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One of the many ways Americans practice gratitude in the month of November is by honoring those who have served in the U.S. military. This federal holiday is always observed on November 11even if that falls on a weekday, as is the case this year. Many federal services take the day off to give workers time to observe Veterans Day. It can get a bit confusing to know how this impacts whats open and closed. The ongoing federal government shutdown adds another layer of uncertainty. Before we clear all that up, lets take a look at the history of the day. A brief history of Veterans Day World War I was supposed to be the war that ended all wars. On November 11, 1918, a temporary armistice went into effect at 11 a.m., which ended fighting between the Allied nations and Germany. This halting of hostilities became permanent on June 28, 1919, when the Treaty of Versailles was signed, but the November 11 ceasefire would have a historical stronghold and continue to be celebrated. The following year, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed November 11 Armistice Day. Congress followed suit eight years later with a concurrent resolution. Unfortunately, as we are all too aware, WWI did not end all wars. The United States went on to fight in World War II and get entangled in conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq, to name just a few. The holiday evolved to honor not just those soldiers who served in WWI but in any of the conflicts that came after. In 1954, Congress officially amended the Act of 1938 to include all veterans. The Uniform Holiday Bill of 1968 moved the observance to Monday, October 25, 1971. People did not love this change, so President Gerald R. Ford reversed the decision in 1975, which took effect in 1978. Are banks open on Veterans Day? No. Veterans Day is a federal holiday, so most major banks are closed. You can turn to online banking in a pinch. Also, most ATMs are operational on Veterans Day. What about the post office? No. The United States Postal Service is closed on Veterans Day. Is mail delivered on Veterans Day? No. You will get a day off from bills and junk mail. The exception is USPS Priority Mail Express, a premium service that guarantees delivery even on federal holidays. Are FedEx and UPS open? Yes. FedEx locations are open, and most services will run as normal. Some delivery and pickup times for standard FedEx Express/ground services are modified because of the holiday. UPS stores are also open for business. Most pickup and delivery services will run as usual, but UPS Ground Saver and UPS Mail Innovations will need an additional day for deliveries. Is the stock market open on Veterans Day? Yes. The New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq are open for trading. What about schools? No. Most schools are not in session on Veterans Day. Some districts even took November 10 off to give everyone a four-day weekend. Are retail stores and restaurants open on Veterans Day? Yes. Most major retail stores and eateries are open for business. Some businesses even offer discounts or deals for service members. Applebees, California Pizza Kitchen, and Red Robin are all offering a free entrée. Knotts Berry Farm in Buena Park, California, is offering veterans and their families discounted tickets. The Nashville Zoo is offering free admission for veterans and their immediate family members. Heres a full list of deals and discounts compiled by the American Legion. What about pharmacies? Most pharmacies are open, including major chains like Walgreens and CVS, but some locations may observe different hours in the pharmacy section, so it’s best to check with your local store if you need medication.
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When you think of leaders you admire, you likely imagine them as authentic, at least in the sense of seeming genuine, real, and trustworthy. Science confirms this is usually the case. For example, data tells us that trustworthy leaders stand out for their no thrills patterns of behavior: They are, in other words, predictable, reliable, and unlikely to shock their employees or followers with erratic or excitable behavior that freaks them out. {"blockType":"mv-promo-block","data":{"imageDesktopUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/10\/tcp-photo-syndey-16X9.jpg","imageMobileUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/10\/tcp-photo-syndey-1x1-2.jpg","eyebrow":"","headline":"Get more insights from Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic","dek":"Dr. Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic is a professor of organizational psychology at UCL and Columbia University, and the co-founder of DeeperSignals. He has authored 15 books and over 250 scientific articles on the psychology of talent, leadership, AI, and entrepreneurship. ","subhed":"","description":"","ctaText":"Learn More","ctaUrl":"https:\/\/drtomas.com\/intro\/","theme":{"bg":"#2b2d30","text":"#ffffff","eyebrow":"#9aa2aa","subhed":"#ffffff","buttonBg":"#3b3f46","buttonHoverBg":"#3b3f46","buttonText":"#ffffff"},"imageDesktopId":91424798,"imageMobileId":91424800,"shareable":false,"slug":""}} Furthermore, the best meta-analysis (quantitative review of hundreds of independent top studies) on personality and leadership tells us that one of the most consistent predictors of whether someone emerges as a leader, and is in turn actually effective in that role, is conscientiousnessa trait embodied by people who are methodical, disciplined, gritty, and who excel at self-control and resisting temptations (in other words, the opposite personality to Charlie Sheen, though his current self has no doubt become more conscientious!). Unsurprisingly, leaders with this profile also tend to create higher levels of psychological safety, which as my colleague Amy Edmondson and I have recently illustrated is likely to create the conditions that enable teams to experiment, take healthy risks, fail smart, and speak up without fear of being reprimanded. Ironically, then, the more leaders can edit themselves, the less pressure their teams will feel to edit themselves. In other words, if you want people to feel safe and included, focus on being your best rather than your real or natural self. Works in progress More importantly, every leader is a work in progress. That is, the growing complexities and uncertainties underpinning each and every one of the new challenges leaders must face (e.g., navigating the human-AI age, coming to terms with global geopolitical conflicts, managing shareholder and stakeholder value, having a voice on polarizing matters without alienating or antagonizing or acting like a cult leader), make it imperative that leaders improve, evolve, and develop. This requires being coachable, and having the necessary curiosity, humility, and motivation to not just be yourselfto not be limited by your past and present self. As my colleague Herminia Ibarra noted, the evolution of the self always consists of going beyond who you already are and finding ways to broaden or enrich your identity. Inevitably, this means resisting the temptation to stay within your comfort zone, playing it safe or playing it to your strengths, and mastering new behaviors and adaptations. Simple example: A naturally extraverted leader will probably have a tendency to dominate meetings, making it hard to let other people speak. However, if they were interested in becoming better and evolving as a leader, they could develop the micro-skills needed to shut up and listen! By the same token, a naturally creative and innovative leader may have a tendency to jump from one idea to the next, getting easily bored with executional details or tactical operational road maps. However, if they were interested in being more effective and becoming a more complete version of themselves, they would benefit from cultivating some patience and interest for these details, and so on. Broadening skills So, as it turns out, self-editing is not just helpful when it comes to making leaders understand that their obligation to others generally eclipses their right to be themselves, but also broadening the skills and behavioral repertoire leaders must possess to manage in complex times. Indeed, even if you think you are effectiveperhaps even talentedas a leader, the only way to get better is by not simply applying your current skills, but learning new adaptations. This means decoupling the trigger-response connection to allow for a wider range of possibilities, responses, and behaviors, turning you into a more diverse and broader version of yourself, a kind of personal enrichment that expands your potential and gives you more choices to respond appropriately to each situation. Because lets not forget: Every situation benefits from the right response, rather than the first or most natural thing that comes to mind. In that sense, acting spontaneously and without much consideration or concern for what others think of you may make you feel more authentic, but also be less effective in the eyes of others. With that, here are eight simple tips for being better at self-editing. Eight practical ways to master the art of self-editing Dont believe your own hype.The moment you start inhaling your own PR, your learning curve flattens. Confidence is useful; self-delusion is not. Good leaders act like their reputation is a rumor they still need to verify. Remember: Its not how good you think you areits how good others think you are.Decades of psychological research show that self-ratings of talent or performance barely correlate (and often correlate negatively) with actual performance. Self-perception is comforting fiction; reputation is data. Pause before you react.The gap between impulse and action is where leadership lives. Emotional self-regulationthinking twice before sending that late-night emailis often the difference between credibility and regret. Curate what you share.Transparency doesnt mean oversharing. The best leaders disclose enough to build trust but not so much that it burdens others. Edit for relevance, not confession. Seek out editors.Every great writer has an editor; every great leader should too. Surround yourself with people who challenge, critique, and occasionally deflate you. If everyone around you nods, youre in an echo chamber, not a team. Balance passion with predictability.Enthusiasm is energizing, but mood