A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
Theres a new orthodoxy quietly sweeping through executive leadership circles. It goes by many namesembodied awareness, whole-self management, conscious leadershipbut the core message is the same: intuition and spiritual presence are the foundations of strategic leadership.
At first glance, this seems like progress. Who wouldnt prefer a leader whos self-aware and emotionally attuned. In a business world riddled with brittle egos and performative hustle, a little more reflection is a breath of fresh air.
But beneath its soothing language, the practice of Conscious Leadership has more insidious effects on business culture. Pioneered by groups like The Conscious Leadership Group, it has evolved into a sprawling, self-affirming ideologyone that displaces competence with charisma, rigor with resonance, and accountability with affirmation.
The result? A growing class of business leaders who mistake internal coherence for external effectivenesswho believe that if they feel right, they must be right. Its not just anti-rational; its anti-leadership.
From Competence to Vibes
At the heart of the formal Conscious Leadership framework is the “15 Commitments”a framework designed to promote self-awareness, integrity, and responsibility. The commitments are trite and self-evident to anyone with a modicum of social or emotional intelligence.
But its not the principles that are the problem, its their embodiment conscious leadership heuristics have become popular shorthand in corporate and entrepreneurial leadership circles where Conscious Leadership has taken on its own ideological life.
Take the idea of the whole-body yes. It sounds poetic, even profound. But in functional terms, it’s an epistemic disaster.
The whole-body yes tells you that if something doesnt feel rightin your gutits probably wrong. Not just wrong for you, but wrong period. And therefore, you shouldnt do it. Or worse, you shouldnt have to do it.
On its face, this confuses intuition with truth. But more dangerously, it provides a prospective license to avoid the hard work of intellectual and moral analysis. Every hesitance becomes an omen to be heeded. Every discomfort becomes a signal to say no. Every debate becomes an attack on your authentic self.
In other words: if you dont want to do something, your subconscious probably knows its ethically compromised or strategically unsound. Therefore, resistance becomes virtue.
An undergraduate ethics major could tell you why this notion is so intoxicatingly fallacious: it is the embodiment of confirmation bias. It tells us that whatever feels right is, in fact, right. Its confusing righteousness with rightness, and its a cloaking device for all of our basest instincts.
Sociopaths exhibit this same kind of circular self-assurance. Like Luigi Mangione and the Unabomber, they are able to dress-up their prejudices in a pseudo-ethical manifesto to rationalize the overt violation of ethical norms.
Modern neuropsychology has taught us that our brain is quite good at confabulatingretroactively fabricating a reason for unreasonable behavior. Thats the essence of the whole-body yes; license for confabulation.
Business Leadership Without Skin in the Game
You can tell a lot about a framework by who evangelizes it. Conscious leadership tends to take root squarely among venture capitalists, consultants, HR departments, and coaching circlesthose stakeholders that are structurally insulated from the consequences of strategic execution.
These are not, generally speaking, people with direct exposure to existential business risks. They dont carry payroll. They dont answer to shareholders. They dont navigate hostile markets. Theyre not in the line of fire. And because of that, they can afford to substitute internal validation for external results. They can afford to confuse feeling good with doing good.
In that vacuum of real-world feedback, Conscious Leadership thrives. It spreads through offsites and retreats. It drips into executive workshops and middle-management Slack channels. It cloaks itself in the language of growth while quietly eroding the foundation of competency-based leadership.
The Reactionary Core: Anti-Rationality in a Pseudo-Spiritual Shell
Despite proselytization among progressive business leaders, Conscious Leadership is a deeply reactionary movement. It doesnt evolve leadershipit regresses to a kind of anti-rational romanticism. It seeks not to integrate intuition with reason, but to replace rational deliberation entirely with internal knowing.
In ancient traditionsfrom Buddhist mindfulness to Greek Stoicismtrue wisdom arises from tension: between emotion and restraint, instinct and inquiry, desire and discipline. The project of modernity was about striking this balance.
In philosophy, the Enlightenment forced the end of insular thinking and the birth of objective bases for decision-making.
In healthcare, we have evidence-based medicine rather than bedside impressions.
In law, we have procedural justice instead of the will of the monarch.
In finance, we have quantitative models instead of gut instinct.
Intuitions may point to the source of whats most fundamentally valuable in human life. But one also needs to recognize that we only get to play the game of modern society if we are able to temper our emotional, gut instincts.
Conscious Leadership indulgently short-circuits that developmental arc. You no longer need to sit in discomfort, wrestle with ambiguity, or act in spite of your fear. You simply check in with your truth, and act accordingly.
This kind of psychospiritual narcissism used to be the birth right of false gurus and religious fundamentalists, but executives are now importing it into the boardroom.
Conscious Leadership Isnt for Everyone: The Narcissism of Framing Dissent as Deficiency
Perhaps the most telling artifact of this movements epistemic regression is represented in an article from the formal Conscious Leadership group entitled Conscious Leadership Isnt for Everyone.
I felt a wave of relief when I stumbled upon this piecefinally, some humility to balance their ideological self-assurance. Surely, I thought, theyll acknowledge the limits of their framework. Something like: Maybe Conscious Leadership doesnt apply so well in a military context, where you cant pause to check in with your body before rushing to save a wounded soldier. Or: Maybe your whole-body yes should be informed by real analysis and empirical evidence.
But no. Instead of setting boundaries (the sign of a real discipline), the article castigates the un-initiated for their small-mindedness. For those not quite ready to do the work. Hres the tone: If you dont resonate with the Conscious Leadership framework, its not because the framework might be flawed. Its because you arent ready. You havent evolved enough. Youre still trapped in your fear, your ego, your unconscious patterns.
This is the hallmark of every narrow-minded epistemology, from religious cults to multilevel marketing: disagreement is pathologized. Non-belief is recast as immaturity. Critique is rebranded as resistance.
What could have been a useful framework becomes a totalizing worldview and a litmus test for identity. Its a circular self-help theology wrapped in the garb of a professional services business model.
