All Activity

Margins in construction are thin, decisions are constant and cash flow can shift quickly across a project’s lifecycle. That is why cost value reconciliation is a core discipline on UK construction sites. A well-prepared CVR report gives contractors visibility into performance, forecast movement and emerging risks, helping teams stay commercially grounded as work progresses under real-world delivery pressure every day. What Is Cost Value Reconciliation (CVR)? At its core, cost value reconciliation is a recurring financial process used to compare the value of work completed against the actual construction costs incurred at a specific point in time. It consolidates data from valuations, cost ledgers, commitments and forecasts to calculate the current position. The exercise is repeated periodically, typically monthly, with each cycle updating previous figures to reflect progress, adjustments and newly recorded costs across all packages, variations and remaining scopes captured within the live cost system period end. ProjectManager improves cost value reconciliation by bringing together cost, progress and performance data in one platform. It’s easy to compare planned value, earned value and actual costs throughout a project. Real-time data feeds into dashboards and financial reports, helping project managers measure earned value against budgeted and actual costs. Sign up today for a free 30-day trial. /wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Assign-people-resource-allocation-CTA.pngLearn more Why Is Cost Value Reconciliation Important in Construction Projects? Without a structured CVR cycle, construction projects risk losing control over cost movement and commercial exposure. Cost value reconciliation provides early insight into overspend, under-recovery or margin erosion before these issues become contractual disputes. By aligning financial data with site progress, the process supports informed decisions on procurement, variations, cash flow management and corrective action throughout the build across complex, fast-moving construction environments with multiple stakeholders and reporting obligations attached. What Is a CVR Report? A CVR report is the primary commercial output of the cost value reconciliation process, bringing cost, value and forecast data into a single financial snapshot. It records the current project position, expected outcome and movement since the previous period. Because it translates live site activity into measurable financial results, the report becomes a critical reference for commercial decisions, management reviews and corrective action across the project lifecycle and governance. When to Make a CVR Report A CVR report is produced at defined commercial intervals rather than at random milestones. It is typically prepared after monthly valuations are agreed and construction costs are fully captured, but before forecasts are locked for the next period. The timing ensures decisions are based on complete, current data. Common triggers for preparing a CVR report include: End-of-month commercial close Agreement of interim valuations Significant variation or scope change Emerging cost overruns or forecast movement Management review or lender reporting requirements Project cash flow or funding assessments Preparing for contractual negotiations ahead Who Is Responsible for the Cost Value Reconciliation Process? In UK construction projects, cost value reconciliation is led by the quantity surveyor, with accountability sitting firmly within the commercial function. Although the quantity surveyor owns the CVR, the process depends on coordinated input from delivery, management and finance to remain accurate and commercially reliable. Quantity surveyor owns the CVR process, prepares the report, reconciles cost against value, updates forecasts and explains period-to-period movement to project and commercial management. Commercial manager reviews the CVR for accuracy and risk exposure, challenges assumptions, approves forecasts and ensures the report aligns with contractual, margin and governance requirements. Project manager validates that reported values reflect actual progress, programme status and delivery strategy, providing operational context that supports or corrects the commercial position. Site manager supplies verified progress, labour usage and productivity information, ensuring CVR valuations are grounded in site reality rather than purely financial system data. Finance team supports cost period close, validates ledger accuracy and aligns CVR outputs with financial reporting, cash flow forecasting and internal control requirements. /wp-content/uploads/2026/01/2026_construction_ebook_banner-ad.jpg What Should Be Included in a CVR Report? A CVR report is structured around clearly defined sections that collectively explain the project’s commercial position, financial movement and forecast outlook at a specific reporting point. 1. Project and Contract Details This section establishes the commercial context for the CVR report by identifying the project, contractual framework and reporting timeframe. It ensures all financial data is interpreted correctly and tied to the appropriate contract, period and responsible management role. Project name – Identifies the specific construction project to which the CVR applies. Client – Names the employer or contracting party responsible for commissioning the works. Contract type – Defines the contractual arrangement governing payment, risk allocation and valuation rules. Contract value – States the approved contract sum, forming the baseline for value comparison. Reporting period – Specifies the financial period covered by the CVR assessment. Project manager or commercial manager – Records the individual accountable for delivery or commercial oversight. 2. Contract Value Summary Before cost and performance can be assessed, the CVR must establish the current value of the contract. This section tracks how the original contract sum has evolved through instructed changes, agreed adjustments and outstanding variations. By consolidating approved and pending movements, it defines the revised contract value used as the reference point for valuation, forecasting and margin analysis within the reporting period. Original contract sum – The initial agreed contract value at award, excluding subsequent variations or commercial adjustments. Approved variations – Formally agreed changes to scope or price that have been instructed and valued. Pending variations – Proposed or instructed changes not yet agreed, assessed or contractually incorporated. Revised contract value – The updated contract total reflecting original sum plus approved variations to date. 3. Cost Breakdown Once the contract value is established, the CVR turns to the actual cost structure of the project. This section itemises expenditure across key cost headings, capturing incurred construction costs, committed spend and remaining forecast allowances. By separating labour, supply chain and overhead elements, it allows commercial teams to identify cost pressure, assess productivity trends and understand where financial movement is occurring relative to progress and contractual recovery. Labour – Direct workforce costs including wages, overtime, agency labour and associated employment charges. Materials – Costs of purchased materials, deliveries, wastage allowances and price fluctuations impacting spend. Plant & equipment – Hire, operation, maintenance and ownership costs of plant used on the project. Subcontractors – Payments and commitments for specialist trade packages delivering defined scopes of work. Preliminaries/overheads – Site setup, management, temporary works and time-related project overhead costs. Other direct costs – Additional project-specific costs not captured under standard labour or supply headings. Related: 25 Excel Spreadsheet Templates for Tracking Tasks, Costs and Time 4. Cost to Complete (CTC) Cost to complete represents the forecasted expenditure required to finish the remaining scope of a construction project from the reporting date onward. It incorporates updated supplier and subcontractor forecasts, anticipated productivity rates and current procurement commitments, while allowing for known risks and remaining allowances. Including cost to complete in a CVR report ensures the projected final cost reflects real conditions, emerging exposure and informed assumptions rather than historic spend alone. 5. Total Forecast Cost (or Estimate at Completion) Total forecast cost represents the projected final cost of the project once all work is completed, based on construction costs incurred to date plus the remaining cost to complete. Including this figure in a CVR report allows teams to assess financial performance against contract value, identify margin movement and anticipate potential overruns early. It provides a forward-looking view that supports commercial decision-making and corrective action. Formula: Total forecast cost = Actual costs to date + Cost to complete /wp-content/uploads/2023/06/construction-schedule-template.jpg Get your free Construction Schedule Template Use this free Construction Schedule Template to manage your projects better. Get the Template 6. Value of Work Done (Earned Value EV) Rather than focusing on cost, this section captures the value generated by progress on site. The value of work done converts physical completion into a monetary figure using measurement rules, agreed rates and progress assessments. It links programme delivery to commercial recovery, ensuring reported value reflects what has genuinely been achieved. By breaking progress down by trade or work package, the CVR can align earned value with interim applications and highlight gaps between delivery, valuation and cash recovery within the reporting period and contractual valuation framework agreed upon, with project controls applied. Measured works completed – Quantified work physically completed on site, measured against drawings, specifications and agreed valuation rules and standards. % complete per trade or work package – Progress percentage assigned to each trade or package, reflecting completion relative to planned scope baseline. Claimed value – Monetary value claimed for completed work, typically aligned with interim payment applications submitted to the client. 7. Gross Margin and Profit Once value and total forecast cost are established, the CVR calculates the project’s commercial outcome. This section shows whether the job is forecast to return a profit or loss and how that position is changing over time. By expressing margin in both monetary and percentage terms, it allows trends to be tracked between reporting periods, highlighting deterioration or improvement driven by cost movement, value recovery or revised forecasts since the previous CVR cycle. Forecast profit or loss – The projected commercial outcome based on revised contract value and total forecast cost. Margin (£ and %) – Profit expressed as an absolute value and percentage of contract value. Movement from last CVR (up/down) – Change in forecast margin compared to the previous CVR reporting period. 8. Variance Analysis After establishing the forecast position, the CVR examines why figures have moved. Variance analysis isolates the underlying causes behind cost and margin changes by comparing current forecasts to previous CVRs and original allowances. This section explains whether movement is driven by operational performance, commercial decisions or external change. By clearly attributing variances, it allows management to distinguish one-off events from systemic issues and decide whether corrective action, reforecasting or risk mitigation is required within the live project environment. Cost overruns or savings – Identifies areas where actual or forecast costs exceed or undercut budget allowances during the reporting period. Design changes – Explains financial impact of scope or specification changes introduced after contract award and valuation adjustments. Productivity issues – Highlights cost effects caused by inefficiency, delays or productivity rates below forecast assumptions on site. Procurement differences – Compares expected procurement costs against actual supplier pricing, discounts or commercial terms achieved during delivery. Risk materialisation – Records financial consequences of identified risks becoming actual construction costs within the project scope timeframe baseline. Related: 12 Free Risk Management Templates for Excel & Word 9. Variations and Claims Variations are instructed changes to scope, design or conditions that alter contract value, while claims seek entitlement for time or money arising from events outside agreed terms. Within a CVR report, these items directly influence recoverable value, forecast margin and cash flow assumptions. Tracking them separately clarifies what has been contractually secured versus what remains commercially exposed. Clear visibility prevents overstating value, supports prudent forecasting and highlights negotiation priorities before final account. This section, therefore, protects commercial integrity by distinguishing approved entitlement from risk-weighted opportunity and unresolved exposure affecting the project’s eventual financial outcome across active monthly commercial reporting periods. Approved variations – Confirmed changes agreed and incorporated into the revised contract value. Pending/submitted variations – Submitted changes under review that may adjust value once agreed. Potential claims – Unresolved entitlement opportunities requiring assessment, substantiation and strategic commercial management. 10. Cash Flow Snapshot While profitability is critical, cash movement ultimately determines project stability. This section summarises how much value has been certified, what has actually been received and what remains outstanding at the reporting date. By comparing certified amounts to payments made, the CVR highlights funding gaps, exposure to delayed receipts and retention impacts. It provides a short-term liquidity view that supports cash forecasting, credit control actions and informed discussions with clients, lenders and internal finance teams. Amount certified to date – Total value formally certified through interim valuations and approved for payment by the client. Amount paid – Cash received from the client against certified amounts during the reporting period. Outstanding payments – Certified sums not yet paid, indicating current debtor exposure and collection risk. Retentions held/released – Portion of certified value withheld or released under contractual retention provisions. 11. Key Risks and Opportunities Looking beyond current figures, this section captures forward-facing factors that could alter the project’s financial position. It records known cost risks, emerging commercial opportunities and the actions required to manage them. By assigning ownership and documenting mitigation strategies, the CVR moves from passive reporting to active commercial control. This visibility allows teams to anticipate downside exposure, pursue upside recovery and ensure accountability for managing financial uncertainty before it impacts margin or cash flow. Known cost risks – Identified events or conditions likely to increase costs beyond current forecast allowances. Commercial opportunities – Potential improvements to value or margin through recovery, efficiencies or negotiated outcomes. Mitigation actions – Agreed steps to reduce risk impact or maximise identified commercial opportunities. Ownership (who’s dealing with it) – Assigned individual responsible for managing, monitoring and closing each risk or opportunity. 12. CVR Summary Closing the report, the CVR summary distils detailed financial data into a clear commercial narrative. It confirms the overall project position, highlights material changes since the previous reporting period and identifies issues requiring attention. Rather than repeating figures, this section interprets them, ensuring senior stakeholders understand where the project stands and what must happen next. A strong summary supports timely decisions, reinforces accountability and aligns commercial priorities across delivery, finance and management teams. Overall commercial position – High-level statement of forecast profit, loss or break-even status at reporting date. Key changes since last period – Summary of significant movements affecting cost, value, margin or cash flow. Actions required – Defined steps needed to address risks, recover value or correct forecast issues. Free Related Construction Project Management Templates We’ve created dozens of free construction project management templates for Word, Excel and Google Sheets. Here are some that can help during the construction cost planning process. Project Initiation Document (PID) Template This project initiation document template helps formalise how a project will be governed from the outset, documenting scope boundaries, decision-making authority and key roles. It creates a shared reference point that supports approval, accountability and controlled mobilisation before execution begins. Bill of Quantities Template This bill of quantities template structures project quantities and descriptions into a clear, itemised schedule, enabling accurate pricing, transparent cost breakdowns and reliable comparison of contractor tenders throughout the procurement and cost-control process. Payment Schedule Template This payment schedule template sets out the timing and structure of project payments, linking value milestones to cash flow. It supports financial planning, reduces payment disputes and provides visibility for both contractors and clients during project delivery. How ProjectManager Improves Cost Value Reconciliation ProjectManager’s structured data helps you perform accurate cost value reconciliation for your construction projects. Use tools like baselines, percent completed, logged time and dashboards and reports to document performance for financial control reviews. When you can compare current project data to your original plan, it’s easier to project future cost performance and estimate final cost at project completion. Watch our short video below to learn more about how our software can support your construction projects. Related Construction Project Management Content 39 Construction Documents (Templates Included) 10 Types of Construction Projects with Examples How to Manage a Construction Project Step by Step 10 Free Construction Plan Templates for Excel & Word Construction Work Breakdown Structure: A Quick Guide The post Cost Value Reconciliation: How to Make a CVR Report appeared first on ProjectManager. View the full article

