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Tariff exemptions announced Friday on electronics like smartphones and laptops are only a temporary reprieve until the Trump administration develops a new tariff approach specific to the semiconductor industry, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Sunday.White House officials, including President Donald Trump himself, spent Sunday downplaying the significance of exemptions that lessen but won’t eliminate the effect of U.S. tariffs on imports of popular consumer devices and their key components.“They’re exempt from the reciprocal tariffs but they’re included in the semiconductor tariffs, which are coming in probably a month or two,” Lutnick told ABC’s This Week on Sunday.Trump added to the confusion hours later, declaring on social media that there was no “exception” at all because the goods are “just moving to a different” bucket and will still face a 20% tariff as part of his administration’s move to punish China for its role in fentanyl trafficking.The Trump administration late Friday had said it would exclude electronics from broader so-called reciprocal tariffs, a move that could help keep the prices down for phones and other consumer products that aren’t usually made in the U.S.China’s commerce ministry in a Sunday statement welcomed the change as a small step even as it called for the U.S. to completely cancel the rest of its tariffs.Sparing electronics was expected to benefit big tech companies like Apple and Samsung and chip makers like Nvidia, though the uncertainty of future tariffs may rein in an anticipated tech stock rally on Monday.U.S. Customs and Border Protection said items like smartphones, laptops, hard drives, flat-panel monitors and some chips would qualify for the exemption. Machines used to make semiconductors are excluded too. That means they won’t be subject to most of the tariffs levied on China or the 10% baseline tariffs elsewhere.It was the latest tariff change by the Trump administration, which has made several U-turns in its massive plan to put tariffs in place on goods from most countries. White House officials sought to dismiss any suggestion of a reprieve as the weekend progressed.“It’s not really an exception. That’s not even the right word for it,” U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday. “This type of supply chain moved from the tariff regime for the global tariff, the reciprocal tariff, and it moved to the national security tariff regime.”Greer added that “the president decided that we’re not going to have exemptions. We can’t have a Swiss cheese solution to this universal problem that we’re facing.”On Air Force One Saturday night, President Donald Trump told reporters he would get into more specifics on exemptions on Monday. In his post Sunday on TruthSocial, he promised the White House was “taking a look at Semiconductors and the WHOLE ELECTRONICS SUPPLY CHAIN.”Some had assumed the exemption filed Friday night reflected the president’s realization that his China tariffs are unlikely to shift more manufacturing of smartphones, computers and other gadgets to the U.S. any time soon, if ever.The administration has predicted that the trade war prod Apple to make iPhones in the U.S. for the first time, but that was an unlikely scenario after Apple spent decades building up a finely calibrated supply chain in China.It would take several years and cost billions of dollars to build new plants in the U.S., burdening Apple with economic forces that could triple the price of an iPhone and torpedo sales of its marquee product.The turmoil has battered the stocks of tech’s “Magnificent Seven” — Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Amazon, Tesla, Google parent Alphabet and Facebook parent Meta Platforms.At one point, the Magnificent Seven’s combined market value had plunged by $2.1 trillion, or 14%, from April 2 when Trump unveiled sweeping tariffs on a wide range of countries. When Trump paused the tariffs outside of China on Wednesday, the lost value in those companies was pared to $644 billion, or a 4% decline.An electronics exemption would fulfill the kind of friendly treatment that industry was envisioning when Apple CEO Tim Cook, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos assembled behind the president during his Jan. 20 inauguration.That united display of fealty reflected Big Tech’s hopes that Trump would be more accommodating than President Joe Biden’s administration.Apple won praise from Trump in late February when the Cupertino, California, company committed to invest $500 billion and add 20,000 jobs in the U.S. during the next four years. The pledge was an echo of a $350 billion investment commitment in the U.S. that Apple made during Trump’s first term when the iPhone was exempted from China tariffs.An electronics exemption would remove “a huge black cloud overhang for now over the tech sector and the pressure facing U.S. Big Tech,” said Wedbush analyst Dan Ives in a research note. Ives amended that note after Lutnick’s comments Sunday, saying the confusing news out of the White House “is dizzying for the industry and investors and creating massive uncertainty and chaos for companies trying to plan their supply chain, inventory, and demand.”Neither Apple nor Samsung responded to requests for comment over the weekend. Nvidia declined to comment. O’Brien reported from Providence, Rhode Island. AP White House correspondent Darlene Superville in West Palm Beach, Florida, and AP Technology Writer Michael Liedtke in Berkeley, California contributed to this report. Mae Anderson and Matt O’Brien, Associated Press