The Real Danger: Corporate Adoption Without Accountability
Perhaps the most dangerous part of Conscious Leadership isn’t its spread in coaching circlesbut its growing adoption in boardrooms. As performance management becomes politicized and teams crave psychological safety, frameworks like these offer a tempting escape hatch: a way to appear ethical and evolved without committing to the hard metrics of performance or the messy realities of leadership.
This trend is more than aesthetic. Its structural.
We are watching as companies quietly substitute felt authenticity for functional accountability. Leaders are now praised for their vulnerability, but rarely challenged on the outcomes of their teams. Difficult conversations are avoided in the name of staying above the line. Strategy becomes an exercise in inner alignment. Disagreement becomes a trauma response.
But in this context, consciousness is the unique privilege of people who have, in some sense, already made it. Being at the top, they have the material wealth and security to dedicate themselves to introspection and exploration. They exhort this new way of thinking, and discourage the exact model ambition, competency-building, and hard-work that allowed them to rise to such a position in the first place.
In this way, Conscious Leadership is more rehabilitative than it is strategic; it is a framework that allows the executive caste to recapture some sense of humanity after years of grinding away in corporate gears.
For the underlings, aware of the path it took leaders to become leaders, these platitudes ring false. Those being consciously led are happy to pay lip-service to their leaders fluffy worldview as long as it protects their position in the organization. All the while, they feel the necessity to continue delivering tangible results The only realistic, quantifiable source of security within the organization.
The disconnectbetween leadership speech and the results-oriented nature of businesssimply breeds cognitive dissonance among employees. They need to confabulate a consciousness-based story to explain their strategic decisions, or worse, they actually use the Conscious Leadership Commitments to make those decisions.
What Leadership Actually Requires
Real leadership doesnt require denial of intuition, but it does require tempering it. It requires navigating the productive tension between feeling and thinking. It means honoring discomfort, not avoiding it. It means acting ethically even when your nervous system is screaming run.
And above all, it means holding power not as self-expressionbut as responsibility.
Leadership isnt about being your most authentic self in the boardroom. Its about making decisions under uncertainty, absorbing pressure so others can thrive, and balancing the needs of the self with the needs of the system.
That kind of leadership may not feel as righteous. But it works, particularly in a business context where employees actually care about whether their organization succeeds.
Heres another unsexy fact of life and businessthe best way to grow spiritually is to find a base of stability. And in many cases, this means having enough material wealth to pay medical bills, repair your car, and care for your family membersand that means that the business must thrive in real financial terms.
Thats why Maslows Hierarchy of Needs is still a useful framework: we need material security and basic social cohesion before we can work towards self-transcendence. But so-called conscious leaders dont realize that transcendence is path-dependent; they havent reflected enough to see that rightful leadership is earned through competency, merit, and sacrifice, rather than verbal appeals to higher ideals.
Most employees are happy to find enlightenment on their own time and in their own way. They dont want group therapy funded through the HR budget and proselytized by their boss.
Theyd prefer their leader to lead the way by making sound strategic decisions, and if that is at odds with being an empathetic and ethical human, then yes, youre in a crappy business situation. This isnt a revelation worthy of a book.
Conscious Leadership isnt wrong. Its just incomplete.
And after all that critique, frankly, the 15 formal Conscious Leadership Commitments are pretty much right. They are general enough to be unchallengeable, but they are represented (and treated) as a comprehensive leadership model.
Principles, rules, and commitments are a protection against chaos. They give us something to latch onto in complex situations, like executive leadership. But the truth is, a leader who truly embodies morality, humanism, and empathy has no need for a formal principle. The people who are most ensnared by moral principles and ideologies are those people who most need themthe type of people for whom integrity is unnatural and hard-won.
After all, the deeper essence of the 15 Commitmentsindividual responsibility, curiosity, integrityought to be ingrained early in life. These qualities should be nurtured through sound parenting, quality education, and lived experience. When foundational virtues like individual responsibility and empathy havent been deeply internalized, frameworks like these can feel revelatorynot because they unlock new wisdom, but because they compensate for what should have already been there.
Those who most loudly profess their principles often do so to paper over their fragility. Moral status, when secure, doesnt need to be declaredits lived.
So, live consciously and lead consciously, but if you ever hear someone start a sentence with in the spirit of conscious leadership, then I suggest you turn tail and run.
From fantastical worlds to personalized Ghibli-esque portraits, social media is flooded with AI-generated images that were created by merely a prompt. But what may be a fun tool for the average user has become an existential threat for graphic design.
And yet, surprisingly, graphic design jobs dont seem to be getting eliminatedyet.
By analyzing job posting data between fall/winter 2023-2024 and fall/winter 2024-2025, Fast Company found that the number of job listings for graphic designers stayed flat, despite worries about AI platforms eliminating these particular jobs.
There just haven’t been very many graphic-design based AI generators yet, says Daniel Lefcourt, visual artist and professor of art and computation at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).
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Since 2018, Lefcourt has used AI models in various courses, and for the past four years he has taught Generative Systems, a course that explores how to use generative technology in the design process. The class uses Invoke, a 2-year-old generative AI platform, and Runway.
Only now are we seeing Figma and Adobe Illustrator starting to generate designs, and that’s pretty recent, he added. Before that, the tech wasn’t there yet to shift the design field in the same way.
The element of trust
While AI platforms such as DALL-E and Midjourney can generate overly produced fantasy-like images, it struggles with basic graphic design concepts like typography and uniformity.
If you’re using a tool that can’t give you consistent results, that makes it challenging to embrace like a standard tool, says Elliott Romano, who is pursuing an MFA in graphic design at RISD. Romano spent 10 years as a digital product designer at cultural institutions, hardware startups, and enterprise software companies before deciding to be more of a generalist than a specialist when it comes to visual communication. He now explores the creative application of generative tools.
I’ll be shocked if, as these things get better, they dont become a replacement of sorts, he says. I see the graphic designer becoming more of a creative director, and being able to come in and move things around.