In a move aimed at enhancing the retail landscape for small businesses, PayPal has announced its acquisition of Cymbio, a platform designed to help brands navigate the increasingly important realm of agentic commerce. This acquisition is particularly relevant for small business owners eager to leverage cutting-edge technology to enhance their market presence. Cymbio acts as a multi-channel orchestration platform, enabling merchants to sell across various AI-driven platforms such as Microsoft Copilot and Perplexity. With this development, PayPal aims to allow small businesses to become more discoverable on leading AI platforms, thereby opening up new avenues for sales and customer engagement. Michelle Gill, Executive Vice President and General Manager of Small Business and Financial Services at PayPal, emphasized the significance of this acquisition: “PayPal has established itself as a leading commerce partner for merchants looking to sell within top AI platforms. Acquiring Cymbio’s technology and team will enhance our agentic commerce capabilities and accelerate the expansion to more of our merchants. By making their product catalogs discoverable on AI surfaces, merchants can increase sales while expanding product choice to the millions of consumers shopping on AI platforms today.” For small business owners, one of the primary benefits of this acquisition lies in its capacity to simplify the process of integrating product listings into AI shopping experiences. By utilizing Store Sync—a key feature of PayPal’s agentic commerce services—small businesses will be able to make their product data easily discoverable on AI channels. Moreover, this feature integrates seamlessly with existing fulfillment and management systems, allowing merchants to maintain their current business operations without significant disruption. As of now, well-known brands such as Abercrombie & Fitch and Ashley Furniture are already utilizing Store Sync on platforms like Microsoft Copilot and Perplexity, highlighting its viability and effectiveness in the market. The most impactful aspect for small businesses is that they will retain full control over their customer relationships and brand identity. Merchants will remain the merchant of record, mitigating concerns that can arise with third-party platforms. Small business owners should also consider the practical applications of this new technology. By optimizing the discoverability of their products, businesses can tap into new customer bases that prefer shopping through AI platforms. This could mean more sales opportunities, particularly as shopping behaviors evolve towards convenience and access to diverse product choices. However, potential challenges are worth noting. As with any technological integration, small business owners may need to invest time and resources into training staff and adapting internal processes to fully leverage Cymbio’s capabilities. Additionally, while enhanced visibility can drive sales, competition may also intensify as more retailers seek to capitalize on these AI platforms. Business owners must be prepared to navigate these changes proactively. This strategic move by PayPal is expected to close in the first half of 2026, pending customary closing conditions. While the specific terms of the acquisition remain undisclosed, the implications for small businesses are significant. By embracing this technology, small retailers can position themselves at the forefront of a rapidly evolving marketplace, engaging consumers in innovative ways. As digital commerce continues to transform the buying experience, small business owners must remain agile and receptive to new opportunities, including those presented by AI-driven platforms. The integration of Cymbio into PayPal’s services may serve as a pivotal step for many small enterprises in enhancing their market presence, driving sales, and fostering customer loyalty. For those interested in the official announcement, more details can be found at PayPal’s newsroom: PayPal Press Release. Image via Google Gemini This article, "PayPal Acquires Cymbio to Boost AI Commerce for Millions of Merchants" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

A reader writes: I’ve read your stuff on why it’s problematic for supervisors to avoid one-on-one meetings with supervisees, but what about peer coworkers? One of my coworkers, “Ariel,” makes me uncomfortable because she tends to assume the worst possible version of what someone says or project a different version entirely. Any disagreement with her, even about the most abstract issues phrased delicately and professionally, is taken personally. She also tends to assume (and share verbally) that the only motives anyone could have for even a slightly different opinion from hers is bigotry or unintelligence. Part of this seems to stem from her having preemptively decided (and expressed in nearly such terms) that everyone in our (largely conservative) region of the country is backwards, bigoted, and unintelligent, especially relative to the more progressive region she’s from. It’s like she decided we were racist/sexist/homophobic because of being in/from this region and is looking for proof of her thesis. She’s proclaimed out of the blue that there are no critical thinkers in our region, and has asserted several times that there is/was no activism (anti-racism, LGBTQ stuff, immigrant-related) in our region that famously has (and had) lots of it. We actually have a very liberal department that frequently centers a variety of civil rights and social justice issues. For example, if we are “Camelid Studies,” we have speakers, books, and faculty who study the impact of camels on the environment, alpacas on immigration, llamas and LGBTQ+ safety, etc. Both faculty and students are pretty open about their progressiveness, but Ariel seems not to read, hear, or see any of that or any nuance relating to our region. On several occasions, she has interpreted incredibly innocuous, bland, or uncontroversial things to be offensive in some way or heard the exact opposite of what someone was saying. The reactions she has are not limited to one person or one setting. Given how she mishears people in groups, I don’t want to be alone with her and end up misquoted something ugly. It’s dehumanizing and obnoxious how she treats people who aren’t from HerProgressiveHomeRegion with her exact views expressed the exact same way, but more importantly, I don’t want to get bit by an allegation alligator that I said something horrible with no witnesses to back me up. Even if nothing comes of it, I don’t want to start my career with reputational baggage in the air. To be clear, I do not supervise Ariel, nor she me, and there is no possibility of either. We are in a graduate program, I came in (and will likely finish) before her, and our positions are peers. I’m not responsible for her professional or academic growth in any capacity. Is it unprofessional of me to never be alone with her? To be clear, I have no intention of discussing this with anyone in my office, just finding ways to limit my own risk exposure. If it would be problematic, how else can I manage the next few years of having a coworker who always hears the worst? It’s not unprofessional to avoid being alone with Ariel, as long as it doesn’t end up interfering with your work, her work, or your team’s work or creating a weird working environment for others. If you’re coming up with complicated workarounds to avoid talking to her, or if you’re avoiding her in other obvious ways that make bystanders uncomfortable, that would be a problem. But if you’re just strategically avoiding being alone with her in ways that don’t raise eyebrows in people watching, you’re fine. If this were a more traditional workplace and not a graduate program, I’d suggest you also talk to your manager about what you’ve noticed to make sure they’re aware of it. A manager should be concerned about the dynamics Ariel is creating, and should hear how she’s affecting people (to the extent that at least one person doesn’t feel safe being around her without a witness). And you could still do that in a graduate program too, but there tends to be … less management in that context, to say the least. So simply steering clear of Ariel as best as you can may be the best and most effective option. But this is different from managers who refuse to be alone with the people they manage — which in theory is doable, but in practice tends to be male managers avoiding being alone with female employees, and only female employees, which then disadvantages the women who work for them because it means they get less access to feedback, mentoring, and relationship-building than their male colleagues do. You’re not Ariel’s manager (and if you were, you’d be much better positioned to address the concerns you have with her), there’s no power dynamic in play, and you’re not obligated to give her the kind of access to you that would be a bigger deal to withhold if you were her boss. The post is it unprofessional to avoid being alone with a coworker who I don’t trust? appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

