ResidentialBusiness

The lawsuit is the latest scrutiny over personnel moves this year at the companies under the purview of U.S. Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte. View the full article

Contract roles can feel like the perfect job setup: flexible hours, work-from-home perks, and a way to break into your dream company. For some, they also serve as a temporary solution until a more permanent position comes along. Yet sometimes when freelancers decide to transition to a full-time gig, their contract history can potentially come back to bite them—even when it shouldn’t. In a job interview, employers might ask: Can you work effectively on a team? Can you take direction from a manager? Will you think about your work long term? Or they might not ask at all, but they’ll still wonder. To be clear: Freelancing or contract work is work, of course. But if full-time employment is your goal, knowing how to address these concerns does matter in a job interview. Don’t assume First, in a job interview—no matter which side of the table you’re sitting on—it’s essential not to make assumptions. “It’s important for hiring managers to be aware of assumptions they might have. Instead of assuming, ask very direct questions,” says Phoebe Gavin, a career and leadership coach. Don’t just assume they can’t work a 9-to-5, or that they’re not willing to commit to a company long term. If you’re a job seeker, when applying for roles and in interviews, get ahead of assumptions by addressing them head-on. If the employer is looking for a collaborative team member, share examples of how you’ve worked effectively with others in the past. The hiring manager “may genuinely not be aware of how collaborative freelance or contract work can be. So for the person who’s being interviewed, don’t make any assumptions about what they know about your work,” Gavin says. Can you work on a team? Freelancers often work more independently, but that doesn’t mean you prefer to, or that you work entirely alone. After all, you probably send your work off to someone for review. If you thrive in a team environment—or even miss being part of a team—say so. When working as a freelancer, there may have been “times when your work has required working with multiple parties and collaborating with teams. Even if it was temporary for a particular project, make it really clear that that’s something you have experience with,” Gavin says. Highlight specific examples from past projects where you successfully collaborated with others, showing that you can contribute effectively on a team. Career coach Patrice Williams Lindo recommends saying something like: “I rebrand quickly into the team’s operating model. That means understanding how decisions get made, who owns what, and where my work fits into the broader system. I don’t operate in silos. I network intentionally across stakeholders so my work lands cleanly, on time, and without creating friction. Independence, for me, means high trust, not high isolation.” Can you take direction? When looking for a new job, remember that you’ll most likely have a manager. If you’re thinking, I don’t really need a manager; I can do the work without you managing me, that mindset can create challenges with the person providing direction. Showing that you can take direction demonstrates adaptability and immediately makes you a stronger candidate. Williams Lindo suggests saying something like: “I don’t need micromanagement, but I do respect structure, accountability, and feedback. My goal is to deliver in a way that strengthens leadership credibility, not competes with it.” Can you think beyond the project at hand? Freelancers usually focus on the work in front of them and don’t always have to think about long-term impact, but in a full-time role, you’re expected to see the bigger picture. If that’s something you do already, make sure you say that. For example, if you like to promote your work after it’s published, that’s something worth highlighting. Williams Lindo suggests saying, “Even when my engagement is project-based, my mindset is enterprise-level. I document decisions, build repeatable processes, and leave behind clarity—not just deliverables. I’m always thinking about how my work ladders up to longer-term outcomes, because recognition comes from impact, not just execution.” Contract roles can help you land a full-time position if you want one. By addressing assumptions up front and showing that you can collaborate, take direction, and think beyond individual projects, you signal that you’re ready to thrive in a full-time role. Freelance experience is real work, and it matters. When presented strategically, it can showcase your impact and position you as a strong candidate for permanent opportunities. View the full article

Whenever I tell people I’m an auctioneer, there are inevitably two follow up questions: First: “Do you talk really fast like those guys on TV?” followed by a cartoonish imitation, complete with an imaginary microphone and a pseudo Southern accent. Second: “What’s the most expensive thing you’ve ever sold?” After two decades of auctioneering, the answer is usually “something in the many millions.” I typically just name the last item I sold for over a million dollars. Whether someone pictures a fast talking cattle auction or a refined British gentleman selling Picassos in black tie, auctioneers are assumed to do one thing: talk. A lot. Which is why most people are shocked to learn that the most powerful tool I like to use on stage isn’t my voice at all. It’s silence. When I’m onstage in front of 500 people, yes, fast, energetic bidding can electrify a room. But in auctioneering, as in negotiation, the person who is comfortable with silence holds the advantage. Think about the last time you negotiated anything. The one who jumps to fill every uncomfortable silence often reveals the most. The one who sits in the quiet controls the pace. Lessons learned After years in the boardroom and on stage, here are the top three lessons I’ve learned about how silence can capture the attention of any room: 1. When a room is talking, don’t talk over it. Own the moment. If a crowd won’t quiet down, talking louder rarely works. Instead, I smile and say, “I’ll wait until the room is quiet enough to hear me.” The shift is immediate. People realize they’re missing something or they are being rude, and they stop. Once they’ve realized I’m willing to wait for them to stop talking before I’ll start again the dynamic is shifted, and now they are paying attention. 2. Make your point, then stop talking. Many times when I am onstage with a new crowd I will ask the audience where I should start the bidding. Instead of throwing out a number that could intimidate half the room, I will say to the audience “who wants to start the bidding?” When the person raises their hand I’ll ask “where are we starting the bidding tonight?” and then I simply wait . . . 9 out of 10 times the person will come in at a higher level simply because they don’t know where I plan to start and want to be sure they don’t announce a low bid. You’ll be amazed how often the other side rushes to fill the space, usually revealing exactly what you need to know. 3. Silence raises more money than any speech ever could. During the paddle raise portion of a charity auction paddle raise, I’m not offering a vacation home or a puppy. I’m simply asking for donations. When I begin at the highest level, say, $25,000 the room gets very still. People shift in their chairs. They look at each other. They wait. But more importantly, I wait. And sometimes I’ll throw in a joke to show them how at ease I am in the silence “I’ll wait just long enough until it starts to get really uncomfortable” and then I smile and wait a little longer. Inevitably someone will raise their hand simply to break the tension. It’s no concern for me; I will wait all night. That’s the power of silence: It moves people to act. The next time you are in an important meeting, giving a speech, or presenting on stage, remember the power of silence and use it to your advantage. View the full article

