It has been five years since May 25, 2020, when George Floyd gasped for air beneath the knee of a Minneapolis police officer at the corner of 38th Street and Chicago Avenue. Five years since 17-year-old Darnella Frazier stood outside Cup Foods, raised her phone, and bore witness to nine minutes and 29 seconds that would galvanize a global movement against racial injustice.
Fraziers video didnt just show what happened. It insisted the world stop and see.
Today, that legacy continues in the hands of a different community, facing different threats but wielding the same tools. Across the United States, Latino organizers are raising their phones, not to go viral but to go on record. They livestream Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids, film family separations and document protests outside detention centers. Their footage is not merely content. It is evidence, warningand resistance.
Here in Los Angeles where I teach journalism, for example, several images have seared themselves into public memory. One viral video shows a shackled father stepping into a white, unmarked van as his daughter sobs behind the camera, pleading with him not to sign any official documents. He turns, gestures for her to calm down, and blows her a kiss. In another video, filmed across town, Los Angeles Police Department officers on horseback charge into crowds of peaceful protesters, swinging wooden batons with chilling precision.
In Spokane, Washington, residents form a spontaneous human chain around their neighbors mid-raid, their bodies and cameras erecting a barricade of defiance. In San Diego, a video shows white allies yelling Shame! as they chase a car full of National Guard troops from their neighborhood.
The impact of smartphone witnessing has been immediate and unmistakablevisceral at street level, seismic in statehouses. On the ground, the videos helped inspire a No Kings movement, which organized protests in all 50 states on June 14, 2025.
Lawmakers are intensifying their focus on immigration policy as well. As the Trump administration escalates enforcement, Democratic-led states are expanding laws that limit cooperation with federal agents. On June 12, the House Oversight Committee questioned Democratic governors about these measures, with Republican lawmakers citing public safety concerns. The hearing underscored deep divisions between federal and state approaches to immigration enforcement.
BREAKING: ICE raid and community resistance in front of Home Depot in Paramount, California.— Jeremy Lindenfeld (@jeremotographs.bsky.social) 2025-06-07T18:27:17.850Z
The legacy of Black witnessing
Whats unfolding now is not newit is newly visible. As my research shows, Latino organizers are drawing from a playbook that was sharpened in 2020 and rooted in a much older lineage of Black media survival strategies that were forged under extreme oppression.
In my 2020 book Bearing Witness While Black: African Americans, Smartphones and the New Protest Journalism, I document how Black Americans have used mediaslave narratives, pamphlets, newspapers, radio and now smartphonesto fight for justice. From Frederick Douglass to Ida B. Wells to Darnella Frazier, Black witnesses have long used journalism as a tool for survival and transformation.
Latino mobile journalists are building on that blueprint in 2025, filming state power in moments of overreach, archiving injustice in real time, and expanding the impact of this radical tradition.
Their work also echoes the spatial tactics of Black resistance. Just as enslaved Black people once mapped escape routes during slavery and Jim Crow, Latino communities today are engaging in digital cartography to chart ICE-free zones, mutual aid hubs and sanctuary spaces. The People Over Papers map channels the logic of the Black maroonscommunities of self-liberated Africans who escaped plantations to track patrols, share intelligence and build networks of survival. Now, the hideouts are digital. The maps are crowdsourced. The danger remains.
Likewise, the Stop ICE Raids Alerts Network revives a civil rights-era tactic. In the 1960s, organizers used wide area telephone service lines and radio to circulate safety updates. Black DJs cloaked dispatches in traffic and weather reportscongestion on the south side signaled police blockades; storm warnings meant violence ahead. Today, the medium is WhatsApp. The signal is encrypted. But the messageprotect each otherhas not changed.
Layered across both systems is the DNA of the Negro Motorist Green Book, the guide that once helped Black travelers navigate Jim Crow America by identifying safe towns, gas stations, and lodging. People Over Papers and Stop ICE Raids are digital descendants of that legacy. Where the Green Book used printed pages, todays tools use digital pins. But the mission remains: survival through shared knowledge, protection through mapped resistance.
The People Over Papers map is a crowdsourced collection of reports of ICE activity across the U.S. [Screenshot: The Conversation U.S.]