AI is “designed to hit the lowest common denominator”
Jody Poole, a digital graphic designer who has spent the past 25 years working on campaigns for brands such as Coca-Cola, Comcast, and Kelloggs, recently shared on Reddit an experience hed had involving AI. He was completing a timed test that had been part of the application for a senior position at a marketing company. The design section of the test, he recalled, included questions like: The client wants you to design this promotional poster, but instead of coffee they want raspberry lemonade. What AI prompts would you use to design this?
I was stunned, he said on Reddit. No thought to typography or colour theory or visual hierarchy. Just give us the prompts and let AI do the rest.
Still, Poole recognizes that AI might be valuable for the design industry one day, particularly when it comes to translating and adapting a human-made design to reach wider and diverse audiences. There is a tidal wave of change that is happening within technology, and you either have to get out the surfboard and ride the wave, or you’re going to drown, he tells Fast Company.
The change might even come with an upside, he explains, likening AI-design with fast fashion, which had the effect of making bespoke designs highly prized.
AI is designed to hit the lowest common denominator, Poole says If you can rise above that, even a little bit, you become a unique, valuable talent out there.
Lefcourt, for his part, isnt too worried for graphic designers, either. What these tools are doing is shifting us into an entirely new realm of visual culture, he says. To be a trained artist, to understand how images work, and how images are created, from the Renaissance to now, actually positions you pretty well for this new world that we’re entering into.
This article is part of Fast Company’s continuing coverage of where the design jobs are, including this year’s comprehensive analysis of 170,000 job listings
Picture this: On your way out of the office, you notice a manager berating an employee. You assume the worker made some sort of mistake, but the managers behavior seems unprofessional. Later, as youre preparing dinner, is the scene still weighing on youor is it out of sight, out of mind?
If you think youd still be bothered, youre not alone. It turns out that simply observing mistreatment at work can have a surprisingly strong impact on people, even for those not directly involved. Thats according to new research led by Edwyna Hill, coauthored by Rachel Burgess, Manuela Priesemuth, Jefferson McClain, and me, published in the Journal of Applied Psychology.
Using a method called meta-analysiswhich takes results from many different studies and combines them to produce an overall set of findingswe reviewed the growing body of research on what management professors like me call third-party perceptions of mistreatment. In this context, third parties are people who observe mistreatment between a perpetrator and the victim, who are the first and second parties.
We looked at 158 studies published in 105 journal articles involving thousands of participants. Those studies explored a number of different forms of workplace mistreatment ranging from incivility to abusive supervision and sexual harassment. Some of those studies took part in actual workplaces, while others examined mistreatment in tightly controlled laboratory settings.
The results were striking: We found that observing a coworker being mistreated on the job has significant effects on the observers emotions. In fact, we found that observers of mistreatment may be as affected by what happened as the people actually involved in the event.
These reactions fall along a spectrumsome helpful, others less so. On the encouraging side, we found that observers tend to judge perpetrators and feel empathy for victims. These reactions discourage mistreatment by creating a climate that favors the victim. On the other hand, we found that observers may also enjoy seeing their coworkers sufferan emotion called schadenfreudeor blame the victim. These sorts of reactions damage team dynamics and discourage people from reporting mistreatment.
Why it matters
These findings matter because mistreatment in the workplace is disturbingly common, and even more frequently observed than experienced. One recent study found that 34% of employees have experienced workplace mistreatment firsthand, but 44% have observed it happening to someone else. In other words, nearly half of workers have likely seen a scenario like the one described at the start of this article.
Unfortunately, the human resources playbook on workplace mistreatment rarely takes third parties into account. Some investigation occurs, potentially resulting in some punishment for the perpetrator and some support for the victim. A more effective response to workplace mistreatment would recognize that the harm often extends beyond the victim, and that observers may need support too.
What still isnt known
Whats needed now is a better understanding of the nuances involved in observing mistreatment. Why do some observers react with empathy, while others derive pleasure from the suffering of others? And why might observers feel empathy for the victim but still respond by judging or blaming them? Answering these questions is a crucial next step for researchers and leaders seeking to design more effective workplace policies.
The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.
Jason Colquitt is a professor of management at the Mendoza College of Business at the University of Notre Dame.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Over the past several years, electric vehicles have garnered something of a reputation for their unusual sounds on the road. Otherworldly EV warning sounds have been compared to a celestial choir, a flying saucer hum, and, in one TikTok with 23.5 million views, the song that might play just before ascending to heaven. But the angelic warble thats come to characterize EV acoustics might have a few drawbacks for pedestrians.
A new study conducted by researchers at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden and published in March examined how well the average person could locate three common types of warning sounds from hybrid and electric vehicles at low speeds. It found that all three of the sounds were significantly harder for pedestrians to locate than the sound of a standard internal combustion engine.
Given that they have no combustion engine, EVs are naturally almost silent. That can be a benefit when it comes to urban noise pollution, but its not ideal for pedestrian safety. For the past six years, all EVs in the U.S. have been legally required to emit some kind of low-level noisea prompt that automakers have chosen to interpret in a range of creative ways. But it might be time for some automakers to take another crack at their proprietary EV acoustics.
What do Hanz Zimmer, a didgeridoo, and fighter jets have in common?
Starting in 2019, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration ruled that all hybrid and electric cars have to be fitted with an external speaker that must make audible noise when traveling in reverse or forward at speeds up to 30 kilometers per hour (about 19 miles per hour). While the law sets expectations for when these noises need to play, it largely leaves the contents of the noise itself up to automakers.
Thats resulted in a variety of EV sounds on the road, from a Cadillac alert made using a didgeridoo to the Hyundai Ioniq 5 Ns fighter-jet-inspired sound and BMWs portfolio of i4 electric sedan noises by composer Hans Zimmer.
This unusual symphony hitting the roads has inspired quippy commentary on social media. Under a TikTok sharing the BMX iX 50s reverse sound, one user wrote, is this ribs by lorde? And in a video poking fun at Teslas reverse audio, another commenter joked, Every time our neighbour pulls onto the drive with their electric car my husband says the spaceship has landed. Beyond sounding a bit silly, though, there are a few key shortcomings to the sounds that many automakers are selecting for their EVs.
