ResidentialBusiness

Google has this new "Know before you go" section in the search results. I mean, it is new for search, not new for Google Maps and not new for local. But I've never seen a Know before you go box in the search results before.View the full article

Microsoft is now showing why it selects or chooses to show a specific ad directly in the Bing search results. When you click on the arrow down by the URL of the search ad snippet, you will get window dialog that may explain why the ad was shown.View the full article

Spotify just opened up a new stream of revenue for podcasters. That is, if they’re uploading video. What was once an audio-first medium, podcasting is now increasingly filmed and produced. That started on YouTube, which is now racking up one billion podcast viewers a month. While Spotify has hosted podcasts for a decade now, the company is suddenly racing to stay competitive, rolling out new features and monetization tools. That includes their Partner Program, which allows podcasters to earn money directly from the streams of premium subscribers, so long as they’re using a video aspect. “We decided to focus on video because that’s where we see a lot of audiences and creators trending,” says Jordan Newman, Spotify’s senior director of content partnerships. “We felt like it was something that we really wanted to encourage and incentivize our platform.” To find out how podcasters feel about the app’s video push, Fast Company spoke with creators on both sides of the aisle—those who have embraced video, and those who have stayed audio-only. The cost-benefit analysis of video podcasting For many podcasters, the shift to video is a financial and logistical leap. Producing a high-quality video podcast requires more than just a microphone—it demands cameras, lighting, editing software, and often a dedicated set. That investment pays off for some, but for others, it adds a new layer of complexity to an already time-consuming medium. Chris Williamson knows this trade-off well. As the host of Modern Wisdom, one of Spotify’s most popular self-improvement podcasts, he’s built a reputation not just for insightful conversations with guests like Andrew Huberman and Steven Bartlett but also for stunning visual production. Yet Modern Wisdom wasn’t always a cinematic experience. In its early days, the show was audio-only, with a basic equalizer graphic on YouTube. Fifty episodes in, Williamson started recording his Skype interviews. A hundred episodes later, he upgraded to professional-quality video. Now, he rents what he estimates is “a quarter of a million dollars”-worth of camera equipment for each shoot. So far, it’s paid off handsomely. Thanks to his polished, production-heavy style, advertisers flock to Modern Wisdom, and Spotify’s expansion into video has further boosted his revenue. Once his full back catalog is uploaded, Williamson expects to earn as much—if not more—from Spotify as he does from YouTube. “I think we’ve kind of gained a reputation in the world of cinematography and production and making a very beautiful podcast, and that makes me feel good,” Williamson says. “It’s not just something that is legitimate in terms of its content, but also in terms of its delivery and its packaging.” While most podcasters don’t operate on Williamson’s scale, video remains for all a big investment. Among the seven podcasters interviewed for this piece, nearly all cited increased costs—both financial and labor-related—as a major consideration. For independent creators, these costs fall directly on their shoulders. For those backed by major podcast networks, the burden is often shared. Diallo Riddle and Blake “LUXXURY” Robin, co-hosts of the music podcast One Song, were caught off guard when their network, Hartbeat, insisted on a video format. (Riddle jokes that, if he had known, he would have demanded they “pay for hair and makeup.”) But they have come to see the move as a fortuitous one. “By now, recording both has become the default,” Robin says. “Part of what podcasting is as a medium, I’ve only learned as we’ve done it, is that parasocial relationship. Getting to know the people, I think it helps when you see them.” The audio/video balancing act The biggest challenge? Making a show work seamlessly for both audiences. Some podcasts are visually stunning but incoherent in audio form; others treat video as an afterthought. The result is a growing divide in audience experiences. The hosts of Petty Crimes, which is also produced by Hartbeat, have been thinking about this drop-off in experience. Griff Stark-Ennis films in Los Angeles, where he’s surrounded by cameras, making it easy to “play into the visual aspect and sometimes forget the audio.” Ceara Jane O’Sullivan, who records simultaneously in New York, positions herself as a check on that impulse. “When we are reviewing episodes back, I always listen to the transcript audio-only,” O’Sullivan says. “You have to present your audio episode and present your video episode as if that is the assumed and correct audience. You never want anyone to feel like they’re being shorted or ignored in either medium.” No matter the issues—scaling costs, getting camera-ready, or remembering the audio listener—all of these podcasters were happy with their video ventures. They’ve all seen the audience widening that video has allowed them, something that Spotify’s Newman emphasized. “Shows with video are growing faster than audio shows right now,” he says. What becomes of the audio-only podcasters? Podcasting started as an audio-only medium—and many creators are sticking to that. In 2023, 32% of podcasters said they had “no plans” to record video, per the IndiePod Census. These creators are barred from that premium revenue stream on Spotify, though they still can earn money from ads. But video isn’t the be all end all; after all, only 30% of audiences are actively watching their podcasts, per Cumulus Media. And some podcasters have other priorities. “Video adds a layer of technical complication,” says Perry Romanowski, co-host of The Beauty Brains. “When I want to do a show, my partner and I hop on a zoom call and we record locally on both of our machines. Neither of us has to take showers and get gussied up. It’s just a lot easier.” Others film some video, but don’t upload it to Spotify. Gibson Johns films the interviews for his show Gabbing With Gib and uploads them to YouTube. But, to fashion these interviews into a podcast form, he records audio-only introductions and uploads the audio alone to Spotify. “I’m solid for now,” he says. “As far as I’m aware, there’s not a way on Spotify to upload a portion of your episode as a video.” Still, Johns is happy with Spotify’s creator experience; he earns the bulk of his money through their advertising. While Romanowski earns his money through Patreon, he’s content with Spotify, too. Neither haven’t felt the encroachment of video hurting their business. Podcasters now are at an inflection point. They must choose: To film or not to film. That choice isn’t just about preference—it’s about costs, and adapting to an industry radically reformed by video. View the full article

Every year, Employee Appreciation Day comes and goes, prompting organizations to rush into gratitude mode—offering lunches, shoutouts, and small gifts. But if March 7 is the only time leaders express appreciation to their teams, they’re missing the mark. It’s like only telling your partner “I love you” on your anniversary. If appreciation is absent the rest of the year, the sentiment feels hollow. In fact, a once-a-year show of recognition can do more harm than good, as employees may perceive these actions as insincere. Whether in relationships or the workplace, real appreciation is built through consistent, meaningful recognition. Recognition is even more critical as companies across industries are rolling back their DEI initiatives—a shift that could impact efforts to create more inclusive workplaces. Some organizations are quietly deprioritizing diversity programs, while others, like Meta, have made highly visible cuts to their DEI teams. As DEI initiatives shrink, rebrand, or disappear entirely, it’s more important than ever to reinforce inclusion through everyday practices. Recognition is one of the simplest and most effective ways to do this. When employees feel seen and valued for their contributions, inclusion becomes embedded in workplace culture—not just a corporate talking point. 4 ways to foster a culture of inclusive recognition Employees at organizations with highly integrated recognition—where recognition is frequent, meaningful, and embedded in the culture—are 10 times more likely to trust their organization and nine times more likely to believe their organization cares about them. Yet, many organizations still treat recognition as an afterthought rather than an everyday practice. Consider these four ways to make recognition a consistent and impactful part of your culture: 1. Make recognition a daily habit Think about the last time you thanked a colleague for their contributions. Was it last week? Last month? If you can’t remember, it’s time to make recognition a habit. Start by incorporating recognition into existing routines. Take a few minutes at the beginning or end of team meetings to acknowledge recent contributions. When providing feedback—whether in one-on-one conversations, emails, or project updates—call out specific actions that made a difference. Use digital tools like Slack or Microsoft Teams to create a space for company-wide appreciation. Recognition doesn’t have to come from leadership alone. You should also encourage peer-to-peer appreciation so employees feel valued by their colleagues, as well. The more ingrained recognition becomes in daily interactions, the more it fosters a culture where everyone feels seen and included. 2. Recognize behaviors, not just outcomes If you’re only recognizing employees for hitting goals—like exceeding sales targets or completing big projects—you’re missing a big part of what makes teams successful. How employees work is just as important as what they achieve. Think about the employees who mentor others, uplift their teammates, or create an environment where all voices are heard. These behaviors drive long-term success, but they often go unnoticed. If you want to build an inclusive culture, make a point to acknowledge the ways employees support and collaborate with each other, not just their individual accomplishments. For example, instead of only celebrating the top performer in a department, recognize the team member who made sure everyone was set up for success. Call out those who took the time to share knowledge, advocate for a colleague’s ideas, or create a positive team environment. By shifting the focus beyond just results, you ensure that a wider range of contributions are valued. 3. Ensure recognition is visible and equitable It’s easy to default to recognizing the employees who are the most vocal or who work on high-visibility projects. But what about the ones who contribute just as much behind the scenes? Unconscious bias can lead to some employees receiving less recognition than their peers. Take a step back and assess who is getting recognized in your organization. Are the same names coming up repeatedly while others are overlooked? If so, make a conscious effort to expand recognition across teams, levels, and roles. Ensure that recognition is public and visible, whether it’s through a company-wide newsletter, town hall meeting, or a shared appreciation board. When recognition is equitable, employees across all levels feel like their work matters. 4. Use Employee Appreciation Day as a reflection point When recognition happens consistently, Employee Appreciation Day becomes a meaningful reflection of the past year’s achievements rather than a last-minute attempt to show gratitude. Instead of using it as the only time to celebrate employees, think of it as an opportunity to reinforce and amplify your year-round recognition efforts. Use it to tell meaningful stories of teamwork, highlight moments when employees went above and beyond, and showcase the contributions that have shaped your organization’s success. Framing the day as a reflection rather than a one-off event helps strengthen your culture of appreciation. This is also a great moment to gather feedback from employees. Ask them how they prefer to be recognized. Some might appreciate public shoutouts, while others prefer personal acknowledgments from leadership. Use this input to refine your approach and make recognition even more impactful. The goal is to ensure that employees feel valued all the time, not just when it’s expected. The bottom line: Inclusion is built daily If employees only hear expressions of praise and recognition once a year on Employee Appreciation Day, you’re missing out on the opportunity to build a more engaged, connected workforce. A culture of recognition helps strengthen workplace relationships, increase motivation, and create an environment where people want to do their best work. It’s also important to remember that recognition alone isn’t enough. Without a living wage, reasonable hours, and supportive management, praise won’t drive true engagement or job satisfaction. Recognition must be paired with a fair and respectful work environment. By making recognition a daily habit, celebrating behaviors as well as outcomes, and ensuring appreciation is visible and equitable, you can create a workplace where your employees feel valued every single day. View the full article