Cloudflare has often been described as some version of “the most important internet company you’ve never heard of.” But for the better part of 2025, cofounder and CEO Matthew Prince has been trying to change that. The company’s core business is to improve the performance and enhance the security of websites and online applications, protecting against malicious actors and routing web traffic through its data centers to optimize performance. “Six billion people pass through our network every single month,” Prince says. If Cloudflare is doing its job well, no one notices. But in July, Prince declared “Content Independence Day,” a broadside against the AI companies that, in his view, were unfairly scraping content to the detriment of the media industry. Cloudflare enabled clients that signed up for its “pay per crawl” service to block AI crawlers from accessing their content unless the companies—Anthropic, Google, Meta, OpenAI, etc.—paid for the privilege. This was catnip to the media, Fast Company included, which immediately started paying a lot more attention to Cloudflare. “I think this is the most interesting question over the next five years,” Prince says. “What is the future business model of the internet going to be?” Prince has a personal interest in this question. He was the editor of his school newspaper at Trinity College (the Connecticut one, not Dublin) and, in 2023, he and his wife purchased the Park Record, his hometown newspaper in Park City, Utah. “I appreciate the hard work of our journalistic team, who’s showing up at city council meetings, covering local politics. There has to be a business model to support that work,” he says. “That work is critically important if we’re going to have a functioning society.” This interview has been edited and condensed. Before Cloudflare, you cofounded Unspam Technologies, an email spam-checker service, and the open-source Project Honey Pot, which tracks and identifies spammers and malicious bots. There’s a common thread to your companies. They’re all about preventing something bad from happening, from spam to cyberattacks to unauthorized data scraping. What would a psychiatrist say about this? I guess I have a superhero fetish or something. You’re a protector. A protector, yeah. I went to law school, and so a lot of the ideas start with: Where is there a failure in society? And if we solve that problem in some way, we’ll be able to turn that into a business. And that’s worked, really. It didn’t work as well with the first spam company [Unspam], but at Cloudflare, it’s really driven everything that we’ve done. Amber Hakim What was your original mission for Cloudflare and how has it changed? Cloudflare started about 15 years ago, when [cofounder and COO] Michelle [Zatlyn] and I were business students. When people would ask us what our mission was, we’d say, “Our mission is to take advantage of this interesting market opportunity, make some money, and impress our parents.” Which is, I think, if anyone’s being honest, kind of why almost everything starts. We knew that in order to build out the network to service large customers, we needed data and we needed ways to build the models to figure out who the good guys were, who the bad guys were, and [how] to stop them. We had the bright idea that we would offer a free version of the service. We thought startups and individual developers would be the ones who would sign up. That’s not what happened at first. What happened was that every civil society organization, every nonprofit, every humanitarian organization signed up because they had small budgets but big security problems. So one day we realized that everyone who was doing some sort of good around the internet was relying on us. I remember going to lunch with a bunch of our engineers, and one of them said, “This is the first job where I feel like I’m actually helping build a better internet.” That resonated, and that phrase kept coming up. Finally someone said, “That’s Cloudflare’s mission: to help build a better internet.” And that’s what stuck. Cloudflare experienced a significant outage in mid-November after a routine infrastructure update. You corrected that problem within a few hours, but how do you mitigate these risks moving forward? Does the rise of AI affect the risk of these kinds of incidents? Any outage is unacceptable given Cloudflare’s role in supporting a large portion of the Internet, and we take full responsibility. We’re implementing additional safeguards to help prevent similar incidents in the future. Past outages have always led us to build new, more resilient systems. We’ll also remain transparent, as we’ve always been in these situations; we published a postmortem within about 12 hours to share what happened and what we’re learning. As the internet evolves, including the rise of AI, we continually assess new risks to ensure our systems remain resilient. Outages and bugs can happen—that’s the nature of software—but our customers’ trust is our top priority. Over the years, you’ve come under pressure to deny service to sites that are associated with hate speech and harassment, raising questions about Cloudflare’s role in content moderation. As you look ahead to the midterms and the 250th anniversary of America next year and then the national election in 2028, what concerns you most when it comes to misinformation and disinformation in the AI age? I think it’s funny that I’m sort of known as the content moderation guy. We’re 15 years old, and we’ve had basically three incidents [the neo-Nazi website the Daily Stormer and extremist forums 8chan and Kiwi Farms]. Essentially, 6 billion people pass through our network every single month. That’s the entire online population. That’s the scale that we have, and we have a responsibility to those people. So the question is, When you have that responsibility, what do you do? People have written about this for a long time. I actually went and dusted off a bunch of my philosophy books from college. Aristotle writes a lot about how governments build trust. We’re not a government, but we operate at a scale that would be inconceivable to Aristotle, and at some level have the same challenges around that. Fundamentally, Aristotle argued that there are three things you need for trust: transparency, consistency, and account­ability. Transparency: You need to know what the rules are. Consistency: The same rules should be applied the same way all the time. And then accountability: The people who apply the rules should be responsible to the rules themselves. In answer to your question, there’ve been a couple of big AI companies that have invited me to be on their boards. I’ve always said no, but I engage with them; 80% of the big AI companies are Cloudflare customers, so we have a relationship with them. I think they’re doing the right thing, and they’re going a million miles an hour. And, I mean, it’s so exciting. But we have to stop and think about: How do you build trust? I think I’m the largest nonacademic buyer of Aristotle’s Politics on Amazon. I’ve sent signed copies to every AI executive I’ve met, saying, “I know you don’t have a lot of time, but take the time to read this.” Let’s talk about how AI is eroding the traditional information ecosystem and what Cloudflare is trying to do about it. Twenty-seven years ago, a fateful thing happened: Google launched and did two things. One, it built a better search engine. Even more importantly, it built the first business model and monetization model for the internet. It helps generate traffic, and then it provides you the tools to make that traffic profitable. That has funded the growth of the vast majority of the internet. We’ve gone through some platform shifts along the way. We went to social, but social was still driven by traffic. What’s going on right now—that I think people don’t completely understand—is we’re going through another platform shift. It’s a bigger platform shift than we’ve ever seen before, which is that the way you’re going to consume information is through AI. With a search engine, you did a search, it returned 10 blue links, and then the search wasn’t over. Google was a treasure map, which generated traffic to Fast Company or whoever; behind that treasure map, you could monetize it. But we know that’s not the end state because sci-fi tells us it’s not, and sci-fi often predicts the future pretty well. If you think about any movie that has a helpful robot in it, if you say, “I would like a recipe for chocolate chip cookies,” the robot doesn’t come back and say, “Here are 10 links, go follow ’em and maybe you’ll find a nice recipe.” It says, “Here’s the recipe.” And that’s exactly what ChatGPT, Anthropic, and increasingly Google with AI Overviews are doing. And make no mistake: For 95% of users, 95% of the time, that’s a better user interface. That user interface is going to win and is going to be the new platform by which we consume information. Which is quite a problem for any entity—not just the media—that wants to be found on the internet. Right. Instead of going and generating traffic, following a treasure map, and getting to Fast Company, now you’re reading a derivative that’s been summarized and maybe combined with other sources, taking the Fast Company information and putting it in this new ChatGPT interface. And that’s a problem because the entire internet has been built on traffic, and that traffic is going away. So no matter what, as the interface of the internet changes, the business model of the internet is going to change. You have a solution for this: the pay-per-crawl model. This business proposition theoretically enables those content providers to continue to provide that content, and be compensated for it, in a way that won’t compromise this new and—I agree—better user experience. How would this work? I’m optimistic because both sides need each other. There are really three things you need to be an AI company, two of which are very expensive and one of which has largely been free. The two things that are expensive are going to get cheaper and cheaper, and the thing that has been free is going to be what differentiates AI companies, which they’re going to be willing to pay more for. So, what are the three things? The first is chips, GPUs, but it’s silicon, right? There’s never been a time in history where a silicon shortage doesn’t turn into a silicon glut. There’s a bunch of sand in the world. GPUs will increasingly become commodities, the same way that CPUs and all other silicon have. The second is talent. Five years ago, if you were getting a PhD in AI, you were kind of a laughingstock. It was thought of as this dead industry that was hot in the ’70s and ’80s, and then it became the place where the sort of weird computer science professor went and promised that tomorrow AI was coming. Well, it turns out they were right. They just had the time frame wrong. But now it’s gone from this backwater to every university spinning up a department. I don’t think there will be a glut of AI researchers, but I think the days of billion-dollar salaries at Meta—that won’t last forever because the education markets are efficient. The last bit is content. In almost all these cases, unique content ends up being the thing that differentiates media over time. YouTube, for example, started out as a technology play. It could deliver streaming video cheaper, faster than everybody else, and that’s why it won. As the rest of the industry caught up with the technology, YouTube had to differentiate. First it was discoverability with search, now it’s with unique content that you can only get on YouTube. I think the AI companies are going to be very, very similar, which means they’re going to need that information that only you [media companies] have. So the key—if you’re a media company today—is to stop the free buffet: Only you have the review of the hot restaurant in Tuscaloosa, which is unique content that’s going to be incredibly precious and incredibly essential. So step one is to say: “We’re not going to give every AI company our content for free. We’re going to say, ‘You’re blocked.’” That’s what we at Cloudflare have been helping with. And then how the market develops after that, we have some ideas, but I’m not quite sure. What I’m confident in—and what the data so far bears out—is that the more unique, the more quirky, the more local your content is, the more valuable it is to AI companies, and the more likely it is that there’s going to be a healthy and sustainable marketplace that exists for you to be able to sell that content. I think that this can be pie-expanding and that we might be on the doorstep of a golden age of media. I love the optimism, and I want to believe it, for obvious reasons. To put a fine point on the mechanics of it, the publisher signs up; Cloudflare blocks the AI crawlers from accessing their content; the publisher sets the price for the AI company to access that content and get paid; and you guys get a cut. That’s pretty much how that works? We have a bunch of different theories of how this could work [over time]. It could be micropayments. That’s what you’ve described, where the publisher sets a price, and then whenever an agent or a crawler or scraper—those are all synonyms—tries to access that content, they pay a fraction of a penny or a few pennies. It could be something that’s closer to a Spotify model, where maybe all the AI companies contribute to a pool and that pool gets aggregated and then [distributed]. In Spotify’s case, it’s based on how many minutes get listened to. Exactly what the business model looks like, it’s going to take some time to mature. If you think about music, we ended up with Spotify, but in order to get to Spotify, we started with Napster, which was sort of anything goes, and then Steve Jobs steps onstage and launches iTunes, 99 cents a song, which was revolutionary at the time, but that wasn’t the business model that eventually won. The business model that eventually won was something closer to all you can eat for $10 a month. My hunch is that we’re not going to get the business model right the first time around, and it may not be Cloudflare that figures it out. There are lots of people who are thinking about this problem. But no matter what, we have to start with scarcity. We’ve got to close the spigot. And again, this isn’t just about media. The same challenges are coming for e-commerce companies, travel companies—anyone who sells anything online. I’ve been struck by how many of the people who are calling us are saying, “Hey, this is a real problem for us too.” Big financial institutions where they’re like, “No, no, no, the AI companies are disintermediating us as well, and they’re creating a problem where our research teams aren’t getting compensated as much.” I mean, what’s the future for a Booking.com in an AI-powered world? What’s the future for anyone who in the past aggregated a bunch of supply together? What is a brand? What is it worth if it’s just agents that are interacting and you don’t have humans that are there? What I think people don’t fully appreciate is that this is a more radical transformation than it was to go to mobile. Fundamentally, we’re going to have to reinvent how we interact and that’s going to impact everyone. Let’s close by going beyond the information ecosystem. Something I struggle with is how seriously to take the existential threat of AI—not to revenue models, but humanity itself. Very smart people argue very different ends of the spectrum, from the terrifying vision of Nate Soares and Eliezer Yudkowsky, whose book on the dangers of a superhuman AI is called If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies, to the much more sanguine outlook of folks like Yann LeCun, Meta’s chief AI scientist. Where do you fall on this spectrum? I’m on the more optimistic side. More on Yann’s side. But I will say that I feel like this is a distraction from the real problems [we’re facing now]. Is there going to be a Terminator moment? We’ve got a lot of stuff to figure out before that. Sure, we can have cocktail party conversations about whether this is going to end the world or lead to kind of a utopia. But don’t let that conversation distract from the more important, more immediate conversation, which is who’s going to pay journalists going forward? [Laughs] I agree: Nothing could be more important than that. View the full article