Why are EVs so hard (and annoying) to hear?
Chalmers researchers examined three of the main categories of EV sounds, also known as acoustic vehicle alerting systems (AVAS): two-tone, multitone, and narrowband noise (a noise concentrated within a small band of audible frequencies, often perceived as a hissing sound).
To compare these sounds to that of an internal combustion engine, researchers studied the reactions of 52 test subjects inside a soundproof chamber. Each subject was surrounded by 24 loudspeakers and given a laser pointer fashioned out of a toy gun. When one of the speakers played a simulated vehicle sound designed to mimic the noise of an EV at a low speed, the subjects were to point the laser toward the sound as quickly as possible.
The tests demonstrated that all the AVAS categories were harder for subjects to locate than the sound of an internal combustion engine. And, according to Leon Müller, a PhD student at Chalmers and one of the papers authors, one of the sounds was more problematic than the others.
[The two-tone AVAS] is significantly harder to localize than other types of warning sounds, as well as combustion noise, Müller says, noting that in a situation with just one vehicle present, these localization errors are relatively small and not particularly concerning for traffic safety. When there are two or three EVs present, though, the situation can get a bit stickier. In that case, the participants had much more [difficulty] localizing the cars, up to a point where most participants failed to even detect all presented EVs within an appropriate time, Müller says.
There are a few reasons why pedestrians might have trouble locating EV sounds. First, Müller explains, combustion noise is a very broadband signalmeaning it contains a lot of frequencies, and hence more information for our hearing system to work with. Second, humans have had substantially more time to acclimate to combustion sounds than artificial EV sounds.
We humans have learned over the last 100 years or so that cars sound in a particular way and how driving behavior, such as acceleration, is reflected in this combustion noise, Müller says. This potential learning effect might also contribute to differences in localization, especially when we need to decode multiple sounds at the same time. One could expect that we would then also get used to EV sounds within a few years. The only problem is that they currently all sound different.
A new sound
In the meantime, Müller believes there are two potential avenues to make EV sounds safer.
Currently, U.S. and EU regulations are limited to minimum sound levels in a specified number of frequency bands, which he argues allows the warning signals to be anything between a futuristic spaceship sound or a racing car engine. In the U.S., he adds, regulations dont require a velocity pitch shift, meaning that a car might sound the same going 60 mph as it does at 25 mph. To address these problems, Müller says the regulations should make more clear demands on the sound characteristics.
On the automaker side of the equation, the Chalmers study indicates that a more broadband AVAS signal, similar to the noise radiated by tires when driving faster, is preferable to a two-tone or multitone AVAS.
[This sound] is potentially less annoying than tonal sounds and has the advantage that we already have learned to interpret this noise since we hear it every day, Müller says.
In the long term, he adds that adaptive AVAS solutionslike pedestrian detection technologycould help EVs radiate a more advanced warning sound directly in the direction of the pedestrian, thus improving safety and reducing noise pollution.
One important bottom line here is that we are no saying EVs are bad or dangerous. With the right type of warning signal, they are not, Müller says. On the contrary, they have the potential of reduced noise pollution since the warning sound can be controlled, while the combustion noise in [internal combustion engine vehicles] is always there.
If youve been in the workplace for a while, youve probably had your share of bad bosses. Maybe youve worked for someone who frequently went MIA, ignoring your emails or requests for information. Or perhaps youve had to report to someone who changed their mind on a dime and expected you to drop everything and follow along.
If these scenarios sound familiar, its because bad management styles often fall into one of several archetypes, says Eric Charran, author of Have You Ever Had a Boss That . . .: Succeeding in a Dysfunctional Workplace.
Sometimes the tools in a managers leadership toolbox make it difficultand almost impossibleto want to work for them, he says. The first thing to do is to try to overcome an overwhelming urge to say Why are they doing this to me? It must be that I’m deficient in some way. It’s not necessarily that individual’s personality is a mismatch [for yours] or that they don’t like you. It’s just that they’re using a hammer when they really need a screwdriver.
Whether you have a difficult boss right now or one lurking in your future, its possible to thrive under their leadership by understanding their motivations. Here are four of the common boss archetypes that Charran identifies in his book, and how you can deal with their behavior.
The Attack Sub
An Attack Sub manager is someone who operates stealthily for an extended period with minimal interaction or feedback. Suddenly, they surface with a flood of information and demands, launching figurative bombs and missiles. They catch employees off guard, shifting priorities and directives and leaving everyone wondering what just happened as they return beneath the water
The Attack Sub Manager can be extremely difficult to deal with, Charran says. They run silent and deep. You’re trying to send them Slacks, or emails, or texts, and it just bounces off them. On the surface, they appear to have a poor capability to manage communication and to give guidance.
If you are comfortable with putting out fires, you may work well with this type of boss. But if youre someone who is detail-oriented, a manager who shoots from the hip will be frustrating. To best work with an Attack Sub manager, Charran recommends reaching out to them first thing in the morning, before they become distracted. Keep messages concise and focused on short, tactical items. It can also help to switch your channels of communication; breaking everyday patterns can draw their attention.
The Order Taker
The Order Taker boss values harmony, hierarchy, and compliance. Their goal is to prove their value to the organization, and the best way to do that is to get you to do what they ask. While this sounds reasonable, demands can quickly turn into commands that put current workloads at jeopardy.
If youre constantly switching from one thing to the other, you’re never going to finish anything, says Charran. Your results at the end of the year from a performance perspective will look abysmal. You will have failed the organization because you are not working on important thingsyou keep stopping them to follow new commands.
The way to work with the Order Taker boss is by managing up, says Charran. Their expectation is that youll say yes to everything, adding, Do you want fries with that? he says. They need to be educated and not saluted. They’re looking for somebody to say, Hey, if we do this, here’s what we could jeopardize. They’re looking for more of a partner, rather than somebody that says, Got it, boss.