When I was 35, a ruptured brain aneurysm nearly killed me. My husband and I had just moved to a new city, bought our first house, adopted a dog, and I had recently started my own business. Life was running at 100 miles an hour and I thought this is what hustling was supposed to feel like. Living my best life, right? Until I collapsed, unconscious, on my bathroom floor. I miraculously survived. Recovery wasn’t always easy due to my new cognitive deficits. However, the experience taught me about the power of empathy to heal and how clarity and decisive action — especially when the stakes are high — can be the most compassionate things someone can do to alleviate stress, confusion, and anxiety. From staff supporting my husband in those crucial first hours to my care team treating me as a person—calling me by name and letting me choose my meals for six weeks—I felt seen, heard, and valued. Their kindness eased my stress and made a difficult time less isolating. According to a 2024 Businessolver State of Workplace Empathy Study, 37% of CEOs still believe empathy has no place in the workplace. This same study shows a marked increase in perceptions of workplaces being toxic. Clearly, we have a workplace conundrum that needs addressing. Engagement is down and mental health issues are up. Experts now cite loneliness as a health epidemic. It begs the question: Should empathy ever be put aside at work, or should we be doubling down on it? When we define empathy too narrowly, we overlook its power to build resilient, high-performing teams and boost engagement, collaboration, and innovation. Empathy means seeing, understanding, and, when appropriate, feeling another’s perspective—then using that insight to act with compassion. It’s a way to gather information, understand context, and take the next right step together. With this definition, it is safe to say that unless you are being physically or psychologically hurt, there are almost no circumstances where we should be putting empathy aside at work. Empathy at work includes practicing clarity, transparency, and decisiveness. Going back to my story — Above all, I credit my surgeon and care team for practicing the often overlooked aspects of empathy: decisiveness, transparency, and clarity. Can you imagine if my surgeon stalled on a decision to give my family a chance to research, analyze, or familiarize themselves with what was going on? He shared the information, clearly explained the risks and upsides, and patiently answered their questions, but he made a firm decision to move forward because he kept his eye on the ultimate goal: Saving my life. This kind of decisive action was exactly what my disoriented and overwhelmed husband needed at that moment. It was truly empathetic. Harvard Business School professor highlights the importance of decisive action when he writes, “A comprehensive study of compassion in the Clinical Psychology Review defines it as recognizing suffering, understanding it, and feeling empathy for the sufferer—but also tolerating the uncomfortable feelings they and the suffering person are experiencing, and, crucially, acting to alleviate the suffering.” Here are some ways that empathetic leaders can show up with greater decisiveness. Revisit your goal and purpose — often Leaders can often get caught up in the drama surrounding important decisions and lose sight of the goal. Create a way to clearly kick yourself in the pants as you make a decision: make your goal physically visible using a sticky note or by including it at the top of every discussion agenda. Read the mission out loud when you kick off meetings to reorient everyone to true north. Here are some tactics to try: Bake in goal-review processes: You can add goal statements to tracking paperwork, insist on reviewing the purpose at every major goalpost, or ask stakeholders to consider the overall goal any time they request a change or addition. Make goal-centricity a group endeavor: Ask your team members or colleagues to be accountability partners in remaining goal-focused. They can remind you, “Which option aligns with the larger purpose?” whenever they see you waffling. Practice transparency There’s no need to make all decisions in a secretive way and unveil them only when they are fully baked. Learn to be clearer quicker, and if possible, talk openly about the choices you’re making and have made. Don’t be afraid to say, “I don’t know, but let’s find out together.” A study published in the Journal of Communication Management reveals how transparent communication significantly influences employees’ trust in their organizations. Here are some tactics to try: Share your failures: Being human with your teams means they’ll feel comfortable doing the same, which builds empathy in both directions. It also will slowly erode any anxiety you have about making “bad” or “wrong” decisions. Process with trusted colleagues: By allowing yourself to process with team members or other leaders verbally, you can reveal your thought processes and limiting factors. Solicit and synthesize input Practice soliciting input from others, but be clear that once a decision is made, naysayers will be asked to disagree but commit. At a certain point, we’ve all got to move forward together and still be committed to the mission. Focus on impact: While general feedback is important, if you want to be decisive by implementing input quickly, you need specifics. You can practice asking the feedback-giver to recommend one thing you could do that would make a difference to them Express enthusiasm for feedback: Ideally, soliciting input should be constant, not sporadic. Verbally reward and encourage feedback regularly. Start small: You can try a low-risk experiment, like asking everyone to vote for the location of the next off-site, department lunch. Leverage all that input to quickly make a call yourself, and practice communicating your decision back. Set a deadline In an article for Fast Company, psychotherapist Amy Morin recommends getting in the habit of setting deadlines for decisions that trip you up. If it’s a small decision—say, picking a spot for a business lunch—give yourself a few hours. If it’s weightier—a big investment or strategic pivot—think more in terms of days or weeks. Here are some tactics to try: Leverage tech: It may sound simple, but just putting a reminder in your phone or calendar can help you stay on track to make decisions in a timely manner. Schedule a decision review block each day: Consider setting aside thirty minutes or so each day to review and mull upcoming choices. This is also a good forcing mechanism for leaders who are overwhelmed by choices. Empathy isn’t just about listening and understanding—it’s about acting decisively, transparently, and with clarity when it matters most so no one is left anxious and scared in the dark. Leaders who embrace these qualities foster trust, reduce anxiety, and inspire collaboration, even during challenging times. View the full article

Starting today, thousands of changemakers and leaders will descend upon Austin for one of the biggest festivals and conferences of the year: South by Southwest (SXSW). It’s the “level playing field” event where startups and Fortune 500 companies share the same stage to discuss the hottest topics and trends in film, tech, sustainability and travel, social good, and health and wellness. It’s where brands unveil new products, relationships are formed, and celebrities premiere their films. However, despite its popularity as a must-attend event, you won’t find SXSW in your Google Calendar app. You also won’t find two other cultural events in March: Women’s History Month or International Women’s Day (March 8), which ironically the start of SXSW often falls on or around. This omission isn’t due to a tech issue, either. It’s part of the Big Tech company’s attempt to get distance from what is now considered a dirty acronym: DEI. Last month, Google Calendar users noticed that cultural events and observances like Black History Month, Pride Month, and Jewish Heritage were no longer displayed on the app. And while the company claims that the changes were made in 2024, the recent response from users comes at a time when any and all changes—quiet or loud—tied to DEI are heavily scrutinized. In 2025, we have officially entered a DEI paradox where everyone—from consumers to employees to global brands—are navigating major backlash and uncertainty of how exactly we can and should use words like diversity, equity, and inclusion. In 2020, hundreds of brands were proud to share their commitments and promises to do better. In 2025, many of the same brands not only removed these promises from their websites but some have even gone so far as to completely distance themselves from any mention of DEI. What a difference five years makes. Google’s decision to remove cultural events like Black History Month and Women’s History Month from its calendar app is just the latest example a major company failing to understand the true value of DEI. As we kick off SXSW, let’s look back at where we’ve been but more importantly, where we still need to go. A Revolving Door of Diversity Officers and Changing Language In 2020, Google made the following commitments: improve representation of underrepresented groups in leadership by 30% and more than double the number of Black workers at non-senior levels by 2025. The next year, Google released its year-over-year hiring data with the following statement: “we’re expanding access to hiring opportunities for underrepresented groups in many parts of the world by centering racial equity across every part of our hiring process—for leaders, hiring managers, and all Googlers.” The Big Tech company didn’t even make it to 2023 before it cut dedicated staff and downsized its DEI programs. Easy promises to make, easy promises to break. And Google is not alone. Just look at the “revolving door” of diversity officers that have clocked in and out of major businesses since 2020: Pinterest, Apple, Zoom, Airbnb, Netflix, and Disney. All of these companies hired dedicated leaders attached to big announcements and pledges and all these companies saw high rates of turnover and DEI departures. Now in 2025, it’s become even easier to dismantle the work and efforts. Google recently announced its plans to end hiring goals for representation and its former Chief Diversity Officer, Melonie Parker, is now VP, Googler Engagement. Google’s Belonging website now includes phrases like “innovative hiring” and “reflecting our users.” The shift in language is reflective of a greater issue that has surfaced in recent months: the “urgent” need to comply with federal policies and executive orders that have reversed previous efforts from the past 50 years to address discrimination and increase diversity and inclusion. This has set a dangerous tone and precedent for 2025 that the great work and efforts from the past 50 years should be seen as a setback instead of a success. This is untrue and unacceptable. What we need from DEI in 2025 According to the World Economic Forum, at the current rate of progress, it will take until 2158 to reach full gender parity. This year’s theme for International Women’s Day is “accelerate action,” which is a call for urgency, inclusion, and transformative change. Imagine a world where instead of shining a spotlight on the critics, we shine a spotlight on the efforts and achievements that uplift and inspire women to strive for success without the restrictions of bias and discrimination. For companies, brands and leaders who are still committed to the work, here is how we accelerate action in 2025: Less Flash, More Substance: The foundation of DEI initiatives and programs goes beyond flashy titles, heritage months, and impressive speeches. Companies need to scale back and focus on important components like standardized hiring practices, recruitment from a wider talent pool, and regular pay-gap reviews for all employees. Learn from Mistakes, Don’t Dwell On Them: Women are underrepresented at every level in technology according to data from recruitment company Anderson Frank. Women still only make up 25% of the tech workforce. DEI plays a big role here. Companies need to provide and prioritize inclusive training opportunities, address gender diversity policies, and bring in more female leaders to act as mentors. Make Room for a New DEI Framework: It’s clear that an acronym has become too problematic. Lily Zheng, author, strategist, and outspoken advocate for DEI, recently shared that they hold DEI programs to the “highest standard of effectiveness” using a framework called FAIR, which stands for fairness, access, inclusion, and representation. Companies should consider this new framework as an opportunity for real change and progress. How can companies move beyond performative gestures to make a genuine impact? First let’s answer the question and then let’s get to work. View the full article

