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The cover process at The New Yorker is a beautifully inexact science. Each week, longtime art editor Françoise Mouly presents editor David Remnick a range of optionssome still in sketch formand Remnick chooses the one that feels most apt for the cultural moment. It could be a cover about a breaking news story; it could be a seasonal cover, an evergreen cover (Mouly banks the latter two types throughout the year). But inevitably, somehow, whatever he chooses feels organic to the publication, if not inevitable. What makes The New Yorker unique is that, as a general-interest magazine, our covers aren’t tied to feature stories but spring from the artists’ own observations and interests, Mouly detailed in an email exchange as she worked to finish production on the magazines landmark 100th anniversary issue. The New Yorker cover stands as one of the last bastions of wordless storytelling in our culture, a place where an artist’s singular vision can still speak directly to readers. In an age when were all flooded with a torrent of anonymous, manufactured images, these carefully crafted covers serve as an antidoteeach one signed by an artist, each one attempting to crystallize a moment or catalyze an idea. [Photo: Leila Abazine] Its a visual lineage that will be celebrated in the magazines centennial issue out this weekand in LAlliance New Yorks exhibition Covering The New Yorker, which runs through March 30. Co-curated by Mouly and Abrams Vice President and Publisher Rodolphe Lachat, the show features something readers have not seen before: original cover artwork from such luminaries as Maira Kalman, Barry Blitt, Chris Ware, Art Spiegelman, Roz Chast, Anita Kunz, Saul Steinberg, and many others. Artist & Curators group shot at January 21st opening. Top, from left: Jenny Kroik, Barry Blitt, Richard Siri, Ed Steed, Mark Ulriksen, Art Spiegelman, Kadir Nelson, Ed Sorel, Peter de Sve, Gracie Lynn Haynes, Victoria Tentler-Krylov, John Cuneo, Front: Françoise Mouly, Tatyana Franck, Rodolphe Lachat, Gayle Kabaker. [Photo: Rebecca Greenfield] Speaking of those artists, Mouly considers the greatest accomplishment of her 30-plus year run to be the careful balance she has maintained between established contributors and new creatives who illustrate the covers. I’ve never had to sacrifice new voices for old ones, or vice versa, she says. As for the inexact science that underpins the cover process, she adores the job because it lacks formula, and says shes amazed the work remains as challenging as when she first began. The fact that I still can’t phone it in after all these years is perhaps the greatest gift of this role. [Photo: Leila Abazine] With the magazine turning 100 this week, we asked Mouly to select the top five New Yorker covers from her tenure. She admits that her selections would likely change on any given daybut either way, today these covers still land with the same power as they did when they first met the cultural moment in our mailbox. Or didnt, regrettably, in the case of the last one Missed Connection by Adrian Tomine, November 8, 2004. [Image: Adrian Tomine and The New Yorker. Used by permission. All rights reserved.] Adrian Tomines Missed Connection (Nov. 8, 2004) Adrian Tomine is a perfect example of the kind of artist I love working withhes a marvelous short story teller. Cartoonists are intellectual athletes in that way: They have a lifetime habit of compressing complex ideas into a few pen marks. When Tomine first approached The New Yorker as a young, relatively unknown cartoonist, he already had a stylistically sharp ligne claire style. Unlike other artists whom I would take to our library to study covers from the 1930s and 40s, Tomine just needed the right story to tell. Having just arrived in New York, he noticed things that natives often forget, like how subway cars running on parallel tracks offer glimpses into other lives. When I asked him to consider ideas for our fiction issue, he began sketching this subway encounter. I suggested having the two characters read the same book. Tomines masterful composition makes this image perfect: We see only tese two faces, and follow their gazes to each other. The use of color draws our eyes to the lightly sketched book. We know the trains will move in different directions and these strangers will lose each other. This is what I lovea picture that tells a complete story. The Man in the Mirror by Saul Steinberg, January 12, 1998. [Image: Saul Steinberg and The New Yorker. Used by permission. All rights reserved.] Saul Steinbergs The Man in the Mirror (Jan. 12, 1998) One of my greatest privileges when I started in 1993 was to be Saul Steinbergs editor. I would go visit him regularly in his home, and spend wonderful hours in conversation (he talked, I listened). He told me