The Raw Nerve
The Raw Nerve boss is highly emotional, often reacting in the moment. This archetype often develops in an environment where quick decision-making is valued, says Charran. They equate immediate action with effectiveness. However, it can come at the expense of thoroughness or the well-being of team members if they ignore or dont explore possible consequences.
Their decisions are not entirely relationship based and not entirely data based, Charran says. Theyre a confluence of all those things. They utilize their cred for quick decision making unilaterally, which can be harmful in many situations.
The best way to thrive with this type of boss is to turn to your support networks that extend beyond your team before any final decisions are made. Leverage the power of a group by talking to customers, higher management, and peers. The key, though, is that you dont do it behind your bosss back.
It has to be done completely above board, Charran says. If done correctly, you can make the communication innocuous enough that it will seen by your manager as stakeholder management.
The Complainer
As the name implies, the Complainer is the boss who is constantly complaining. For example, their team isnt big enough, they dont have the correct resources, or theyve been giving unrealistic goals by their superiors. What they don’t realize is that their venting is bringing down the team and poisoning the well.
Off-the-cuff remarks have a cognitive impact on team morale, Charran says. The things may be true, but it ends up coming off negative. What the team sees is a person in a downward spiral of jadedness. This archetype usually results from a deep-seated insecurity.
The human brain is wired to look for threats, and, whether theyre a danger or not, the brain will find them. To work for a Complainer, Charran says you need the intellect and drive to make positive mental choices instead of getting dragged into their storm.
Coexisting with the Complainer begins with empathy, he says. This doesnt mean condoning endless negativity but rather recognizing it as a cry for help or a sign of deeper issues. Empathy must be balanced with the establishment of positive boundaries to protect your own mental and emotional well-being.
While it can be frustrating to work for someone with an outlook and behavior that clashes with your own, Charran says youre ultimately responsible for your own happiness and have tools within your own reach.
A fundmental principle in maintaining a positive mental attitude is understanding the emotions of others and how they express them, Charran says. Their attitudes and reactions are not contagious and do not have to be internalized. Empathize with others and understand their emotions, but dont be sucked into a collective negative spiral. Knowing your worth is important and so is choice.
Every year, I tell my students in my business analytics class the same thing: Dont just apply for a job. Audition for it.
This advice seems particularly relevant this year. In todays turbulent economy, companies are still hiring, but theyre doing it a bit more carefully. More places are offering candidates short-term work experiences like internships and co-op programs in order to evaluate them before making them full-time offers.
This is just one of the findings of the 2025 College Hiring Outlook Report. This annual report tracks trends in the job market and offers valuable insights for both job seekers and employers. It is based on a national survey conducted in September 2024, with responses from 1,322 employers spanning all major industries and company sizes, from small firms to large enterprises. The survey looks at employer perspectives on entry-level hiring trends, skills demand, and talent development strategies.
I am a professor of information systems at Drexel Universitys LeBow College of Business in Philadelphia, and I coauthored this report along with a team of colleagues at the Center for Career Readiness.
Heres what we found:
Employers are rethinking talent pipelines
Only 21% of the 1,322 employers we surveyed rated the current college hiring market as excellent or very good, which is a dramatic drop from 61% in 2023. This indicates that companies are becoming increasingly cautious about how they recruit and select new talent.
While confidence in full-time hiring has declined, employers are not stepping away from hiring altogether. Instead, theyre shifting to paid and unpaid internships, co-ops, and contract-to-hire roles as a less risky route to identify talent and de-risk full-time hiring.
Employers we surveyed described internships as a cost-effective talent pipeline, and 70% told us they plan to maintain or increase their co-op and intern hiring in 2025. At a time when many companies are tightening their belts, hiring someone whos already proved themselves saves on onboarding reduces turnover and minimizes potentially costly mishires.
For job seekers, this makes every internship or short-term role more than a foot in the door. Its an extended audition. Even with the general market looking unstable, interest in co-op and internship programs appears steady, especially among recent graduates facing fewer full-time opportunities.
These programs arent just about trying out a job. They let employers see if a candidate shows initiative, good judgment, and the ability to work well on a team, which we found are traits employers value even more than technical skills.
What employers want
We found that employers increasingly prioritize self-management skills like adaptability, ethical reasoning, and communication over technical skills such as digital literacy and cybersecurity. Employers are paying attention to how candidates behave during internships, how they take feedback, and whether they bring the mindset needed to grow with the company.
This reflects what I have observed in classrooms and in conversations with hiring managers: Credentials matter, but what truly sets candidates apart is how they present themselves and what they contribute to a company.
Based on co-op and internship data weve collected at Drexel, however, many students continue to believe that technical proficiency is the key to getting a job.
In my opinion, this disconnect reveals a critical gap in expectations: While students focus on hard skills to differentiate themselves, employers are looking for the human skills that indicate long-term potential, resilience, and professionalism. This is especially true in the face of economic uncertainty and the ambiguous, fast-changing nature of todays workplace.
Technology is changing how hiring happens
Employers also told us that artificial intelligence is now central to how both applicants and employers navigate the hiring process.
Some companies are increasingly using AI-powered platforms to transform their hiring processes. For example, Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia uses platforms like HireVue to conduct asynchronous video interviews. HR-focused firms like Phenom and JJ Staffing Services also leverage technologies such as AI-based resume ranking, automated interview scheduling, and one-way video assessments.
Not only do these tools speed up the hiring process, but they also reshape how employers and candidates interact. In our survey, large employers said they are increasingly relying on AI tools like resume screeners and one-way video interviews to manage large numbers of job applicants. As a result, the candidates presence, clarity in communication, and authenticity are being evaluated even before a human recruiter becomes involved.
At the same time, job seekers are using generative AI tools to write cover letters, practice interviews, or reformat résumés. These tools can help with preparation, but overreliance on them can backfire. Employers want authenticity, and many employers we surveyed mentioned they notice when applications seem overly robotic.
In my experience as a professor, the key is teaching students to use AI to enhance their effort, not to replace it. I encourage them to leverage AI tools but always emphasize that the final output and the impression it makes should reflect their own thinking and professionalism. The bottom line is that hiring is still a human decision, and the personal impression you make matters.