This week in branding news, Volvo released its first-ever entirely AI-generated ad, fashion brand Pretty Little Thing attempted to overhaul its brand image, and Crystal Light made a late bid on the canned cocktail craze. Here’s everything you need to know. Volvo veers into the uncanny valley The news: Volvo just released a new AI-generated ad, and it doesn’t include a single car. That was probably a mistake. Big picture: The ad, which aired in Saudi Arabia, is Volvo’s first spot made entirely with AI. Created by the agency Lion, the minute-long video used Midjourney for visuals, Runway editing software for touch-ups, and ChatGPT for narration. It’s essentially a slideshow of clips, including models gazing into the camera, kids smiling up at the sky, and, for some reason, sports fans gathering in a stadium. At no point does a Volvo vehicle appear in the work. Why it matters: The issue with Volvo’s new ad is not necessarily that it relies on AI tools (most advertising professionals will tell you that AI tech is bound to reshape the entire industry, whether we like it or not), but more so that said AI was used so clumsily. To start, the spot has no discernible plot, instead appearing to skip nonsensically between brief AI prompts with little apparent attempt to edit the shots together. The clips themselves display a clear disregard for the current state of AI-generated video by relying mainly on human bodies and expressions, two of the visuals that AI has yet to reliably recreate—resulting in plasticky, overly-airbrushed models that veer straight into the uncanny valley. Volvo’s choices in this ad are even more head-scratching given that we have evidence of an actually good AI-generated Volvo ad—one that was made nine months ago, in less than 24 hours, by a random guy. The speculative ad, created by colorist László Gaál, follows a Volvo vehicle as it speeds through a deserted city, bringing the crumbling architecture back to life by leaving a flood of greenery in its wake. Despite a comparatively tiny budget and time investment, the ad went viral for convincing many viewers, and even some marketing professionals, that it was authentic. The chances of a similar phenomenon occurring with Volvo’s official new ad are close to zero. Pretty Little Thing tries to glow up The news: The fast fashion site Pretty Little Thing (PLT) just rebranded to a new look that mimics luxury brands, and the internet is calling it the end of “the BBL aesthetic.” Big picture: PLT has swapped its former branding—a millennial pink-based design with a basic, sans-serif logo—for a chic new rebrand that uses a darker color palette, calligraphic wordmark, and monogram logo. It’s a full 180 shift that’s clearly taken its inspiration from high fashion brands like Louis Vuitton and Vivienne Westwood. The move is an attempt to reposition PLT away from its reputation for cheap fast fashion and toward a new era as a slightly pricier site to find dupes for the “quiet luxury” and “clean girl” aesthetics. [Image: Pretty Little Thing] “[PLT has] removed the bbl fashion and it’s more clean girl aesthetic now,” one tweet with 67,000 likes reads. “Wow the bbl aesthetic is really out.” Why it matters: PLT’s transparent bid to distance itself from the visual trappings of fast fashion should not distract from the fact that there’s no evidence that its business model has actually changed. In 2023, the company received a meager 23% on Fashion Revolution’s Fashion Transparency Index for poor labor standards, a lack of sustainability efforts, and little discernible effort to minimize animal suffering. “As it stands, the rebrand doesn’t entirely place PLT in the ‘affordable luxury’ sector,” Vicky Bullen, CEO at design agency Coley Porter Bell, told Creative Bloq. “While its refreshed design draws on some of the cues of luxury brands to create a somewhat more ‘sophisticated’ feel for the company, a brand is much more than just its logo and visuals.” Crystal Light goes boozy The news: Your mom’s favorite lemonade brand in the ‘90s, Crystal Light, is going after Gen Z. Big picture: In a bid to cash in on both its nostalgia-inducing branding and a growing interest in ready-made cocktails, Crystal Light is set to release an alcoholic take on its lemonade packets. The brand just announced a line of canned vodka refreshers, which, like the OG lemonade, will be low calorie and made with artificial sweetener. [Image: Kraft-Heinz] Why it matters: As household brands continue to vie for a piece of White Claw’s success, the RTD space is becoming increasingly oversaturated. Over the past few years, we’ve borne witness to Sunny D vodka, spiked AriZona Iced Tea, Fresca Mixed, and alcoholic Dunkin’ drinks—and, honestly, Crystal Light’s late bid on the space feels a tad bit desperate. “The bladder isn’t big enough to handle them all,” Gary Stibel, CEO of New England Consulting Group, told AdAge. “A few will succeed, but the ones that succeed will be based upon good marketing, not just good product.” View the full article

The true causes of growth are one of the great mysteries of economic thoughtView the full article

Tyler, the CEO of an early-stage technology company, reached out for executive coaching support at the recommendation of a college friend: “Give it a try,” she encouraged. He was skeptical about anything “touchy-feely” and wondered if coaching could offer his leadership an “edge.” After we reviewed his 360 results together, Tyler’s skepticism took center stage. His feedback consisted of descriptors like controlling, arrogant, and dismissive. Tyler was unmoved. He asked, “Why should I care about what people think of me if we’re getting great results?” Tyler’s not an anomaly. There are leaders everywhere who behave badly interpersonally but exceed sales goals, secure investor funding, or get a product to market in record time. As executive coaches who have supported hundreds of senior leaders, we believe this one-dimensional focus on results is seductive, but eventually self-sabotaging and shortsighted. Today’s leaders need to focus on results and interpersonal relationships for long-term success. Here are some reasons why: Competitive and collaborative leaders get the strongest results Tyler has been successful to-date, and he believes that will continue even if he keeps deprioritizing relationships. Of course, research says that’s unlikely. A study of sales organizations that the National Bureau Of Economic Research conducted found that there is a cost to promoting stars who haven’t built skills in collaborating with or developing people. Their teams will make, on average, 30% fewer sales than sales teams with collaborative managers. Bad behavior reduces long-term effectiveness Tyler, as a start-up CEO, can “get away” with bad behavior now given his results. However, over time toxic leaders contribute to reduced productivity, decreased employee performance, increased turnover, and increased legal fees, according to a study in Health Psychology Research. These consequences are a drain on resources and tenured employees. Bottom line, bad behavior catches up with leaders. Tending to relationships and results secures more longevity in senior roles. Caring is a worthwhile investment Tyler’s strategy might be working now, but leadership strategies need to be resilient to professional and personal change. One senior leader, Alexandra, who routinely delivered impressive results, did so at the cost of her team’s morale (For example, she didn’t take their complaints to HR seriously). Then, Alexandra’s aging parents’ health concerns required her to routinely fly cross country to manage their care. When Alexandra’s capacity shifted, her team resisted stepping-up to assist her. Alexandra’s nonexistent social capital with her team ended up costing the company floundering results. The company demanded intensive leadership coaching for Alexandra and a commitment to change. She eventually shifted her leadership style in accordance with research—where cultivating an environment that prioritizes people and relationships is good for business. How to course correct: There’s no one-size-fits-all solution to move from challenged to successful people leader. However, here are three steps to begin excelling at both financial and people development metrics. 1. Focus on self: shift intimidating behaviors First, identify the specific behaviors that inhibit the people you work alongside. Pay attention to feedback like, “She dominates the conversation with her opinions,” or “When I ask clarifying questions, he gets exasperated.” Years of research on psychological safety illuminates the downsides of leading through fear. Ultimately, this contributes to lower levels of effectiveness and engagement. Once you’re clear on your unproductive behaviors, pick small new behaviors that invite learning and new perspectives versus fear. One effective way to form stronger connections with colleagues is to ask curious questions. Some examples include, “What else do you want me to understand?” or “Can you tell me more about how you see the challenge?” or “What’s your perspective?” 2. Focus on others: invest in developing your people Taking time to engage with your employees and have meaningful career development conversations builds loyalty. People want to perform well for leaders who support their long-term career development. Set the stage by letting your people know you’ll find time twice a year to explore their career aspirations. Send questions like these in advance to prime the pump for a meaningful conversation. Where do you hope to see yourself 10 years from now? What other roles do you see in the company that interest you? If you could design your next role at the company, what would you want it to look like and why? What is one skill (technical or soft) that if you were to develop, would benefit you greatly for the next five years? Start the conversation by stating your intention: to help your employee develop in ways that are meaningful to them. Then, discuss your employee’s answers to the questions and layer on your own thoughts. You might say, “I also see you as Marketing Director in the next few years and could see you overseeing Sales too given your creative mind and focus on data.” It’s affirming to have your manager share what they envision for you along with validating any strengths. Finally, discuss ways to get more on-the-job experience in their areas of interest over the coming months. Your employee should leave with a plan of action for how to make progress on their career goals and an understanding of how you’ll support their efforts. 3. Focus on team: build interdependency Often team leaders with a high need for control rely on a hub-and-spoke model of management where every problem goes through them. This is inefficient and loses the benefits that interdependent teams can give their organizations, the chance to outperform competitors and increase profitability. No leader will perfectly tend to results and people. But understanding the importance of both often leads to organizational success. When Tyler agreed to explore this, he found himself inspired in new ways. He dove into the challenge of defining how to demonstrate care for his people while simultaneously holding them to a high bar. It’s not easy. But as the leaders we’ve worked with have found, it’s much more fulfilling to drive results together with their team, rather than at their expense and well-being. View the full article

Branded is a weekly column devoted to the intersection of marketing, business, design, and culture. While it’s not clear what President Trump’s ever-shifting tariffs attack on Canada might ultimately achieve, it has already done one thing for certain: ticked off a lot of Canadians. That’s taken the form of anti-Trump and anti-American sentiment (including the booing of the U.S. national anthem before various sporting events being played in Canada). But it’s also taken the form of renewed Canadian pride—as witnessed by a reported spike in buying, and flying, Canadian flags. Naturally, official symbols of Canadianism aren’t the only option for expressing devotion to the Great White North: Consumer brands are a big part of that conversation, too. Last month, during the reprieve between Trump’s initial threat and the 25% tariff on Canadian imports kicking in Tuesday (which Trump already paused again on Thursday), a survey of Canadian consumers found 85% said that they planned to replace some or all of the U.S.-made products on their shopping lists. (Interestingly, 41% said they would avoid shopping on Amazon.) And now, it seems, many are acting on that pledge. On Reddit and other online forums, fans of Canada-based consumer-goods companies have gathered to tout brands in seemingly every conceivable category—from Hawkins Cheezies snacks (“I can’t believe anyone would eat a Cheeto if they had the option of Hawkins Cheezies,” one fan enthused), Cove carbonated drinks as an alternative to American sodas, Stanfield’s underwear (founded in 1856, it bills itself as “Canadian even before Canada”), hipster-luxury denim brand Naked & Famous and Heartbeat Hot Sauce (“On Hot Ones many times,” a Redditor says) to Boo Bamboo personal-care products made with organic bamboo extract. A “Look for the Leaf” sign near the checkout counter of a store in Toronto, March 4, 2025, guides shoppers to look for maple leaf labels, which mark made-in-Canada items. [Photo: Michelle Mengsu Chang/Toronto Star/Getty Images] A slew of roundups and listicles have followed, showering attention on a range of Canadian brands. The Toronto Star, to pick one example, published a “How to buy Canadian” primer, which recommends Savör eggs, GoodLeaf Farms produce, and Royale toilet paper and tissues. “Look for [dairy] products with the Blue Cow logo,” the paper advised, “which means they’re made with 100% Canadian milk and ingredients.” There’s also a website, Made in CA, that compiles Canadian goods. Canadian grocer Loblaw’s CEO Per Bank has been posting on LinkedIn about its tariffs experience, noting that weekly sales of Canadian products were up by double digits in mid-February, and recently announcing the rollout of new in-store-display features to guide shoppers to Canadian wares. The combined desire to boycott American goods and support Canadian alternatives is, in some cases, clouded by intertwined global markets that have developed over decades of free-trade boosterism. “People are directly writing into customer service asking detailed questions on whether [products] are Canadian, where they source from,” and so forth, the CEO of Vancouver-based “superfood latte” brand Blume told Modern Retail. (Blume has been playing up its Canadianism on its site and social media lately.) But that consumer challenge is creating its own market: Several new apps with names like Buy Beaver and Maple Scan promise to reveal how Canadian a product is—where it’s made, what it’s made of, etc.—by scanning its barcode. That said, there are plenty of symbolic gestures, too, like rebranding caffe Americano as “Canadiano.” And there have been more directly punitive responses including canceling U.S. vacations and pulling American brands from Canadian liquor stores (a move the maker of Louisville, Kentucky-based Jack Daniels calls “worse” than a tariff), along with retaliatory tariffs on many American imports. The underlying sentiment isn’t a matter of wonky economics; it’s emotional and visceral, based on a belief among many that the tariffs have nothing to do with border-security demands (as claimed) but are a blunt attempt to damage Canada’s economy, and ultimately absorb the 158-year-old nation. (Trump has derisively referred to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “governor.”) If Canadians are acting like they’ve been betrayed by an old friend, they have good reason to feel that way. Hours after the tariffs went into effect, CTV News interviewed several Canadian-citizen shoppers who sounded determined to defy any trade strong-arming and indeed take it as motivation to seek out Canadian-made alternatives they’d ignored or overlooked in the past. “I think we should really cut them off,” said one Halifax resident, speaking of American brands, “and we should stay [buying] 100% Canadian.” Of course, that also could mean ultimately punishing brands from other countries that have nothing to do with the U.S. tariffs. But at least one American export appears to be catching on in Canada thanks to this trade flare-up: economic nationalism. View the full article