about baseball, architecture, the O.J. Simpson story, Las Vegasthere was so much he loved about America. Then wed look through his flat files, fishing for ideas. He was in his eighties then, and he would search through his thousands of sketches and doodles for ideas he hadn’t yet transformed into New Yorker covers. He was always careful not to repeat himself. When I discovered this particular drawing, it resonated deeply with meit captured what artist Maira Kalman would later call The Optimism of Breakfast. It brought back memories of my own father singing in the bathroom while shaving. Though Steinberg was dubious about whether the image was substantial enough for a cover, I encouraged him to develop it. Later, he gave me the original drawingthis one is yours, he saidwhich is why the original is included in this exhibition. I learned so much from Steinberg: less is more, use color only when necessary, let ideas shine through simplicity. As Steinberg said of his work, Once youve seen it, you cant remember not having seen it. A good image can become a building block of thought, like implanting a new word into the language. Thats an awesome power for artists to have. 9/11/2001, by Art Spiegelman & Françoise Mouly, September 24, 2001. [Image: Art Spiegelman, Françoise Mouly, and The New Yorker. Used by permission. All rights reserved.] Art Spiegelman and Moulys Black on Black (Sept. 24, 2001) On Sept. 11, 2001, my husband, Art Spiegelman, our daughter, and I stood four blocks away from the second tower as we watched it collapse in excruciatingly slow motion. Later, back in my office, I felt that the only appropriate solution would be to publish no cover image at allan all-black cover. Then Art suggested adding the outlines of the two towers, black on black, which I drew. It conveyed something about the sudden absence in our skyline, the abrupt tear in the fabric of reality. From no image came the perfect image. Iya Ni Wura (Mother Is Gold) by Diana Ejaita, May 13, 2019. [Image: Diana Ejaita and The New Yorker. Used by permission. All rights reserved.] Diana Ejaitas Iya Ni Wura (Mother Is Gold) (May 13, 2019) Diana Ejaita, who divides her time between Lagos and Berlin, created this Mother’s Day cover as her first of many contributions to the magazine. I love that the image evokes patterns and colors that are common in Nigeria, and was delighted to see she included the keke in the background. It gives you a sense of place, yet its also universal, capturing an emotion every parent knows. The composition tells the story perfectly: A mother kneels to meet her child at eye level, making herself fully present. The child’s posture, the way she holds herself, suggests that shes asserting her independence. It’s a tender portrait of maternal love preparing to let go. Venus on the Beach by Roz Chast, August 4, 2014. [Image: Roz Chast and The New Yorker. Used by permission. All rights reserved.] Roz Chasts Venus on The Beach (Aug. 4, 2014) Though cell phones have dominated our reality for decades, The New Yorker rarely features them on its covers. If the magazine published every phone-related submission, thered be room for nothing else. This exception to the rule, by Roz Chast, is particularly successful, however. Usually images of people on their phone focus on the screen. Here the phones all function as arrows, pointing us toward the alive and surprising. And this twist on Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus is a clever way for the cartoonist to use one old cliché to shed light on another. Kamala by Kadir Nelson. [Image: Kadir Nelson and The New Yorker. Used by permission. All rights reserved.] Coda: Kamala by Kadir Nelson (Nov. 18, 2024) On Nov. 5, 2024, I was preparing a cover that would celebrate the first woman presidentjust as I had done for Hillary Clinton in 2016. Kadir Nelson had created this painting as a celebration of the first woman, first Black and first Indian-American president. Despite editor David Remnicks repeated requests for a Plan B, I had no other approved sketch in the works. Around 9:30 p.m. on election night, it became clear that the Harris cover would never be published. I turned to a rough sketch that Barry Blitt had sent in. I called him and asked for a finish. When do you need it? he asked. Now, I told him. I asked him to draw it very small, very quickly; to keep it gestural, to just spew it out. The resulting image was published in the morning. Powerful covers often emerge not from advance planning but from living through and feeling the moment. This is as true for me as the art editor as it is for the artists. And in the show, I just love the juxtaposition of these two images: the huge, masterful oil painting of Harris, which took weeks to complete and carried so much hope, and the tiny, dark ink stain next to it. It speaks volumes.