Category:
E-Commerce
Its been another chaotic weekend when it comes to President Trumps tariff trade war. On Friday, it was announced that electronic devices like smartphones and computers would be exempt from the looming tariffs of up to 145%music to tech investors’ ears. But by Sunday, the president had said that any exemptions would be short-lived. Despite this tariff exemption whiplash, the Magnificent Seven tech stocks of Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla are all currently up in premarket trading this morningthe first trading session after the tariff exemptions were initially announced. Heres what you need to know. Tariff exemption whiplash Since President Trump announced sweeping tariffs on nearly every country in the world on April 2, the stock markets have been hammered. But perhaps even worse than the tariffs effect on the markets has been the messaging around the tariffs. At various times over the past two weeks, administration officials have stated that the tariffs are both open to negotiation and permanent. And now the messaging over tariff exemptions is equally as confusing. On Saturday, Bloomberg was the first to report that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which is charged with managing tariffs on imported goods, had posted a bulletin day earlier, on April 11, that the Trump administration had declared tariff exemptions on certain electronic devices. These exemptions meant that many popular consumer itemsand items that are also critical to the supply chains of Americas Big Tech companieswould not be hit with staggering 145% tariffs if being imported from China (and lower, but still high tariffs from other nations). The bulletin said there were now exemptions on smartphones, computers, tablets, and even smartwatches, among other electronic items. This news was particularly welcome to Apples investors, as the company sources many of its iPhones, MacBooks, and Apple Watches from China. But this relief surrounding the tariff exemptions was short-lived. Thats because, on Sunday, April 13, Trump officials and President Trump himself stated that the just-published exemptions werent actually permanent. Policy confusion continues As noted by CNN, Trumps commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, told ABC News on Sunday morning that (Electronics are) exempt from the reciprocal tariffs, but theyre included in the semiconductor tariffs, which are coming in probably a month or two. In other words, Lutnick seemed to confirm that smartphones and laptops are indeed exempt from the existing reciprocal tariffs. However, he further implied that, in a few months, the Trump administration will be rolling out another new type of tariff to cover items with semiconductors (computer chips) inside. That would mean smartphones and laptops will be hit with tariffs then. Lutnick also said that upcoming tariffs targeting products that are key to national security, which likely include semiconductor products, are not available for negotiation. President Trump also chimed in on Sunday on Truth Social, announcing that NOBODY is getting ‘off the hook’ for the unfair Trade Balances, and Non Monetary Tariff Barriers, that other Countries have used against us, especially not China which, by far, treats us the worst! Trump went on to claim that There was no Tariff exception announced on Friday. He said that the reportedly previously announced exempted products like smartphones and laptops were still subject to an existing 20% fentanyl tariff and they are just moving to a different Tariff bucket. The Fake News knows this, but refuses to report it, the president continued. We are taking a look at Semiconductors and the WHOLE ELECTRONICS SUPPLY CHAIN in the upcoming National Security Tariff Investigations. Big tech stocks react in Monday trading While Apple would undoubtedly be the biggest winner from any electronics exemptions in the tariffs on China, nearly every major tech company would benefit as well. Even if they do not sell physical hardware products, they rely on servers and other electronics to keep their software services running. So its no wonder that, what the Trump administration says is now just a temporary pause, is still being met with a positive reaction in the markets when it comes to the stock prices of the Magnificent Seven. Heres how Mag Seven stocks are reacting at the time of this writing in premarket trading: Alphabet Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOG): up 1.4% Amazon.com, Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN): up 1.6% Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL): up 4.9% Meta Platforms, Inc. (Nasdaq: META): up 1.7% Microsoft Corporation (Nasdaq: MSFT): up 0.8% NVIDIA Corporation (Nasdaq: NVDA): up 1.8% Tesla, Inc. (Nasdaq: TSLA): up 1.3% Its worth keeping in mind, however, that while the Trump administration says any tariff exemptions are temporary, you have to take that with a grain of saltor at least be aware that things could change in the future. The administration’s stance on tariffsor at least the administration’s messaging around its stance on tariffshas been all over the place this month. Things could be very different a week from now, as Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts pointed out this weekend. Nobody can figure out what the rules will be five days from now, much less five years from now, she said (via CNN). This story is developing . . .
