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In the aftermath of Trump’s executive orders targeting DEI, leading companies across corporate America have been reevaluating their diversity programs. Disney is now joining the ranks of major employers that are shifting their DEI efforts, according to a memo obtained by Axios. One of the major changes will be how diversity goals correlate with executive compensation, which has become a common practice at many large companies. Disney will now consider “talent strategy” rather than “diversity and inclusion” as a factor in executive compensation, though that will still include elements of DEIa shift that seems more like a reframing, rather than an outright rejection of DEI practices. Disney is also changing the name of its affinity groups from “Business Employee Resource Groups” to “Belonging Employee Resource Groups,” to underscore how ERGs are a crucial part of “strengthening our employee community and workplace experience,” per the memo. It’s not entirely clear what the rebrand means for ERGs, though unlike some other companies (i.e. Ford), Disney does not seem to be restructuring those groups to focus on professional interests rather than shared identity. (The company did not respond to a request for comment and clarification on its ERG strategy.) In addition, Disney is also making content-related changes to the language of its disclaimers and the Reimagine Tomorrow initiative, which has highlighted stories from underrepresented communities. Also, unlike other companies, Disney does not appear to be disbanding its DEI team altogether or completely eliminating its diversity initiatives. Most of the changes outlined in the memo seem intended to move away from the traditional language of diversity programsperhaps to address any legal riskbut Disney is still using terms like “belonging” that have long been a part of DEI parlance. In fact, the company still seemed to express its support for DEI values in the memowithout using the term itself. “Creating a welcoming and respectful environment for our employees and guests is core to our company culture and our business,” human resources chief Sonia Coleman wrote. “Our valuesintegrity, creativity, collaboration, community, inclusionguide our actions and how we treat each other.”
Category:
E-Commerce
In the Northern Hemisphere, February is the middle of winter. According to NASA, this is why Native American tribes named this month’s full moon the Snow Moon. Historically, the shortest month of the year was also the coldest because of the heavy snowfall that occurred. Another name for this lunar display of grandeur is the Hunger Moon. That name also makes historical sense because of how the snowiest month made hunting and gathering more difficult. If you didnt plan ahead properly, your stomach was bound to rumble. Lets take a deeper look at the winter of it all, and when to best peep up at the night sky for optimal full moon viewing. When exactly is the middle of winter? Many people believe that Groundhog Day marks the middle of winter. Its a close approximation, but not always 100% accurate. If you want to get technical, according to the Farmers Almanac, the middle of winter varies from year to year. Groundhog Day always falls on February 2, and this year, the following day was actually the halfway mark between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox. Winter takes the prize for both the coldest and shortest season of the year. It lasts 88.99 days on average. Its brevity is due to perihelion, the point in the Earths orbit that it is closest to the sun. The cold is caused by Earth’s axial tilt, or obliquity. In the Northern Hemisphere, from December to February, the earth is tilted away from the sun, which means less direct sunshine and chillier days. The tilt overrides the nearness of the sun. Whats a groundhog got to do with it? Groundhog Day was created by German-speaking immigrants in the United States, who became known as the Pennsylvania Dutch because of a misinterpretation of the word “Deutsch.” It was based on the Christian tradition of Candlemas, a feast celebrating the day that Jesus was presented at Temple by Joseph and Mary. The early Christian church incorporated pagan traditions into its calendar. For Candlemas, one of these was weather-predicting folklore. In Germany, a bear or badger was used, but in the United States, groundhogs took center stage. The best known groundhog these days is Punxsutawney Phil, who calls Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania home. This year, he predicted six more weeks of winter after seeing his shadow. How to see the full snow moon In parts of the country, such as the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic, snow storms may prevent one from catching the snow moon. Talk about irony. The rest of the country will also experience cloudy skies amid potential rainstorms. If you want to try your luck, according to EarthSky, the full moon will reach peak illumination on Wednesday morning (February 12) at 8:53 a.m. ET. The celestial orb will also appear full Thursday and Friday.