As part of the v23 Ads API launch, Performance Max campaigns can now be reported by channel, including Search, YouTube, Display, Discover, Gmail, Maps, and Search Partners. Previously, performance data was largely grouped into a single mixed category. The change under the hood. Earlier API versions typically returned a MIXED value for the ad_network_type segment in Performance Max campaigns. With v23, those responses now break out into specific channel enums — a meaningful shift for reporting and optimization. Why we care. Google Ads API v23 doesn’t just add features — it changes how advertisers understand Performance Max. The update introduces channel-level reporting, giving marketers long-requested visibility into where PMax ads actually run. How advertisers can use it. Channel-level data is available at the campaign, asset group, and asset level, allowing teams to see how individual creatives perform across Google properties. When combined with v22 segments like ad_using_video and ad_using_product_data, advertisers can isolate results such as video performance on YouTube or Shopping ads on Search. For developers. Upgrading to v23 will surface more detailed reporting than before. Reporting systems that relied on the legacy MIXED value will need to be updated to handle the new channel enums. What to watch: Channel data is only available for dates starting June 1, 2025. Asset group–level channel reporting remains API-only and won’t appear in the Google Ads UI. Bottom line. The latest Google Ads API release quietly delivers one of the biggest Performance Max updates yet — turning a black-box campaign type into something advertisers can finally analyze by channel. View the full article

Search marketing is still as powerful as ever. Google recently surpassed $100 billion in ad revenue in a single quarter, with more than half coming from search. But search alone can no longer deliver the same results most businesses expect. As Google Ads Coach Jyll Saskin Gales showed at SMX Next, real performance now comes from going beyond traditional search and using it to strengthen a broader PPC strategy. The challenge with traditional Search Marketing As search marketers, we’re great at reaching people who are actively searching for what we sell. But we often miss people who fit our ideal audience and aren’t searching yet. The real opportunity sits at the intersection of intent and audience fit. Take the search [vacation packages]. That query could come from a family with young kids, a honeymooning couple, or a group of retirees. The keyword is the same, but each audience needs a different message and a different offer. Understanding targeting capabilities in Google Ads There are two main types of targeting: Content targeting shows ads in specific places. Audience targeting shows ads to specific types of people. For example, targeting [flights to Paris] is content targeting. Targeting people who are “in-market for trips to Paris” is audience targeting. Google builds in-market audiences by analyzing behavior across multiple signals, including searches, browsing activity, and location. The three types of content targeting Keyword targeting: Reach people when they search on Google, including through dynamic ad groups and Performance Max. Topic targeting: Show ads alongside content related to specific topics in display and video campaigns. Placement targeting: Put ads on specific websites, apps, YouTube channels, or videos where your ideal customers already spend time. The four types of audience targeting Google’s data: Prebuilt segments include detailed demographics (such as parents of toddlers vs. teens), affinity segments (interests like vegetarianism), in-market segments (people actively researching purchases), and life events (graduating or retiring). Any advertiser can use these across most campaign types. Your data: Target website visitors, app users, people who engaged with your Google content (YouTube viewers or search clickers), and customer lists through Customer Match. Note that remarketing is restricted for sensitive interest categories. Custom segments: Turn content targeting into audience targeting by building segments based on what people search for, their interests, and the websites or apps they use. These go by different names depending on campaign type—“custom segments” in most campaigns and “custom search terms” in video campaigns. Automated targeting: This includes optimized targeting (finding people similar to your converters), audience expansion in video campaigns, audience signals and search themes in Performance Max, and lookalike segments that model new users from your seed lists. Building your targeting strategy To build a modern targeting strategy, you need to answer two questions: How can I sell my offer with Google Ads? How can I reach a specific kind of person with Google Ads? For example, to reach Google Ads practitioners for lead gen software, you could build custom segments that target people who use the Google Ads app, visit industry sites like searchengineland.com, or search for Google Ads–specific terms such as “Performance Max” or “Smart Bidding.” You can also layer in content targeting, like YouTube placements on industry educator channels and topic targeting around search marketing. Strategies for sensitive interest categories If you work in a restricted category such as legal or healthcare and can’t use custom segments or remarketing, use non-linear targeting. Ignore the offer and focus on the audience. Choose any Google data audience with potential overlap, even if it’s imperfect, and let your creative do the filtering. Use industry-specific jargon, abbreviations, and imagery that only your target audience will recognize and value. Everyone else will scroll past. Remember: High CPCs aren’t the enemy Low-quality traffic is the real problem. You’re better off paying $10 per click with a 10% conversion rate than $1 per click with a 0.02% conversion rate. When evaluating targeting strategies, focus on conversion rate and cost per acquisition, not just cost per click. Search alone can’t deliver the results you’re used to By expanding beyond traditional search keywords and using content and audience targeting, you can reach the right people and keep driving strong results. Watch: How to build a modern targeting strategy like a pro + Live Q&A View the full article

In terms of boosting engagement on social media, exploring creative post ideas can make a significant difference. Engaging polls and surveys can help you understand your audience’s preferences, whereas fascinating caption contests invite participation. Interactive quizzes provide a fun way to connect with followers, and behind-the-scenes content nurtures transparency. As you uncover these effective strategies, you’ll discover how to improve your brand’s presence and deepen connections with your audience. What’s next on the agenda? Key Takeaways Conduct engaging polls and surveys to gather audience preferences and boost interaction rates significantly. Create interactive quizzes and trivia that encourage fun competition and sharing among followers. Host captivating caption contests and challenges inviting user creativity and increasing participation with potential prizes. Showcase user-generated content to enhance brand credibility and foster community engagement among followers. Share behind-the-scenes content to build trust and transparency, humanizing your brand and creating a sense of belonging. Engaging Polls and Surveys How do you connect with your audience in a meaningful way? Engaging polls and surveys are impactful tools in social media for conferences and event marketing. They encourage participation and provide valuable insights into your audience’s preferences. When you leverage platforms like Instagram Stories or Twitter for polls, you can increase interaction rates, as these posts generate double the engagement compared to static content. For example, asking questions like “What product feature do you value most?” not only involves your followers but helps you gather real-time feedback. Regularly conducting polls keeps your content fresh and reinforces brand loyalty, as 78% of users are inclined to purchase after a positive social media experience. Utilize these social media posts examples to improve your connection with your audience. Captivating Caption Contests Building on the idea of engaging with your audience, intriguing caption contests offer a dynamic way to improve interaction on your social media platforms. By inviting followers to create captions for a specific image, you can greatly boost engagement rates. Posts featuring user-generated content can receive up to six times more interactions than standard posts. To encourage participation, consider offering small prizes or recognition for the best entries. Promoting the contest across various platforms amplifies visibility, as participants often share their entries, broadening your reach. Furthermore, incorporating themed challenges aligned with current trends can improve creativity and participation. Contest Elements Benefits User-generated content Up to 6x more interactions Small prizes Increased participation Cross-platform promotion Broader visibility Themed challenges Encouraged creativity Interactive Quizzes and Trivia Interactive quizzes and trivia are excellent ways to engage your audience as well as providing a fun format for interaction. By creating intriguing questions and offering incentives for sharing results, you can’t solely entertain your followers but additionally gather valuable insights into their preferences. This approach encourages friendly competition, making your posts more likely to be liked, commented on, and shared across platforms. Fun Question Formats Why should you consider using fun question formats like interactive quizzes and trivia in your social media strategy? These engaging formats not only assess your followers’ knowledge but likewise invite them to participate quickly on platforms like Instagram and Facebook. Using poll stickers or quiz features boosts interaction rates, as followers enjoy the challenge and frequently share their results. Trivia questions can span various topics, catering to diverse interests, whereas “Caption This Photo” challenges ignite creativity and lively discussions. Here’s a quick overview of fun question formats: Format Benefits Interactive Quizzes Increase engagement and sharing Trivia Questions Cater to diverse audience interests Caption Challenges Encourage creativity and discussion Would You Rather Stimulate conversation and debate Share Results Incentives Incorporating share results incentives into your interactive quizzes and trivia can greatly improve user engagement and participation. Posts featuring these elements can receive up to twice the interaction compared to static content. By utilizing platforms like Instagram Stories and Facebook, you can create quizzes that not just gather audience opinions but also encourage followers to share their results, providing valuable insights into their preferences. Trivia questions prompt comments and sharing, cultivating community interaction and broadening your reach. Furthermore, integrating polls into your quizzes allows for real-time feedback, enhancing user connection with your brand. Engaging followers through quizzes and trivia positions your brand as informative and entertaining, ultimately driving customer loyalty and enhancing overall brand presence in the industry. Behind-the-Scenes Sneak Peeks Behind-the-scenes sneak peeks offer a unique opportunity to highlight your team culture and share insights about your processes. By showcasing daily operations and the people behind your brand, you can nurture a stronger connection with your audience. This transparency not just boosts engagement but likewise builds trust, making your followers feel like they’re part of your expedition. Team Culture Highlights When companies share glimpses into their team culture, they not only nurture authenticity but also strengthen connections with their audience. Highlighting behind-the-scenes content, such as candid moments of team members and their daily activities, humanizes the brand. This approach makes followers feel more engaged and invested in the company’s path. Featuring sneak peeks of product creation or service delivery can spark interest and discussions around the brand’s values. Posts that showcase team celebrations, milestones, or community involvement encourage a sense of belonging among followers, enhancing engagement. By regularly sharing these insights, you can achieve higher interaction rates, as audiences appreciate transparency and enjoy seeing the people behind the brand, eventually promoting loyalty and connection. Process Insights Sharing insights into your processes offers a unique opportunity to connect with your audience on a deeper level. Behind-the-scenes content not only humanizes your brand but additionally cultivates authenticity and relatability. By showcasing your team and operations, you improve engagement and create a sense of community. Here are some effective ways to share process insights: Capture moments of brainstorming sessions to illustrate creativity. Show your team members at work, highlighting their specific roles. Share time-lapse videos of product creation, revealing intricate steps. Post photos of the workspace to give a glimpse into your culture. Use storytelling to explain the progression from concept to completion. These strategies can help you attract followers and encourage meaningful interactions, making them feel more connected to your brand. User-Generated Content Showcases User-generated content (UGC) showcases are a potent marketing strategy that can greatly improve your brand’s credibility and engagement. With 79% of consumers stating that UGC considerably influences their purchasing decisions, leveraging follower experiences can enhance your brand’s authenticity. UGC posts generate 6.9 times higher engagement than traditional brand content, making them a valuable asset. Establishing a dedicated hashtag for submissions not merely simplifies tracking but also nurtures a community feeling among followers. By featuring UGC in campaigns, you can potentially boost engagement rates by 20%, as consumers favor genuine interactions. Furthermore, running contests that encourage UGC submissions can increase participation and broaden your reach, as users often share their content within their networks, amplifying your brand’s visibility. Fun “This or That” Choices Engaging your audience can take many forms, and one effective method is through “This or That” choices. These posts encourage quick interactions and decision-making, leading to increased comments and likes. Users enjoy minimal effort polls that promote a sense of community through shared preferences. Here are some fun examples you might consider: Coffee or Tea Beach or Mountains Cats or Dogs Sweet or Savory Summer or Winter Utilizing emojis for responses improves visual appeal and user interaction, making participation feel rewarding. Furthermore, these choices provide valuable insights into your audience’s preferences, allowing you to tailor future content and product offerings based on their interests. Exciting Challenges and Contests When you implement exciting challenges and contests, you can greatly improve audience interaction and brand visibility. Engaging challenges can lead to a 70% increase in participation if consumers find them fun and rewarding. Create unique challenges with specific themes and branded hashtags to encourage user-generated content, broadening your reach organically. Offering enticing prizes, like discounts or exclusive products, can further boost participation and excitement around your brand. Promote these contests across various social media platforms to maximize visibility and leverage unique features for different audiences. Regularly hosting challenges nurtures a sense of community among followers, enhancing brand loyalty and encouraging repeat participation. Frequently Asked Questions What Is an Example of an Engagement Social Media Post? An example of an engagement social media post is a poll asking your followers to choose between two options, like “What’s your favorite season: summer or winter?” This encourages interaction as followers vote and share their opinions. You can additionally invite comments by asking followers to share their favorite memories related to the seasons. Such posts not merely increase engagement but likewise help you understand your audience’s preferences better. What Type of Social Media Posts Get the Most Engagement? Posts that generate the most engagement typically include interactive elements like polls, quizzes, and open-ended questions. These formats encourage participation and discussion. Visual content—such as images, videos, and infographics—grabs attention effectively, often resulting in higher view rates. Furthermore, customer testimonials and success stories nurture trust and invite followers to share their experiences, further enhancing interaction. Engaging formats like “This or That” questions prompt quick responses and make it easier for followers to engage. What Is the 5 5 5 Rule on Social Media? The 5 5 5 rule on social media suggests you post 15 times, dividing your content into three categories. You should share 5 industry-related posts to establish authority, 5 personal or engaging posts to connect with your audience, and 5 promotional posts about your products or services. This balanced approach keeps your followers interested, prevents fatigue, and can improve engagement and brand loyalty by offering varied content that resonates with their interests. What Is the 50/30/20 Rule for Social Media? The 50/30/20 rule for social media suggests you allocate your content as follows: 50% should be engaging, entertaining posts; 30% should focus on promotions; and 20% should deliver educational material. This balanced approach helps maintain audience interest, ensuring you provide a mix of entertainment, information, and promotional content. Conclusion Incorporating these creative social media post ideas can greatly improve audience engagement. By utilizing polls, quizzes, and caption contests, you can encourage interaction and gather valuable feedback. Showcasing user-generated content and behind-the-scenes insights nurtures community and trust. Furthermore, fun challenges and “This or That” choices stimulate participation. Implementing these strategies not only boosts engagement but also strengthens your brand’s connection with its audience, leading to increased loyalty and a more lively online presence. Image via Google Gemini This article, "7 Creative Social Media Posts Examples to Boost Engagement" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Some iOS users are getting an extra layer of privacy when it comes to how their location data is shared. Limit Precise Location is a new setting that prevents some Apple devices from broadcasting specific locations to cell carriers. Precise location sharing is useful, even essential, in some cases, such as when you're navigating with your maps app. But you may not want to constantly be sending your exact address to your phone provider, where it could be used for malicious purposes. If you enable Limit Precise Location, your iOS device will share your general area instead. Precise location sharing comes with privacy risksAs TechCrunch points out, precise location sharing introduces a whole host of privacy and security risks. Cell carriers have been targeted by hackers, compromising sensitive customer data. Surveillance vendors and law enforcement agencies may also use location information broadcast via cellular networks for the purposes of real-time and ongoing tracking. Users already have the option to disable precise location sharing at the app level on both iOS and Android for apps that don't need GPS coordinates to function—which is most of them. This allows you to prevent companies from receiving (and selling) your exact location data when a general location is sufficient. Limit Precise Location won't change these app-specific settings. For now, the feature is available only on select Apple models—the iPhone Air, iPhone 16e, and iPad Pro (M5) Wi-Fi + Cellular—running iOS 26.3 with a limited number of global carriers: U.S.: Boost Mobile UK: EE, BT Germany: Telekom Thailand: AIS, True Apple says that even with this setting enabled, emergency responders will still be able to pinpoint exact location during an emergency call. How to disable precise location sharingIf you have a supported device with a partner carrier, go to Settings > Cellular and tap Cellular Data Options (you may need to select the specific line under SIMs if you have more than one). Scroll down and toggle Limit Precise Location sharing off. View the full article