Is Reddit like other social media platforms? That’s the question before the High Court of Australia in light of the country’s under-16s social media ban. Last week, Reddit filed a lawsuit in Australia’s highest court seeking to overturn the country’s recently enacted social media ban for children. The San Francisco-based firm claims the law is unconstitutional because it infringes on Australia’s implied freedom of political communication. The lawsuit follows a case filed last month by Sydney-based rights group Digital Freedom Project. Reddit is also asking the High Court to rule that even if the legislation is valid, that Reddit is not like other social media platforms. The Australian eSafety Commissioner’s website provides a list of criteria for social media platforms subjected to the age restrictions, as well as a flow chart to help companies work out whether their platforms fall under the scope. The regulatory agency lists the platforms that fall under its age restrictions as Facebook, Instagram, Kick, Reddit, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, Twitch, X, and YouTube. Sites that will not be subject to age restrictions are Discord, GitHub, Google Classroom, LEGO Play, Messenger, Pinterest, Roblox, Steam and Steam Chat, WhatsApp, and YouTube Kids. In documents filed in the High Court, Reddit argues it does not satisfy the first criteria of having “the sole purpose, or a significant purpose, of enabling online social interaction between two or more end-users.” Reddit brought up definitions of the word social in its filing to make its case that its users mostly do not interact “in a social manner.” Reddit says that for an interaction to be social, it has to happen “because of a particular user’s relationship with or interest in another user as a person; indeed, in most cases the identity of a user on Reddit is not even known to other users.” The same could be said for other social platforms. The company said it does not promote real-time presence, friend requests, or activity feeds that drive ongoing engagement. Instead, it “operates as a collection of public fora arranged by subject.” Reddit says it merely “enables online interactions about the content that users post on the site. It facilitates knowledge sharing from one user to other users.” In a post accompanying the filing, Reddit admin LastBluejay said they are complying with the law and they are notably not against child safety measures or regulations, or trying to retain young users for business reasons. They wrote that the law carries “some serious privacy and political expression issues for everyone on the internet.” Platforms now face fines of up to 49.5 million Australian dollars ($32.9 million) if they fail to take reasonable steps to remove the accounts of those under the minimum age. View the full article

“Season’s greetings” aren’t as cheery when it’s a season of layoffs. November marked the eighth time this year that job cuts were up over the same period the year before, according to research from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. To make matters worse, hiring in November was down 35% from 2024, marking the lowest year-to-date total since 2010. News about the current labor market can be unnerving—even more so when layoffs are hitting your company. Being prepared can help make it less so. And one group of people knows more about that than most. A page out of the prepper book The word prepper may bring to mind images of shows like Doomsday Preppers, in which people stockpile food, water, weapons, and supplies in anticipation of apocalyptic events. However, most preppers are simply people who want to have some basic essentials or plan in place just in case. In fact, the last Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) National Preparedness Report found that more than half of U.S. adults (55%) had taken 3 or more of the 12 preparedness steps, like making a plan, gathering supplies, and securing documents. It’s not that different from preparing for a layoff, says organizational psychologist Melissa Doman. “Going through an unexpected layoff is a form of a temporary ‘doomsday’ for some people. They didn’t expect it, they can’t control it, and they don’t know how long it’s going to last,” she says. If you’re worried about an impending layoff, try preparing like a prepper. Know what you have When layoff rumors start circulating, “if you start making plans as soon as the whispers begin, or before if possible, you’ll be in a much better position,” says Michael McAuliffe, president and CEO of Family Credit Management, a nonprofit credit counseling agency. Personal finance expert LaChelle Johnson agrees, advising, “Figure out exactly what you have in terms of cash on hand, liquid assets, and even funds you may have access to in an emergency that you can withdraw from, like retirement accounts or investment accounts.” Maximize income and benefits In 2018, Michelle Arellano Martin had what she thought was her dream job. Then, she got a surprise. “I had just completed a huge project—garnered some incredible awards for my work—and then my position was eliminated,” she says. If she had it to do over again, she says she would have applied for unemployment benefits immediately, because the first payment took several weeks to arrive. She also advises negotiating for the best severance package you can. After her second layoff, she was able to negotiate an additional three months of severance pay. This, in part, helped her launch her business, sustainable travel site Travara. Talent strategist Brittany Dolin, CEO of the Pocketbook Agency recruitment firm, advises reviewing an expected severance package and how benefits like health insurance last after a layoff. You may also look for benefits that can give you immediate value, such as flexible spending account balances available to you. Johnson also suggests looking for items that you might be able to sell if necessary—everything from future concert tickets to that bread maker you always wanted to use but never opened. She also advises thinking about side hustles (but be sure you understand their impact on unemployment benefits). Slash spending When Johnson was laid off years ago, she and her husband had car loans, private school bills, credit card balances, and a big mortgage. The couple decided to make serious changes, like moving in with his parents for a year, to protect what they had and get out of debt. “I just felt like we were maxed out from wall to wall,” she recalls. Johnson advises taking a close look at spending and eliminating what you don’t need: Cut subscriptions. Pause gym memberships. Plan meals, and eat at home. Look for cheaper housing options. Follow frugal living communities on Reddit or other social media for more ideas on cutting expenses. You may pick up some good habits and find room in your budget to beef up your emergency fund over time, she says. Get your support team lined up Three of the 12 disaster preparation actions FEMA recommends involve identifying people you need for help and communication during emergencies. Similarly, Doman says you need to identify your support team if you suspect you’re facing something as stressful as a layoff. Don’t just default to your best friend or a family member. Instead, she says, think about the people who are going to let you feel your emotions and, when you’re ready, devise an action plan if the layoff comes to pass. “You don’t want someone who’s just going to brush off your emotions or give you a lot of toxic positivity,” she says. In fact, she adds, “You may need more than one person.” Reach out to these trusted individuals and let them know what’s going on so they can support you—and perhaps even help you network to find a new job. Keep a schedule If the layoff does come to pass, you may need to wallow a bit. Doman says it’s okay to take a “duvet day” to lie in bed and watch television if you need it. But don’t do that for too long, she adds. “Keep structure in your day—get up at a set time, work on some tasks to find a new job, get some fresh air, talk to a friend,” she says. Dolin agrees. Fear can be paralyzing, and if a layoff is pending or just happened, it’s time to buckle down and do your best “to stay employable in an unpredictable market,” she says. “Preparation does not equal panic.” View the full article