swings are exhausting. Your team shouldnt need to forecast your emotional weather. Reliability is charismas less exciting but more mature (and employable) sibling. Audit your habits.What you do repeatedlyhow you listen, decide, interrupt, and delegateforms your leadership brand. Record yourself in meetings, solicit feedback, or keep a behavior log. Then rewrite the bad sentences. Edit forward.View your leadership style as a draft in progress. Ask: What part of me needs less airtime now? What version of me do my team and context need next? Continuous revision is how leaders evolve rather than ossify. In short, leadership maturity is less about finding yourself than about refining yourself. The best leaders dont broadcast every thought or impulse, they run an internal editorial process that filters noise, amplifies value, and leaves others with clarity rather than confusion. {"blockType":"mv-promo-block","data":{"imageDesktopUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/10\/tcp-photo-syndey-16X9.jpg","imageMobileUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/10\/tcp-photo-syndey-1x1-2.jpg","eyebrow":"","headline":"Get more insights from Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic","dek":"Dr. Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic is a professor of organizational psychology at UCL and Columbia University, and the co-founder of DeeperSignals. He has authored 15 books and over 250 scientific articles on the psychology of talent, leadership, AI, and entrepreneurship. ","subhed":"","description":"","ctaText":"Learn More","ctaUrl":"https:\/\/drtomas.com\/intro\/","theme":{"bg":"#2b2d30","text":"#ffffff","eyebrow":"#9aa2aa","subhed":"#ffffff","buttonBg":"#3b3f46","buttonHoverBg":"#3b3f46","buttonText":"#ffffff"},"imageDesktopId":91424798,"imageMobileId":91424800,"shareable":false,"slug":""}}
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A few months ago, I was lying in bed, lightly clutching my phone, when Instagram Reels presented me with a brief video that promised an impossible soap opera: There were animated catswith feline faces but unmistakable human bodiesliving seemingly human lives, including in a human-seeming house and also, for some totally unclear reason, at a seemingly human construction site. There was drama: A female cat appeared to have been knocked up. There was also, somehow, a related love triangle involving two far more muscle-y male cats vying for her affection. None of the cats actually spoke. Yet somehow the plot proceeded, with one cat winning the heroines heart. It was well rendered. It was brain-meltingly inane. AI slop is now our collective shorthand for short-form digital garbage. Specifically, the term slop evokes liquidy, wasteful goo, threatening to gush over everything. We use this description because the content AI is manufacturing is often low-quality, vulgar, stupid, even nihilist. What decent defense can be mounted for the video I just described, at least to the best of my internet-corroded memory? This output is gross, indeed, sloppy. And its getting everywhere. AI slop did not emerge from artificial intelligence, generally. (Artificial intelligence has a broad scope, but the term has been around for a few decades and is often associated with machine learning.) Specifically, the term was birthed around 2023 in the aftermath of generative AI, when platforms like ChatGPT and Dall-E became publicly available, according to Google Trends. All of a sudden, everyday internet users could generate all sorts of stuff. While AI companies sort out a business modeltheyre working on it!the internet public has been left to navigate a subsidized AI free-for-all, where we can render slop into existence with merely some keyword cues and a chatbot. Of course, with mass production comes surplus and, then, refuse. We containerize actual trash because otherwise debris gets on everything else and makes everything less good. AI is, arguably, doing the same on the internet. Its clear we think of a lot of AI as trash, though were not doing much to clean it up. There are already clear signs of contamination. The arrival of low-cost AI generated content has obviated a certain category of digital parachute journalism: stumbling upon a wacky or concerning online trend, then quickly writing it up without any form of verification. Fox News recently published an attempt at such internet stenographyduring the shutdown, designed to denigrate Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) beneficiariesonly to later issue a clarification after the outlet learned the videos were created by AI. The confusion goes the other way, too: While reading a clue, Jeopardy! host Ken Jennings recently caught heat for describing something as AI generated when, in fact, it wasnt. The quagmire has even gotten the billionaires. In the aftermath of Zohran Mamdanis victory in New York Citys mayoral election, financier Bill Ackman shared a video of Elon Musk talking about the mayor-elect. Musk is the spokesperson. He is brilliant, incredibly articulate, and spot on, said Ackman of the video, only for the community notes section of X to confirm that the video of Musk was AI. The Notes entry pointed to the videos