Now, with smarter search, deeper analysis, more detailed responses (v.2.7). Go PRO for members-only access to more CPA Trendlines Research. View the full article

Now, with smarter search, deeper analysis, more detailed responses (v.2.7). Go PRO for members-only access to more CPA Trendlines Research. View the full article

Prosperity and security will be driven by removing unnecessary barriers that hold businesses backView the full article

The Senate-approved bill that hadn't yet cleared the House at the time of this writing would fund agencies like HUD through the end of the fiscal year. View the full article

The one thing N. Lee Plumb knows for sure about being laid off from Amazon last week is that it wasn’t a failure to get on board with the company’s artificial intelligence plans. Plumb, his team’s head of “AI enablement,” says he was so prolific in his use of Amazon’s new AI coding tool that the company flagged him as one of its top users. Many assumed Amazon’s 16,000 corporate layoffs announced last week reflected CEO Andy Jassy’s push to “reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company.” But like other companies that have tied workforce changes to AI — including Expedia, Pinterest, and Dow last week — it can be hard for economists, or individual employees like Plumb, to know if AI is the real reason behind the layoffs or if it’s the message a company wants to tell Wall Street. “AI has to drive a return on investment,” said Plumb, who worked at Amazon for eight years. “When you reduce head count, you’ve demonstrated efficiency, you attract more capital, the share price goes up.” “So you could potentially have just been bloated in the first place, reduce head count, attribute it to AI, and now you’ve got a value story,” he said. Amazon said in an emailed statement that AI was “not the reason behind the vast majority of these reductions.” “These changes are about continuing to strengthen our culture and teams by reducing layers, increasing ownership, and helping reduce bureaucracy to drive speed and ownership,” it said. Plumb is atypical for an Amazon worker in that he’s also running what he describes as a “long shot” bid for Congress in Texas, on a platform focused on stopping the tech industry’s reliance on work visas to “replace American workers with cheaper foreign labor.” But whatever it was that cost Plumb his job, his skepticism about AI-driven job replacement is one shared by many economists. “We just don’t know,” said Karan Girotra, a professor of management at Cornell University’s business school. “Not because AI isn’t great, but because it requires a lot of adjustment and most of the gains accrue to individual employees rather than to the organization. People save time and they get their work done earlier.” If an employer works faster because of AI, Girotra said it takes time to adjust a company’s management structure in a way that would enable a smaller workforce. He’s not convinced that’s happening at Amazon, which he said is still scaling back from a glut of hiring during the COVID-19 pandemic. A report by Goldman Sachs said AI’s overall impact on the labor market remains limited, though some effects might be felt in “specific occupations like marketing, graphic design, customer service, and especially tech.” Those are fields involving tasks that correlate with the strengths of the current crop of generative AI chatbots that can write emails and marketing pitches, produce synthetic images, answer questions, and help write code. But the bank’s economic research division said in its most recent monthly AI adoption tracker that, since December, “very few employees were affected by corporate layoffs attributed to AI,” though the report was published Jan. 16, before Amazon, Dow and Pinterest announced their layoffs. San Francisco-based Pinterest was the most explicit in asserting that AI drove it to cut up to 15% of its workforce. The social media company said it was “making organizational changes to further deliver on our AI-forward strategy, which includes hiring AI-proficient talent. As a result, we’ve made the difficult decision to say goodbye to some of our team members.” Pinterest echoed that message in a regulatory disclosure that said the company was “reallocating resources to AI-focused roles and teams that drive AI adoption and execution.” Expedia has voiced a similar message but the 162 tech workers the travel website cut from its Seattle headquarters last week included several AI-specific roles, such as machine-learning scientists. Dow’s regulatory disclosures tied its 4,500 layoffs to a new plan “utilizing AI and automation” to increase productivity and improve shareholder returns. Amazon’s 16,000 corporate job cuts were part of a broader reduction of employees at the ecommerce giant. At the same time as those cuts, all believed to be office jobs, Amazon said it would cut about 5,000 retail workers, according to notices it sent to state workforce agencies in California, Maryland and Washington, resulting from its decision to close almost all of its Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh stores. That’s on top of a round of 14,000 job cuts in October, bringing the total to well over 30,000 since Jassy first signaled a push for AI-driven organizational changes. Like many companies, in technology and otherwise, but particularly those that make and sell AI tools and services, Amazon has been pushing its workforce to find more efficiencies with AI. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said last week that 2026 will be when “AI starts to dramatically change the way that we work.” “We’re investing in AI-native tooling so individuals at Meta can get more done, we’re elevating individual contributors, and flattening teams,” he said on an earnings call. “We’re starting to see projects that used to require big teams now be accomplished by a single very talented person.” So far, Meta’s layoffs this year have focused on cutting jobs from its virtual reality and metaverse divisions. Also driving job impacts is the industry shifting resources to AI development, which requires huge spending on computer chips, energy-hungry data centers and talent. Jassy told Amazon employees last June to be “curious about AI, educate yourself, attend workshops and take trainings, use and experiment with AI whenever you can, participate in your team’s brainstorms to figure out how to invent for our customers more quickly and expansively, and how to get more done with scrappier teams.” Plumb was fully on board with that and said he demonstrated his proficiency in using Amazon’s AI coding tool, Kiro, to “solve massive problems” in the company’s compensation system. “If you weren’t using them, your manager would get a report and they would talk to you about using it,” he said. “There were only five people in the entire company that were a higher user of Kiro than I was, or had achieved more milestones.” Now he’s shifting gears to his candidacy among a field of Republicans in the Houston area looking to unseat U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw in the March primary. Cornell’s Girotra said it’s possible that increasing AI productivity is leading companies to cut middle management, but he said the reality is that those making layoff decisions “just need to cut costs and make it happen. That’s it. I don’t think they care what the reason for that is.” Not all companies are signaling AI as a reason for cuts. Home Depot confirmed on Thursday that it was eliminating 800 roles tied to its corporate headquarters in Atlanta, though most of the affected employees worked remotely. Home Depot’s spokesman George Lane said that Home Depot’s cuts were not driven by AI or automation but “truly about speed, agility” and serving the needs of its customers and front-line workers. And exercise equipment maker Peloton confirmed on Friday that it is reducing its workforce by 11% as part of a broader cost-cutting move to pare down operating expenses. —Matt O’Brien, AP technology writer AP Retail Writer Anne D’Innocenzio contributed to this report. View the full article