For the past two years, I’ve written predictions for how AI will continue to change the media industry and the business of news in the coming year. Prognosticating is a risky business even at the most tranquil of times, and media’s AI era is anything but: bots are multiplying, newsrooms are shrinking, and new business models always seem to be still developing. Last year, four of the five predictions I made came true, those being the spread of audio experiences like NotebookLM’s audio overviews, a greater emphasis on content licensing, more “legit” AI-generated content, and publishers doing more with their own summarization and chatbots. I should have probably known my one strike was going to be agents—that was such a buzzword last year that I couldn’t avoid including it, but it turns out there were significant barriers keeping agents outside the mainstream (data privacy and complexity being the main ones). This time, the task is even more challenging. Many trends, like AI adoption in newsrooms, are further along, which you would think makes their effects easier to predict. But the reality is that the most impactful things happen when those trends slam into realities, such as Cloudflare taking a hard stance against AI ingesting publisher content without compensation or consequence. Who saw that coming? With all that in mind, here are my predictions for how AI’s presence in media will evolve in the next year: 1. The copyright issue gets worse before it gets better Despite an ever-growing set of lawsuits, the copyright issue is still largely unresolved. Publishers want compensation for how their content is ingested and used by AI companies, which continue to claim fair use. Sure, there are more licensing deals between the two sides, but the fundamental tension remains. What’s changed is that more publishers have woken up to what they see as the predations of the AI industry, and they’ve gotten more aggressive at blocking AI crawlers. That prevents AI engines from bringing users the best, most up-to-date data, which makes them less competitive. This, however, doesn’t apply to Google, because it uses the same crawler for search and AI, and no publisher in their right mind would ever block Google Search. That gives Google a competitive advantage at a time where OpenAI just went into “code red” for fear of falling behind. Similarly, Perplexity is now the target for legal action from both News Corp. and The New York Times for how it summarizes their content. For any AI company in a race with Google, it’s hard to see how they can balance respecting copyright with staying competitive. If even the tremendously successful OpenAI sees the threat as existential, it’s hard to see how any of them wouldn’t see the copyright issue as secondary. My expectation: Not only will AI companies avoid making moves that broadly support content providers (such as enabling them to block user agents)—they may even become more brazen about ignoring safeguards like the Robots Exclusion Protocol. 2. AI focus in newsrooms shifts to product and revenue When The New York Times opened the doors for AI use by its staff, it was an indicator that newsrooms were becoming more comfortable with using AI to improve efficiency with things like transcription and social media management. Similarly, the launch of more sophisticated AI-infused products like Times AI Agent—which turns the publication’s vast archive into a grounded, AI-ready corpus—signals a shift toward AI products that could potentially improve the bottom line. Whether that opens up real revenue is unclear, and the road is certainly longer and bumpier than deploying an AI headline writer (Politico recently got into hot water with its newsroom union over an AI tool for its lucrative Politico Pro division), but the potential rewards are great enough that we’re sure to see more publishers go this route. 3. PR’s lean renaissance The era of “go direct” PR led many to postulate that the whole industry might face a steep decline, if not become entirely obsolete. However, AI has revived PR for a new era: Since AI engines look for credibility across domains and platforms, the ability to get a story cited widely, even on lesser-known sites, is newly valuable. However, AI is also forcing the industry to rethink the basics—even more than the media. Since much of PR work involves content, and it doesn’t have the same audience relationship that has kept almost all journalism authentically human, there’s intense pressure on the client side to leverage AI in content generation to cut costs. That all translates into a strengthened PR industry, but one that’s by necessity smarter and leaner than before. 4. Authenticity reasserts itself When generative AI first arrived, there was existential dread that big chunks of journalism would end up being authored by AI. While AI has secured a place in many newsrooms, that prediction largely hasn’t come to pass. That’s not because AI isn’t capable of researching, analyzing, and writing stories, but because AI authorship alters the audience relationship. In other words, human authenticity is back in style. AI can still be an accelerant here, helping more publications adopt video formats like the Times “explain the news” vertical shorts. With AI reducing the cost of production, the choice of expanding to a new platform will have more to do with audience opportunity, as it should be. 5. Continued prioritization of owned audience Just because we’re likely not going to Google Zero, doesn’t mean media properties can relax. A world of “Google Smaller” still means publishers will need to keep divesting from strategies dependent on SEO traffic, and direct their energies toward building and nurturing direct, habitual audience relationships through proprietary apps and formats with traditionally higher engagement, like newsletters and live events. The bad news: the more who do, the harder it will be to stand out. It may still be early days for AI, but we’re well past the point of no return. More and more people are using it for information discovery (34%, up from 18% a year ago, per the Reuters Institute) and journalists continue to adopt AI as part of their workflows (more than half now use it at least once a week). The industry is clearly adapting to the new AI reality, and whether or not we get clearer answers to the big questions around copyright and business models, 2026 might be the year the media’s AI survival manual gets written. View the full article

Gateworks - a global leader in modules for industrial IoT - says it expects to ship more than 100,000 Wi-Fi HaLow modules by 2028. The post Gateworks’ ‘Made in America’ strategy & Wi-Fi HaLow tech boosts differentiation, growth in embedded compute appeared first on Wi-Fi NOW Global. View the full article

The many benefits of the new standard are best demonstrated and experienced under specific conditions, MediaTek says. The post MediaTek: The benefits Wi-Fi 8 will be impressive. But how will you know you’re using it? appeared first on Wi-Fi NOW Global. View the full article

By Claus Hetting, WiFi NOW CEO & Chairman Commercial Wi-Fi 8 products are unlikely to ship in volumes for a couple of years at least – but that’s not stopping major chipset vendors from introducing Wi-Fi 8 technology now. Following Broadcom’s Wi-Fi 8 announcement in October (and MediaTek sampling their Wi-Fi chips since October) Qualcomm […] The post Qualcomm to unveil “complete Wi-Fi 8 generation platform portfolio” at MWC Barcelona 2026, company reveals appeared first on Wi-Fi NOW Global. View the full article