This isnt just about new grads
While our research focuses on early-career hiring, these findings apply to other audiences as well, such as career changers, returning professionals, and even mid-career workers. These workers are increasingly being evaluated on their adaptability, behavior, and collaborative abilitynot just their experience.
Many companies now offer project-based assignments and trial roles that let them evaluate performance before making a permanent hire.
At the same time, employers are investing in internal reskilling and upskilling programs. Reskilling refers to training workers for entirely new oles, often in response to job changes or automation, while upskilling means helping employees deepen their current skills to stay effective and advance in their existing roles. Our report indicates that approximately 88% of large companies now offer structured upskilling and reskilling programs. For job seekers and workers alike, staying competitive means taking the initiative and demonstrating a commitment to learning and growth.
Show up early, and show up well
So what can students, or anyone entering or reentering the workforce, do to prepare?
Start early. Dont wait until senior year. First- and second-year internships are growing in importance.
Sharpen soft skills. Communication, time management, problem-solving, and ethical behavior are top priorities for employers.
Understand where work is happening. More than 50% of entry-level jobs are fully in person. Only 4% are fully remote. Show up ready to engage.
Use AI strategically. Its a useful tool for research and practice, not a shortcut to connection or clarity.
Stay curious. Most large employers now offer reskilling or upskilling opportunities, and they expect employees to take initiative.
One of the clearest takeaways from this years report is that hiring is no longer a onetime decision. Its a performance process that often begins before an interview is even scheduled.
Whether youre still in school, transitioning in your career, or returning to the workforce after a break, the same principle applies: Every opportunity is an audition. Treat it like one.
Murugan Anandarajan is a professor of decision sciences and management information systems at Drexel University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Christopher Pelkey was shot and killed in a road range incident in 2021. On May 8, 2025, at the sentencing hearing for his killer, an AI video reconstruction of Pelkey delivered a victim impact statement. The trial judge reported being deeply moved by this performance and issued the maximum sentence for manslaughter.
As part of the ceremonies to mark Israels 77th year of independence on April 30, 2025, officials had planned to host a concert featuring four iconic Israeli singers. All four had died years earlier. The plan was to conjure them using AI-generated sound and video. The dead performers were supposed to sing alongside Yardena Arazi, a famous and still very much alive artist. In the end Arazi pulled out, citing the political atmosphere, and the event didnt happen.
In April, the BBC created a deepfake version of the famous mystery writer Agatha Christie to teach a maestro course on writing. Fake Agatha would instruct aspiring murder mystery authors and inspire their writing journey.
The use of artificial intelligence to reanimate the dead for a variety of purposes is quickly gaining traction. Over the past few years, weve been studying the moral implications of AI at the Center for Applied Ethics at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and we find these AI reanimations to be morally problematic.
Before we address the moral challenges the technology raises, its important to distinguish AI reanimations, or deepfakes, from so-called griefbots. Griefbots are chatbots trained on large swaths of data the dead leave behindsocial media posts, texts, emails, videos. These chatbots mimic how the departed used to communicate and are meant to make life easier for surviving relations. The deepfakes we are discussing here have other aims; they are meant to promote legal, political, and educational causes.
Moral quandaries
The first moral quandary the technology raises has to do with consent: Would the deceased have agreed to do what their likeness is doing? Would the dead Israeli singers have wanted to sing at an Independence ceremony organized by the nations current government? Would Pelkey, the road-rage victim, be comfortable with the script his family wrote for his avatar to recite? What would Christie think about her AI double teaching that class?
The answers to these questions can only be deduced circumstantially, from examining the kinds of things the dead did and the views they expressed when alive. And one could ask if the answers even matter. If those in charge of the estates agree to the reanimations, isnt the question settled? After all, such trustees are the legal representatives of the departed.
But putting aside the question of consent, a more fundamental question remains.
What do these reanimations do to the legacy and reputation of the dead? Doesnt their reputation depend, to some extent, on the scarcity of appearance, on the fact that the dead cant show up anymore? Dying can have a salutary effect on the reputation of prominent people; it was good for John F. Kennedy, and it was good for Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
The fifth-century BC Athenian leader Pericles understood this well. In his famous Funeral Oration, delivered at the end of the first year of the Peloponnesian War, he asserts that a noble death can elevate ones reputation and wash away their petty misdeeds. That is because the dead are beyond reach and their mystique grows postmortem. Even extreme virtue will scarcely win you a reputation equal to that of the dead, he insists.
Do AI reanimations devalue the currency of the dead by forcing them to keep popping up? Do they cheapen and destabilize their reputation by having them comment on events that happened long after their demise?
In addition, these AI representations can be a powerful tool to influence audiences for political or legal purposes. Bringing back a popular dead singer to legitimize a political event and reanimating a dead victim to offer testimony are acts intended to sway an audiences judgment.
Its one thing to channel a Churchill or a Roosevelt during a political speech by quoting them or even trying to sound like them. Its another thing to have them speak alongside you. The potential of harnessing nostalgia is supercharged by this technology. Imagine, for example, what the Soviets, who literally worshipped Lenins dead body, would have done with a deepfake of their old icon.
Good intentions
You could argue that because these reanimations are uniquely engaging, they can be used for virtuous purposes. Consider a reanimated Martin Luther King Jr. speaking to our currently polarized and divided nation, urging moderation and unity. Wouldnt that be grand? Or what about a reanimated Mordechai Anielewicz, the commander of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, speaking at the trial of a Holocaust denier like David Irving?
But do we know what MLK would have thought about our current political divisions? Do we know what Anielewicz would have thought about restrictions on pernicious speech? Does bravely campaigning for civil rights mean we should call upon the digital ghost of King to comment on the impact of populism? Does fearlessly fighting the Nazis mean we should dredge up the AI shadow of an old hero to comment on free speech in the digital age?
Even if the political projects these AI avatars served were consistent with the deceaseds views, the problem of manipulationof using the psychological power of deepfakes to appeal to emotionsremains.