Have you seen the new Volvo ad made with generative artificial intelligence? Go ahead. Watch it. . . . I’ll wait. If you think it looks awful, you’re not alone. The physics are all wrong, with hair, sand, and objects going in the wrong direction at the wrong time. The humans look like they’re made of plastic. Their emotions are forced, their expressions deformed, their smiles anything but warm. Instead, they likely fill you with an uncanny Grand Canyon of dread. The lighting is artificial, too—no film, digital camera, or grading would produce that unnatural palette. Some people are saying that Volvo made a mistake by not putting a car in the ad, obviously not realizing that currently there’s no video generator that can reliably re-create objects. Had the ad’s creators tried to produce a Volvo, they’d have ended up with a car with morphing proportions and features that change from shot to shot. The ad was made with Midjourney, which is pretty bad, but Sora, Kling, or Luma would have screwed it up too. And while apparently it is fine to create uncanny humans for promotional purposes, I’m pretty sure that the Swedish car company wouldn’t have accepted a Frankenvolvo. [Image: Volvo Cars KSA]According to Adweek, who spoke to Lion, the Dubai-based creative agency behind the spot, the ad is an effort to reintroduce Volvo to Saudi Arabia after years of pulling back on business in the region. Lion’s founder and executive creative director, Osama Saddiq, told the publication: “The ad is a mélange of ‘technically accurate and culturally resonant renders for Saudi Arabia. AI today is rarely humanized—most executions are tactical, with little focus on brand storytelling. Our approach was different. We started by crafting a narrative that strategically aligned with Volvo’s comeback in the region.” The issue, of course, is that nothing in the ad feels human, mammalian, or even protozoan. [Image: Volvo Cars KSA]According to Lion, using AI reduced production timelines from “months to weeks.” That might be enough to sell a business on the technology. And sure, there’s a place for AI in current production, but generating entire ads is not it—at least not yet. We’ve seen this exact issue time and time again with brands that use technology for technology’s sake. From Coca-Cola to Toys “R” Us, brands that use emerging technology as a shorthand for creative innovation usually come to regret it. [Image: Volvo Cars KSA]I’m sure some people will protest this ad for its ethical considerations; because they don’t like the idea of AI putting people in the creative and film industries out of a job. That’s a real concern. But the reason this ad shouldn’t exist is simpler than that: It just looks bad. So here’s a piece of advice for ad creators out there: It’s time to forget about AI for a few years. Come back to it when it’s ready, and when you have a good idea for how to actually use it. View the full article

Stanley Druckenmiller has spent years quietly running his family office. Now one protégé is Treasury secretary and another is vying for Fed chairView the full article

Shop around for a new car and you’ll come across an array of acronyms. There’s BEVs (battery electric vehicles), HEVs (hybrid electric vehicles), PHEVs (plug-in hybrid electric vehicles), and of course that’s all in contrast to ICE (internal combustion engine) cars. Soon, American shoppers could see another option on dealership floors: EREVs, or extended-range electric vehicles. EREVs are like a cross between a gas car and an electric vehicle, but different from a hybrid. The technology has been around for years and has seen success in China. Now, automakers across Europe and the United States are showing interest in the technology, hoping it can help more people transition away from gas cars—as long as it doesn’t cause more customer confusion. EREV vs hybrids An extended-range electric vehicle has an electric motor that uses energy from a battery. But it also has an internal combustion engine that kicks in to generate electricity when the battery loses its charge. EREVs can be plugged into any EV charger—even fast chargers, which take between 20 minutes to an hour to get an EV battery to 80%. That’s different from hybrids in a few ways. Hybrid cars also have a gas engine and an electric motor, but the gas engine directly powers the wheels when driving at higher speeds. HEVs also rely on regenerative braking to recharge the battery, and are never plugged in to charge. Plug-in hybrids have a bigger battery and, as their name says, can be plugged in to charge—but most aren’t compatible with fast chargers, and tend to charge more slowly. The Mazda EZ-6 [Photo: Mazda] EREVs then are even more of a middle ground between an electric vehicle and a gas car. The technology can extend a car’s range, alleviating that range anxiety that still plagues consumers. The Mazda EZ-6, an EREV currently available in China, boasts a total range of more than 800 miles with both its battery and gas engine, for example. But because they don’t solely rely on EV charging, they can also ease charging stress, especially in places that still don’t have enough EV chargers. EREVS aren’t new—but do consumers want them? EREVs have been available in China for years, and sales there have been picking up speed. EV sales are strong in China in general—Chinese brands account for more than three-quarters of global EV sales—and technological advancements have made EVs there ultra affordable. EREV sales more than doubled in China over the prior year, Bloomberg reported in August 2024, accounting for 30% of the country’s plug-in hybrid sales. But EREVs aren’t even that new to the U.S., says Patrick Hertzke, a partner at McKinsey & Company who focuses on the EV and automotive sector. The technology was in GM’s Chevy Volt and the Cadillac ELR, though production on those vehicles ended in February 2019 and February 2016, respectively. (The Cadillac ELR saw low sales of just over 3,000 units.) A Chevy Volt [Photo: jetcityimage/Getty Images] No EREVs are currently for sale stateside—but the concept is coming back. Ram has an EREV model in the works, as does Scout Motors, and Ford has hinted at looking into the tech. EREVs are still months or years away for U.S. customers, but the technology is taking hold as automakers look to amid concerns of charging stress and range anxiety, while also capitalizing on lower battery prices. “You have an ability to find this different blend that could be interesting to some consumers,” Hertzke says. McKinsey surveyed more than 2,000 U.S. drivers about EREVs, and whether they’d be likely to choose one, in late 2024. First, the survey asked what vehicle drivers would be interested in buying next, without listing EREVs as an option. To that, 44% of respondents said they’d pick a gas car, while 27% said a hybrid, 17% a full battery EV, and 10% a plug-in hybrid. When they asked again and added EREVs to the list, and explained that they’d get a combined range of 400 to 500 miles, 18% said they’d pick an EREV. And it wasn’t just people interested in full battery EVs that switched over. “[EREVs] stole share from all the others,” Hertzke says; the amount of people picking a gas car dropped by 6 points, hybrids by 7, and full battery EVs by 4. “It was really across the board exciting consumers as something new that might fit their lifestyle.” EREV confusion But getting consumers excited about EREVs means making sure they understand what they are, and that could be a challenge. Consumers are already inundated with multiple terms and lots of EV info, and so automakers need to clarify the differences with EREVs. Adding to that challenge is the fact that carmakers might brand their extended range options differently. “Some are saying EREV, some are saying REEV. Some are calling them super hybrids, some are going to call them hyper hybrids,” Hertzke says. Companies will have to make a decision about whether to brand these cars their own way or try to use an industry term. When talking to automaker clients, Hertzke says this is a big question they have about EREVs: “How do we communicate this appropriately to consumers and with our dealers, which are also now going to be inundated with more choice and more complexity?” Carmakers also have to figure out how to price these new models. Because they would use a smaller battery, the vehicles could potentially cost less than a full EV but more than a gas car. That could help entice more buyers, especially since EREVs could offer benefits that hybrid and gas cars don’t, like bidirectional charging. But automakers have been losing money on full battery EV sales, and so they may end up pricing EREVs a bit higher than necessary, as a way to make up some of those losses. “It’ll be very interesting to see how they’re positioned, how they’re priced, how they’re communicated to consumers, and that’s one of the hottest debates raging at automakers today,” Hertzke says. What U.S. automakers are doing next U.S. automakers are already working on rolling out some EREV options. Ram may be the closest; its 1500 Ramcharger is an EREV truck (though the Ram site calls it a “range-extended electric truck) expected in 2025. It’ll come with a range of 690 miles—higher than the current F150 Lightning range that tops out around 320 miles. Ford is also reportedly working on the technology for EREVs, though the company wouldn’t “speculate” about future products to Fast Company. A spokesperson noted that the brand has said that EREVs and other technologies “have the potential to offer more” when it comes to choices for customers. (Ford CEO Jim Farley has been vocal about driving—and loving—the Xiaomi SU7, a Chinese EV, and though that isn’t an EREV, Xiaomi has been working on such options, including an EREV SUV.) Scout Motors, a U.S. offshoot of Volkswagen, is also working on an extended range electric truck, called the Terra, as well as an SUV (both with a range of 500 miles), though neither are expected until 2027. “We fully expect we’re going to see more [EREV] models in the U.S. and in Europe [in the next two to three years], and we’re going to see more auto brands adopt these,” he says. “It’s going to create some pretty exciting new products. And we do expect to see consumers pretty interested in these once they understand them over time.” View the full article