Category:
E-Commerce
Shares of Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) rose 8% on Tuesday after Vice President JD Vance said that the U.S. will safeguard American artificial intelligence and chip technologies from theft and misuse by its “adversaries,” making a veiled reference to China. (The stock closed up by just over 6%.) We will . . . work with our allies and partners to strengthen and extend these protections and close pathways to adversaries attaining AI capabilities that threaten all of our people, Vance said in address at Frances AI Action Summit in Paris. Some authoritarian regimes have stolen and used AI to strengthen their military intelligence and surveillance capabilities, capture foreign data, and create propaganda to undermine other nations national security.” China’s chipmaking and AI technologies have been front and center at the Paris talks, with a focus on China’s DeepSeek, a reasoning AI model believed to now rival U.S.-based OpenAI’s GPT-o1 technology, but at a much lower cost. Intel is currently trying to turn around its business after the chip-manufacturing giant’s shares lost 59.60% last year. The stock is down 4.2% year to date. The question on the street remains whether Intel can get back its chipmaking edge. Help from the Trump administration could do just that. Once the largest semiconductor company in the world, Intel has lost market share in the past few years to rivals Nvidia and Broadcom after making a number of missteps, including missing out on the generative artificial intelligence boom. It eventually lost its spot in the Dow Jones Industrial Average to Nvidia. Intel is now rebuilding its business, having cut 15% of its staff as part of a $10 billion plan to reduce costs this past summer. More recently, Intel’s fourth-quarter earnings beat estimates, driving shares up 3% in after-hours trading, although it issued disappointing guidance ahead. Meanwhile, shares of Nvidia and Broadcom stayed relatively flat today, down 0.22% and up 0.89%, respectively.
Category:
E-Commerce
Meta underwent another big round of layoffs on Monday, cutting 3,600 jobs, or roughly 5%, of its total workforce. Between 2022 and 2023, the tech giant eliminated 21,000 positions, nearly a quarter of its workforce, and continued to reduce staff in 2024. But while those other recent reductions appeared driven by organizational restructuring and cost-cutting efforts, CEO Mark Zuckerberg seemed to tie this weeks layoffs to those he deemed “low performers.” Ive decided to raise the bar on performance management and move out low performers faster, Zuckerberg wrote in an internal memo when announcing the cuts in January. We typically manage out people who arent meeting expectations over the course of a year, but now were going to do more extensive performance-based cuts during this cycle. Some of the employees who have just been let go object to this characterization, though, and they are fighting back. Layoffs are increasingly common in tech, but theyre often framed as a failure of the company and its leaders rather than a reflection of individual employees. (Although Amazon famously culls its workforce based on performance metrics, and Microsoft reportedly has plans to do the same.) Given Metas public trumpeting of the low-performer criteria for this recent initiative, however, being swept up in this batch of layoffs seems closer to just getting fired. When these newly unemployed workers apply for other jobs, the concern is that hiring managers who might ordinarily be impressed with seeing Facebook on a CV will know exactly why these applicants are suddenly on the marketand, as a result, may be less inclined to give them a chance to defend themselves in an interview. Instead of waiting to find out for sure, some laid-off workers have started preemptively defending themselves onlineand they are bringing receipts. Kaila Curry, who, until Monday, worked in product content operations at Meta, posted on LinkedIn her surprise at being lumped in with supposed low performers after receiving an exceeds expectations in her mid-year review. I frequently asked for feedback and was always told I was doing a good job, she wrote in the post. I was never placed on a [performance improvement plan], never given corrective feedback, and never properly mentored or provided clear expectations. Currys experience lines up with a new report from Business Insider, claiming Meta’s director of people experience allowed managers to add employees from higher-performance tiers to those marked for layoffs if they couldn’t reach their reduction goals just from lower-rated employees. A spokesperson for Meta tells Fast Company that these were “performance-based terminations,” adding, “Prior ratings were not downgraded. Simply because someone had a history of meeting or exceeding expectations does not mean they continue to consistently meet the bar. In searching for other potential reasons for her inclusion in the layoffs, though, Curry cites one recent incident: Perhaps I became too vocal when our shift to young adult (YA) content involved removing safeguards that protected LGBTQ+ users. The past few months have been a time of transition for Meta. The company has recently made major changes to its content moderation and DEI policies that appear in line with Zuckerbergs recent embrace of President Trump. (The CEO also donated to Trumps inauguration fund, added UFC CEO and Trump ally Dana White to Metas board, and declared on Joe Rogans podcast in January that companies currently need more “masculine energy.