Dangerous necessity
Five years after George Floyds death, the power of visual evidence remains undeniable. Black witnessing laid the groundwork. In 2025, that tradition continues through the lens of Latino mobile journalists, who draw clear parallels between their own communitys experiences and those of Black Americans. Their footage exposes powerful echoes: ICE raids and overpolicing, border cages and city jails, a door kicked in at dawn and a knee on a neck.
Like Black Americans before them, Latino communities are using smartphones to protect, to document and to respond. In cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and El Paso, whispers of ICE is in the neighborhood now flash across Telegram, WhatsApp, and Instagram. For undocumented families, pressing record can mean risking retaliation or arrest. But many keep filmingbecause what goes unrecorded can be erased.
What they capture are not isolated incidents. They are part of a broader, shared struggle against state violence. And as long as the cameras keep rolling, the stories keep surfacingilluminated by the glow of smartphone screens that refuse to look away.
Allissa V. Richardson is an associate professor of journalism at USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
This is your reminder to pause and reflect on your own wellbeing, and check in on those around you. Be it anxiety, depression, burnout, or just a general malaise, its important to stay intentional and proactive about nurturing a healthy mind.
These 10 mental health books offer guidance and tips for cultivating inner peace, lasting joy, and emotional comfort.
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
Taming the Molecule of More: A Step-by-Step Guide to Make Dopamine Work for You
By Michael Long
Dopamine, the molecule of more, is the chemical in our brains that drives us to seek out newer and better thingsthe latest gadget, the coolest job, the perfect partner. But for many of us, its easy to get stuck in a cycle of never being truly satisfied. Because dopamine can only promise happiness. It can never deliver. That part is up to us. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Michael Long, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
Healing the Modern Brain: Nine Tenets to Build Mental Fitness and Revitalize Your Mind
By Drew Ramsey
This essential guide explores the nine tenets vital to cultivating mental fitness and provides direct, actionable techniques to improve brain function and emotional health. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Drew Ramsey, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
Unshrunk: A Story of Psychiatric Treatment Resistance
By Laura Delano
The powerful memoir of one womans experience with psychiatric diagnoses and medications, and her journey to discover herself outside the mental health industry. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Laura Delano, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
Ordinary Magic: The Science of How We Can Achieve Big Change with Small Acts
By Gregory Walton
Discover simple psychological shifts that build trust, belonging, and confidencefrom the codirector of the Dweck-Walton Lab at Stanford University. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Gregory Walton, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
The Narrowing: A Journey Through Anxiety and the Body
By Alexandra Shaker
An exploration of the connection between anxiety and the body by a clinical psychologist, drawing from the latest research as well as historical and cultural insights through time, arguing that only through understanding anxietys role in our lives can we transform it into resilience. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Alexandra Shaker, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
Validation: How the Skill Set That Revolutionized Psychology Will Transform Your Relationships, Increase Your Influence, and Change Your Life
By Caroline Fleck
How the science of seeing and being seen is the key to inner and interpersonal transformation. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Caroline Fleck, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
How to Love Better: The Path to Deeper Connection Through Growth, Kindness, and Compassion
By Yung Pueblo
Love enters our lives in many forms: friends, family, intimate partners. But all of these relationships are deeply influenced by the love we have for ourselves. If we see our relationships as opportunities to be fully present in our healing and growth, then, Yung Pueblo assures us, we can transform and meet one another with compassion instead of judgment. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Yung Pueblo, or view on Amazon
[hoto: The Next Big Idea Club]
How Do You Feel?: One Doctors Search for Humanity in Medicine
By Jessi Gold
A poignant and thought-provoking memoir following one psychiatrist and four of her patients as they deal with the unspoken mental and physical costs of caring for others. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Jessi Gold, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
The Grief Cure: Looking for the End of Loss
By Cody Delistraty
In this lyrical and moving story of the world of prolonged grief, journalist Cody Delistraty reflects on his experience with loss and explores what modern science, history, and literature reveal about the nature of our relationship to grief and our changing attitudes toward its cure. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Cody Delistraty, or view on Amazon
[Photo: The Next Big Idea Club]
How to Be Enough: Self-Acceptance for Self-Critics and Perfectionists
By Ellen Hendriksen
Are you your own toughest critic? Learn to be good to yourself with this clear and compassionate guide. Listen to the Book Bite summary, read by author Ellen Hendriksen, or view on Amazon
This article originally appeared in Next Big Idea Club magazine and is reprinted with permission.