How are the world’s most creative people using AI to drive their work forward? This was the question at the heart of an in-depth survey Fast Company recently conducted in partnership with Whalar, a leading social agency focused on content creators. We found that, for most, AI has become a routine part of the creative process—and a return to an AI-free working life has become almost unfathomable. Yet the survey also found the world’s creative elite are grappling with a technology that gets more powerful and useful every day but remains unwieldy, error-prone, and not entirely trustworthy. “I want people to understand how well it can augment and enhance the thinking process—not just the creative and generative thinking process, but the thinking process itself,” said one respondent. “If AI is used responsibly, it’s a wonderful collaborative partner and needn’t be feared.” We sent the detailed (anonymous) survey to a diverse cohort of people who have been honored in Fast Company’s “Most Creative People in Business” list over the years, plus a selection of independent content creators, and got 100 responses. The result offers a close look at how the world’s leading creatives are using this revolutionary technology to shape the future of their industries and the wider world. “The internet first revolutionized the playing field by democratizing publishing and audience access,” says Neil Waller, co-CEO of the Whalar Group. “Now, AI is creating the next massive rebalancing, this time in creative production capability. What excites me most is watching creators, who are inherently nimble and unburdened by legacy systems, adopt AI tools with remarkable speed. ” EARLY AND ENTHUSIASTIC ADOPTERS First, here are some key stats on the respondents: Forty-seven percent of those who responded were founders, partners, or principals of their companies, and 65% were 10 C-suite or higher. The top industries were tech (22%), design (16%), and entertainment (14%), and substantial numbers came from healthcare, science and research, and the nonprofit sector. The size of their organizations ranged from global behemoths to solo creators. Twenty-two percent of respondents booked more than $1 billion in revenue in 2024. Twenty percent did less than $1 million. Unsurprisingly, these folks are not new to AI, for the most part. More than a third (39%) have been aware of AI usage in their industry for more than five years, and 19% began using it themselves that long ago. Another third (30%) began using the technology two to three years ago, a timeframe that aligns with the arrival of ChatGPT in November 2022. “Eighty-three percent have incorporated AI into their creative process, and nearly half (48%) rely on it for most or all of their projects. “I absolutely use it every single day—probably five times a day or more,” says Joel Bervell, a med-school student and popular influencer known on TikTok and Instagram as the Medical Mythbuster. Text-based software still dominates usage. Three quarters (74%) of the respondents use AI primarily to generate or manipulate words, with only 26% saying they mainly use it for still images or video. “Whenever I use AI for writing, I make sure to make it my own,” says Amy Merrill, an artist, musician, web designer, and founder of Plan C Pills, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving abortion access nationwide. “But sometimes my tired and overstretched brain needs help synthesizing, and I’m grateful for the tool to be able to take a heady, complex question or issue and compress it into a more or less understandable response that I can adapt, correct, personalize, and use. Sometimes it feels like it saves me time in the clumsy human part, while allowing me to preserve the thought leadership part.” WHICH TOOLS ARE MOST POPULAR? OpenAI’s ChatGPT continues to dominate the LLM market, with 69% citing it as their go-to app, followed by Google’s Gemini (28%), Anthropic’s Claude (19%), and Microsoft’s Copilot (18%). Google leads in AI search, but it’s far less dominant than in traditional search. While well over half of respondents (57%) say they primarily use Google’s AI summaries, 14% cited Perplexity and 7% Microsoft’s Bing. Twenty-eight percent said they don’t use AI search at all. (For those tallying up the numbers, respondents could select more than one answer.) On the image side, Midjourney came out on top at 28%, followed by Adobe Firefly at 19% and OpenAI’s DALL-E at 16%. “We use Midjourney to create posters for our shows,” says Plan C Pills’ Merrill. “We love the experience of prompting and feeding in inspiration, and in return getting something we never would’ve thought of.” Fashion designer Arturo Obegero recently collaborated with an artist to create an ad campaign featuring real models against an AI-generated backdrop. “We never would have been able to afford that shoot [IRL],” he says. In that vein, notes Waller of Whalar, “a creator with passion, vision, and an AI tool kit can now produce content that previously required a 20-person team and a seven-figure budget.” Although AI generally saves time and money, it’s not always smooth sailing. “While the AI tools helped generate images quickly, it can be a real struggle to get results that meet our standards,” said one respondent, articulating a theme that came up repeatedly in the anonymous responses. “We have spent many hours sifting through hundreds of generated images that more or less looked similar. It’s [often not] until we manually create more specific visual inputs such as sketches or quick 3D models/ screenshots that we’re able to direct the images to be more specific and distinctive and reflect our aesthetics and design principles.” Despite AI’s growing role in image creation, video tools have yet to see widespread adoption outside industries that rely on them, with 76% of respondents saying they don’t use them at all. Of those who do, Adobe Premiere Pro was the most popular application (15%), followed by Runway (5%), and Synthesia (3%). Among respondents who use AI to help write code, ChatGPT was most popular at 25%, Github Coplit was second at 10%, and Claude third at 8%. WHERE AI IS HELPING THE MOST (AND THE LEAST) We asked respondents how AI is affecting their creative work and overall business. A plurality of respondents praised production speed (44% “very positive”) and idea generation (35%), with marketing/promotion (25%) and revenue generation (25%) tying for third. Production speed and idea generation go hand in hand. Many respondents noted that AI allows them to focus on creative ideation by automating tedious tasks and enabling rapid iteration without the need for physical prototypes. “This dual transformation—amplifying creative potential while streamlining business operations—is why AI represents such a profound accelerator for the creator economy,” says Waller. “When harnessed the right way, it’s not replacing the creator’s voice. It’s supercharging it, and unlocking the next chapter of growth.” On the flip side, there were grave and consistent concerns about consumer trust. “My greatest fear is not about creativity,” said one respondent. “My greatest fear is that we are entering a dystopian era when people will lose trust in what they see and hear.” “I now doubt every video I see on the internet,” said another. “Everything is no longer a ‘wow’ video since it could possibly be AI.” We also asked for respondents’ views on how AI will affect the job market in their industries. Surprisingly, 39% said it would have neither a positive or a negative impact on job creation, and 34% said it would have a “somewhat positive” or “very positive” impact. Only 28% predicted the impact would be “somewhat negative” or “very negative” impact. But when asked to predict how many jobs in their industry would be replaced by AI, 42% replied that about a fifth of all jobs would be lost to machines. THE PARADOX OF AI That apparent contradiction reflects a macro theme that infused the survey results in a variety of ways: a sense that we are living through a technological shift that is existentially game-changing but ultimately still nascent. Think of it like a young and immensely talented athlete: The potential is indisputable and crystal clear, but the coordination and mastery just aren’t there yet. “It fails all the time in code, but I just test and ask for revisions,” said one respondent. “I used it to help prep me for a business meeting,” said another. “The client company had just emerged from Chapter 11, and ChatGPT didn’t think to mention that little fact.” Overall, though, most respondents took the rise of AI as an inevitable and ultimately positive thing that nevertheless requires human will to control. “Are you gonna let AI take over you,” asks Joel Bervell, the Medical Mythbuster, “or are you gonna let it enhance your work?” In that spirit of optimism, we’ll close with the most utopian anonymous comment in the entire survey: “I truly believe we are unlocking new insights into information, understanding, creativity and human potential, including our growing ability to understand the ecosystem we live in and the vast potential to coexist with each other and everything else in it. Let’s do this!!” View the full article

Gen Z isn’t “quiet quitting”—they’re rejecting outdated leadership. That’s the conversation my recent Fast Company article sparked, and the response has been overwhelming. Leaders, managers, and employees from across industries have reached out, confirming what many of us have seen firsthand. Workplace culture is changing fast, and leadership needs to evolve with it. But as the dust settles on this conversation, I’ve been thinking about a different question: If leadership needs to evolve, what role does Gen Z play in shaping the change they want? It’s easy to say leadership is broken—and in many cases, it is. But just as bad leadership creates disengaged employees, disengaged employees can reinforce bad leadership. And while Gen Z is demanding more fairness, structure, and transparency from their workplaces, the truth is: building better leadership isn’t just a job for managers. Gen Z is in a unique position in the workforce. They’re the first generation that’ll work alongside more generations than any before them, whether that’s boomers delaying retirement, or Gen X, millennials, and even the generation coming up behind them. This isn’t just a leadership shift—it’s a multigenerational workplace shift. That means creating better workplaces will require something more than just rejecting old models—it will require bravery, self-advocacy, and a willingness to collaborate across generations. Past generations have valuable knowledge, hard-earned experience, and different perspectives that can help Gen Z navigate the workforce—if they engage with them. If Gen Z wants a different kind of workplace, they also have to play an active role in creating it. Here’s how. 1. Know the difference between bad leadership and imperfect leadership There’s a big difference between a truly toxic work environment and a flawed or frustrating one. Not every manager is a bad leader—many are undertrained, overwhelmed, or trying to adapt to the same changing workplace dynamics as everyone else. Instead of assuming leadership is the enemy, Gen Z employees can look for opportunities to bridge the gap. If they’re not sure about what the company expects, they should ask their manager. If they get inconsistent feedback, perhaps it’s worth requesting regular check-ins. When they wait for leadership to be “perfect” before engaging with it, it sets everyone up for failure. Ask yourself: Am I giving leadership the same patience I want them to give me? 2. Find common ground across generations Many credit Gen Z with bringing work-life balance back into the conversation. That’s a good thing. But sometimes, the conversation confuses balance with disengagement. Healthy boundaries mean knowing your limits and advocating for yourself. But they don’t mean withdrawing from conversations that can actually improve workplace culture. If you’re frustrated by leadership, speak up constructively and respectfully. If you see a manager is struggling, offer feedback or solutions. Employees that cocreate workplaces result in better cultures than companies that try to dictate their culture in a top-down manner. At the same time, finding common ground with older generations can make workplace relationships stronger. It’s easy to assume boomers and Gen Z have nothing in common, but that’s not always the case. Remember, bridging the gap doesn’t mean ignoring generational differences—it means looking for shared values and experiences. Ask yourself: Am I setting boundaries—or just checking out? Am I looking for ways to build connections across generations, or assuming those gaps are too big to close? 3. Be part of the solution, not just the critique A lot of companies don’t get Gen Z—there’s no denying that. But change doesn’t happen just by pointing out what’s wrong. The best way to shape workplace culture is to lead by example. Want more transparency? Be transparent in your own work. Want stronger communication? Initiate conversations and share ideas. Want a culture of fairness? Look for ways to support your colleagues, not just yourself. This is especially true in a multigenerational workplace. Each generation brings something to the table—and bridging that gap will require curiosity, mutual respect, and a willingness to learn from those who came before. The future of leadership is collaborative Yes, leadership needs to evolve. But Gen Z isn’t just the future of the workforce—they’re the future of leadership. And leadership isn’t something that just happens at the top. It happens every time someone takes initiative, creates clarity, or builds trust in the workplace. Leaders will not be the only ones building the workplace of the future. Teams, employees and managers need to work together if they want to create something better. That’s the real challenge—and the real opportunity. Is Gen Z ready to lead the change they want to see? View the full article

A new book on venture capital and private equity explores how those two forces have helped push homeownership further out of reach for millions of Americans. And the author believes that amid the deregulation and job cuts of the second Trump administration—staffing at the Department of Housing and Urban Development may be cut in half—consumers are even more likely to get a bad deal. “They’re playing with fire,” says civic technologist Catherine Bracy. “It’s catastrophic on a scale that I don’t have words for. What that means for the rental and mortgage market . . . it could put 2008 to shame.” In Bracy’s new book, World Eaters, she traces how venture capital and private equity came to be, how they impact the health of our economy and the labor market, and how they exacerbate inequity and the housing crisis. She chose that title because she believes the approach of venture capital—a sort of casino mentality, where big bets are encouraged despite the risks—is subsuming the economy, “eating industries and infecting the mindset of how people think about what the economy should be.” Bracy, who cofounded the nonprofit advocacy group TechEquity in 2016, has long pushed for more consumer protections and better transparency around tech business models. World Eaters traces how post-Great Recession opportunities allowed tech and VC money to get into the single-family rental home market and begin building out new housing products, including fractionalized ownership and rent-to-own pathways. These models have had mixed results. Fractionalized ownership firms like Landa have gotten into legal trouble, while Divvy, the massive rent-to-own company was subject to significant consumer complaints; it has been sold, with much of its staff laid off earlier this year. Bracy has a warning about how technology may further impact the housing market during the Trump administration. “Housing is the cornerstone of a normal person’s economic well being, so when you start to undermine consumer protections, when you start to . . . allow corporations to do whatever they want to do, that’s only going to be worse for consumers,” she said. How Property Tech Can Pressure Aspiring Homeowners Bracy argues that in many cases, property tech, or proptech, firms have presented themselves as companies seeking to help consumers who don’t traditionally qualify for homeownership. But Bracy argues, there’s a reason these customers were deemed too risky for traditional financial products, and perhaps they shouldn’t be placed in a position where they’re trying out untested or unregulated ideas. She believes the housing market is entering an even more unregulated phase that will allow a larger variety of tech firms to push new products and services; many consumer regulators with AI and tech experience have been let go from the federal government, and new federal guidance seeks to encourage alternative financing arrangements. “Even with the assumption that the government was there to provide consumer protections or civil rights protections [before this administration], there was still a feeling it was ripe for mass exploitation,” she said. “Now there’s none of that, and there will be more desperate people, so you’re increasing the market size.” Venture capital in real estate startups was basically nonexistent in 2008, Bracy notes, but by 2017, the market globally had grown to $9 billion, demonstrating the impact that these funding models and firms had on the market. She argues that while a number of issues, like zoning and construction costs, contribute to high housing costs, the VC models that have made single-family rental housing a large and growing asset class are exacerbating the problem. Bracy’s coverage of the housing market in World Eaters pays particular attention to a new generation of firms utilizing cryptocurrency and blockchain, such as LoftyAI. (Lofty didn’t respond to attempts to reach it for an interview.) Many focus on the idea of fractionalized ownership, and utilizing this technology to split the cost of ownership among many and make it easier to be a real estate investor, theoretically democratizing access. But Bracy argues that consumers often don’t understand the risks of their investments, and unwieldy ownership and operations mean the tenants living in these investments can suffer from nonresponsive landlords. She’s particularly alarmed at the legal grey area these firms reside in—there’s no real precedent in real estate securities law. That’s compounded by the fact that Trump has repeatedly professed his support for crypto, including a recent plan to create a national crypto reserve. “I would watch the crypto in the housing space,” Bracy said. “These models are terrifying, and they’re only going to get easier to build, scale, and replicate.” View the full article