Many Americans are likely to see massive changes to their taxes in 2026, especially seniors. That’s largely due to President Donald The President’s so-called big, beautiful bill, a massive 940-page bill signed into law over the summer that includes an array of new tax write-offs but also fails to renew some previous deductions from the Biden administration. One change is a $6,000 deduction for seniors. Here’s what to know. Who qualifies for the new senior tax deduction? The President’s tax and spending law introduced a $6,000 deduction for qualifying seniors ages 65 and older, on top of the current additional standard deduction for seniors under existing law. Taxpayers must attain age 65 on or before the last day of the taxable year to be eligible. The $6,000 senior deduction (or $12,000 for a married couple where both spouses qualify) applies to an eligible individual earning up to $75,000 in modified adjusted gross income, or up to $150,000 for joint filers. It is available for both itemizing and non-itemizing taxpayers. Taxpayers must include the Social Security number of the qualifying individual(s) on the return, and file jointly if married, to claim the deduction. How does the deduction impact Social Security? The deduction is meant to offset upcoming federal taxes on Social Security payments. Older taxpayers could be taxed up to 85% based on their “combined income,” which is calculated based on a taxpayer’s adjusted gross income plus half of their Social Security benefits, according to CNBC. Anything else to know? According to the IRS, the deduction expires at the end of 2028, right before The President leaves office, making this a temporary deduction effective for tax years 2025 through 2028. View the full article

It’s rare that your esoteric, impossible-to-pronounce, decade-long research project becomes a technology so crucial to national security that the President of the United States calls it out from the White House. But that’s exactly what happened to Dr. Eric Wengrowski, the CEO of Steg AI. Wengrowski spent nearly a decade of his life advancing steganography, a deeply-technical method for tracking images as they travel through the machinery of the modern Internet, as the focus of his PHD at Rutgers University. After earning his degree, Wengrowki and a team of co-founders rolled his tech into a small startup. For several years, the company grew, but mostly toiled away in relative obscurity. Then, AI image generators exploded into the public’s consciousness. And for Wengrowki and Steg’s team, everything blew up. Durable Marks I met Wengrowski during the pandemic, when we both volunteered to help a media industry trade group rapidly pivot its yearly in-person conference to a Zoom format. For years, I only knew Wengrowski as a cheerful, highly-intelligent floating head in my video chat window. I even interviewed him for my YouTube channel from the COVID-safe confines of our respective home offices. When I finally met him in person in San Francisco in 2023, I discovered that he’s actually a towering 6 feet 3 inches tall. It was one of those iconic pandemic professional meet-cute moments people joke about, where you find that someone you’ve virtually “known” for years looks totally different in person. What wasn’t different about Wengrowski in real life was his intense interest and passion for his chosen field. Steganography (pronounced STEG-an-ography, like the “Steg” in “stegasaurus”) is a technique for embedding an invisible code into the pixels of an image. Basically, a complex algorithm subtly changes selected pixels in a way that’s invisible to human perception. Images look no different after being marked with a steganographic watermark than they did before. Yet, when special software looks at the marked image, the unique code embedded in its pixels comes through clearly to the software’s computerized eyes. The presence of that code lets companies like Steg track a marked image back to its source with extremely high accuracy. Crucially, because the code is embedded directly into the image’s pixels, it’s also nearly impossible to remove. Bad actors can easily crop out a physical watermark from an image’s pixels, or use a tool like Photoshop to scrub data from the image’s IPTC or EXIF metadata fields. In contrast, because steganographic watermarks live directly in the visual part of the image itself, they travel with the image no matter where it goes. And they survive the most common image-related funny business that nefarious people might try to use to remove them. All steganographic watermarks can survive things that amateur image thieves might try, like aggressive cropping, or even the common practice of taking a screenshot of an image in order to stealthily steal it. But Steg’s tech goes even further, Wengrowski told me in an interview. If for example you load an image watermarked by the company’s tech on your computer screen, take out your phone, and photograph the physical screen, the company’s watermarks will survive in the new image on your phone. Your nefarious copy will remain traceable to the original with Steg’s tech. AI Explodes Everything When Wengrowski originally developed Steg’s technology, he knew it was cool. And he had a hunch that it was useful for something. But exactly what that “something” might involve wasn’t originally clear. In the early days, Steg slowly grew by helping companies with legal compliance and image protection. Steg would embed its watermarks in copyrighted images, for example, and then trace where those images ended up. If someone stole and used a copyrighted image without permission, Steg’s embedded watermarks could be used to prove the theft and could help lead to a legal settlement. The company also worked to safeguard things like pre-release images of a new product. If a company sent top-secret images of a new phone (marked with Steg’s tech) to a supplier, for example, and those photos suddenly ended up as a leak in TechCrunch, the company could trace the embedded watermark and know who to blame. That was enough for Steg to grow slowly and steadily improve its tech. Then, in 2022, everything changed. All at once, OpenAI released its Davinci image generation model (remember the avocado chairs?), Midjourney rolled out its then world-beating image generation tech, and Google leaned into image generation within its Bard and later Gemini AI models. Almost overnight, the world was awash in AI images. And very quickly, they became so realistic that everyday people had trouble knowing what was real and what was AI generated. This presented a huge problem for AI companies. They wanted to release their tech far and wide. But they fretted about the potential societal (and legal) consequences if their images were used for deepfakes to deceive people, or even to sway elections. And more broadly, anyone with an interest in the veracity of images suddenly had a huge problem knowing what was real and what was AI-generated. Everything from news reporting to war crimes tribunals rely on imagery as evidence. What happens when that imagery can be quickly and cheaply spun up by an AI algorithm? Yes, AI companies can physically watermark their images (such as by adding a little Gemini star in the lower right), or embed “Generated by AI” markers in their images’ metadata. But again, removing those markers is child’s play for even the least sophisticated scammers. With AI image generators storming the world, the origins and veracity of every image online was suddenly called into question. Thank You, Mr. President That led to a bizarre situation for any deeply technical person pursuing their random, highly-specific passion in relative obscurity. On October 30, 2023, Wengrowki woke to find that then-president Joe Biden had issued an executive order specifically calling out AI watermarking tech, highlighting it as a crucial factor in national security, and ordering all Federal agencies to use it. Specifically, Biden’s order mandated “embedding information” that is “difficult to remove, into outputs created by AI — including into outputs such as photos, videos, audio clips, or text — for the purposes of verifying the authenticity of the output or the identity or characteristics of its provenance, modifications, or conveyance.” The order also specifically called for the rapid development of “science-back standards and techniques for…labeling synthetic content, such as using watermarking.” Biden framed this as mission critical–the term “national security” appears 36 times in his executive order. Basically, Biden was mandating the use of tech like steganography, and specifically calling it out from the White House. When that happened, Wengrowski told me, everything went crazy. Since the order–and the corresponding growth of AI imagery more broadly–Steg’s revenue has increased 500%. Moreover, protecting the integrity of images appears bipartisan–Wengrowski told me that AI watermarking has been embraced by both the Biden and The President administrations. In an extremely tight AI job market where top researchers can command eight-figure salaries, Steg now employs five machine learning PHDs devoted to improving its technologies. Although Wengrowski couldn’t share his customer list on the record, I can vouch for the fact that it’s wildly impressive. While keeping its legal compliance and image tracing side alive, Steg has expanded aggressively into the world of cybersecurity and AI image watermarking. For AI companies that want to ply their trade without ruining humanity’s trust in visual media, Steg’s tech is a lifeline. Companies can embed a steganographic watermark directly into AI images the moment they’re generated. For the life of an image, the code travels with it, even if it’s reposted, edited or altered. If that image is used as a deepfake or used to manipulate or harass people, the company that created it can quickly read the embedded steganographic watermark in its pixels, definitively label it as a fake, and quickly dispel any damage the image might cause. If you’ve created an AI image in the last year, you’ve almost certainly used steganography without even knowing it. Most major AI image generation companies now use the tech. Many use Steg’s. And in a world where AI images are so good that they easily fool most detectors (and even trained forensic image analysts), many companies see steganography as the only bulwark against AI’s total destruction of any truth still left in the visual world. A Wild Ride For Steg and for Wengrowski personally, it’s been a wild ride. Right as Biden issued his order, Wengrowski became a father, and now juggles the everyday struggles and joys of a young parent with the rigors of such things as constant travel and testifying in state legislatures. The rise of AI imagery has also revealed some counterintuitive challenges. When Steg first launched, Wengrowski told me, he expected that people would yearn for a technology that could prove whether an image was real or fake. In reality, he was surprised by how little people care. Many people are fine with seeing AI generated content, as long as it’s funny, informative or otherwise engaging. Whether or not it’s properly labeled as AI matters very little to them. More pointedly, it matters very little to the social media platforms that disseminate the content, too. Again, though, for the companies who create that content–and who face legal and reputational risk if their tech runs awry–it matters an awful lot. Wengrowski tells me that Steg is continuing to improve its tech, making its watermarks even harder to beat. The company is also entering the emerging field of “poisoning.” New software that Wengrowki showed me invisibly alters images in ways that trip up common deepfake algorithms. If someone tries to turn the “poisoned” image into a deepfake, it comes out garbled and illegible. The tech works both when images are used for training deepfake models, and when a bad actor tries to create a deepfake of a specific person. The idea is that an influencer, for example, could upload “poisoned” images of themselves to their social media. The images would look normal to human users. But if someone tried to deepfake the influencer, the poisoned images would thwart them. Wengrowki told me he’s especially excited to use the tech to help protect young influencers and teens in general, who are often targeted in abhorrent cyberbullying attacks involving explicit deepfakes. More broadly, though, Wengrowski’s story is an inspiring one for anyone grinding away on an as-yet unproven technology, convinced of its value but unsure whether the world will ever see their work. Reflecting on Steg’s success, Wengrowski acknowledged that “It’s probably best to start a business with a clear plan and an understanding of product/market fit.” But in his words, “There’s also something to be said for knowing a technology is cool, continually improving it even if you have no idea where that will lead, and just trusting that eventually it will have some value for the world.” In Steg’s case, that’s indeed been a winning formula. View the full article