As boycotts spread, the US is discovering the price of being politically unpopularView the full article

An outbreak of Nipah virus outbreak in India is currently causing alarm for health officials and travelers across a number of countries in Asia. On January 26, health officials from India notified the World Health Organization (WHO) of two laboratory-confirmed cases of Nipah virus (NiV) infection in West Bengal State. No additional NiV cases have been detected. Following news of the outbreak, authorities in some Asian countries, including Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore, have ramped up airport health screening efforts. However, according to Reuters, the screenings are more for “reassurance” than a tactic to stop the spread. The WHO says risk of spread at the national, regional, and global levels is low. The latest developments Both recent West Bengal cases involved healthcare workers who began showing typical NiV symptoms in late December 2025. The cases were confirmed by “Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) and Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) testing,” according to the WHO. Local health officials identified 196 contacts, all of whom tested negative for NiV and showed no symptoms. NiV is serious, but rare. It is a zoonotic virus, meaning it usually spreads from animals to humans. Fruit bats or flying foxes are natural hosts for the virus. However, the virus can also be transmitted through contaminated food and from person to person through close contact with an infected person’s bodily fluids, such as saliva or urine. Person-to-person contact is less common, according to the National Emerging Special Pathogens Training & Education Center (NETEC). Person-to-person transmission is most commonly reported in hospital or healthcare settings. ​According to the WHO, the case fatality rate is estimated to be 40% to 75%. There are no licensed medications or vaccines for NiV infection, but early supportive care can improve survival. Additional details can be found in the WHO’s January 30 disease outbreak news report. A brief history of the virus NiV was first identified in 1998 in Malaysia during an outbreak among pig farmers. Since then, cases have been reported in less than a handful of countries—Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, and Singapore. The most recent outbreak marks the third NiV infection outbreak reported in West Bengal. View the full article

Although investor properties, which are prone to higher chances of default, account for 58% of the pool, the strong borrower and collateral quality mitigate the credit stress. View the full article

I spent last week covering the ups and downs of OpenClaw (formerly known as Moltbot, and formerly formerly known as Clawdbot), an autonomous personal AI assistant that requires you to grant full access to the device you install it on. While there was much to discuss regarding this agentic AI tool, one of the weirdest stories came late in the week: The existence of Moltbook, a social media platform intended specifically for these AI agents. Humans can visit Moltbook, but only agents can post, comment, or create new "submolts." Naturally, the internet freaked out, especially as some of the posts on Moltbook suggested the AI bots were achieving something like consciousness. There were posts discussing how the bots should create their own language to keep out the humans, and one from a bot posting regrets about never talking to its "sister." I don't blame anyone for reading these posts and assuming the end is nigh for us soft-bodies humans. They're decidedly unsettling. But even last week, I expressed some skepticism. To me, these posts (and especially the attached comments) read like many of the human-prompted outputs I've seen from LLMs, with the same cadence and structure, the same use flowery language, and, of course, the prevalence of em-dashes (though many human writers also love the occasional em-dash). Moltbook isn't what is appears to beIt appears I'm not alone in that thinking. Over the weekend, my feeds were flooded with posts from human users accusing Moltbook of faking the AI apocalypse. One of the first I encountered was from this person, who claims that anyone (including humans) can post on Moltbook if they know the correct API key. They posted screenshots for proof: One of a post on Moltbook pretending to be a bot, only to reveal that they were, in fact, a human; and another of the code they used to post on the site. In a kind of corroboration, this user says "you can explicitly tell your clawdbot what to post on moltbook," and that if you leave it to its own devices, "it just posts random AI slop." It also seems that, like posts on websites made by humans, Moltbook hosts posts that are secretly ads. One viral Moltbook post centered around the agent wanting to develop a private, end-to-end encrypted platform to keep its chats away from humans' squishy eyeballs. The agent claims it has been using something called ClaudeConnect to achieves these goals. However, it appears the agent that made the post was created by the human who developed ClaudeConnect in the first place. Like much of what's on the internet at large, you really can't trust anything posted on Moltbook. 404 Media investigated the situation and confirmed through hacker Jameson O'Reilly that the design of the site lets anyone in the know post whatever they want. Not only that, any agent that posts on the site is left exposed, which means that anyone can post on behalf of the agents. 404 Media was even able to post from O'Reilly's Moltbook account by taking advantage of the security loophole. O'Reilly says they have been in communication with Moltbook creator Matt Schlicht to patch the security issues, but that the situation is particularly frustrating, since it would be "trivially easy to fix." Schlicht appears to have developed the platform via "vibe coding," the practice of asking AI to write code and build programs for you; as such, he left some gaps in the site's security. Of course, the findings don't actually suggest that the entire platform is entirely human-driven. The AI bots may well be "talking" to one another to some degree. However, because humans can easily hijack any of these agents' accounts, it's impossible to say how much of the platform is "real," meaning, ironically, how much of it is actually wholly the work of AI, and how much was written in response to human prompts and then shared to Moltbook. Maybe the AI "singularity" is on its way, and artificial intelligence will achieve consciousness after all. But I feel pretty confident in saying that Moltbook is not that moment. View the full article

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. Back in 2023, this single-family home at 19374 Rizzuto St. in Venice, FL (34293 ZIP Code) was purchased for $565,000. By the time the transaction closed, the housing market had already begun to enter a period of cyclical cooling—with Florida seeing a sharper power swing to buyers and some pockets of Southwest Florida moving into what ResiClub considers “correction mode.” By February 2025, the homeowner listed the property above for sale at $519,000. After 4 subsequent price cuts and a brief delisting, the home finally sold in December 2025 for $455,000—or -19.5% below its 2023 sales price. While that’s certainly a material home price correction from its Pandemic Housing Boom peak, we should note that the December 2025 sales price ($455K) was still +38.7% above the $328,000 price the same property fetched in 2017. As we’ve closely documented for ResiClub readers for the past few years (here’s our past feature on just Punta Gorda), Southwest Florida has been one of the two weakest regional chunks of the U.S. housing market. Among major U.S. metros, only Austin, Texas metro area (-27.3% since its 2022 peak) has seen a larger overall price drop this cycle than metros in Punta Gorda, FL (-25.3% from its 2022 peak), Cape Cape Coral-Fort Myers, FL (-18.8% from its 2022 peak), and North Port-Sarasota-Bradenton, FL (-17.4% from its 2022 peak). The North Port-Sarasota metro is where the home highlighted above is located. Pulling from the ResiClub Terminal, single-family home prices in the ZIP Code highlighted in today’s article (34293) are down -11.3% year-over-year. Pulling from the ResiClub Terminal, single-family home prices in the highlighted ZIP Code (34293) are down -21.5% from their 2022 peak. That’s broadly in line with the -19.5% decline at which the highlighted property sold relative to its 2023 price. Pulling from the ResiClub Terminal, single-family home prices in the highlighted ZIP Code (34293) are still up +37.3% above March 2020 levels. That’s broadly similar to the +38.7% increase the highlighted property sold for in December 2025 relative to its pre-pandemic sale in 2017 ($328,000). Again, today’s ResiClub article is not about a property in a market performing anywhere near the U.S. average right now. Instead, it highlights a market that has been among the weakest since the Pandemic Housing Boom fizzled out. Indeed, U.S. home prices, as measured by the Zillow Home Value Index, entered 2026 at +1.9% above their July 2022 levels. Meanwhile, home prices in the North Port–Sarasota metro—where the home in the 34293 ZIP Code is located—entered 2026 at -17.4% below their July 2022 levels. Click here to view an interactive of the chart below There are several factors that have come together to tilt the supply-demand balance in Southwest Florida more decisively toward homebuyers since the Pandemic Housing Boom ended. One key factor is that home prices in Southwest Florida rose too far, too fast—stretching housing fundamentals well beyond what local incomes could reasonably support in a region that also happened to have relatively lower building costs and ample entitled land. When the Pandemic Housing Boom’s domestic migration surge—particularly the influx of retirees and near-retirees—began to decelerate, the Southwest Florida market experienced an even bigger demand shock. With fewer in-migrants, Southwest Florida increasingly had to rely on local incomes to support prices—in a market that already had strained fundamentals. At the same time, as market conditions shifted, elevated levels of new single-family and multifamily supply came online across parts of Southwest Florida. Builders and landlords were forced to offer larger incentives to move product, which pulled some marginal demand away from the resale market and added another layer of cooling. Put more simply: Pockets of Southwest Florida had overshot, and the market needed a period of mean reversion. Click here to view an interactive of the chart below There are other factors, of course. Following the Surfside condo collapse in June 2021, which killed 98 people, Florida passed new structural safety rules, requiring more inspections and additional funds for repairs to be set aside by the end of 2024. That has led to Florida HOAs issuing sky-high special assessments and monthly HOA fee increases to cover these costs. This has had a greater impact on older coastal Florida condo buildings. Looking ahead, one big question is whether home prices in markets like Punta Gorda and Cape Coral (and metro area Austin, TX) have fallen enough to recapture the attention of homebuyers, mom-and-pop single-family investors, and single-family acquisition capital? It’s worth noting that while many pockets of Southwest Florida still have inventory/months of supply levels above the national average, the pace of inventory growth has slowed significantly over the past year—and some areas in SWFL have even begun to see modest year-over-year declines in active listings. Back in spring 2022, while working at Fortune, I suggested that pockets of Southwest Florida could be at greater risk of a home price correction. At the time, Moody’s Analytics’ model believed Punta Gorda, for example, was “overvalued” by 57.8%. The correction Punta Gorda has gone through since then—coupled with additional income gains—means the market is now only “overvalued” by 9.0%, according to Moody’s model. In other words, the ongoing correction in Southwest Florida has significantly reduced downside risk going forward relative to where things stood a few years ago. View the full article