“) Another former employee, data scientist Joshua Latshaw, was also taken aback by his inclusion in the layoffs. As he wrote on LinkedIn, his five-year history with the company included several exceeds expectations ratings and a promotion. (His post even includes screenshots of those reviews in the comments.) According to Latshaws post, a meets most expectations in 2024 followed months of turmoil within his teamwith the managers who conducted his review having only worked with him for less than six weeks. This is the first [Performance Summary Cycle] at [M]eta that I wasn’t exactly correct in predicting my rating, he wrote. The lone meets most expectations rating in Latshaws tenure at Meta was also striking, he notes, because it followed his taking parental leave earlier in the year. Over on Reddits r/Layoffs sub, a pseudonymous poster, identifying as a senior-level Meta employee who was let go on Monday, wrote that she, too, had taken maternity leave in the lead-up to her layoff. Several posters elsewhere on Reddit describe rumors of other Meta employees being laid off after returning from a recent parental or medical leave. (Meta did not comment on this.) Regardless of what led each Meta employee to wind up in this round of layoffs, it’s clear that the “low performer” moniker struck a nerve among those affected. Metas stock has been on the rise, with shares gaining 65% in 2024. Yet, considering that Zuckerbergs big bet on the metaverse continues to cost his company billions of dollars per quarter, the CEO should maybe consider himself fortunate to have evaded the low performer label himself.
Category:
E-Commerce
Trader Joes and other grocers are limiting the number of eggs customers can buy across the U.S., citing limited supply caused by the ongoing bird flu outbreak. Trader Joes is capping purchases to one carton per customer each day, the Monrovia, California-based chain confirmed. That limit applies to all of Trader Joes locations across the country. We hope these limits will help to ensure that as many of our customers who need eggs are able to purchase them when they visit Trader Joes, the company said in a statement sent to The Associated Press Tuesday. Photos of in-store notices about eggs purchase limits at retailers nationwide have swirled around online in recent weeks. In addition to Trader Joes, consumers and several local media outlets have also reported varying limits seen at stores like Costco, Whole Foods, Kroger and Aldi locations. When each limit went into effect is unclear, however. And not all are being implemented nationally. A spokesperson for Kroger, for example, confirmed that the supermarket giant doesnt currently have enterprise-wide limits in place but said some of regional divisions and store banners are asking customers to cap egg purchases to two dozen per trip. Walmart says it also hasnt imposed national limits expect for bulkier purchases of 60-count cartons, which have been capped to two per purchase, the Bentonville, Arkansas-based retail giant confirmed Tuesday. Although supply is very tight, were working with suppliers to try and help meet customer demand, while striving to keep prices as low as possible, Walmart said in an emailed statement. Costco, Whole Foods and Aldi did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday. But Costco confirmed to CNN that the chain was limiting its customers to three packages of eggs, which are typically sold in two-dozen or four-dozen cartons. Meanwhile, notices previously seen in some Target locations have warned about supplier shortages, but dont indicate specific purchase limits. The AP reached out to the retailer for further information. Avian flu is forcing farmers to slaughter millions of chickens a month, pushing U.S. egg prices to more than double their cost in the summer of 2023. The average price per dozen nationwide hit $4.15 in December and it appears there may be no relief in sight, with the Agriculture Department predicting prices will soar another 20% this year. Retailers could notably feel added pressures with Easter demand fast approaching. Beyond grocery stores limits, U.S. consumers are also facing more expensive eggs in some restaurants. Last week, Waffle House, for example, said it would be adding a 50-cent surcharge per egg on all of its menus. Wyatte Grantham-Philips, Associated Press
Category:
E-Commerce
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