Category:
E-Commerce
The Trump administration’s fight against electric vehicles includes everything from trying to get rid of the EV tax credit to freezing funding for charging stations. But EV company Rivian says its strategy hasn’t changed. We talked to CEO RJ Scaringe about why his long-term vision isn’t dependent on current policy, and the company’s future plans for its products. The company makes luxury SUVs and trucks, including 2024’s bestselling premium SUV in California (electric or gas); next year, it will launch a more affordable vehicle that starts at $45,000. Construction on a new factory outside Atlanta is set to begin in 2026, with a $6.57 billion loan guarantee that the Department of Energy finalized just before Biden left officethat legally, Trump shouldn’t be able to take away. The Trump administration is pushing to cut EV incentives, including the $7,500 federal tax credit. What impact do you think that will have on the EV market in the U.S.? There’s a lot of emphasis right now on the very short termwhat happens in the next months or even weeks with policy. But the way we make decisions as a company, were looking at this on a much more long-term basis. The product roadmap we built, the technology we’ve developed, the way we’re designing and building and growing the businesses, is really being architected around a long-term view that the market will move over time to 100% electric. RJ Scaringe [Photo: Rivian] In that transition, it’s critical that there’s a collection of great companies being built in the United States, employing the U.S. workforce, developing the technology, building the products, and making sure that we as a country maintain leadership and what undoubtedly and unavoidably is going to be the core of personal transportation. Combustion will become an increasingly small percentage over time. Even though youre focused on the long-term view, how much do you think current policy matters in terms of pushing EVs forward faster? Policy, of course, matters, but its not the only driver, especially in a situation like this where the end state is so clear. Were paying very close attention to [policy]. But we will adjust around whatever the policy is. When I started the company [in 2009], I didnt start with any idea that there would be policies that are either tailwinds or headwinds. We just said that this is something that needs to happen. And its going to happen with the collective efforts of companies that are innovating with technology and creating compelling products. I think the other thing to recognize, in all the noise and the discussion of electrification and how it’s become politicized, there’s one thing that’s very consistent that’s on all sides of the political spectrum: Creating jobs in new technology, creating manufacturing in the United States, building a really robust ecosystem of companies that are facing that future state is something everyone’s aligned on. We have a plant today in Normal, Illinois and a plant that were building just outside Atlanta, Georgia, with support from both states. They’re different very different states politically, but the amount of excitement and reception we have in both states is outstanding. If some legacy automakers pull back from EVs because there are fewer incentives, does that give you a competitive advantage? We talk about making decisions in the context of our [kids’ futures] . . . I think its really important that every manufacturer is investing heavily in electrification and creating products that are so compelling and so exciting that regardless of whether they’re electric or gasoline theyre going to draw customers in. If we really want to accelerate the speed at which we electrify, the speed at which that transition happens, it’s going to require a lot of choices [for consumers]. Certainly, a lot more than we have today. I say all that because I do think it’s important that other manufacturers invest. If I looked at it purely through the lens of what’s best for Rivian, I think that manufacturers pulling back, myopically, is actually better for Rivian. It [hurts the] competition. But I don’t think that’s good for the world. If some other U.S. automakers do retreat temporarily from EVs, how much is China’s EV industry likely to get farther ahead? If you’re optimizing for the next quarter, I think you can make bad decisions as a business and bad decisions for us as a country. But every business is going to make decisions [based on] what they believe is going to maximize value for their shareholders. Its not an easy challenge, especially in a world where youve got a legacy business that is maybe highly profitable, and youve got a lot of experience. Its a hard decision to say were going to go build products that, by definition, pull demand from our legacy products. Those new products, by virtue of being lower volume and the technology being different, may not have the same profitability to start. Over time, I think electric vehiclesgiven the dramatically enhanced simplicity and fewer partswill become not only cost-competitive, but theyll have a cost advantage relative to combustion-powered vehicles. But theres a lot of work to do in battery technology to get there. [Photo: Rivian] How long will that take? Isnt it right that some EVs are at cost parity with their counterparts now, if you look at total cost of ownership? How far away are competitive sticker prices? I think it depends on the segment. In the premium segment, it’s there. As evidenced by us. We only sell our flagship products today (our R1T, R1S) and the average transaction price is over $90,000. It’s the bestselling premium SUV in Californianot premium electric SUV, preium SUV. It’s doing really well. If you look at other premium SUVs, you could even say it’s priced at a discount. It’s much higher performance. In a premium product like that, there’s a lot of other contributors to cost, so that the relative cost of the battery to the rest of the vehicle is not as significant. To get to cost parity on something