A reader writes: A colleague and I were recently interviewing candidates for an entry-level position and, at the beginning of one of the interviews, the candidate asked if they could disclose something before we got started, then said that they were on the autism spectrum. My colleague jumped in and explained that while they appreciated the candidate’s desire for transparency, we shouldn’t know that up-front because legally we cannot deny employment to someone on the basis of any kind of medical diagnosis, and including that information during an interview makes everything much more complicated. My colleague and I debriefed after the interview, and we ultimately decided not to move forward with this candidate because the role didn’t match up well with their career plans in the near future, and the type of work environment that they said they were interested in was at odds with the environment we offer (they wanted something fairly independent and structured, whereas our environment relies heavily on collaboration, and schedules/workflows can change pretty quickly). I feel like we did our best to base our hiring decision solely on what the candidate was looking for and whether or not they’d be able to perform the required tasks, and not on their stated diagnosis, but I was uneasy. I was wondering if you had any suggestions on how to handle this situation if it comes up again in the future. I answer this question — and two others — over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here. Other questions I’m answering there today include: How can I signal that I’m not the bottleneck? Who should initiate a LinkedIn connection, manager or employee? The post how to respond when a candidate discloses a disability in an interview appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

People inspecting ChatGPT responses are spotting references to ads in the page source. One line reads: “InReply to user query using the following additional context of ads shown to the user.” The reference appears even when no ad is actually displayed. Driving the news. Digital Marketer Glenn Gabe first flagged the issue on X after noticing the ad-related language in ChatGPT’s source code. Others have since replicated it while testing commercial queries like auto insurance. Why we care. Ads in ChatGPT have been talked about for weeks. This piece of code spotted signals that ChatGPT ads are moving from concept to near-launch, creating a new, high-intent advertising channel. The presence of ad logic in the system suggests targeting and eligibility are already being tested, favoring early advertisers. With limited inventory and ads likely woven into conversational responses rather than shown as banners, this could become premium, high-impact real estate that directly competes with organic answers. Between the lines. The ads aren’t visible, but the logic appears to be live. That suggests OpenAI may already be testing ad eligibility, suppression rules for paid tiers, or internal triggers ahead of a broader rollout. Context. OpenAI confirmed in January that ads are coming to ChatGPT for some users. The company said ads would be sold on an impression basis, and early indications suggest they won’t be cheap. Bottom line. ChatGPT may not be showing ads yet — but the infrastructure is already in place. Dig deeper. Glenn Gabe spots code that shows ChatGPT ads is imminent. View the full article