Youd be forgiven for forgetting that there was a time when Microsoft Edge was basically the web browser that opened when you accidentally clicked a link that didnt default to opening in Chrome or Firefox.
But something shifted in 2020 when Microsoft switched Edges digital drivetrain to Chromium, the technology that powers the Google Chrome browser and others like it.
Edge suddenly shed its awkward skin and emerged as a genuinely competentnay, pleasantbrowsing experience.
And if you use Edge during your workday, there are some wonderfully useful time-savers built right into its core. Here are the ones I find most excellent.
Split Screen: 2 for the price of one
Want to browse to your hearts content while keeping an eye on your email? Try a neat little Edge feature called “Split Screen.”
Click on the three little dots in the upper-right corner and select this menu option, and the browser will split into two panes and you can open different sites. It even handles multiple tabs for each pane as well.
It’s perfect for always-on email, social media, or anything you need to keep a constant watch over without disrupting your main workflow. It’s like having a mini-browser within your browser and is especially helpful if youre working off a laptop without multiple monitors to plug into.
Collections: Your digital idea board
If you often find yourself researching something, opening a few dozen tabs, and then realizing youll need to revisit all of them later . . . then you and I are kindred, unorganized spirits.
Yes, bookmarks exist, but they’re meant to be reasonably permanent and theyre a bit clunky for quick idea gathering. “Collections,” on the other hand, act like digital project managers for you to reference later.
Click the three-dot menu and choose Collections to get started. You can drag and drop links, images, even snippets of text into a themed collection.
Planning a trip? Researching a new gadget? Building a shopping list? Collections keep it all tidy and easily accessible. Imagine: actual organization!
Performance Settings: Nobody likes a laggy browser
Even the best browser can bog down the beefiest system when you have a gazillion tabs open and a dozen extensions running, and you’re streaming 4K resolution video.
Edge’s “Performance” settings section is a quiet hero. It aims to save CPU, RAM, and battery by saving system resources, including a handy feature that puts inactive tabs to sleep. It doesn’t close them, but rather simply pauses them, freeing up resources for stuff youre actively working on.
You can enable and tweak various efficiency features in Settings > System and Performance. Your CPU fan will thank you.
Web Capture: Screenshots made simple
If ever youre feeling down about the state of the world, just know that its never been a better, easier era to grab screenshots. So theres that.
What once involved a delicate dance of Print Screen, pasting into Paint, cropping, and then realizing you missed a pixel is now as easy as right-clicking in the open space of a web page, selecting “Screenshot,” and grabbing what you need.
You can grab a specific area, the full page, or exactly what you see in the browser. You can annotate directly on the capture, too.
Shopping Features: Save some bucks, save some time
I’m not usually one for built-in shopping assistants, but Edge’s are surprisingly unobtrusive and genuinely helpful.
If youre on a site that sells stuff, look for a blue price tag icon to appear on the right-hand side of the address bar.
Click it, and the feature can automatically find coupons, compare prices, show you historical price trends, and let you track the item and get alerted if it goes on sale. It’s like having a miniature, nonjudgmental personal shopper living in your browser.
Like all awkward workplace conversations, a compassionate and direct approach is best. Welcome to Pressing Questions, Fast Companys work-life advice column hosted by deputy editor Kathleen Davis.
This article is republished with permission from Wonder Tools, a newsletter that helps you discover the most useful sites and apps. Subscribe here.
Perplexity has become my primary tool for search. I rely on it for concise summaries of complex topics. I like the way it synthesizes information and provides reliable citations for me to explore further.
I prefer Perplexitys well-organized responses to Googles laundry list of links, though I still use Google to find specific sites & addresses and for other micro-searches.
Perplexitys not perfect. Ive rarely seen it hallucinate, but it can pick dubious sources or misinterpret your question. As with any tool that uses AI, the wording of your query impacts your result. Write detailed queries and specify preferred sources when you can. Double-check critical data or facts.