that is a $20,000 car, $25,000 car, the battery then makes up such a a large percentage of its price that today it is still difficult. I think over time we’re going to solve that, but it’s a few years out. Whether it’s three years out or five years out, when you squint, you can see it. We’re getting close to it. It’s not, like, 20 years away. Youre launching a more affordable EV next year, right? Yes, and Im so excited. Its probably the most excited Ive ever been for a product were developing, which is funny because I didnt think I could be more excited than when we launched the R1, something Id been working on since I started the company. R2 takes all of the learnings from R1. The cost for us to make it is less than half of R1, and the price is quite a bit lowerit starts at $45,000. [Photo: Eric Anderson/Rivian] You mentioned the idea of designing a car thats compelling not just because its electric but for other reasons. What does that involve? It’s important to have a really clear vision for what both the product and the company stand for and represent. I mean that not just in philosophical ways, but in terms of product/attribute tradeoff. The best products, whether they’re cars or electronics or furniture, are the products that feel really holistically thought through. Where despite the fact that maybe hundreds or maybe even thousands of people have worked on that product, it feels like a singular vision. Apple has done an amazing job of this. Of course, I think we did a really nice job on it with our R1 products. What we’re trying to do with R2 is to capture that. For us, it’s really blending the aspiration of something that feels premiumthe materials are nicely executed, we’re thoughtful in the selection of materialsbut at the same time, the fact that it’s aspirational doesn’t take away from its usability. You can get it dirty. You can fit a lot of gear into it. We often think of it as a platform to go generate the kinds of memories that you’re going to want to hold on to for many years to comethe kinds of things you want to take photographs of. [The cars also] accelerate incredibly well. They’re very capable on road. They’re very capable off road. But we really want all the attributes, all the characteristics of that mosaic, to come together into this feeling. Like this vehicle is your adventure partner. When you look into the future, how do you see EV technology continuing to change? With battery technology, for example, how is that evolving? The most important element is getting cost down, both through the chemistry in the batteries and the rest of the battery packconcepts like cell to pack where were minimizing the amount of structural overhead that exists in the pack to take the overall cost down. And we see with our own products that the cell costs have come down, the pack costs have come down, modules have been massively simplified. I expect that innovation to continue. Of course, [there’s] competition between all the different manufacturerseveryones trying to drive cost down on this system. We have thousands and thousands of people across many different companies that are working on this problem. Its great to see the healthy and, Id say, highly productive competition between different companies in trying to address costs. What about something like solid state batteries? Are they likely to be in cars in the market soon? I think it’ll make its way into cars. It depends on how you define soon. I’d say within the next 10 years, for sure, but within the next two years, not likely, and not at scale. You may see some premium applications sooner, but they’re going to be really expensive because there’s lots of different ways you can accomplish solid state, but the industrialization of solid state still has a ways to go. Last year, you made a $5.8 billion deal with Volkswagen that lets VW access your vehicle software. How do you think about technology differently than some of the legacy automakers? We don’t have large teams of people that used to do something in the old waywe’ve only architected the business around a future state. So, obviously, that means we don’t have an engine design department. And our propulsion team has only ever worked on electric propulsion. There’s not an electric division and a gas division. The existing manufacturers can develop motors, develop battery systems. I think a more challenging aspect for them has been building out software teams and the computer design teams, the electronics design teams. And the reason is it’s so different from what they’ve done historically. [Image: Rivian] How does your “zonal” electrical architecture work? Over time, [other car companies] had this massive proliferation of what are called ECUseffectively little comuters across the car. A modern car might have 75 to somewhere north of 100 ECUs. It was never architected in a proper way. [We have controllers in a few larger zones] versus all these little computers, and we built an entire software operating system and software stack around it that is a very different topology than what incumbents have. It represents various essential cost savings, but importantly, makes managing software many orders of magnitude easier. [Photo: Elliot Ross/Rivian] What’s coming next for Rivian? We have some products that we’re already planning that essentially extend our brand into different segments, different form factors. Obviously, it should be different price points. [Editor’s note: One of the next products is the R3, an even more affordable car.] With the form factor and the overall aesthetics of the [R3], you sort of find yourself saying, is it a hatchback, is it a crossover, is it an SUV? We really wanted something that gave us a chance to demonstrate what we felt really strongly about, which is that the brand we’re building and the company we’re creating has a lot of elasticity. It represents an idea that’s bigger than just a single segment of cars. It’s this idea of, as I said before, enabling the kinds of adventures you want to take photographs of.