Management at the Bay Area transportation startup Glydways wants you to be clear about what the company is not: It may plan to move people in futuristic autonomous pods, but it’s not hyperloop-grade vaporware. And its funding by big-name Silicon Valley investors does not make it a ride for the 1%. “Public transit for everyone, everywhere,” says founder Mark Seeger. But Glydways is starting smaller than that. Its first green-lit project (after a temporary test track now under construction next to an abandoned mall in Richmond, Calif.) and others under consideration by local governments will have Glydways’s four-seat electric vehicles plying short on-demand routes between existing business and transportation hubs. [Image: Glydways]That debut pilot effort—a half-mile route linking a convention center and arena to the last stop on a people mover outside Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport—is on a small enough scale to evoke the Vegas Loop that Elon Musk’s Boring Company opened as a shortcut between three of the halls of the Las Vegas Convention Center. “We want to see how well the system operates with various fluctuations of riders showing its ability to scale and that it is indeed a viable transit option,” says Krystal Harris, program director for ATL Airport Community Improvement Districts. After two years of free-fare service, that agency and the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority will assess how things worked and if the technology merits expansion. Putting a cap on capexThe $18 million in construction and operational costs that Harris cited may seem steep for such a short distance, but not in the context of U.S. transit construction expenses that have made the country exceptional in the wrong way. For example, the $3 billion Silver Line extension that Washington’s Metro system opened to Washington Dulles International Airport and beyond in late 2022 cost $263 million a mile, including a large rail yard built by the airport. That, however, looks like an outright steal next to other U.S. rail projects, topped by the Long Island Rail Road’s East Side Access project in New York and its $3.5 billion a mile expense. Glydways, meanwhile, touts a design for simple, narrow guideways that require neither rails nor electric power via overhead wires or third rails that it says will cost 90% less than traditional transit. [Image: Glydways]“We can do it for tens of millions,” Glydways CEO Gokul Hemmady says, adding that at-grade costs could run still lower at just $2 to $3 million per mile while elevated paths needed to avoid grade crossings could run $15 million a mile. “The moment you’re in pedestrian-class infrastructure, your costs plummet,” he says. “The world knows how to build this.” Construction costs of some recent U.S. cyclist and pedestrian infrastructure fall roughly into that minor-league ballpark. A trail being built along the SMART commuter-rail line in Sonoma and Marin counties in California has run about $4 million a mile. Two bridges on the Washington & Old Dominion Trail constructed over wide roads in Arlington and Fairfax counties in Virginia had project costs around $30 million a mile. But a veteran transit consultant who has led projects in North America, Europe, and Australia and New Zealand warned against expense extrapolation. Writes Jarrett Walker: “They will have to build out a demo project before we know.” No human operators, some operating costsThe operational part of the Glydways pitch involves leveraging autonomous-vehicle advances to provide high-frequency, on-demand service around the clock at fares not that far above traditional transit—with the ability to transport 10,000 people an hour. “We offer ride-hailing-like experience at a fraction of the cost,” says Hemmady. Pressed for an example, he cites the Oakland Airport Connector, an automated, elevated train that runs between that airport and Bay Area Rapid Transit’s Oakland Coliseum station for a one-way fare of $7.45. But while those fares covered 96% of the connector’s operating costs pre-pandemic, Hemmady says Glydways’s lower costs—30% of other modes of transit, the company says—will let it clear a profit: “We are the only mass transit system that is revenue positive.” A Glydways vehicle shown off at CES 2025 was all shiny modernity, with a streamlined exterior hiding camera, lidar and radar sensors, and large doors that slid open to reveal a clean plastic interior with tap-to-pay terminals by those doors. The closest visual parallel: the pod-like Zoox robotaxis now rolling around Vegas in test drives. The lack of human operators or attendants has led some critics to raise safety concerns, but Glydways emphasizes that short waits at stations and the limited number of passengers per vehicle will keep it safe. [Animation: Glydways]Older, almost as small-scale “personal rapid transit” systems built on older autonomous technology—such as one that runs between campuses of West Virginia University in Morgantown, W. Va.—have operated without incident for decades. Larger automated-train systems rely on a combination of surveillance and patrolling. For example, Vancouver’s SkyTrain equips its driverless trains with emergency intercom systems and contact systems while having attendants and transit police at stations. Next stopsAfter the Atlanta pilot, Glydways has advanced to final stages of consideration in a San Jose project to link that city’s Caltrain and Amtrak train station with San José Mineta International Airport—a 3.4 mile route that Google Maps estimates as a seven-minute drive but a 40-plus-minute transit adventure. Glydways says it can build that mostly elevated route, with its vehicles taking eight minutes between the station and the airport, for under the city’s $500 million cost cap but isn’t specifying a cost estimate. The city council should be voting on its proposal, which allows for possible extensions to such nearby traffic generators as Apple’s headquarters, in the coming weeks. [Image: Glydways]This company has a comparable plan not far north of San Jose in Contra Costa County, where it’s pitched its technology as an automated transit network to provide transportation from train stations to nearby destinations. And in the Los Angeles suburb of Ontario, Glydways has advanced a proposal to use its vehicles in a tunnel to connect Ontario International Airport with the closest Metrolink commuter-rail station. The Boring Company had earlier offered a version of the Vegas Loop concept but abandoned that bid in 2022. Glydways’s proposition of robotic transportation has the advantage of not having to coexist with human-driven traffic like robotaxis like Waymo. And the company has the advantage of funding from such deep-pocketed investors as the VC firm Khosla Ventures and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. But in the realm of transit, self-driving technology isn’t something Glydways invented, and many transit agencies outside the U.S. already employ it on higher-capacity subway and light-rail lines. And as autonomous mobility continues to advance on public roads, Walker suggests that established transit operators will be able to make better use of it than any startup that has to pour new concrete—even if the technology goes into something as unfancy as buses. Says Walker: “If driverless technology becomes available, debugged, and socially accepted, there will be all kinds of applications, including much bigger-vehicle services that will be a better use of scarce space in dense cities.” View the full article

Over the past year, a growing number of corporate employers have shown signs of backing away from diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in the workplace, amid mounting social pressures and the risk of litigation from right-wing activists. President Trump’s recent executive orders—which explicitly threaten legal action against the private sector over “illegal DEI” practices—have only exacerbated those concerns, leading companies to take more forceful action or, at a minimum, reevaluate their diversity programs. In a report released today by the research insights firm Gravity Research, nearly three-quarters of corporate executives claim that potential federal investigations into corporate DEI have been keeping them “up at night.” This sentiment was nearly universal across the finance sector, with 95% of leaders expressing those concerns—in line with reports that Wall Street firms have pared back their DEI initiatives over the last year. “When we actually talk to our clients, there’s a lot of question marks around: ‘I thought we were legally compliant,’” says Gravity Research president Luke Hartig, noting that the group of employers surveyed includes Fortune 500 companies. “We don’t have a clear answer to that question just yet. However, the fact that 74% said that they fear federal investigations tells us that it’s at least creating a sense of fear and anxiety among these large companies, even if we’re still uncertain as to exactly how far this can go.” The report also captures how many companies have responded to the executive orders and anti-DEI movement, with 64% saying they were redefining or rebranding their DEI functions—a common shift among employers that have altered their DEI programs recently. Many companies reported altering their public messaging on DEI: In 2025 alone, 66% of companies say they have cut back on the use of DEI terminology in their external communications. That can mean curtailing mentions of “equity” or the acronym DEI, opting instead for terms like “inclusion” and “belonging,” which might be less loaded. “We know terminology matters, but the work is more important,” one executive explained as part of the survey. “We are striving to communicate in a way that won’t attract undue attention so we can protect the work versus having to defend the work with external actors.” And yet, many companies are still worried about how their workers may react to these changes, with 60% of respondents saying they expected to see employees mobilize on political or social issues. In fact, the majority of respondents said they were “feeling pressure to make an internal statement reaffirming their commitment to inclusion and belonging,” according to Hartig, though only 28% have actually done so. Despite all the pushback to corporate DEI—and the changes that have already been made at a number of companies—most of them are still not entirely culling their ranks. Gravity Research found that most employers were not eliminating C-suite DEI roles, though certain sectors were more likely to do so; this shift was especially evident in the consumer staples sector, where 20% of employers had made changes to C-suite DEI positions. Even prior to Trump’s executive orders, however, consumer companies and retailers have been particularly vulnerable to the DEI backlash, as evidenced by the response to conservative activist Robby Starbuck’s social media campaigns over the last year. “When [we] talk to the chief diversity officer community, we definitely hear a lot of anxiety about the future of DEI-dedicated functions within companies,” Hartig says. “But certainly the research shows that they are not getting rid of it all together.” As Fast Company has reported, plenty of companies have continued to stand their ground on DEI or have made minimal changes to protect against potential legal risks. That much is also clear from the report, which indicates that 80% of companies are “actively monitoring” anti-DEI laws and legal challenges, rather than taking immediate action. While a good share of employers have adopted semantic changes, their approach has been more conservative as it relates to cutting DEI programs. About half of respondents have revised DEI trainings, but few have taken more significant steps like cutting employee resource groups. That said, a sizable portion of employers (34%) are now reconsidering their participation in the Human Rights Campaign’s annual survey measuring workplace inclusion for LGBTQ+ workers, which can be traced back to the anti-DEI campaign that Starbuck has waged across social media. Several major companies—including McDonald’s, Target, and Walmart—have already pulled out of the HRC survey in recent months. As Hartig points out, moves like this appear to be motivated more by social pressure than by legal consequences. Gravity Research has found that even companies that have yet to bow out of the survey are now more reticent to advertise their scores publicly—which many employers have long used to send a signal to LGBTQ+ workers. “At least from major companies, we’ve seen virtually no publicization of their HRC scores,” Hartig says. “This was something that companies previously touted and used as a sign of being an inclusive employer. Will that change as we get closer to Pride month? Will companies start to talk about that? Maybe. But it certainly reflects a broader movement from the corporate community.” View the full article