Googles new AI Mode is a strong new competitor, and ChatGPT, Claude and others now offer AI-powered search, but I still rely on Perplexity for reasons detailed below. This post updates my previous post with new features, examples, and tips.
My favorite new features
Labs. Create slides, reports, dashboards, and Web apps by writing a detailed query and specifying the format of the results you want. Check out the Project Gallery for 20 examples.
Voice Mode. I ask historical questions about books, curiosities about nature and science, and things I should already know about movies & music. The transcript shows up afterwards.
Templates for Spaces. A large new collection of templates makes it easier to get started with custom instructions for various kinds of research, for sales/marketing, education, finance, or other subjects.
Transcription. Upload & transcribe files up to 25mb. Ask for insights & ideas.
Topical landing pages for finance, travel, shopping, and academics provide useful examples and new practical ways to use Perplexity.
When to use Perplexity
Get up to speed on a topic: Need to research North Korea-China relations? Ask Perplexity for a summary and sources. See the result.
Research hyper-specific information: Ask for a list of organizations that crowdsource info about natural disasters. See the result.
Explore personal curiosities: I was curious about Mozarts development as a violinist, so I asked for key dates and details. See the result.
The best things about Perplexity
Sources. Perplexity provides links to its sources, so you can follow-up on anything you want to learn more about. Tip: specify sources to prioritize.
Summaries. Instead of long articles or lists of links, get straight-to-the-point answers that save time. Tip: specify when you want a summary table.
Follow-ups. Ask follow-up questions to dive deeper into a topic, just like a conversation. For visual topics, Perplexity can surface relevant images and videos. Tip: customize your own follow-up query if defaults arent relevant.
Deep Research. Get fuller results for queries where you need more info. Tip: Use Claude or ChatGPT to help you draft clearer, more thorough search prompts.
Spaces. Group related searches into collections so theyre easy to return to later. I created one for Atlanta before a trip. You can keep a collection private, invite others to edit it, or share a public link. Tip: create a team space.
Pages. Share search results by creating public pages you can customize. Watch a 1-minute video demo. Examples: Beginners Guide to Drumming, a Barcelona itinerary, and forest hotels in Sweden.
Labs. This brand new feature is meant for generating interactives, data tables, and visuals. Results vary widely in my testing.
Use Perplexity More Effectively
You can use Perplexity on the Web, Mac, Windows, iOS and Android.
Start with Perplexitys own introductory guide, check the how it works FAQ, then use the Get Started template to use Perplexity itself to learn more.
Write detailed queries Include two or more sentences specifying what youre looking for and why. Your result will be better than if you just use keywords.
Refine your settings Specify one or more preferred source types: Web, academic sources, social (i.e. Reddit), or financial (SEC filings).
Pick your model. Advanced users can specify the AI flavor Perplexity uses. Id recommend maintaining Perplexitys default or the o3 option for research that requires complex reasoning. You can also use Grok, Gemini or Claude.
Specify domains to search. Mention specific domains or kinds of sites youre nterested in for more targeted results. Use a domain limiter to narrow your search to a particular site or domain type, e.g. domain:.gov to focus only on government sites. Or just use natural language to limit Perplexity to certain kinds of sites, as in this example scouring CUNY sites for AI policies.
Personalize your account. Add a brief summary of your interests, focus areas, and information preferences in your profile to customize the way Perplexity provides you with answers.
Quick searches are fine when youre just looking for a simple fact, like when was CUNY founded. Pro searches are best for more intricate, multi-part queries. On the free plan you get 3 pro searches a day.
Examples: Perplexity in action
Check public opinion: Is there a Pew survey about discovering news through social media platforms? See the result.
Explore historical archives: List literacy and education programs in high-growth African countries in the last decade. See the result.
Discover patterns: Compare residential rent to residential real estate trends in California. See the results.
Pricing
Free for unlimited quick searches, 3 pro searches and 3 file uploads per day.
$20/month for unlimited file and image uploads for analysis; access to Labs; and 10x as many citations. See the 2025 feature comparison.
Privacy
To protect your privacy when using Perplexity, capitalize on the following:
Turn data retention off in your settings. (Screenshot).
Turn on the Incognito setting if youre signed in to anonymize a search.
