and mentors. Doomed to impersonal video conferencing in converted bedrooms, these youngsters couldn’t hope to gain the confidence and deep experience of their predecessors. They would make their mistakes out of sight, and fail to learn. Now imagine those new workers and interns are digital, not human. Since OpenAI launched ChatGPT at the end of 2022, it’s not unusual to see generative AI systems referred to as interns, coworkers or even colleagues. In that case, it’s tempting to see their offspring, AI agents, as more experienced employees. Using the “brain” of a large language model, agents are given a specific purpose and granted access to an organization’s software tools and data in order to autonomously fulfil their task. For many enterprises, the question is not whether they should adopt agentic AI, but how quickly and how widely. Gartner forecasts that, agentic AI will address and resolve 80% of regular customer service issues with no human intervention by 2029, and this will result in a 30% reduction in operational costs. With stats like that, other business functions will surely follow—and fast. Chain of thought Big-name tech companies such as Salesforce are going all-in on an agentic future and AI companions are already a common feature in business tools such as Zoom and Slack. AI rivals are reaching agreement at an unprecedented pace on new technology protocols that allow the integration of AI models with all types of business tools and applications. In this new era, the digital workers are being handed the keys to the enterprise. What can possibly go wrong? Potentially, quite a lot. All the major models are fallible and flawed. As Anthropic, maker of the popular Claude family of AI models, explains in a new research paper: “Language models like Claude aren’t programmed directly by humans—instead, they’re trained on large amounts of data. During that training process, they learn their own strategies to solve problems. These strategies are encoded in the billions of computations a model performs for every word it writes. They arrive inscrutable to us, the model’s developers. This means that we don’t understand how models do most of the things they do.” [Italics added for emphasis.] Anthropic’s own research shows Claude being tricked into naming the ingredients for a bomb, though stopping short of giving instructions on how to make one. Separate Anthropic-backed research found that more advanced reasoning models, which show the chain of thought they use to reach their conclusions, “don’t always say what they think.” Without the ability to rely on chain of thought, “there may be safely-relevant factors affecting model behavior” that remain hidden, the researchers concluded. (The researchers evaluated the faithfulness of two state-of-the-art reasoning models, Claude 3.7 Sonnet and DeepSeek-R1.) Connecting AI models to business tools, via agents, raises the safety stakes. An agent that has access to an email system can be exploited as a useful tool for attacker intent on phishing. Access to database systems can be levered to extract valuable data from an organization. Even instances of accidental misuse can have significant consequences in terms of disruption, cost, and reputational damage to an organization. An adult in the room In the absence of the ability to predict or drive the behavior, these new digital colleagues—like their human counterparts—need chaperones to provide guidance and feedback. It’s important there is at least one “adult” in the room to constantly monitor these (not very streetwise) interns, intervening in real time when they may be sent on a fool’s errand, tricked into handing over their wallet, or encouraged to say or do something offensive or illegal. We know from experience that attempting to rapidly introduce new technology across an enterprise can be a recipe for chaos. Someone, somewhere—and likely many people—will find themselves in the headlines looking silly, at best. At worst, they may lose valuable intellectual property and suffer serious financial and reputational loss. The best solution for an agentic workforce is agentic oversight—using powerful, customized agents to simulate real-world scenarios and probe AI for weaknesses. Continuous, automated “red teaming” of these new technologies, at speed, can give enterprises the confidence they need before they send their armies of new interns and employees out to do real jobs. This agentic warfare approach offers the greatest chance of implementing enterprise AI for its intended purposes. After all, you wouldn’t give an unvetted new employee completely unhindered and unsupervised access to your business systems, would you? Donnchadh Casey is CEO of CalypsoAI. View the full article