Project 2025 called for the privatization of all sorts of government agencies and services, and Elon Musk—who has been helping enact that plan—said this week that the U.S. should privatize Amtrak specifically, calling the national passenger rail service a “sad situation.” It’s not the first time Amtrak privatization has been suggested, or that the rail system has been criticized. Train travel in the U.S. is notoriously lacking: Huge regions of the country aren’t serviced by rail; trains are often delayed or have infrastructure issues; and tickets can be expensive, making driving or even flying more affordable for many people. But privatization wouldn’t solve those issues, experts say. Instead, it could add operational costs, deteriorate service, result in higher fairs, and still leave the system unprofitable. Musk’s interest in privatization is another example of the way he has tried to kill government-funded transportation to serve his own interests, notably his Hyperloop project, which undermined high-speed rail efforts in California. Musk’s conflicts of interest Musk and his so-called Department of Government Efficiency have taken unprecedented steps to shrink the federal government. While dismantling those services, Musk has also attempted to further his own companies, for example pushing his Starlink broadband product as a solution to outdated air-traffic control systems. Musk has also targeted agencies that specifically investigated or fined his companies. “[Musk] has some power and authority, it seems now, to sell off pieces of federal work and assets, but he also seems to have his hand out to get some of these contracts,” says Donald Cohen, director of In the Public Interest, a nonprofit research and advocacy group, and author of The Privatization of Everything: How the Plunder of Public Goods Transformed America and How We Can Fight Back. “Just because of that, he’s not the right voice to be listening to on how to make government better, because he’s clearly got some interest in getting his hands on multibillion-dollar contracts.” In a 2015 biography of Musk, author Ashlee Vance wrote that part of Musk’s motivations behind announcing the Hyperloop were to force the cancellation of California’s high-speed rail development. (Despite getting hundreds of millions of dollars in funding—even some from the 2021 infrastructure bill—the Hyperloop company shut down in 2023.) Musk has voiced animosity toward mass transit for years, instead sharing his preference for private cars. And he has an interest, of course, in selling Teslas. Privatized Amtrak: Higher costs, worse service, safety concerns Still, Musk isn’t the only one to suggest privatizing Amtrak; it’s been a conservative talking point for years. In 2003, urban planning expert Elliott Sclar wrote a report for the Economic Policy Institute in response to that faction, called Amtrak Privatization: The Route to Failure. “The passenger rail service is blamed for failing to show a profit,” he wrote. But this insistence that Amtrak should be profitable “is an effort to impose a highly selective business model on what is really a public service.” If Amtrak were privatized, it could actually mean fewer rail options for the country. A private model would likely eliminate rural routes with low ridership that don’t make as much money as more popular ones. (Amtrak’s state-sponsored routes, in contrast, don’t have profit goals because the states simply want to provide residents with ridership options.) Cohen points to the privatization of hospitals as an example of this effect: “Rural hospitals are closing because there aren’t enough patients,” he says. “The market is exactly the wrong place to put something if you want a rail transportation system that meets the needs of all of America.” Amtrak has a unique structure; technically it operates as a for-profit company, not a public authority, but the president appoints its board of directors and the federal government is its majority stockholder. It also gets funding from both federal and state sources depending on the type of route. Privatizing Amtrak wouldn’t necessarily make it cheaper to operate—which is true for any entity, as all the business expenses (executive compensation, shareholder returns, debt) would still be there, plus a private company would seek to maximize profits by cutting costs and charging more. That could happen by paying workers less, reducing staffing, or cutting corners that would affect safety. Employing fewer workers is a safety issue itself, because overworking a short staff can lead to fatigue and errors, an issue the freight rail industry has been dealing with in recent years. After cutting costs, a privatized Amtrak could also raise prices for consumers—either on tickets, or by adding extra charges for things like baggage. We’ve already seen private airlines take these steps, increasing baggage fees and charging other “junk fees” on top of base ticket prices. It’s also often more expensive to fly to a smaller town or “spoke city” than to a major airport hub, because—just like for rural rail lines—the demand for those routes isn’t as high. The privatization of British Rail is an example of these impacts, and is largely seen as a failure. Once state-owned, British Rail was privatized in the early 1990s by the right-wing Tory government. Afterward, one union report revealed that at least 1.5 billion pounds (nearly $2 million) “leaks out of Britain’s railways every year” because of its operating companies, subcontractors, or other costs; little of that is reinvested in the railway. For passengers, rail costs in Britain are almost 8% higher than they were before privatization. After privatization, British Rail also experienced notable safety issues, including four fatal accidents that led to 49 deaths. Britain has since reversed course, passing a bill in 2024 to renationalize its rail services. Privatizing Amtrak wouldn’t totally erase the need for federal transit funding, either. Brightline West, a private high-speed rail line in the works between Las Vegas and Rancho Cucamonga, California, once said that project would require “no capital or operating funding from the government.” But it’s since sought, and received, a $3 billion federal grant. If private companies took over Amtrak, they also wouldn’t have the right to operate on freight tracks, which own 97% of Amtrak’s route network. Amtrak has that right through federal statutes, but it’s not transferable to private companies. Amtrak is almost profitable—but that’s not the point Though Amtrak has never made a profit, its business has been growing. The rail service saw an all-time high ridership record in 2024, and has plans to double its ridership by 2040. “Amtrak’s business performance is strong. Ridership and revenue are at all-time highs, and transformative projects are underway that will greatly improve the customer experience,” a spokesperson told Fast Company. By maintaining this momentum, Amtrak says it’s “on track to reach operational profitability—for the first time in history—during this administration.” Privatizing Amtrak now could jeopardize that progress, Cohen says. But still, profitability isn’t the point, especially when you consider the benefit rail transportation provides. This goes back to the idea of Amtrak being a public service—even a public good. By Cohen’s definition, to be a public good a service shouldn’t be something we need individually, but rather something everyone needs, and something that we all benefit from having. Even if someone doesn’t have children, for example, public education benefits them because it’s in everyone’s interest to have an educated nation. The same argument could be made for transportation. Train travel options help prevent more car and air travel, which have disastrous environmental effects, and which come with other costs like traffic. Rail also helps people live in many different places, or be able to travel around for tourism. “For mobility, for transit, it’s in our interest for people to get to work,” Cohen says, “without polluting our environment.” View the full article

Healthcare.gov, the government health insurance marketplace website, launched in October 2013 only to buckle under the weight of just 2,000 simultaneous users. As millions of Americans stared at error messages and frozen screens, a political crisis unfolded, but so did a new era of government technology. The result was 18F, an in-house digital services consulting agency that brought Silicon Valley expertise to government, challenging decades of outdated procurement practices and introducing a radical new approach to building digital public services. Founded on March 19, 2014, by Presidential Innovation Fellows, 18F was housed within the Technology Transformation Services department of the General Services Administration, or GSA. The name 18F was derived from the address of GSA headquarters: 1800 F Street. On March 1, 2025, just a few weeks shy of 18F’s 11th anniversary, the Trump administration eliminated the agency and laid off its staff. As a researcher who studies public administration and technology, I have observed the transformational role 18F played in government digital services. The unit’s elimination raises the question of what the future of those services will look like. Impact of 18F 18F served a unique role as an in-house digital consultancy for the U.S. government, drawing on innovative strategies to improve public service through technology. Within 18F, teams consisting of designers, software engineers, strategists, and product managers worked together with federal, state, and local agencies to not only fix technical problems but to build, buy, and share technology that helped to modernize and improve the public’s experience with government services. Over nearly 11 years, 18F built an impressive portfolio of successful digital projects that transformed how people interact with the U.S. government. Even if the average person is unfamiliar with 18F, the odds are quite high that they have at least encountered one of its many products or services. For example, 18F supported the Internal Revenue Service in creating IRS Direct File, a free online tax filing tool that provides taxpayers with a simplified filing process. As of today, IRS Direct File is available in 25 states and is expected to serve 30 million eligible taxpayers during the 2025 tax filing season. 18F has been pivotal in modernizing and securing digital systems to help create more streamlined and secure user experiences for the public. For instance, Login.gov is a secure single sign-on platform that simplifies access to multiple government services for users. Perhaps the most notable of 18F’s modernization efforts that touches nearly every aspect of government today is the U.S. Web Design System. The comprehensive design system was developed in collaboration with the U.S. Digital Service in 2015. It helps support dozens of agencies and makes nearly 200 websites more accessible and responsive to user needs. How 18F worked What set 18F apart was its approach. Rather than spending years on giant information technology contracts that often failed to deliver, 18F championed agile development. Agile and lean methodologies have been popular in Silicon Valley startups and software companies for decades due to their flexibility and focus on rapid iteration. By applying agile development principles, 18F focused on breaking down large projects into manageable pieces with incremental improvements based on frequent user feedback. This approach allowed continuous adaptation spurred by user feedback and changing requirements while reducing risk. Another cornerstone of 18F’s innovative approach was its focus on user-centered design. By focusing on the needs of the people who actually used government services, 18F was able to go beyond merely satisfying technical requirements to design digital products that were more accessible and user-friendly. The idea was to understand the end users and the problems they encountered in order to effectively design products and solutions that addressed their needs. It also aimed to provide a consistent user experience and earn the users’ trust in the services. By prioritizing open-source development and collaboration, 18F also helped to make government IT more affordable. Making project code transparent meant that agencies could reuse the code and reduce the cost of duplicate development efforts across agencies and levels of government. 18F also had a hand in helping agencies develop their own technology capacity, whether by teaching them how to build software using open-source development and agile methodologies or by teaching agencies how to hire and oversee technology vendors themselves. This model was especially beneficial for state and local agencies following 18F’s expansion in 2016 to provide services to state and local government agencies that receive federal funding. End of an era The elimination of 18F marks the end of an era, raising concerns about both current and future technology projects. As of now, there does not appear to be a succession plan, leaving many federal agencies without ongoing support for their digital transformation efforts. Critics also argue that the loss of 18F means the loss of significant technical expertise within the government. These changes come at a time when agencies are experiencing substantial personnel shifts, rendering digital services potentially even more critical. As agencies brace for more personnel cuts, the public may need to rely more on digital services to fill the gap amid growing staffing shortages. Since the news was announced, current and former 18F team members as well as advocates of the unit have taken to social media platforms, including X, Bluesky, and LinkedIn, to share stories of its successes, honor its legacy, and share 18F resources. Kayla Schwoerer is an assistant professor of public administration & policy at the University at Albany, State University of New York. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. View the full article