Search in an incognito browser tab without logging into Perplexity.
Bonus features
The free Chrome Extension lets you summon a Perplexity search from any page. The summarize button hasnt always worked for me.
The Perplexity Encyclopedia has a collection of tool comparisons
An experimental beta Tasks feature lets you schedule customized searches
Listen to an AI audio chat about Perplexity I generated w/ NotebookLM.
Caveats
Accuracy and confabulation: While Perplexity uses retrieval augmented generation to reduce errors, it’s not flawless. Check the sources it references.
Document analysis limitations: The file size limit for uploads is 25MB. Covert larger files to text or use Adobes free compressor or SmallPDF.
Deep Research, though fast, is not nearly as thorough as what is provided by ChatGPTs Deep Research or Geminis.
Alternatives to Perplexity
Google AI Mode: Google’s much-improved new AI search option provides summary responses like Perplexity. Heres an example of a comparison table it created for me and its take on 10 Perplexity features. Try it in labs. Free.
Consensus: Superb for academic queries. Search 200 million peer-reviewed research papers and get a summary and links to publications. Useful for scientific or other research questions, e.g. active vs. passive learning or how cash transfers impact poverty. Pricing: Free for unlimited searches and limited premium use; $9/month billed annually for full AI capabilities.
ChatGPT Web Search. Turn on the Search the Web option under the tools menu when using ChatGPT to enable Web searching. Search chats include inline links with sources. For example, heres a ChatGPT Web search query about Perplexity vs. other AI search tools. It includes a helpful ChatGPT-generated chart. As differentiators I like Perplexitys summaries, suggested follow-up queries, Labs, and the handy Voice Mode for quick questions.
This article is republished with permission from Wonder Tools, a newsletter that helps you discover the most useful sites and apps. Subscribe here.
Want more housing market stories from Lance Lamberts ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter.
Heading into the year, Zillow economists forecasted that U.S. home prices were likely to rise 2.6% in 2025.
However, this year, the housing marketin particular in the Sun Beltwas softer than expected and Zillow has made several downgrades to its forecast for national home prices.
This week, newly released data from Zillow shows that U.S. home prices have decelerated to a year-over-year increase of just 0.4%. Zillow economists now expect U.S. home prices to decline by 0.7% between May 2025 and May 2026.
With inventory up nearly 20% over the previous year, buyers had more options in May than at any time since July 2020. Despite higher sales, sellers still outnumber buyers, wrote Zillow economists. This gives buyers more time to decide and more power in negotiations. Zillows market heat index shows a balanced market nationwide, one thats a lot more buyer-friendly than in recent years. Competition among buyers declined to the lowest level seen in May in Zillow records, reaching back through 2018.
Not only do Zillow economists predict soft national home price growth this year, but theyre also predicting that the housing market will only see 4.1 million U.S. existing home sales in 2025. That would mark the third-straight year of suppressed existing home sales. For comparison, in pre-pandemic 2019, there were 5.3 million existing home sales in the U.S.
Zillow economists added: Home values have fallen in 22 of the 50 largest metro areas over the past year, and sellers cut prices on almost 26% of listings nationwideanother May high in Zillow records. Homes that sell typically do so in 17 days, about four more than last year and only two days fewer than pre-pandemic averages.
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Among the 300 largest U.S. housing markets, Zillow expects the strongest home price appreciation between May 2025 and May 2026 to occur in these 10 areas:
Atlantic City, New Jersey 3.4%
Kingston, New York 2.7%
Knoxville, Tennessee 2.6%
Pottsville, Pennsylvania 2.5%
Torrington, Connecticut 2.4%
Rochester, New York 2.2%
Syracuse, New York 2.1%
Fayetteville, Arkansas 2.1%
Rockford, Illinois 2.1%
Yuma, Arizona 2.0%
Among the 300 largest U.S. housing markets, Zillow expects the weakest home price appreciation between May 2025 and May 2026 to occur in these 10 areas:
Houma, Louisiana -9.4%
Lake Charles, Louisiana -8.9%
New Orleans -7.2%
Alexandria, Louisiana -6.7%
Lafayette, Louisiana -6.6%
Shreveport, Louisiana -6.4%
Beaumont, Texas -6.2%
San Francisco -5.5%
Midland, Texas -5.3%
Odessa, Texas -5.3%
While Zillow expects home prices across most of Florida to be flat over the coming year, ResiClub remains skeptical. After all, Florida has experienced a significant increase in active inventory and months of supply over the past year, which could signal potential pricing weakness. Indeed, prices of single-family homes and condos are currently declining in most Florida housing markets.