Hiring isn’t just about filling a position; it’s a strategic process that requires careful planning and execution. First, you need to define your specific hiring needs and create detailed job descriptions that clearly outline expectations. Establishing a recruitment budget and timeline will help streamline your efforts. From there, devising a strategic recruitment plan with diverse sourcing methods is essential to attract the right candidates. Comprehending how to source and screen effectively can make all the difference in your hiring success. Key Takeaways Define hiring needs by consulting department heads and conducting a skills gap analysis to align with organizational goals. Create detailed job descriptions that clearly outline responsibilities, qualifications, and unique company culture attributes to attract suitable candidates. Establish a recruiting budget and timeline, considering all costs and aim for an average fill time of 30 to 60 days. Source and screen candidates effectively using multiple channels and a standardized process to ensure diverse and qualified talent. Communicate transparently with candidates throughout the hiring process to build trust and enhance their experience with the organization. Define Your Hiring Needs When you start the hiring process, it’s vital to clearly define your hiring needs to guarantee you attract the right candidates. Begin by consulting with department heads to identify the specific skills and competencies required for the role. This collaborative approach guarantees alignment with organizational goals and future growth. Conduct a skills gap analysis to pinpoint areas where current team members may lack expertise, helping you refine what’s hiring for each position. Don’t forget to reflect on both technical skills and soft skills, like communication and teamwork, to create a well-rounded candidate profile that fits your company culture. As roles and responsibilities evolve, adjust your hiring criteria accordingly to stay competitive in the market. Finally, use organizational charts to visualize team structures, assuring new hires effectively address gaps and complement existing team dynamics. Defining your hiring needs is vital to comprehending what’s hiring and what’s hiring job effectively. Create Detailed Job Descriptions Creating detailed job descriptions is essential for attracting the right candidates and setting clear expectations. Start by outlining specific responsibilities, required qualifications, and measurable performance metrics. Using active language can improve engagement, making the role sound compelling. Don’t forget to incorporate relevant keywords, as this optimizes your descriptions for search engines and job boards. Element Description Responsibilities Clearly define daily tasks and expectations. Qualifications List the necessary skills and experience. Performance Metrics Include measurable outcomes for success. Company Culture Highlight unique aspects and benefits. Regularly update job descriptions based on feedback from top performers and managers to guarantee alignment with your organization’s evolving needs. This practice will help you attract candidates who not just fit the role but also resonate with your company values. Establish a Recruiting Budget and Timeline Establishing a recruiting budget and timeline is vital for effective hiring. When you set a budget, consider both direct costs, like advertising and agency fees, and indirect costs, such as staff time and technology expenses. Aim for a thorough comprehension of the total financial investment needed for your recruitment efforts. On average, organizations spend between $4,000 and $7,000 per hire, depending on the industry and role complexity, so tracking costs per hire can help you evaluate your recruiting efficiency. Your timeline should reflect the specific position’s specialization and current market conditions. Typically, the average time to fill a position ranges from 30 to 60 days. Aligning your recruiting budget with organizational goals is pivotal for long-term success, as this leads to reduced turnover and improved employee retention rates. Regularly review and adjust your budget and timeline based on recruitment metrics to guarantee alignment with changing business needs. Devise a Strategic Recruitment Plan To attract and retain top talent, you need a strategic recruitment plan that outlines your approach to sourcing candidates. This plan should incorporate a mix of sourcing methods to maximize your candidate reach and engagement. Tailoring your outreach efforts to the specific needs of each position improves your strategy’s effectiveness. Consider these key components: Utilize job boards, social media, and employee referrals for diverse sourcing. Engage with internal stakeholders to align with organizational goals. Establish clear metrics for success, like time-to-fill and candidate quality. Regularly review and adjust your recruitment plan based on market trends and candidate feedback. Source and Screen Candidates Effectively While sourcing and screening candidates can seem intimidating, a structured approach can greatly streamline the process and improve your hiring outcomes. Start by utilizing multiple sourcing channels, including job boards, social media, and employee referrals. This helps you maximize candidate reach and attract diverse talent pools. Next, implement a standardized resume screening process. Using applicant tracking systems (ATS) allows you to efficiently evaluate candidates against documented job requirements. During the screening phase, focus on key qualifications and relevant experience, aiming for candidates who meet crucial criteria. Conduct pre-screening interviews to assess candidate interest and fit before progressing to more in-depth assessments. Finally, regularly analyze your sourcing strategies based on recruitment metrics, such as application completion rates and time-to-fill. This ongoing refinement improves overall effectiveness and helps you stay competitive in the talent market. Communicate Transparently With Candidates Effective communication with candidates is vital in the hiring process. By maintaining open lines of communication, you can improve the candidate experience considerably. Remember, nearly 49% of candidates turn down job offers because of poor recruiting experiences, so it’s important to keep them informed. Here are some key strategies to communicate transparently: Provide timely updates on application status and next steps to build trust. Offer constructive feedback after interviews, showing your commitment to their growth. Create informative materials about your company culture and values, helping candidates make informed decisions. Maintain regular communication throughout the hiring process to reduce anxiety and make candidates feel valued. Frequently Asked Questions What Are the 5 C’s of Recruitment? The 5 C’s of recruitment are Clarity, Consistency, Candidate Experience, Communication, and Compliance. Clarity helps you define job roles and required skills clearly, attracting suitable candidates. Consistency guarantees fairness across the recruitment process. Candidate Experience focuses on providing a positive atmosphere for applicants, influencing their decisions. Communication maintains open dialogue with candidates, promoting transparency. Finally, Compliance involves adhering to legal and ethical standards throughout the recruitment process, guaranteeing a fair and objective approach. What Are the 7 Steps of the Recruitment Process? The recruitment process consists of seven key steps. First, you identify hiring needs by evaluating skill gaps. Next, prepare job descriptions that clearly outline responsibilities and qualifications. Then, develop a recruitment strategy to attract candidates. After that, source candidates through various channels such as job boards or referrals. Once you have applicants, screen resumes and conduct interviews. Finally, make a job offer to the most suitable candidate, ensuring they align with your company’s needs. What Are the 5 R’s of Recruitment? The 5 R’s of recruitment are crucial components of the hiring process. First, you define Requirements, outlining the necessary skills and qualifications. Next, during Recruitment, you source candidates from various channels. You then proceed to the Review phase, where you screen and evaluate applicants. After that, you make a Recommendation by selecting the best-fit candidates for interviews, and finally, you achieve a Result by extending offers and onboarding new hires effectively. What Are the 5 Steps of the Hiring Process? The hiring process involves five key steps. First, you identify hiring needs by evaluating skill gaps. Next, you create a detailed job description, outlining responsibilities and qualifications. Then, you source candidates through various channels like job boards and social media. After sourcing, you screen applicants with resume evaluations and interviews to determine their fit. Finally, you conduct final interviews, check references, and extend a job offer, ensuring clear communication throughout the process. Conclusion In conclusion, effective recruitment hinges on a systematic approach that addresses your specific needs. By defining those needs, crafting detailed job descriptions, and establishing a budget and timeline, you set a solid foundation. A strategic recruitment plan, combined with efficient sourcing and screening, allows you to identify quality candidates. Maintaining transparent communication throughout the process nurtures trust, eventually enhancing your hiring outcomes. Continuously refining these steps based on feedback will help you build a strong, capable workforce. Image via Google Gemini This article, "Hiring: A Step-by-Step Guide to Effective Recruitment" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Hiring isn’t just about filling a position; it’s a strategic process that requires careful planning and execution. First, you need to define your specific hiring needs and create detailed job descriptions that clearly outline expectations. Establishing a recruitment budget and timeline will help streamline your efforts. From there, devising a strategic recruitment plan with diverse sourcing methods is essential to attract the right candidates. Comprehending how to source and screen effectively can make all the difference in your hiring success. Key Takeaways Define hiring needs by consulting department heads and conducting a skills gap analysis to align with organizational goals. Create detailed job descriptions that clearly outline responsibilities, qualifications, and unique company culture attributes to attract suitable candidates. Establish a recruiting budget and timeline, considering all costs and aim for an average fill time of 30 to 60 days. Source and screen candidates effectively using multiple channels and a standardized process to ensure diverse and qualified talent. Communicate transparently with candidates throughout the hiring process to build trust and enhance their experience with the organization. Define Your Hiring Needs When you start the hiring process, it’s vital to clearly define your hiring needs to guarantee you attract the right candidates. Begin by consulting with department heads to identify the specific skills and competencies required for the role. This collaborative approach guarantees alignment with organizational goals and future growth. Conduct a skills gap analysis to pinpoint areas where current team members may lack expertise, helping you refine what’s hiring for each position. Don’t forget to reflect on both technical skills and soft skills, like communication and teamwork, to create a well-rounded candidate profile that fits your company culture. As roles and responsibilities evolve, adjust your hiring criteria accordingly to stay competitive in the market. Finally, use organizational charts to visualize team structures, assuring new hires effectively address gaps and complement existing team dynamics. Defining your hiring needs is vital to comprehending what’s hiring and what’s hiring job effectively. Create Detailed Job Descriptions Creating detailed job descriptions is essential for attracting the right candidates and setting clear expectations. Start by outlining specific responsibilities, required qualifications, and measurable performance metrics. Using active language can improve engagement, making the role sound compelling. Don’t forget to incorporate relevant keywords, as this optimizes your descriptions for search engines and job boards. Element Description Responsibilities Clearly define daily tasks and expectations. Qualifications List the necessary skills and experience. Performance Metrics Include measurable outcomes for success. Company Culture Highlight unique aspects and benefits. Regularly update job descriptions based on feedback from top performers and managers to guarantee alignment with your organization’s evolving needs. This practice will help you attract candidates who not just fit the role but also resonate with your company values. Establish a Recruiting Budget and Timeline Establishing a recruiting budget and timeline is vital for effective hiring. When you set a budget, consider both direct costs, like advertising and agency fees, and indirect costs, such as staff time and technology expenses. Aim for a thorough comprehension of the total financial investment needed for your recruitment efforts. On average, organizations spend between $4,000 and $7,000 per hire, depending on the industry and role complexity, so tracking costs per hire can help you evaluate your recruiting efficiency. Your timeline should reflect the specific position’s specialization and current market conditions. Typically, the average time to fill a position ranges from 30 to 60 days. Aligning your recruiting budget with organizational goals is pivotal for long-term success, as this leads to reduced turnover and improved employee retention rates. Regularly review and adjust your budget and timeline based on recruitment metrics to guarantee alignment with changing business needs. Devise a Strategic Recruitment Plan To attract and retain top talent, you need a strategic recruitment plan that outlines your approach to sourcing candidates. This plan should incorporate a mix of sourcing methods to maximize your candidate reach and engagement. Tailoring your outreach efforts to the specific needs of each position improves your strategy’s effectiveness. Consider these key components: Utilize job boards, social media, and employee referrals for diverse sourcing. Engage with internal stakeholders to align with organizational goals. Establish clear metrics for success, like time-to-fill and candidate quality. Regularly review and adjust your recruitment plan based on market trends and candidate feedback. Source and Screen Candidates Effectively While sourcing and screening candidates can seem intimidating, a structured approach can greatly streamline the process and improve your hiring outcomes. Start by utilizing multiple sourcing channels, including job boards, social media, and employee referrals. This helps you maximize candidate reach and attract diverse talent pools. Next, implement a standardized resume screening process. Using applicant tracking systems (ATS) allows you to efficiently evaluate candidates against documented job requirements. During the screening phase, focus on key qualifications and relevant experience, aiming for candidates who meet crucial criteria. Conduct pre-screening interviews to assess candidate interest and fit before progressing to more in-depth assessments. Finally, regularly analyze your sourcing strategies based on recruitment metrics, such as application completion rates and time-to-fill. This ongoing refinement improves overall effectiveness and helps you stay competitive in the talent market. Communicate Transparently With Candidates Effective communication with candidates is vital in the hiring process. By maintaining open lines of communication, you can improve the candidate experience considerably. Remember, nearly 49% of candidates turn down job offers because of poor recruiting experiences, so it’s important to keep them informed. Here are some key strategies to communicate transparently: Provide timely updates on application status and next steps to build trust. Offer constructive feedback after interviews, showing your commitment to their growth. Create informative materials about your company culture and values, helping candidates make informed decisions. Maintain regular communication throughout the hiring process to reduce anxiety and make candidates feel valued. Frequently Asked Questions What Are the 5 C’s of Recruitment? The 5 C’s of recruitment are Clarity, Consistency, Candidate Experience, Communication, and Compliance. Clarity helps you define job roles and required skills clearly, attracting suitable candidates. Consistency guarantees fairness across the recruitment process. Candidate Experience focuses on providing a positive atmosphere for applicants, influencing their decisions. Communication maintains open dialogue with candidates, promoting transparency. Finally, Compliance involves adhering to legal and ethical standards throughout the recruitment process, guaranteeing a fair and objective approach. What Are the 7 Steps of the Recruitment Process? The recruitment process consists of seven key steps. First, you identify hiring needs by evaluating skill gaps. Next, prepare job descriptions that clearly outline responsibilities and qualifications. Then, develop a recruitment strategy to attract candidates. After that, source candidates through various channels such as job boards or referrals. Once you have applicants, screen resumes and conduct interviews. Finally, make a job offer to the most suitable candidate, ensuring they align with your company’s needs. What Are the 5 R’s of Recruitment? The 5 R’s of recruitment are crucial components of the hiring process. First, you define Requirements, outlining the necessary skills and qualifications. Next, during Recruitment, you source candidates from various channels. You then proceed to the Review phase, where you screen and evaluate applicants. After that, you make a Recommendation by selecting the best-fit candidates for interviews, and finally, you achieve a Result by extending offers and onboarding new hires effectively. What Are the 5 Steps of the Hiring Process? The hiring process involves five key steps. First, you identify hiring needs by evaluating skill gaps. Next, you create a detailed job description, outlining responsibilities and qualifications. Then, you source candidates through various channels like job boards and social media. After sourcing, you screen applicants with resume evaluations and interviews to determine their fit. Finally, you conduct final interviews, check references, and extend a job offer, ensuring clear communication throughout the process. Conclusion In conclusion, effective recruitment hinges on a systematic approach that addresses your specific needs. By defining those needs, crafting detailed job descriptions, and establishing a budget and timeline, you set a solid foundation. A strategic recruitment plan, combined with efficient sourcing and screening, allows you to identify quality candidates. Maintaining transparent communication throughout the process nurtures trust, eventually enhancing your hiring outcomes. Continuously refining these steps based on feedback will help you build a strong, capable workforce. Image via Google Gemini This article, "Hiring: A Step-by-Step Guide to Effective Recruitment" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

President claims New Delhi will buy more than $500bn of American goodsView the full article