Figure strengthens case for BoE rate cut this weekView the full article

I’m on vacation. Here are some past letters that I’m making new again, rather than leaving them to wilt in the archives. 1. Employee missed work because of birthday drinking An employee I manage called out today due to being hospitalized over the weekend for alcohol poisoning. The employee went out to celebrate their birthday over the weekend and overdid it on the partying. I realize this is out of work conduct; however, it is affecting the employee’s job because they called in to work. Do I have a leg to stand on if I have a serious conversation with the employee about their judgment and how this type of behavior could negatively effect their employment with our company? If it just happened once, leave it alone. People are human and make mistakes, and until there’s evidence that this is part of a pattern, there’s no reason to assume that this person hasn’t learned their lesson (or even that there’s more to the story that you don’t know). I mean, the person ended up hospitalized. They probably realize it’s a big deal. When someone makes a mistake and it’s clear to them that it’s a mistake and they’re already set on not repeating it in the future, there’s no need to lecture them about it. (The exception to this would be if the work day they missed as a result was particularly crucial – – like if they were supposed to be presenting at an important client meeting that day, in which case, yes, a serious conversation would be warranted.) – 2019 2. My manager scratches his butt before high-fiving us I am a supervisor for a retail store and work with a sales manager who is very big on high-fives as motivation. However, I have seen him many times scratch his butt and then go to high-five someone. If it was a one-off scratching a small itch, that would be one thing but it’s happened many times and it’s a full-on scratch (leg straight and into the crack scratch). The first time he tried to high-five me after I saw this, I hugged my hands to my chest and said I have a germaphobia about high-fives and getting sick. I do have a slight germaphobia (12 years in retail will do that) so it’s not a full-on lie, but the issue is now when my staff do something I can’t high-five them without him noticing. Is there another way to deal with this? Do you have the kind of relationship where you could just be straightforward? As in, “I saw where your hand just was! No thanks.” If not, then you’re going to have to stick with the germaphobia story, which you’ve already put out there anywhere. And yeah, that means you can’t high-five others. But also, why is he prefacing all his high-fives with a butt scratch? This is weird indeed. – 2018 3. My colleagues are late every week with edits to my work As an executive assistant to the director of my division, I am responsible each week for a report on our major contracts. I gather information from various managers, consolidate their updates onto one document, and edit the updates so that the verbiage is clear and consistent. This report takes most of the week because there are always questions that my boss wants answered, as well as a lot of editing required on my part. Each Thursday I send the final draft to everyone and request initial edits by 1 p.m. on Friday. I NEVER get responses on time. They eventually turn them in, but it’s usually an hour or more past deadline. These edits really consist of a few sentences per contract and no more. I ave tried to talk with management, to be a pest, and to move the deadline back and no matter what it’s turned in late. Please advise if you have a strategy for dealing with this. I have no authority over these people other than as the representative of my boss, and that clearly holds little weight. They might actually need more time. Even though their edits are only a few sentences, they presumably have to read the whole thing and might need to chase down answers from their own staff, and they may have work that’s legitimately a higher priority that day. If they’re getting their edits to you just an hour past the deadline, you might just need to mentally adjust the deadline in your head and think of it as being 2:00 rather than 1:00, if your own workflow will allow for that. If it won’t, then you could try sending their sections to them earlier if possible (if you’re able to send their piece of it before the entire document is ready), or talking to them to explain why you need it on time and what the impact is if you don’t get it (preferably an impact that it’ll be clear matters to your director rather than just to you, since they’re more likely to prioritize that). If that doesn’t work, you might need to talk to your boss about the timeline being too tight for people to turn around their edits in time. She might actually agree that they’re right to be prioritizing other things, or she might decide to use her authority to push them to prioritize this — but at that point, where you’ll have exhausted everything you can do on your own, that should be her call to make. – 2018 4. Applying for a job with someone who asked me to leave a college job In college, I wrote for a collegiate chapter of a national website. The national version of a website has an open position which matches my skillset pretty well. My one hesitation is that I was asked to leave the college chapter after a year. My editors sent me an email asking me to leave, citing a mutual feeling of disrespect and disinterest. I completely understood where they were coming from as I was unable to attend chapter meetings and keep up on my articles because of several group projects for my major, a volunteer position, a part-time job, and other obligations. Basically, I had too much going on and one thing was bound to fall through the cracks. Unfortunately, it was the website. I fully accept that my overbooking is to blame for what happened and regret it deeply. I loved my time with the publication and still admire their work even after my spectacular screw-up. I really want to apply for this job because it’s one I could potentially really thrive in. One of the editors from my collegiate chapter works for the national website. After she asked me to leave, I did apologize and we have gotten along well when we’ve seen each other. While there is no lasting anger on my end, I’m not sure how she feels. Part of me wants to reach out and apologize again as well as give her a heads-up that I’m applying. Should I even apply to this job? If I do apply, should I address this issue in my cover letter? How would I best go about explaining the situation? And what’s your opinion on reaching out to my former editor? I don’t want to seem like a selfish jerk but I also can’t stand the idea of someone hating me (even if I do kind of deserve it). Yeah, that might be a deal-breaker, unfortunately. Having the person who had to ask you to leave now working at the place you’re applying … is not great for your chances. (Although it could also depend on how long ago that was and what you’re done since then.) I wouldn’t address this in your cover letter; that’s way too much focus on your downsides for a cover letter. But I do think that if you’re considering applying, you’d need to reach out to the editor who asked you to leave and let her know. Acknowledge that you were overextended in college and took on too much, and say that you’ve learned a lot since then and are hoping to be able to demonstrate that if you get an interview. If you just apply without contacting her first and acknowledging what happened, it’s going to look tone-deaf or like you’re oblivious to why it matters. Honestly, there’s still a good chance it’ll remain a deal-breaker, but that’s likely your best shot at it. – 2019 5. How do I explain in an interview that I don’t like working with other people? I’m an entry-level worker looking to move into a new job. Most entry-level positions are very customer-oriented and I really DO NOT like working with people. I am introverted, but more importantly, I have bad social anxiety. Dealing with people regularly would lead to exhaustion at best, panic attacks at worst. Either way, it would be awkward for everyone. I don’t want to disclose having social anxiety in an interview, but I want to make it clear I want very limited customer interaction. I know that just saying “I don’t like people” or “I don’t want to handle customers” would get a bad reaction. Is there a way to spin it into something neutral or even positive? For what it’s worth, I can be cordial with other people, like coworkers. I’m just a withdrawn person and would like to work independently. First and foremost, make sure that you’re doing your best to screen jobs well before you apply, and make sure that you’re only applying for things that already look like pretty solitary jobs. Then, in the interview, ask about it directly: “My sense from the job posting is that this is relatively solitary work, without a ton of interaction with others. Is that correct?” Assuming they say yes, you can say something like this: “I know that a lot of people go stir-crazy in jobs without a lot of interaction, but I really enjoy working on my own so that element of the job is appealing to me.” For the right job, that’ll be appealing to the hiring manager; often the worry when hiring for solitary jobs is that the person will get bored or antsy for social contact, so hearing you say that you prefer working on your own is likely to be a plus. – 2016 The post employee missed work because of birthday drinking, manager scratches his butt before high-fiving us, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