The Fast Company Impact Council is an invitation-only membership community of leaders, experts, executives, and entrepreneurs who share their insights with our audience. Members pay annual dues for access to peer learning, thought leadership opportunities, events and more. Leadership transformation isn’t found in boardrooms—it’s happening in our homes. In a world facing converging crises of climate, technology, and social displacement, how we create our spaces reveals everything about how we’ll lead through these transformative times. Integrity derives from the Latin word “integer”—meaning whole, complete, undivided. This word describes both ethical leadership and structural soundness. A home lacks integrity when its foundation cracks or its systems fail to work as a unified whole. Similarly, leadership without integrity fragments under pressure, creates waste through misalignment, and fails to shelter those who depend on it. The decisions that shape our homes—from material sourcing to energy systems to spatial design—are fundamentally ethical choices. They reveal whether we truly understand our relationship to resources, community, and future generations. This connection between home and leadership becomes clearest when we contrast two fundamentally different approaches: The extractive mindset designs homes that deplete resources, prioritize appearance over performance, and externalize their true costs to communities and ecosystems. The regenerative mindset creates living spaces that work in harmony with natural systems, optimize for both human and planetary health, and regenerate the communities they exist within. The mindset we adopt when designing our homes reveals our relationship with material resources, directly reflecting our capacity to lead with integrity. The same patterns of thinking that have contributed to environmentally wasteful building practices in the past inevitably also surface in organizational decision making. The good news is that embracing regenerative practices creates a virtuous cycle—transforming our homes, reshaping our mindsets, and ultimately enhancing our leadership abilities. Beyond four walls Visionary leaders recognize that their organizations, like homes, exist within living systems. Just as a sustainable home requires understanding energy flows, material lifecycles, and community impacts, effective leadership requires seeing beyond isolated metrics to the health of entire ecosystems—organizational, financial, social, and ecological. These systems transform leadership in four critical dimensions: Holistic integration: The alignment of systems, values, and resources to create a unified whole greater than the sum of its parts. In homes, this means designing spaces where energy, water, materials, and human needs work in harmony. In leadership, it means cultivating organizations where purpose, people, profit, and planetary impact reinforce rather than undermine each other. Regenerative stewardship: Moving beyond sustainability to actively restore and enhance the systems that support life. In homes, this means creating spaces that give more than they take. In leadership, it means building organizations that actively heal social divides, regenerate depleted resources, and leave ecosystems healthier. Honest materiality: Embracing the true nature, origins, and impacts of what we build with. In homes, this means selecting materials for their authentic properties rather than superficial aesthetics. In leadership, it means fostering transparency about how value is created, and impacts are managed throughout the entire organizational ecosystem. Adaptive co-evolution: Designing for a dynamic relationship with changing environments rather than rigid control. In homes, this means creating spaces that respond to seasonal shifts, climate extremes, and evolving family needs. In leadership, it means developing organizations capable of thriving amid uncertainty—sensing, responding to, and shaping emerging futures. As technological acceleration and climate impacts intensify, transformative leaders mirror sustainable builders: envisioning regenerative systems, pioneering new methods, and understanding the interconnectedness of people and planet. The next generation of breakthrough leaders won’t just manage extraction more efficiently—they’ll architect regeneration more intelligently. And like all great architects, they’ll understand that integrity isn’t just a virtue—it’s structural necessity. The whole puzzle Traditional leadership focuses on optimizing fragments: profit centers, performance metrics, quarterly returns. This fragmentation is like building a house by perfecting individual rooms without ensuring they work together—a strategy that inevitably creates dysfunction at both local and planetary scales. The integrity-driven approach sees the whole puzzle—understanding that a home, like an organization, exists within Earth’s living systems. When our homes and businesses operate with fragmented thinking, the collective impact accelerates climate destabilization. When we design with integrity, we create regenerative ripples beyond our immediate sphere. This planetary perspective transforms leadership from an exercise in optimization to an act of stewardship. It requires alignment between systems, purpose, and impact across scales—from the individual home to the global commons we all share. The future of leadership starts in the home because our profound transformations begin with reconsidering what we’ve taken for granted. By examining the integrity of our fundamental structures—our living spaces—we reveal the blueprint for leading organizations capable of thriving amid complexity while contributing to a flourishing world. The leadership our future demands builds on the same foundation as sustainable homes: the recognition that integrity—both structural and moral—isn’t optional. It’s essential for creating systems that withstand time, resource constraints, and accelerating change. Gene Eidelman is cofounder of Azure Homes. Rachel Weissman is founder of Congruence. View the full article

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. This comment section is open for any non-work-related discussion you’d like to have with other readers, by popular demand. Here are the rules for the weekend posts. Book recommendation of the week: Greta & Valdin, by Rebecca K. Reilly. Greta and Valdin are siblings and roommates, one dealing with his break-up with a much older man, and one trying to figure out love and her career. It’s also about their large Maori-Russian-Catalonian family, and about struggling to find your way, and it’s funny. (Amazon, Bookshop) * I earn a commission if you use those links. View the full article

Instagram has a new feature that curates custom Reels feeds for you and your friends. Blend, an invite-only option within individual or group chats, refreshes daily and suggests content based on participants' tastes. Spotify has a similar Blend feature that creates shared playlists—also updated daily—based on both listeners' tastes. Note that Instagram Blend, which is a mobile-only feature, is not yet available to all users, even if the icon appears in your chats. How to use Instagram BlendTo start a blend, you'll need to invite users via your individual or group chats. From Messages on the mobile app, open the one-on-one or group chat you want to create a blend with and tap the new Blend icon. Everyone in the chat will receive an invite—if at least one person accepts, a blend will be created, but an individual's suggested reels will be added only if they accept. Once a blend is created, you can view it by tapping the Blend icon at the top of the chat, where you can then comment on or react to it. You can delete a reel that has been suggested for you by tapping the three horizontal dots and selecting Remove from your blends, though this will remove it from any blends you are part of. If you want to leave a blend, open it and tap the Settings icon > Leave this blend. According to Instagram's explainer page, you can also curate suggestions by indicating whether you are interested or not interested (tap the three horizontal dots on the reel) to get more or less of similar content. Sensitive content will be filtered based on the member with the strictest settings. View the full article