Category:
E-Commerce
It’s a simple idea. Aside from its electrical components, the Hoop Table Lamp by Finnish furniture company Vaarnii is made completely from pine timber and pine veneer. The result is a warm, natural statement lamp without any fuss. Released last week, the lamp is available in two sizes. It retails for about $360 for the medium and about $260 for the small. The appropriately-named London designer John Tree designed the lamp, which has a solid wood base created from a knot-free block of solid pine timber. The Hoop table lamp is topped by a pine veneer shade that’s cut thin enough to allow a glow of light through. All in all, the lamp is made up of only two pieces, and a gorgeous example of reductive minimalism that still conveys a sense of warmth. [Photo: Vaarnii] “Hoop is about reduction of form and an unambiguous use of quality pine wood,” Vaarnii says. “Simple yet painstakingly engineered, monolithic yet delicate, this is an effortless and essential lamp for illuminating any space with warm pine-filtered light.” Vaarnii sets itself apart from other furniture companies by creating its products from raw materials, including chairs and tables to ceiling lights all made from materials sourced from Finland. The wood for its Hoop Table Lamp comes from Finnish Scots Pine trees that the company says are sustainably managed and slowly grown. That means each piece is unique with its own grain pattern, and because pine changes as it ages, the color of the lamp deepens the longer you have it until it settles into a honey tone. The natural simplicity of the Hoop table lamp proves it doesn’t necessarily take much for timeless, sustainable design.
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E-Commerce
It took decades, but Rachael Kelly broke the insidious cycle of abuse shed been stuck in since childhood. At the time, she was leading human resources at a restaurant group in 2020. Im new in this job, and my toxic marriage start[ed] to peak, she says. Meanwhile, she was trying to help the employees at her restaurant who were suffering through the trauma and joblessness of the COVID-19 pandemic. Ending her marriage to an abusive husband while helping those workers establish safety nets made her think: How do we package [what Im doing here] and model it forward? Kelly ended up doing just that by first launching her nonprofit HiveStrong, which helps survivors of intimate partner violence and human trafficking. She then translated HiveStrongs principles to the professional sphere with her for-profit consulting arm called HiveSmart. I didnt expect how much trauma there is in the workplace, she says, and how much work around trauma and holding a safe space [could increase] business productivity. HiveSmart Consulting provides HR and coaching services to organizations with anywhere from five to 5,000 employees in industries ranging from hospitality to retail to HR technology in the U.S. It may look like any business consulting firm on the surface, but all its profits go toward Kellys survivor-aiding nonprofit and its methods stem from this workin other words, theyre trauma-informed. For Kelly, that means teaching business clients on how to do things like hold a safe space for their employees and where to draw the line between being compassionate, empathetic, and flexible while maintaining accountability. It also involves helping mediate and improve relationships between bosses and employees, particularly when one or both have experienced traumas that make them wary of each other, or unable to communicate effectively. Kellys particularly equipped to do this given her background as both a trauma survivor and a business leader. Since its August launch, HiveSmart has grown to include 20 consultants and works with four to six active clients at a time, Kelly says. Shes not alone in running a consultancy that fosters trauma-informed work environments; a quick Google will reveal that trauma-informed consultants are active around the country. But its a trend that Kelly says more employers are starting to see the need for, judging by the growing interest in her expertise and greater awareness of just how many people experience trauma. One global 2016 study found 70% of respondents reported experiencing at least one traumatic event in their lives, while the US National Center for PTSD reports roughly 5% of U.S. adults have Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in any given year, a condition that might result in employees shutting down or lashing out when theyre triggered by a colleague or managers behavior. Everyone experiences trauma, Kelly says, citing the mass trauma incurred from the pandemic, and there’s a way to make change that’s inclusive, not alienating. The challenge, then, she says, is bringing that message to the C-suite. How trauma affects the workplace Its difficult to trace the exact origins of trauma-informed practice, but many cite its roots in the healthcare field, specifically in how professionals came to work with Vietnam War veterans in the 1970s. With PTSD newly identified among veterans, healthcare providers shifted their approach to address its symptoms. This meant instead of asking patients, What