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If you want to optimize your recruiting workflow, it’s vital to start by evaluating your current process. Identifying inefficiencies can lead to improvements that save time and resources. Collaborating with hiring managers to clearly define job roles is likewise important. Moreover, streamlining your screening methods and enhancing the candidate experience will make a significant difference. Finally, consider how an effective onboarding program can support new hires. Comprehending these steps can transform your recruitment strategy. What comes next? Key Takeaways Assess and analyze the current recruitment workflow to identify inefficiencies and bottlenecks for targeted improvements. Collaborate with hiring managers to create precise and aligned job descriptions that reflect organizational goals and required skills. Streamline the screening process using automation and pre-employment assessments to enhance efficiency and objectivity in candidate selection. Improve candidate experience through effective communication and timely feedback, ensuring candidates feel valued throughout the recruitment process. Develop a structured onboarding program that integrates new hires into the company culture and provides ongoing training and support. Assessing Your Current Recruitment Workflow How effectively is your recruitment workflow functioning? Evaluating your current recruitment workflow is vital for identifying inefficiencies. Start by reviewing each step, from job requisition to onboarding, to pinpoint areas that need improvement. Gather feedback from hiring managers, recruiters, and candidates to understand their experiences and pain points. This collective input will provide valuable insights into the challenges your recruiting workflow faces. Additionally, utilize hiring software analytics to uncover hidden inefficiencies, such as bottlenecks and high candidate drop-off rates, which mightn’t be immediately visible. Establish a structured roadmap for improvement based on your evaluation findings, ensuring each step is targeted toward enhancing efficiency. Regular evaluations of your recruitment workflow can lead to reduced time-to-hire and an improved candidate experience, in the end optimizing your entire recruitment process. Defining Job Roles and Requirements A well-defined job role is the cornerstone of an effective recruitment process. By collaborating with hiring managers, you can create precise job descriptions that clearly outline responsibilities and expectations. These descriptions should align with your organization’s goals and culture, attracting candidates who fit well. To streamline the screening process, specify the required skills, qualifications, and experience, establishing minimum and desirable criteria. Utilizing data from previous hiring processes can improve the accuracy of your job role definitions. Here’s a simple table to guide you in defining job roles: Aspect Details Responsibilities Outline key tasks and duties Required Skills List crucial skills and qualifications Cultural Fit Reflect organization’s values Adaptability Regularly update to match market needs Understanding the full cycle recruiting meaning allows you to optimize this stage effectively, ensuring you attract top talent. Streamlining the Screening and Selection Process To improve the efficiency of your recruitment efforts, streamlining the screening and selection process is essential. Implementing recruitment automation, such as automated resume screening tools, can greatly reduce initial screening time by up to 75%. This allows you to quickly filter out unqualified candidates, focusing on those who meet your criteria. Conducting initial phone screens helps assess candidate suitability and cultural fit, enabling you to concentrate on high-potential candidates for in-depth interviews. Integrating customized pre-employment assessments offers objective evaluations that can predict job performance with a 60-80% accuracy rate. Furthermore, leveraging video interviews for remote hiring expedites the process, allowing multiple stakeholders to assess candidates simultaneously from different locations. Involving diverse stakeholders in the selection process can lead to a 50% reduction in hiring biases, ultimately enhancing overall hiring decisions. These strategies work together to create a more efficient and effective recruitment workflow. Improving Candidate Experience During Recruitment Improving the candidate experience during recruitment is essential for attracting top talent and nurturing a positive organizational reputation. Effective communication plays a key role; 78% of candidates appreciate timely updates on their application status. By implementing recruitment process automation, you can provide clear and transparent information about the hiring process, reducing candidate anxiety—67% of job seekers prefer knowing each step. Offering timely feedback after each stage is critical, as 62% of candidates report it positively influences their perception of your organization. Personalizing the experience by addressing candidates by name and acknowledging their qualifications is important, with 69% valuing this approach. Remember, a smooth and respectful process can greatly improve your organization’s reputation; 80% of candidates who’ve a positive experience are likely to share it online or with others. Prioritize these strategies to improve candidate satisfaction and strengthen your employer brand. Onboarding and Integrating New Hires When new hires join your organization, a structured onboarding program is crucial for helping them feel welcomed and informed right from the start. It should cover important topics like company policies, culture, and job-specific training. Clearly communicating performance expectations and establishing key performance indicators (KPIs) during onboarding allows new employees to understand their roles and how success is measured. To improve workplace integration and morale, facilitate connections among new hires and existing team members through social events and mentorship programs. Additionally, provide ongoing training and development opportunities during this phase to encourage continuous growth and help new hires adapt effectively. Incorporating automated hiring processes can streamline onboarding tasks, making the experience smoother. Finally, solicit feedback from new hires about the onboarding process to identify areas for improvement, ensuring a more effective and engaging experience for future employees. Frequently Asked Questions What Are the 5 C’s of Recruitment? The 5 C’s of recruitment are Competence, Compatibility, Commitment, Culture, and Communication. Competence evaluates candidates’ skills necessary for the job. Compatibility assesses how well candidates fit within the team and role expectations. Commitment reflects their dedication, often seen in career history. Culture examines alignment between candidates’ values and the organization’s environment, essential for retention. Finally, Communication gauges how effectively candidates can convey ideas and collaborate with others, enhancing overall team dynamics. What Are the 7 Steps of the Recruitment Process? The recruitment process involves seven key steps. First, you identify hiring needs by clarifying the position’s purpose. Next, you craft a detailed job description outlining qualifications. Then, you source candidates through job boards and social media. After sourcing, you screen applications using tools and initial phone screenings. Following that, you conduct interviews to evaluate candidates. Finally, you make a selection and onboard new hires, ensuring they integrate smoothly into the organization. What Are the 5 Steps of the Recruitment Process? The recruitment process consists of five key steps. First, you’ll conduct an intake session to clarify job requirements with hiring managers. Next, you’ll create a structured job posting to attract suitable candidates. After that, you’ll screen resumes and perform initial conversations to assess fit. Then, you’ll conduct interviews to evaluate candidates’ skills and cultural alignment. Finally, you’ll extend an offer to the selected candidate, including salary discussions and necessary approvals. What Are the 3 P’s of Recruitment? The 3 P’s of recruitment are People, Process, and Performance. First, you need to engage the right individuals, like hiring managers and recruiters, to align on candidate qualifications and culture fit. Next, establish a structured process that guides you from job requisition to onboarding, ensuring consistency and efficiency. Finally, focus on performance by measuring key metrics such as time-to-hire and quality of hire, allowing you to refine your recruitment strategy continuously. Conclusion By following these five fundamental steps, you can greatly optimize your recruiting workflow. Evaluating your current process helps identify inefficiencies, whereas clearly defined job roles guarantee alignment with organizational goals. Streamlining screening through automation improves efficiency, and enhancing candidate experience promotes positive interactions. Finally, a structured onboarding program is vital for integrating new hires. Implementing these strategies not merely improves recruitment effectiveness but additionally contributes to long-term organizational success and employee satisfaction. Image via Google Gemini This article, "5 Essential Steps to Optimize Recruiting Workflow" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