producers, who note their channel isnt actually affiliated with the SpaceX executive. Deni Ellis Béchard, a senior technology writer at Scientific American, recently cautioned that the challenge of mass-produced cultural content, of course, isnt new: Innovative technologies always spur new forms of art, but also a largess of worthless bleh. This was also the case with the printing press, the internet, and cinema, he explains. In all of these situations, the point wasnt to forge masterpieces; it was to create rapidly and cheaply, he writes. But the production of new types of slop widens the onramps, allowing more people to participatejust as the Internet and social media birthed bunk but also new kinds of creators. Perhaps because much of massmade culture has been forgettable, original work stands out even clearer against the backdrop of sameness, and audiences begin to demand more of it. Indeed, the world of mass AI creation will inevitably feature some true gems. AI masterpieces, even. But there are real, unfortunate consequences of the real getting all mixed up with the fake, even more than it already was. Sure, there are reasons to think that the search for an objective truth is futile. But the alternative is corrosiveand structuralconfusion. The risk isnt that well miss the AI jewels hidden under slop, but that we, ourselves, will drown in it. We might even be fogging up the digital panopticon. Its become totally normal to know quite a lot about someones life from their social media. But today, my Instagram Reels, at least, is clogged with bizarrethough, it pains me to admit, engrossingAI videos. These videos are certainly less common on the platforms classic photo grid, but the platform is pushing us to short-form video, anyway, where this slop flourishes. Eventually, well reach a tipping point where AI overruns organic human activity on the internet. As Axios observed, the web will shift into a bot-to-bot, rather than person-to-person, platform. This, of course, is hard to measure: The whole point is that bots are trying to impersonate humans. Still, one cybersecurity firm recently found that 51% of the internet is now generated by bots. Last year, an analysis published by Wired found, over a multiweek period, that 47% of Medium posts appeared to be generated by AI. The companys leadership seemed totally fine with this, as long as people werent reading the stuff. But even if we arent reading the trash, its still introducing a new source of duplicity to our collective online knowledge. Eventually, also, the same confusion will come for the machines. A study in Nature published earlier this month found that AI can struggle with significant attribution bias. Even worse: We also find that, while recent models show competence in recursive knowledge tasks, they still rely on inconsistent reasoning strategies, suggesting superficial pattern matching rather than robust epistemic understanding. Most models lack a robust understanding of the factive nature of knowledge, that knowledge inherently requires truth. These limitations necessitate urgent improvements before deploying LMs in high-stakes dmains where epistemic distinctions are crucial. Companies have built powerful facial recognition by slurping up images of faces posted on social media to train detection algorithms. AI faces might complicate this methodology, though. A few months ago, FedScoop reported that Clearview AI, a dystopian operation that scraped hundreds of millions of images from social media to build a highly accurate facial recognition model and then sell that technology to the governmentwas hoping to build a deepfake detector. LinkedIn recently announced that its now using data from its site for improving Microsofts generative AI models, though much of the site already sounds like an AI bot (Is it? We dont have a way to measure!). AI companies have explored using synthetic data to train AI systemsa reasonable strategy? Perhaps, in some contexts. But it also seems like a bad idea. In fact, there are tons of concerns about AI contaminating itself. Theres serious worry about a phenomenon called model collapse, for instance. Another Nature study last year found that indiscriminate use of model-generated content in training causes irreversible defects in the resulting models. Theres the possibility of creating an AI feedback loop, corrupting the very real and very true human data that was supposed to, in aggregate, make the technology so powerful. Amid the unctuous praise lobbied toward AI firms, slop seems like a problem for them, too. The nightmare scenario is something like the Kessler Syndrome, a fancy coinage to describe how humanity is polluting outer space. In low-Earth orbit, space trash (including a lot of dead satellites) frequently hits other trash, powerful collisions that then produce even more space trash, making the entire place cloudier and much harder to navigate and use. A similar future could await artificial intelligence: a whack-a-mole hodgepodge of AI creations and AI detections, all trained on increasingly AI-polluted data. When you get sloppy, you blur your words and start to stumble. AI may be similarly fallible.
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