is wrong with you? theyd start by asking, What happened to you? That latter question is still at the root of trauma-informed practices today, which have expanded beyond healthcare into arenas like education and, thanks to consultants like Kelly, the workplace. The U.S. Department of Healths Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration names the six key principles of a trauma-informed approach as safety, trustworthiness and transparency, peer support, collaboration and mutuality, empowerment aka voice and choice (giving workers agency that they lacked in their traumatic experiences) and cultural, historical, and gender issues. When organizations dont consider those principles in their operations, say trauma-informed practitioners, trauma can manifest at work in myriad ways. It’s hard to [paint] a broad stroke, because trauma responses can look so different across folks, says Shelby Cook, who founded the Ohio-based Cook Counseling and Consulting after getting burnt out as a therapist with the Department of Veterans Affairs. Two prominent examples she sees are absenteeism and presenteeism. (The former happens when employees, for example, repeatedly take sick days for their mental health. Presenteeism means employees physically show up to work but are mentally checked out and underperforming.) That can be a result of trauma, where that shut-down mode [turns] on, Cook says. As a therapist, Cook describes herself as touchy feely but notes this isnt the most common trait across C-suite executives. Kelly points out how many older executives grew up in an era when the common wisdom deemed emotions weak, she says. That can result in bosses and managers, perhaps inadvertently, shaming employees for feeling. When you do that, you make those emotions more acute, she says, training the brain that theyre worse than they are. Eschewing trauma-informed practices also results in communication breakdowns. I would see people talking past each other, Kelly says, because they didnt understand where the other was coming from. Context is everything when it comes to successful communication. This stuck out to Kelly when she worked with a CEO whod been traumatized by people having stolen from him and was trying to improve his relationship with an employee whod been abused by an older man when she was younger. Their relationship was sparking [the employees] triggers of controlling, untrustworthy, middle-aged white men, says Kelly, But once she understood what was going on with him, and he understood what was going on with her, they could . . . meet in the middle. That employee, whod been on the verge of quitting, ended up getting promoted and increasing her companys revenue. Implementing trauma-informed practices at work Dawn Emerick, a former CEO who now runs the trauma-informed Dawn Emerick Consulting in Florida, learned how her trauma affected her ability to work when she came up against what she calls a bully boss in her previous job. His authoritative characteristics, she says, elicited the fight or flight responses she didnt realize shed been suppressing since her traumatic childhood. They became so overwhelming that Emerick eventually resigned. Today, Emerick draws on her experience to coach other CEOs on trauma-informed methods. Coaching, she underscores, is not the same as giving advice, which she avoids in favor of executives comng to their own solutions. We talk it through and give scenarios, she says. Sometimes CEOs just need a confidential place [to talk], because it’s lonely at the top. She often uses the elevator metaphor to help clients land on productive responses to workplace problems. If there’s ten floors to their emotional response, and theyre at an eight, she says, they need someone to help them get down to a four so they don’t send that damn email. Strategizing around specific conversations is also a big part of Kellys work, as is ensuring leaders listen to and empower their employees. Having agency and choice is so important for trauma survivors, because its something they were denied as victims. Asking employees for their input, then, is crucial to fostering trauma-informed workplacesand not just asking, but then acting on employees suggestions and requests. This holds for big and small asks. Cook brings up employees requesting she stock decaf coffee in the office kitchen. These small touches show employees that they matter and are being heard. When Kelly started working with LaMonte Jones, whos on the board of directors of the nonprofit Children of Restaurant Employees, the organization struggled with board members operating in silos and cliques, Jones says, keeping their issues hidden. Kelly built connections with individual members to facilitate, Jones says, an environment that allowed everyone to be heard and all their ideas to be considered. The board members realized they had a common goal; they were just disagreeing on how to get there. Once they saw others listening to their ideas, they were able to incorporate more board members perspectives productively. Since Kellys intervention, says Jones, COREs funding is up, and theyve identified staffers to promote to the executive levelthe first time theyve