But what about enlisting AI Agatha Christie to teach a writing class? Deepfakes may indeed have salutary uses in educational settings. The likeness of Christie could make students more enthusiastic about writing. Fake Aristotle could improve the chances that students engage with his austere Nicomachean Ethics. AI Einstein could help those who ant to study physics get their heads around general relativity.
But producing these fakes comes with a great deal of responsibility. After all, given how engaging they can be, its possible that the interactions with these representations will be all that students pay attention to, rather than serving as a gateway to exploring the subject further.
Living on in the living
In a poem written in memory of W.B. Yeats, W.H. Auden tells us that after the poets death Yeats became his admirers. His memory was scattered among a hundred cities, and his work subject to endless interpretation: The words of a dead man are modified in the guts of the living.
The dead live on in the many ways we reinterpret their words and works. Auden did that to Yeats, and were doing it to Auden right here. Thats how people stay in touch with those who are gone. In the end, we believe that using technological prowess to concretely bring them back disrespects them and, perhaps more importantly, is an act of disrespect to ourselvesto our capacity to abstract, think, and imagine.
Nir Eisikovits is a professor of philosophy and director of the Applied Ethics Center at UMass Boston.
Daniel J. Feldman is a senior research fellow at the Applied Ethics Center at UMass Boston.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Difficult conversations are something we tend to avoid at all costs. Whether its about underperformance, conflict, a personal issue, or an unsuccessful job application, entering any difficult conversation triggers fear within ourselves and the person on the other end. Our brains flight or fight mechanism is triggered, with emotions taking the lead, and we frequently find ourselves in defensive mode looking for a win.
Whether it be after a keynote at a conference or in a workplace emotional intelligence program, Im often approached by people who are struggling with difficult conversations. Theyre gripped with frustration, fear, and exhaustion when they need to initiate a conversation and address an issue (or, on the other end, when they feel the repercussions of a poorly handled situation).
Dealing with emotions in difficult conversations
While weve become more focused on emotional intelligence in recent years, we still have a long way to go when we initiate difficult conversations.
The language and emotional undertone of the words we use can exacerbate the emotions a person is feelingor help them own it, process it, and move forward. Heres how to have an emotionally intelligent response to the feelings that you may encounter when you begin a difficult conversation with another person, along with what to avoid.
1. Upset
Being upset is no different from any other emotion in that it has appropriate and severe levels.
We have higher severity levels when fear is driving our emotions, or its something that means a lot to us. Sometimes, our hormones can also be out of whack, meaning that we cry more easily than others. Heres how to receive upset.
Your best approach: Getting upset in front of others (especially at work) tends to be embarrassing. Respond to the emotion, rather than the message delivered.
Ask: Would you like to take a break, go to the bathroom or get a support person? How can I best support you through this?
Avoid: Saying I know how you must be feeling, I know this cant be easy, or I am not loving delivering this message either. Avoid any sentence that starts with I or is related to you. You dont know how your companion is feeling, nor should you assume you do. Its not about you at all.
2. Anger
Anger is an intense emotion. Our mind is being driven by our emotional brain, so there is no logic in play. Quite often we cant (or wont) hear anything people are saying until the intensity decreases, or we have finished saying what we have to say. Heres how to receive anger.
Your best approach: Listen and pause; let them get it off their chest. Once they have aired their frustrations, use the same approach as you would with upset: ask them if they would like to take a break or how you can best support them through this. If their anger becomes inappropriate, pause the conversation and let everyone take a break and regain control of their emotions.
Avoid: Our fight or flight response is often triggered at this point, so our natural defense mechanism is ready for battle or protection. Dont defend or try to justify your reasoning or message: this will only make their anger response even more intense. Avoid responding with anger, too.
3. Denial
When our mind doesnt like what we are hearing, we can sometimes go into total denial to avoid the emotions being faced and felt. We put up barriers in our mind to block emotions and truly convince ourselves that this isnt happening. Heres how to receive denial.
Your best approach: Reiterate the facts and reality of the situation clearly and explain the next steps.
Ask: Does what I told you make sense? Do you understand what this means and what comes next?
Avoid: Some people take time to process and accept information. Trying to force them to do it instantly is never wiseand is likely to lead to more denial. Avoid getting frustrated, telling someone how to accept the conversation or making statements. Ask questions instead to help them process it in their head.
4. Meh
When the care factor or emotional response is low, it can be very confusing. People tend to be meh: the expression that they couldnt care less about what is happening. They might seem disinterested, or even like they arent listening. Heres how to receive it.
Ask: Do you have all the information you need? Do you understand the outcome, next steps, and expectations? How can I best support you from here? After this, it is best to end the meeting but keep an eye on them and revisit the conversation if required.
Avoid: Dont try to make it a big deal if they seem unfazed. This might be a cover for a deeper emotion, or they might not have processed the conversation yet. Or it may simply not be a big deal to them. Dont keep them there and continue to talk until you get the reaction you want or expected.
5. Curiosity
Tough conversations can spark many unanswered questions. Questions arent a bad thing and are a part of effective communication. Heres how to actively listen to curiosity and answer questions.
Ask: Are there any other questions or thoughts you would like to share? How are you feeling about the information? Do you want to talk about it?
Avoid: This shouldnt be a one-way conversation. Dont end the conversation before they have finished or have enough answers and information. Avoid laughing at any questions or comments.
6. Positivity
Sometimes, something we believe will be a tough conversation isnt one. For some people, its a relief to have the conversation or to have the issue out in the open. For others, its an actual win aligned to their priorities.
Ask: Are you happy to share more about what you are feeling and why? Is there anything more I can do to support you? Keep an eye on them and revisit the conversation if required, especially if their emotions change.
Avoid: A positive response can catch you off-guard, so its important to manage your own emotions both visually and verbally. Avoid cutting the conversation short or assuming this positive response will stay positive. It may be a protective front, or other emotions may follow.
Following the emotion through the conversation brings the human factor back into communication. While it can seem a drawn-out process or distraction, it will get us a better interaction, understanding and outcome.