Category:
E-Commerce
I have lost count of the number of accomplished professionals whove said to me, I dont want to seem silly on video or, I am awkward when Im on camera. I have trained hundreds of people, ranging from members of Congress to supermodels to everyday folks, for national TV program appearances. Here are my tips to sound natural and authentic on camera. Toss The Teleprompter, Ditch the Script Try not to use a teleprompter! Heres why: The idea of video is to build connection. Using a prompter makes you sound like a robot. For short-form videos, under a minute long, instead of relying on a teleprompter, identify two to three bullet points. Write them on a sticky note and put it on your phone or camera. Make sure to put it close to the lens so you have the proper eye line. If you must stick to a scriptwhether its to ensure legal accuracy, clearly communicate your offerings, or include specific required detailsthen using a prompter is totally fine. Just dont let it flatten your energy. Dont Sell Etched into my memory is the spokesperson for now-defunct consumer electronics chain Crazy Eddie in a bizarre ad from the 80s where he shouts directly at you that the discounts are insane. Hes talking loudly and very quickly; its a prototypical sales pitch of that era. Too many of us remember that type of commercial, and we think we dont want to be that guy. Thats the excuse people use to avoid making videos. Heres the perfect solution: If you don’t want to be salesy, don’t sell. Every piece of content you put out there should deliver value: Focus on educating people, sharing your perspective of whats happening in your industry, or having people feel seen. Over time, that will convert into sales, but not from shouting. A recent client who hired me to build their video marketing plan said she had been listening to me on a podcast and had been following me on social media for several months. I had been able to build that trust with her through providing her with valuable content online. No Studio? No Problem If youre worried that the style or quality of your video will represent your company poorly, remember that for every Razzie Award-winning B-film, there is an Oscar-winning documentary. The key is understanding the style you want, and working with a video producer or agency to execute the style youre interested in that feels most authentic to your brand and voice. Communicate your aesthetic preferences clearly and youll be closer to Oscar documentary than slasher film. If youre interested in the DIY path but youre worried your videos feel low-budget, there are simple ways around this. I coach clients on how to get the most of your iPhone (the resolution on the cameras are very high) and my clients have been able to expand their client list extensively through iPhone videos alone. Make sure to use the highest resolution settings on your phone both as you film it and maintain the high-quality settings as you edit and upload. There are of course many reasons to hire a professional video crewwhere the audio and video quality are high and you can leave the tech up to someone else.