If you want to optimize your recruiting workflow, it’s vital to start by evaluating your current process. Identifying inefficiencies can lead to improvements that save time and resources. Collaborating with hiring managers to clearly define job roles is likewise important. Moreover, streamlining your screening methods and enhancing the candidate experience will make a significant difference. Finally, consider how an effective onboarding program can support new hires. Comprehending these steps can transform your recruitment strategy. What comes next? Key Takeaways Assess and analyze the current recruitment workflow to identify inefficiencies and bottlenecks for targeted improvements. Collaborate with hiring managers to create precise and aligned job descriptions that reflect organizational goals and required skills. Streamline the screening process using automation and pre-employment assessments to enhance efficiency and objectivity in candidate selection. Improve candidate experience through effective communication and timely feedback, ensuring candidates feel valued throughout the recruitment process. Develop a structured onboarding program that integrates new hires into the company culture and provides ongoing training and support. Assessing Your Current Recruitment Workflow How effectively is your recruitment workflow functioning? Evaluating your current recruitment workflow is vital for identifying inefficiencies. Start by reviewing each step, from job requisition to onboarding, to pinpoint areas that need improvement. Gather feedback from hiring managers, recruiters, and candidates to understand their experiences and pain points. This collective input will provide valuable insights into the challenges your recruiting workflow faces. Additionally, utilize hiring software analytics to uncover hidden inefficiencies, such as bottlenecks and high candidate drop-off rates, which mightn’t be immediately visible. Establish a structured roadmap for improvement based on your evaluation findings, ensuring each step is targeted toward enhancing efficiency. Regular evaluations of your recruitment workflow can lead to reduced time-to-hire and an improved candidate experience, in the end optimizing your entire recruitment process. Defining Job Roles and Requirements A well-defined job role is the cornerstone of an effective recruitment process. By collaborating with hiring managers, you can create precise job descriptions that clearly outline responsibilities and expectations. These descriptions should align with your organization’s goals and culture, attracting candidates who fit well. To streamline the screening process, specify the required skills, qualifications, and experience, establishing minimum and desirable criteria. Utilizing data from previous hiring processes can improve the accuracy of your job role definitions. Here’s a simple table to guide you in defining job roles: Aspect Details Responsibilities Outline key tasks and duties Required Skills List crucial skills and qualifications Cultural Fit Reflect organization’s values Adaptability Regularly update to match market needs Understanding the full cycle recruiting meaning allows you to optimize this stage effectively, ensuring you attract top talent. Streamlining the Screening and Selection Process To improve the efficiency of your recruitment efforts, streamlining the screening and selection process is essential. Implementing recruitment automation, such as automated resume screening tools, can greatly reduce initial screening time by up to 75%. This allows you to quickly filter out unqualified candidates, focusing on those who meet your criteria. Conducting initial phone screens helps assess candidate suitability and cultural fit, enabling you to concentrate on high-potential candidates for in-depth interviews. Integrating customized pre-employment assessments offers objective evaluations that can predict job performance with a 60-80% accuracy rate. Furthermore, leveraging video interviews for remote hiring expedites the process, allowing multiple stakeholders to assess candidates simultaneously from different locations. Involving diverse stakeholders in the selection process can lead to a 50% reduction in hiring biases, ultimately enhancing overall hiring decisions. These strategies work together to create a more efficient and effective recruitment workflow. Improving Candidate Experience During Recruitment Improving the candidate experience during recruitment is essential for attracting top talent and nurturing a positive organizational reputation. Effective communication plays a key role; 78% of candidates appreciate timely updates on their application status. By implementing recruitment process automation, you can provide clear and transparent information about the hiring process, reducing candidate anxiety—67% of job seekers prefer knowing each step. Offering timely feedback after each stage is critical, as 62% of candidates report it positively influences their perception of your organization. Personalizing the experience by addressing candidates by name and acknowledging their qualifications is important, with 69% valuing this approach. Remember, a smooth and respectful process can greatly improve your organization’s reputation; 80% of candidates who’ve a positive experience are likely to share it online or with others. Prioritize these strategies to improve candidate satisfaction and strengthen your employer brand. Onboarding and Integrating New Hires When new hires join your organization, a structured onboarding program is crucial for helping them feel welcomed and informed right from the start. It should cover important topics like company policies, culture, and job-specific training. Clearly communicating performance expectations and establishing key performance indicators (KPIs) during onboarding allows new employees to understand their roles and how success is measured. To improve workplace integration and morale, facilitate connections among new hires and existing team members through social events and mentorship programs. Additionally, provide ongoing training and development opportunities during this phase to encourage continuous growth and help new hires adapt effectively. Incorporating automated hiring processes can streamline onboarding tasks, making the experience smoother. Finally, solicit feedback from new hires about the onboarding process to identify areas for improvement, ensuring a more effective and engaging experience for future employees. Frequently Asked Questions What Are the 5 C’s of Recruitment? The 5 C’s of recruitment are Competence, Compatibility, Commitment, Culture, and Communication. Competence evaluates candidates’ skills necessary for the job. Compatibility assesses how well candidates fit within the team and role expectations. Commitment reflects their dedication, often seen in career history. Culture examines alignment between candidates’ values and the organization’s environment, essential for retention. Finally, Communication gauges how effectively candidates can convey ideas and collaborate with others, enhancing overall team dynamics. What Are the 7 Steps of the Recruitment Process? The recruitment process involves seven key steps. First, you identify hiring needs by clarifying the position’s purpose. Next, you craft a detailed job description outlining qualifications. Then, you source candidates through job boards and social media. After sourcing, you screen applications using tools and initial phone screenings. Following that, you conduct interviews to evaluate candidates. Finally, you make a selection and onboard new hires, ensuring they integrate smoothly into the organization. What Are the 5 Steps of the Recruitment Process? The recruitment process consists of five key steps. First, you’ll conduct an intake session to clarify job requirements with hiring managers. Next, you’ll create a structured job posting to attract suitable candidates. After that, you’ll screen resumes and perform initial conversations to assess fit. Then, you’ll conduct interviews to evaluate candidates’ skills and cultural alignment. Finally, you’ll extend an offer to the selected candidate, including salary discussions and necessary approvals. What Are the 3 P’s of Recruitment? The 3 P’s of recruitment are People, Process, and Performance. First, you need to engage the right individuals, like hiring managers and recruiters, to align on candidate qualifications and culture fit. Next, establish a structured process that guides you from job requisition to onboarding, ensuring consistency and efficiency. Finally, focus on performance by measuring key metrics such as time-to-hire and quality of hire, allowing you to refine your recruitment strategy continuously. Conclusion By following these five fundamental steps, you can greatly optimize your recruiting workflow. Evaluating your current process helps identify inefficiencies, whereas clearly defined job roles guarantee alignment with organizational goals. Streamlining screening through automation improves efficiency, and enhancing candidate experience promotes positive interactions. Finally, a structured onboarding program is vital for integrating new hires. Implementing these strategies not merely improves recruitment effectiveness but additionally contributes to long-term organizational success and employee satisfaction. Image via Google Gemini This article, "5 Essential Steps to Optimize Recruiting Workflow" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article