Adapted from The Emotional Intelligence Advantage by Amy Jacobson, available at all leading retailers. Visit www.amyjacobson.com.au for more.
Ever dream about work? Have nightmares? According to a survey by the mattress review site EachNight.com, nearly two-thirds of us have job-related dreams that cause us to wake up stressed out and worried. Instead of shrugging them off, you might want to take note.
While no definitive answer exists on the meaning of dreams, notable scientists, including Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, believed they hold messages. Freud, for example, considered dreaming to be an expression of repressed or unconscious conflicts or desires, while Jung explained dreams as thoughts released by the subconscious, creating an internal dialogue. Modern research recently concluded that dreams are part of the brains data-dumping function, consolidating information it deems to be important.
Dream interpreter Inbaal Honigman believes there is meaning in the dreams that you remember. It could be something super benign, or it could be more than that, she says.
Honigman teamed up with JobLeads, an online job search platform, analyzing search data to find the most popular work-related dreams. Here are some of the most common, along with Honigmans take on what they could be trying to tell you.
Being Late for Work
Getting to work late is the most common work-related dream, according to the JobLeads research. This theme falls into the anxiety dream category. While being late for work isnt as high stakes as a dream about being late for a flight or wedding, Honigman says it still suggests that stress and pressure have entered your subconscious, creating feelings of being overwhelmed. To decipher this dream, you must get to its root.
It could be that you feel insecure at work, because work is very harsh, Honigman says. It could be that you feel insecure due to low self-esteem. Its from the same dream school as being naked in the classroom. Anxiety is firing up your brain and sending you to the worst-case scenario.
Losing Your Job
The next most common work-related dream involves losing your job or being fired. Honigman says you need to consider the emotion to understand the meaning. Were you on any level relieved, because that would be very telling, she says. Or did you feel like you wouldn’t be able to manage afterwards?
Dreaming about losing your job doesnt usually come out of the blue. Honigman says it could be related to surviving a recent layoff, knowing that the organization is facing difficulties, or experiencing difficult interactions with other staff members.
This dream can arise if you feel unsupported at work or in your personal life, she says. While it doesn’t necessarily predict an actual firing, heed it as a warning. Its a subconscious signal urging you to address the pressures youre facing and seek clarity or support in your job.
Getting a New Job
Not all work-related dreams are stressful. The most common positive work dream involves getting a new job. According to Honigman, this can indicate a subconscious craving for change. While you dont necessarily need to leave your work environment, it could mean youre ready to seek out a fresh challenge or shift in responsibilities.
[Positive dreams are] less common, not because people hate their jobs, but because theyre less notable and life changing, Honigman says. A happy work dream can create a ripple effect, though, boosting your mood and leaving you feeling more motivated, confident, and energized.
Romance with a Coworker
If you have a romantic dream that involves a coworker, you might wake up puzzled. Honigman says it doesnt necessarily mean that youre attracted to the person physically or romantically. Instead, it could indicate that you feel at home when youre at work, or that you admire the persons confidence, creativity, and work ethic.
This dream can mean youre feeling very at ease, appreciated, and have some kind of excitement about going into work, Honigman explains. Or the dream could also signal a desire for greater harmony and cooperation within your professional relationships.
What to Do With Your Dreams
As much as possible, Honigman recommends journaling about your dreams each morning. If thats too difficult, share your dream with someone else. Writing it down or sharing it with someone makes you more likely to remember the story.
Then, look at the emotions youre feeling in the dream. For example, if you dream about getting a new job because you started your own business, how did you feel when you woke up? For some people, it’s a sign of something they should be doing because they felt excited or proud, Honigman says. Someone else may wake up from that dream in abject horror.
While the dream doesnt have to be identical, look for patterns that might indicate a situation that you haven’t resolved. Dreaming about being late to work again and again could mean that you have a work anxiety that needs to be addressed. How you fix it can have many different answers.
Dreams are not instructions. Honigman says you should consider them to be more like indications, especially in the case of anxiety work dreams.
They’re not there to tell you stuff you don’t know, she says. Look at dreams as food for thought and very precious insight into what goes on in your mind. It’s valuable information, part of a jigsaw puzzle, and not the whole picture.
If nothing else, looking for meaning in dreams can be fun, like solving a riddle or connecting the dots. Any thoughts on what a dream about riding a giant cat to work might mean? (Asking for a friend.)
The world envies Swiss chocolate, army knives, and now . . . interest rates?
Swiss National Bank, Switzerlands central bank, moved interest rates to zero this week, a reduction of 25 basis points, and a notable detraction from other central banks around the world, such as the Federal Reserve in the U.S. and the Bank of England in the U.K.
In a statement, the Swiss National Bank said that the move was made in relation to declining inflation worriesand that its expecting the economies to buckle under the volatility created, in part, due to the Trump administrations trade policies.
With today’s easing of monetary policy, the SNB is countering the lower inflationary pressure. The SNB will continue to monitor the situation closely and adjust its monetary policy if necessary, to ensure that inflation remains within the range consistent with price stability over the medium term, the statement read.
The global economic outlook for the coming quarters has deteriorated due to the increase in trade tensions. In its baseline scenario, the SNB anticipates that growth in the global economy will weaken over the coming quarters. Inflation in the U.S. is likely to rise over the coming quarters. In Europe, by contrast, a further decrease in inflationary pressure is to be expected.
Meanwhile, in the U.S., the Federal Reserves latest meeting wrapped up this week with no change in interest rates, despite pressure from the White House and others to lower them. Fed Chair Jerome Powell and other Fed governors have been reluctant to do so, as inflation data still has not gotten close enough to its 2% target, and employment data has remained positive.
Across the Atlantic, however, another European country, Norway, also cut rates this week. And some experts think that the Swiss could go even further, instituting negative interest rates at some point this year.
There are risks that the SNB will go further in the future if inflationary pressures dont start to increase, and the lowest the policy rate could go is -0.75%, the rate it reached in the 2010s, Swiss National Banks Chairman Martin Schlegel told CNBC on Thursday. But what I can say is that going negative, we would not take this decision lightly.