Category:
E-Commerce
Who am I to tell them how to make decisions? This anxiety-induced thought played like a broken record in my head as my first leadership training event approached in my new role as a training director. Talking in front of 40 leaders, most of whom were older than my ripe old age of 30 at the time felt like the perfect opportunity for them to see right through my lack of expertise and expose me as the fraud I was. Years ago, while working at a regional bank, I was promoted from trainer to leading a training team in another department. My prior roles as a sales trainer and human resources consultant allowed me to build a company-wide reputation as an expert on complicated sales processes and navigating employee benefits and hiring processes. This new role pushed me out of the payment division into the retail branch banking side. In other words, it was way out of my comfort zone. And at this first training event, I could no longer rely on my expertise to help me feel safe, trusted, or relevant. The Sky Parted That first event was tough. Afterward, I admitted to my manager, Who am I to tell them what to do? Ive been a manager for about five minutes and most of these leaders have been managers for 15 years. The question she posed to me next transformed my relationship with expertise for a lifetime. She asked, What if your job is not to be the expert up there, but to facilitate the expertise in the room? It was like the sky parted and the sun emerged. Of course that was the answer. Because I had been promoted throughout my career due to my level of expertise, it was natural for me to assume that in my new role, expertise was the only way I could add value. Instead of being the expert, I had to rebrand myself as a leader who could facilitate, promote, and grow the expertise around her, whether it be in a training room, on my team, or even now leading my own coaching and speaking practice. Managers looking to break their identity as the expert and the go-to can benefit from undertaking a similar rebranding campaign. People will likely continue to reach out to you, hoping for you to provide quick answers or jump in to help them fix an issue the way you used to. But its critical that you teach others how to see and use you in a new way so that you can advance to more strategic levels of leadership. This is easier said than done. After all, people have grown accustomed to your old ways of working. Here are some common situations that can keep your stuck in the expert identity trap and some strategies to consider to avoid it. THE GUILT TRAP Moving into a new leadership role can sometimes unsettle colleagues accustomed to our old ways of working. They may (intentionally or not) attempt to elicit guilt, saying things like, You used to do this for me or People are going to be upset about this change. While these concerns may be valid, your role is to redirect any resistance toward productive outcomes. A helpful response might be, Thats true, and moving forward, my focus is on working on this strategic project development for my team. Here are some other questions you can ask to redirect their energy: I know I used to handle this issue. How can I help you get the resources you need to move forward? I could give you the answer and I would also love to help you self-source for future needs. Where have you looked so far? I understand that people may be upset that Im not involved any longer. What ideas do you have to help support them moving forward? THE HABIT TRAP As I rose to new levels of leadership in my corporate roles, if I continued saying yes to too many requests to do the work myself, people would continue to expect this of me. As a result, I would have been too busy delivering training without enough time to plan for, coach, and develop my direct reports. It would also mean my team loses out on valuable development opportunities and meaningful work. In every conversation, you have the opportunity to set the tone for your leadership, for the team, and for yourself. This includes expressing your expectations and having clear boundary conversations to redistribute and delegate work that is no longer yours. This might sound like: Jane handles this project now. Id be happy to coordinate an introduction and handoff. Matt will be leading this initiative from now on. Id be happy to schedule time for us to connect and coordinate transitions. THE COMFORT TRAP When you are promoted, comfort can get the best of your leaders if they continue assigning the same tasks as they did before the promotion. Because they value your speed and competence, this can hinder your growth in your new role. To avoid this, proactive communication is key. In my experience making this shift, I proactively communicated with my leader by clearly defining which projects Id handle personally and which Id delegate. I also encouraged my leader to reset expectations with her peers, making it clear my team would take on more project work as I transitioned into higher-level responsibilities. Aligning with leadership across the organization ensures that both you and your team are positioned to grow into new opportunities. This might sound like: Id like my team to take on this project moving forward, so I can uplevel. How should we best communicate this to your peer group? Instead of me, my team will be leading these events. How should we best inform your peers so they know to go to Susie instead of me? THE FREE TIME TRAP You have excused yourself from meetings you dont need to be a part of and successfully delegated work. Now what? The mindset shift from respond and react to think and plan is challenging. One of my clients said it best: Im staring at a blank Word document that is supposed to be our annual strategic plan and I dont know where to begin. This space can feel disorienting and lead to the question, If Im not doing the visible work, then how am I adding value? The key is to turn non-doing into an opportunity for growth and clarity. Focus on creating value by developing a new expertise setting strategic goals and coaching your team to achieve them. Try reflecting on some basic questions like: What did our team accomplish in the last month? Quarter? Year? What opportunities exist in our organization or market? What threats may hinder our progress or ability to succeed? Do I have the talent on my team to accomplish our future goals and objectives? What does good coaching, development, or support look like to achieve our goals? What key relationships do I need to repair, retain, or cultivate to ensure we reach our teams goals? Breaking free from the expert trap requires you to redefine your value as a leader. The real measure of leadership is not in having all the answers but in cultivating the conditions for others to grow, contribute, and step into their own expertise. As you navigate this transformation, ask yourself: What legacy do I want to leave? Do I want to be the person who always had the answers or the leader who empowered others to find their own?