President Donald Trump talks of big change in his second term of office. But he’s not forgetting small change, either. Trump ordered the Treasury Department to stop making pennies with a February 10 sentence on his social media account that followed years of conservatives pointing out that putting a copper-coated zinc disc in your pocket costs the government more than a cent—almost 4 cents today. Will Trump’s order make the penny disappear? There is no sign that the U.S. Mint will stop pressing pennies in Denver and Philadelphia, and Mint officials did not respond to requests for clarification this week. But the presidential penny pledge is already being felt in one niche world. It’s a little-known world that depends on buying pennies wholesale, loading them into machines and persuading parents to feed a few dollars into machines that stamp designs on the pennies—Paw Patrol, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles—as they are stretched between metal rollers at funfairs. Small orbits of collectors and craftsmen have developed around them. And without the penny, the whole thing faces an uncertain future. The last pennies? New copper pennies vanished from circulation in 1982—73 years after the first Lincoln penny was minted. They were replaced by coins of mostly zinc thinly coated with copper. The solid copper old ones were more pliable and easier to stamp, making them hot items for kids at funfairs. “They’ll clean ’em so when they elongate the dino or shark of the printed coin it maintains a ghost image of the printed head of Lincoln,” said Brian Peters, general manager of Minnesota-based Penny Press Machine Co. “Pre-1982 copper pennies, they bring those.” Jeweler Angelo Rosato worked for decades in the 1960s and ’70s hand-printing pennies with scenes of their New Milford, Connecticut, hometown and historical and sentimental scenes. Everything was obsessively cataloged, including more than 4,000 penny photographs. “We’re big fans of the penny. Keep the penny,” said Aaron Zablow of Roseland, New Jersey, who was with two of his sons at the American Dream mall. “I like the pennies,” his 9-year-old son Mason said. Some don’t want the U.S. to stop making cents Critics say the rise of electronic commerce and the billions of pennies in circulation mean the U.S. could stop printing the copper coins tomorrow and see little widespread effect for decades. But some people are watching fearfully to see if Trump’s public critique of the penny will affect their business. Alan Fleming, of Scotland, is the owner of Penny Press Factory, one of a number around the world that manufacture machines that flatten and stamp coins. “A lovely retired gentleman in Boston sold me over 100,000 uncirculated cents a couple of years ago but he doesn’t have any more,” Fleming wrote. “I will need to purchase new uncirculated cents within the next 12 months to keep my machines supplied and working!” Regardless of what happens to niche businesses like Fleming’s, penny defenders say they’re an important tool for lubricating the economy even if they’re a money-losing proposition. Since the invention of money, humankind has wrangled with the question of small change, how to denominate amounts so small that the metal coin itself is actually worth more. In 2003, Thomas J. Sargent and another economist wrote “The Big Problem of Small Change,” billed as “the first credible and analytically sound explanation” of why governments had a hard time maintaining a steady supply of small change because of the high costs of production. Why pay money for coins? In a digital world with the line blurring between the real and the virtual, tactile coins have been reassuring. “What this all tells you about the United States as a country is that it’s an incredibly conservative country when it comes to money,” said Ute Wartenberg, executive director of the American Numismatic Society. Pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters are sometimes designed by artists laser-sculpting tiny portraits of leaders and landmarks using special software. “It’s pretty cool because when I tell people what I do I just say my initials are on the penny,” Joseph Menna, the 14th chief engraver of the United States Mint, said in the 2019 film Heads-Up: Will We Stop Making Cents? Fleming is hoping some lobbying may help: “Maybe we should take a trip to Washington and ask to speak to President Trump and Elon Musk and see if we can cut a deal on buying millions of pennies from them.” —By Michael Weissenstein and Joseph B. Frederick, Associated Press View the full article

As toy inventors, toy manufacturers and buyers for stores that sell toys met for a four-day annual trade show in New York last weekend, a topic besides which items were destined for holiday wish lists permeated the displays. President Donald Trump had announced days before that he planned to increase the extra tariff he put on Chinese imports in February to 20%. Would he? By Tuesday, the last day of the Toy Fair, attendees had their answer, and the talk about how it would affect the prices of playthings grew more urgent. Nearly 80% of the toys sold in the U.S. are sourced from China, according to the Toy Association, a national industry group that sponsors the show formerly known as the North American International Toy Fair. Many toy makers are now renegotiating prices with retailers and taking a hard look at their products to see if they can cut costs. Greg Ahearn, president and CEO of the Toy Association, said price increases of 15% to 20% are expected on games, dolls, cars, and other toys by the back-to-school shopping season. The price range that U.S. consumers are willing to pay is anywhere from $4.99 to $19.99, leaving little wiggle room to raise prices, he said. “It’s untenable,” Ahearn said, noting that small businesses make up roughly 96% of the American toy industry. Trump also moved forward this week with 25% tariffs on products imported from Canada and Mexico. Some companies have moved some of their manufacturing to Mexico to be closer to the U.S. On Wednesday, though, the president granted U.S. automakers a one-month exemption from the tariffs on the neighboring North American nations. Trump’s changing statements and policies on tariffs have made it challenging for toy companies to plan accordingly. Basic Fun CEO Jay Foreman said he didn’t rush late last year to get shipments of Tonka trucks, Care Bears, and other toys his Boca Raton, Florida-based company produces in China because he wasn’t sure if the 60% tariff on Chinese goods that Trump discussed on the campaign trail would come to pass. “If you plan in a chaotic environment, you have a much greater chance of being wrong than being right,” Foreman said when interviewed Sunday at his Toy Fair booth. All of Basic Fun’s toy products are made in China except for K’Nex, a construction set made in the U.S., he said. After Trump instead imposed an additional 10% tariff on Chinese goods last month, Foreman said he worked hard to persuade retailers to share some of the cost so he didn’t have to pass it on to consumers. Now that the import duty has doubled, he said he will have to raise prices for many of his items. For example, a Tonka Classic Steel Mighty Dump Truck, which now retails for $29.99, will likely go up to $39.99 as early as the fall, Foreman said. The Toy Association lobbied hard to exempt the toy industry from the 10% to 25% tariffs Trump levied on Chinese goods during his first term. The group lobbied again this time around, trying to educate members of Congress that toy companies can’t replicate the expertise found in Chinese factories. Ahearn noted there’s a lot of sophistication of manufacturing and craftsmanship that has been built up over time over generations in China. The high-skilled and lower-cost labor force that is available in China is not available currently, and it will take this same amount of time to build that up. Some toy companies are looking at ways to avoid raising prices. Steve Rad, CEO of toy maker Abacus Brands, said the Austin-based company considered switching to factories in countries like Cambodia or Vietnam, but concluded they don’t have the same level of skills. He does, however, plan to start having one of the company’s China-made products manufactured in the United States. Abacus Brands found a Texas factory that said it could produce Pixicade, which converts doodles and drawings into playable video games, at no additional cost. The U.S.-made version is expected to be in stores by August, Rad said. Other Abacus Brands toys are more complex, Rad said, and he doesn’t see making them in the U.S. as feasible. Instead, he’s exploring whether he can lower costs by cutting some product features. Foreman, of Basic Fun, said he plans to offer new spins on his existing toys to make them look new. Take Mash’ems, which are soft, water-filled collectibles that feature different licensed characters packaged in small cardboard boxes. “Maybe I’ll change the color of the box,” he said. “Or maybe I’ll put it in a plastic container.” Some retailers already have received letters from toy suppliers announcing immediate price increases. Richard Derr is the owner of the Learning Express franchise in Lake Zurich, Illinois, and president of the 85-member Learning Express franchise council. He questions if those suppliers are acting in good faith since many of them had sped up deliveries from China ahead of the tariffs. He and other Learning Express franchisees are studying alternatives to suppliers that suddenly want to raise prices, Derr said. He said he isn’t too worried about customers comparing what a toy costs compared with the year before since 65% of his products are new to the market. “We are in the era of one day, one thing, one day, two things, and it changes up and down,” Derr said. “So to put out something now, I think, is just preparing the stew when in fact the stew may not even be cooked.” —By Anne D’Innocenzio, AP business writer View the full article

As artificial intelligence begins to “devour the world,” job seekers must adapt their strategy to stand out in the hiring process. Hiring managers have begun to populate their interviews with questions about how prospective employees use AI in their work. According to industry experts, these types of questions will become more common as time goes on and AI continues to advance. In fact, 88% of C-suite leaders say speeding up AI adoption is important over the next year, according to LinkedIn’s 2025 Work Change Report. This can be daunting for people who don’t work in technology. You certainly don’t want to tell a hiring manager that you use ChatGPT to write and ideate everything for you, but you also don’t want to seem behind. We asked three hiring experts in different industries how non-techies can best navigate questions about AI in a job interview. Tip 1: Show curiosity Good news! Not being skilled in AI isn’t a deal-breaker. Even if you are far from an AI expert, you should highlight your curiosity about the technology in your interviewing process, notes Gillian Davis, chief people officer at strategic communications firm Mission North. She recommends that job applicants speak about a willingness to learn and adapt quickly. “It’s most important that you’re interested in AI, that you have a curiosity about it, and that you’re willing to look at it as a powerful complement to talent,” Davis says. AI is most powerful in the PR and communications space when it’s used as a way to tackle the mundane tasks, she says. Davis suggests showing off your understanding of what AI’s capabilities are, how you can apply it to real-world scenarios, and your willingness to continue learning about and adapting to the new technology. For example, you could talk about ways you’ve used AI to be more productive and to free yourself up to perform the highest-value parts of your work. Davis says when she speaks with potential hires who are wary of integrating AI into their work, she sees it as a “red flag” for Mission North. “That’s just not the world we live in anymore,” she says. Tip 2: Know who you’re dealing with Most of the largest organizations in the world are adopting AI and looking for creative ways to use the technology, according to Siobhan Savage, CEO of workplace intelligence platform Reejig. To best understand any company’s outlook on AI, Savage recommends combing through its most recent earnings report, noting that CEOs are often “very vocal” about their companies’ AI attitudes. Savage suggests providing specific examples about how you use AI to optimize your work if you’re interviewing for a company that’s embracing the technology. If instead the company hasn’t spoken much about AI adoption, she suggests highlighting the fact that you’re keeping up to date with all the latest developments. For example, you could share that you’ve used AI to automate the more mundane parts of your job, or discuss how you’ve heard other people use it in your industry. “Whether you’re in tech or PR, it doesn’t matter,” Savage says. “Everyone in a company cares about productivity.” Tip 3: Even if there’s no right opinion, have one When interviewing potential hires for his PR firm, Shore Fire president Mark Satlof likes to use questions about AI as small talk. But he treats applicants’ answers like a Rorschach test where he learns a lot about their work ethic and values, he says. “You can answer it a million different ways and I don’t know if there’s a right or wrong answer,” Satlof says. He notes, however, that he would not be interested in hiring someone who says they will never use AI. He wants prospective employees to “have a stance” and “show engagement” with technological developments. It’s okay if someone is skeptical of AI or, alternatively, completely gung ho about the technology. Satlof just wants your opinion to be grounded in research and knowledge. He recommends that job applicants do their research before any interview about the various areas and capabilities of AI. For example, he says applicants should understand the difference between the broad catchall of AI versus the specifics of what a large language model is. (If you’re wondering: AI refers to everything a computer does that simulates complex tasks, and LLMs are a type of AI that interprets and generates human language.) Applying for jobs can be a stressful experience, and it can be hard to know the right thing to say at all times. But by researching the company, brushing up on the basics of AI, and expressing a willingness to learn, you can present yourself as a good fit for any job. View the full article

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