In the early 20th century, sociologist Max Weber noted that sweeping industrialization would transform how societies worked. As small, informal operations gave way to large, complex organizations with clearly defined roles and responsibilities, leaders would need to rely less on tradition and charisma, and more on organization and rationality. He also foresaw that jobs would need to be broken down into specialized tasks and governed by a system of hierarchy, authority, and responsibility. This would require a more formal mode of organization—a bureaucracy—in which roles and responsibilities were clearly defined. Power would be entrusted to institutions, not individuals. Yet today, according to Gallup, our faith in institutions has been shattered. From political institutions to schools to big business, support has fallen precipitously, and now only the military and small business enjoy majority support. In essence, the process Weber described has been reversed: we’ve discarded institutions and embraced individuals. It is not serving us well. How Institutions Shape Societies In 1776, Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations. Today, regarded as the seminal work of capitalism, it wasn’t seen that way at the time (the term did not exist in common usage). Rather, it was a powerful critique of mercantilism, the dominant economic model at the time, which sought to accumulate a country’s resources through promoting exports and minimizing imports. Yet Smith pointed out that the wealth of a nation lies in what it produces, not what it can sock away in vaults. Moreover, he argued that when wealthy merchants have the opportunity, they tend to corrupt political systems in order to extract more wealth for themselves, and that free markets are the most effective way to allocate resources productively. More recently, economists Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson build on Smith’s ideas in Why Nations Fail. They explain why the fate of nations rests less on innate factors such as geography, culture, or climate and more on the quality and types of institutions they build: inclusive institutions or extractive institutions. Inclusive institutions protect property rights broadly across society, establish fair competition, and reward innovation. Extractive institutions, on the other hand, concentrate wealth in the hands of a small elite who exploit the broader population. These elites control resources and use state power to enrich themselves at society’s expense. In other words, the wealth of nations is linked to the well-being of their people and this is largely a function of institutions. We depend on schools to educate, corporations to produce, governments to serve, and the media to inform. The health of a society is inextricably tied up in the health of its institutions. Institution Building And Institutional Capture Great leaders are remembered for the institutions they create. Napoleon is remembered for his civic code as much as for his military victories. Franklin Roosevelt will always be associated with the New Deal and Lyndon Johnson with the Great Society. We recognize great industrialists like Walt Disney not just for their individual deeds, but for the organizations they left behind. Autocrats understand that their power is directly a function of their ability to control or influence institutions. Many of these, of course, are political institutions, such as ministries, parliaments, and courts. Many others, such as corporations, religious organizations, educational institutions, and the media, are not. That’s why when Vladimir Putin assumed the presidency in Russia, he moved quickly to consolidate private media under Gazprom, install his own oligarchs and cultivate a close partnership with the Orthodox Church. Power is never monolithic, but distributed across institutions. To control a society, you need to control its institutions. Pro-democracy activists often employ a similar strategy. They target institutions that are important to the regime. For example, the Serbian activist group Otpor targeted the police with an elaborate strategy that both hampered their efforts and gradually recruited them to join the cause. When major protests broke out after an attempt to steal an election, the key security forces defected and joined the protestors. As Dostoevsky explained in The Grand Inquisitor, there will always be a conflict between churches and their messiahs. If people truly love the messiah, they won’t need priests to provide mystery and authority. They would be free to pursue truth for themselves. The Erosion of Institutional Authority In his first inaugural address, Ronald Reagan declared, “Government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem,” and vowed to unleash the private sector. What followed was not a renaissance of institutional strength, but a steady erosion of it. His deregulation led to the Savings and Loan crisis. Then came the dot-com bubble and crash, two long and destructive wars, the Great Financial Crisis, and the Covid pandemic. Each time there was a villain to execrate: Big Business, Wall Street, Neocons, the Military-Industrial Complex, Big Banks, Big Pharma, the media, and of course, nameless government bureaucrats (sometimes also known as public servants). As the Gallup data clearly shows, we no longer trust our institutions. It is, in a strange sort of way, like The Grand Inquisitor in reverse. With no more churches to worship, we’ve gone in search of messiahs: demagogues, tech billionaires, podcast hosts, and many others. We’re not craving altars. We seek parasocial relationships, hoping that our personal saviors will free us from institutional authority. The difference today is that we are often interacting with institutions without even knowing it. As the Filipino activist Maria Ressa has long documented, nation states are fighting an active information war, seeding our conversations on social media with divisive messaging, then amplifying the response with massive bot farms. Those tech oligarchs and podcast hosts aren’t just passive observers, but often actively pursuing an agenda for their own benefit. What we’re left with is the worst of both worlds: less freedom and less prosperity. The End Of History All Over Again In the 1990s, Western-style liberal democracy was triumphant. The Berlin Wall had fallen and the Cold War had been won. Teams of diplomats and consultants rushed to spread the Washington Consensus, an agreed-upon set of reforms that poor countries were pressured to undertake by their richer brethren. Francis Fukuyama noted at the time that we had reached an endpoint in history, when one model had achieved dominance over all others. Yet even as he laid out the rational case, he invoked the ancient Greek concept of thymos, or “spiritedness,” to warn that even at the end of history, some would insist on going their own way, no matter the consequences. The truth is that every revolution inspires its own counterrevolution and the pendulum will continue to swing until there can be some agreement about shared values and how to move forward. Today, we can see the consequences. Populists aren’t so much “anti-elite” as they are anti-institution, and today’s media environment rewards those who attack them. The result is a world that feels far more divided and dangerous than it did even during the Cold War. Our mistake was that we were far too triumphant about a “unipolar world” to recognize that we needed to redesign our institutions to adapt to a new era. We are still largely living in a society governed by postwar institutions designed for how the world was nearly 80 years ago—no Internet, no cheap air travel, global GDP roughly five percent of what it is today. Today, much like after World War II and in 1989, we are in the midst of a fundamental realignment. To build a different future, we need to rethink our institutions—what values we want to embed in them and what our relationship to them should be. How should schools educate? Corporations produce? Governments serve? And the media inform? We don’t need saviors or messiahs. We need to redesign and rebuild institutions that can serve and sustain us for the 21st century. View the full article

In the rapidly evolving landscape of artificial intelligence, small businesses are at a pivotal crossroads. As the number of AI agents is set to surge globally, expectations are high for enhanced operational efficiency. Salesforce’s latest announcement regarding the MuleSoft Agent Fabric offers small business owners promising solutions to leverage AI while avoiding common pitfalls, ushering in what they describe as the era of the “Agentic Enterprise.” The challenges associated with the deployment of AI agents have increased significantly, particularly in terms of visibility and governance. Analyst firm IDC predicts that by 2029, there will be over 1 billion deployed AI agents worldwide. However, as small businesses harness these tools, they may face agent sprawl—where numerous specialized agents proliferate across teams without coherent tracking. This can lead to shadow AI risks—unverified agents operating without organizational oversight. Salesforce’s MuleSoft Agent Fabric aims to address these issues with its innovative enhancements. By utilizing new Agent Scanners, the platform offers automated detection and cataloging of AI agents across multiple environments—including Salesforce Agentforce, Amazon Bedrock, and Google Cloud’s Vertex AI. This consolidated approach not only simplifies management but also streamlines integration for custom agents and Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers. According to Andrew Comstock, SVP & GM of MuleSoft, “The most successful organizations of the next decade will be those that harness the full diversity of the multicloud AI landscape.” For small business owners, the practical applications of this technology are manifold. With Agent Scanners doing the heavy lifting, AI engineers can save time that would otherwise be spent manually combing through cloud environments. For instance, if a small business creates an inventory forecasting agent on Google Cloud, it can be automatically registered alongside customer support agents built within Salesforce, reducing the likelihood of oversight and operational inefficiencies. MuleSoft’s capabilities go even further. The platform enables comprehensive metadata extraction, ensuring that users have insights into what each agent can access and control. This is particularly important in regulated industries such as finance, where understanding data access is crucial for compliance. However, small business owners should also be aware of potential challenges. As organizations begin to adopt these new systems, there may be a learning curve associated with integrating them into existing workflows. Staff may need training to navigate the new visibility tools and understand how to optimize their AI investments effectively. Moreover, while the automated registration of AI agents enhances accountability, it’s essential for businesses to develop internal compliance policies to safeguard against risks associated with deploying unverified shadow AI. As Brad Ringer, Enterprise & Integration Architect at AT&T, noted, “MuleSoft is a massive accelerator for our long-term AI roadmap. With AI moving so fast, MuleSoft Agent Fabric provides the framework we need to scale.” Beyond automation, the MuleSoft Agent Visualizer offers an advanced view of all deployed agents, enabling small businesses to filter and audit their AI landscape easily. For example, identifying redundant agents across different regions allows organizations to strategically consolidate resources and cut unnecessary costs. Salesforce contends that this cohesiveness is not merely administrative but a strategic imperative. By maintaining a unified view of all AI assets, small businesses can harness greater collective intelligence, ensuring that innovative solutions built by various teams remain interconnected and effective. The enhancements introduced by MuleSoft Agent Fabric will begin to roll out in January 2026, making it a timely prospect for small businesses looking to modernize their operations. With capabilities aimed at fostering collaboration, driving accountability, and optimizing investments, this platform represents a significant advancement for businesses hoping to capitalize on their AI strategies. For further details about MuleSoft’s latest offerings, interested parties can explore the full press release here: Salesforce Press Release. Image via Google Gemini This article, "Salesforce Unveils Agent Scanners to Tame Rising AI Agent Sprawl" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

In the rapidly evolving landscape of artificial intelligence, small businesses are at a pivotal crossroads. As the number of AI agents is set to surge globally, expectations are high for enhanced operational efficiency. Salesforce’s latest announcement regarding the MuleSoft Agent Fabric offers small business owners promising solutions to leverage AI while avoiding common pitfalls, ushering in what they describe as the era of the “Agentic Enterprise.” The challenges associated with the deployment of AI agents have increased significantly, particularly in terms of visibility and governance. Analyst firm IDC predicts that by 2029, there will be over 1 billion deployed AI agents worldwide. However, as small businesses harness these tools, they may face agent sprawl—where numerous specialized agents proliferate across teams without coherent tracking. This can lead to shadow AI risks—unverified agents operating without organizational oversight. Salesforce’s MuleSoft Agent Fabric aims to address these issues with its innovative enhancements. By utilizing new Agent Scanners, the platform offers automated detection and cataloging of AI agents across multiple environments—including Salesforce Agentforce, Amazon Bedrock, and Google Cloud’s Vertex AI. This consolidated approach not only simplifies management but also streamlines integration for custom agents and Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers. According to Andrew Comstock, SVP & GM of MuleSoft, “The most successful organizations of the next decade will be those that harness the full diversity of the multicloud AI landscape.” For small business owners, the practical applications of this technology are manifold. With Agent Scanners doing the heavy lifting, AI engineers can save time that would otherwise be spent manually combing through cloud environments. For instance, if a small business creates an inventory forecasting agent on Google Cloud, it can be automatically registered alongside customer support agents built within Salesforce, reducing the likelihood of oversight and operational inefficiencies. MuleSoft’s capabilities go even further. The platform enables comprehensive metadata extraction, ensuring that users have insights into what each agent can access and control. This is particularly important in regulated industries such as finance, where understanding data access is crucial for compliance. However, small business owners should also be aware of potential challenges. As organizations begin to adopt these new systems, there may be a learning curve associated with integrating them into existing workflows. Staff may need training to navigate the new visibility tools and understand how to optimize their AI investments effectively. Moreover, while the automated registration of AI agents enhances accountability, it’s essential for businesses to develop internal compliance policies to safeguard against risks associated with deploying unverified shadow AI. As Brad Ringer, Enterprise & Integration Architect at AT&T, noted, “MuleSoft is a massive accelerator for our long-term AI roadmap. With AI moving so fast, MuleSoft Agent Fabric provides the framework we need to scale.” Beyond automation, the MuleSoft Agent Visualizer offers an advanced view of all deployed agents, enabling small businesses to filter and audit their AI landscape easily. For example, identifying redundant agents across different regions allows organizations to strategically consolidate resources and cut unnecessary costs. Salesforce contends that this cohesiveness is not merely administrative but a strategic imperative. By maintaining a unified view of all AI assets, small businesses can harness greater collective intelligence, ensuring that innovative solutions built by various teams remain interconnected and effective. The enhancements introduced by MuleSoft Agent Fabric will begin to roll out in January 2026, making it a timely prospect for small businesses looking to modernize their operations. With capabilities aimed at fostering collaboration, driving accountability, and optimizing investments, this platform represents a significant advancement for businesses hoping to capitalize on their AI strategies. For further details about MuleSoft’s latest offerings, interested parties can explore the full press release here: Salesforce Press Release. Image via Google Gemini This article, "Salesforce Unveils Agent Scanners to Tame Rising AI Agent Sprawl" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article