promoted in-house in a long time. At the last board meeting, Jones observed that everyone likes each other, he says. They’ve got more strategic partners than they’ve ever had in the past. . . . They have people working in spaces that highlight their gifts and talents. ‘Empathetic leadership’ doesnt equal ‘trauma-informed’ While Cook calls this work touchy feely, Cook says the approach is essentially rooted in specific actions covered in those six SAMHSA principles, ranging from DEI efforts to other practices like responding sincerely to employee input. Defining it only as empathetic leadership, says Emerick, doesnt do it justice. Being an empathetic leader means being able to put yourself in an employee’s shoes, she adds, while being a trauma-informed leader means acting on that empathy by making employees feel safe at work (like making sure theyre listened to and supported) in such a way that still holds them accountable to their job requirements and deadlines. For example, bosses can act compassionately toward their employees without bending to their every demand. Holding a safe space doesn’t mean you’re saying it’s okay not to perform, Kelly says. Bosses can practice flexibility by, say, letting an employee with a history of trauma leave a little early one day a week to go to therapy while still requiring they meet their deadlines. Kelly looks to the Americans with Disabilities Act for guidance on how to treat employees whove experienced trauma equitably without favoring them: What’s reasonable, she asks, if somebodys going through something, to accommodate in a way that still meets the needs of the business? Employees notice shallow accommodation efforts. Offering snazzy workplace perks like ping pong tables or team-building days arent going to solve employees trauma-rooted problems. Cook brings up a misguided Employee Assistance Program she witnessed at a large Ohio university that offered counseling for its staff and students . . . provided by its own staff, meaning it lacked meaningful confidentiality. Ultimately, says Kelly, trauma-informed practices at work are means to an end. There’s always a business outcome we’re trying to accomplish, she says. For executives, achieving that outcome while holding safe spaces for employees isnt unattainableyou just need the right coaching.
Category:
E-Commerce
The standing desk is old news. Behold, the standing table. Herman Miller just released a new design that takes the concept of a standing desk to a whole new level. The Spout Sit-to-Stand Table comes in a range of sizes, from 2-by-4 feet to a whopping 4-by-7 feet, supports up to 400 pounds, and can seat a whole team rather than just one worker. Thats because it breaks a key form factor that most other standing desks follow: the number of legs in use. The vast majority of standing desks have only two motorized legs, mostly because theyre easier to stabilize and engineer to move seamlessly. Meanwhile, the Spout table stands on four legs, allowing chairs to be placed comfortably on all sides of the table.[Image: Herman Miller]The biggest challenge in designing a four-leg solution was creating a rigid and stable platform that could seamlessly support large surfaces, a Herman Miller spokesperson shared with Fast Company. The design team and engineers tackled this by developing an elegant 360-degree understructure that not only enhances stability but also scales across multiple sizes, from 2448 deep and 4284 wide.[Photo: Herman Miller]A four-legged standing desk isnt unheard of (in fact, Herman Miller offers a leather-wrapped version), but youd be hard-pressed to find one with 28 square feet of surface space. And, whereas most standing desks on the market tend to live within a minimalist color palette, the Spout can be customized with a wide range of surface materials, edge details, and leg colors, like dusty blue or fire engine red. To keep the tables profile sleek and elegant, its engineers also had to ensure that all of its moving mechanicslike the motors and drive assemblywould be tucked out of view inside the legs themselves.[Photo: Herman Miller]The team devoted countless hours to ensuring that every line and radius aligned perfectly, the spokesperson said. While the table may appear elegantly simple, the precision and complexity behind its design are anything but.Buyers of the Spout table will certainly be paying for this attention to detail. The price of the table varies widely depending on the size you choose and how you personalize it (see a guide here), but the three standard sizes currently available for purchase on the website start in the mid-$2,000s. For a Herman Miller product, this isnt exactly a surprise. Many of the companys office goods have make up their pricey costs not only in their high-quality materials, but also in their status-signaling cachet (see the Eames lounge chairs recent renaissance among tech bros).Personally, Id want my $2,000 desk to come with just a bit more opulence. Still, for any work-from-home tech couples out there or office managers looking to literally level up their space, this might just be the perfect product.
Category:
E-Commerce
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