Category:
E-Commerce
Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! Im Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning. Regular readers of Modern CEO know I often cite advice and anecdotes from Bill George, the former chairman and CEO of Medtronic and executive fellow at Harvard Business School. I share his words in part because of the depth of his experience and his extensive body of work, including True North, Authentic Leadership, and 7 Lessons for Leading in Crisis. Still, I began to wonder if I had become overly reliant on his insights and set out to find other leadership experts. And who better to ask than George himself? What follows are edited excerpts of a wide-ranging conversation on the next Bill George, the difference between management and leadership, andbecause I couldnt help myselfGeorges advice for leading organizations in these supremely chaotic times. Modern CEO: Whos the next Bill George, if there is such a thing? Bill George: No. 1 would be Hubert Joly, the former CEO of Best Buy. Hes doing an amazing job at Harvard Business School, running CEO programs there, and wrote a book, The Heart of Business. And hes got a major research study, which Im sure will result in a [new] book, on frontline workers. Hes doing really good work and has a keen understanding of business purpose, values, and how one leads in this very chaotic period we are in. Within the business community, the best CEO in the world today is probably Satya Nadella at Microsoft. Others I would mention are Mary Barra [of GM], Doug McMillon of Walmart, and Dave Ricks at [Eli] Lilly. There are a lot of great CEOs out there right nowbut I dont know if any of them are going to write about it. Most academics prefer to write about management rather than leadership, and I think thats a terrible mistake. Many of the management techniques we have talked about over the last 30 to 50 years are woefully outdated. Theres no such thing as a 10-year strategic plan anymore. You can do one, but its meaningless because the worlds changing so rapidly. MC: Can one teach leadership without having been a leader? BG: Thats a really good question. [Former Harvard Business School Dean] Nitin Nohria is a brilliant teacher of leadership. I actually do think you need practice in leading. MC: We cant do a 10-year strategic plan anymore, but is there enduring advice on how to manage in chaos? BG: Leadership is much more difficult today than it was when I was a CEO or even 10 years ago. Why? Because the external world is changing so rapidly. One has to be very adaptive. Not all leaders are trained to deal with this worldtheyre trained to run businesses, to gain market share, to innovate with new products, to come up with creative, new marketing plans to make money, to manage the finances skillfully, to create more cash to please the stock market. Those are all the traditions. But today most of the issues one faces have to do with external factors. The great leaders have to be very skilled in how they deal with external events. We had 9/11, the meltdown of the banks in 2008, COVID, which affected every single human being on the planet in one way or another, and now the chaos thats taking place in trade and other things as a result of leadership in the United States. You have to be adaptive; you have to be flexible. But beyond that, I think there has to be a grounding, and that is your purpose or your mission and your values. And if youre not grounded in that as a company, youre going to be in [trouble]. A good example is Meta. Mark Zuckerberg is all over the map, and hes not going to fare well in this environment. Hes a brilliant guy, created the whole field of social media, but hes not going to do well in this because he is not well grounded. One has to lead with clarity about purpose and clarity about values. And that means you have to be clear in your own values. MC: Theres no shortage of people offering leadership advice on LinkedIn and TikTok. Is there information overload? BG: I think a lot of those writers are looking for an edge. A lot of the academics are thinking, How can I do something different? MC: How are you advising CEOs to manage through uncertainty at this moment? BG: First, be out there talking to your people all the time about your purpose and values. [Say,] Were not deviating from that as a company. Second, keep your head down and run the business really well. Dont deviate from what your business’s basic core strategy is. Three, if youre a global company, you have to be global. I actually think we will continue to be a global world, but [tariffs are] causing CEOs to really have to reset the bar. Who is the next top leadership guru? Which next-gen CEOs and leadership authorities should Modern CEO know? Send your recommendations to me at stephaniemehta@mansueto.com. Im eager to expand my network of experts. Read more: CEO wisdom Mass Mutuals CEO on the No. 1 leadership trait What SAIC CEO Toni Townes-Whitley learned from Satya Nadella Steve Ballmer has cracked the code on CEO second acts
Category:
E-Commerce
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