Getting the hiring process right is one of the most critical and challenging aspects of building a startup. Early hires shape your companys culture, operational efficiency, and future growth, yet many founders face this task without prior hiring experience or a clear sense of what their evolving business truly needs. Without being thoughtful about hiringfrom crafting compelling job descriptions to setting consistent compensation and onboarding practicesstartups risk bringing in team members who are misaligned with the companys needs or culture, creating friction and slowing momentum. Over the course of my three decades as a startup operator, executive coach and educator of entrepreneurs, Ive observed that investing the time upfront to build strong hiring practices not only helps attract the right talent but also lays a foundation for a healthy, scalable organization.
While you cant prevent occasional mis-hires, you can try to minimize the possibility by including a project phase in your hiring process or even considering a project as a paid consulting engagement (try before you buy) for both you and the candidate. This allows the candidate to demonstrate what they are capable of and what it might be like to work with themand them with youonce they are on board full time. Projects can give you a higher degree of confidence that this is the one, which can be super hard in the early stages of your startup when you are not sure what the one even is. If this is not a try-before-you-buy situation, I recommend that projects are performed just before you are ready to do reference checks and make an offer. This can be an especially helpful step if you are down to two finalists you really like so you can compare how each one approaches a project.
Unless you plan to do a trial engagement with them, try not to choose a project that takes more than one to two hours to do unless you pay them for the work. A startup Ive worked with offers to pay for the time taken to do a project, and if the candidate declines payment, the startup makes a donation to a charity of the candidates choice as compensation for their time.
Below are some projects that can be effective at startups. Keep in mind that these projects test the candidates approach more than whether they do the work perfectly. Build alignment with your team on what good looks like for each project and plan to debrief once the assignment is complete and/or presented. Here are a few examples of what good might look like.
The First 90 Days
This is a good general test for any new hire, especially an executive, but also for a people manager or technical leader. Have the candidate explain what their first ninety days on the job will look like. Either leave it wide open or offer a few prompts like, Who will you spend time with? or How will you get to know the business? or What accomplishments do you hope to make by the end of the first ninety days?
Engineering and Design Projects
While there are some nifty tools out there that can test coding skills for engineers, I am a strong advocate for testing the softer skills. Those who design and/or build your product should be able to demonstrate their work beyond coding or portfolio samples. The best type of project here is a brief scenario about building a new feature or capability for your product that will allow the candidate to demonstrate not just depth of syntax knowledge or design best practices, but also how they will work on a problem with your team. These projects can be done as homework, although its nice if it can be done in person or as part of a video interview. Present a scenario and ask the candidate how they will approach it. You could give them some alone time to think about it and then ask them to talk through it. Ask them to cite how they thought about it and to explain the direction they took and why. Prepare to have another approach or idea for the scenario when they walk through their work. This can help gauge how the candidate handles feedback and if they are willing to collaborate on ideas.
Scenarios for Non-Engineering Teams (Marketing, Sales, Product)
I prefer scenario tests over presentations of a non-engineering candidates past work because such tests will show you how they use their experience to approach something new. Scenarios you may ask them to work through can be actual challenges you are facing, or they can be hypothetical. Here are some quick examples of scenario tests for a few functional areas:
Product: Our CTO just came back from a listening tour with some of our customers and wants to explore a new set of features to expand our product offerings. These offerings are not on the product roadmap. What steps would you take to understand these new features and how would you approach the prioritization process?
Marketing: Were about to launch a new product for our customers. What steps would you take to plan for this product launch and how will you measure its success?
Sales: We are building a product to attract new customers in a new segment. What information do you need to prepare your team to sell this new product and how will you set sales goals for the team?
You could imagine similar scenarios for finance, customer sup- port, or other functional roles. Remember, these candidates dont know how your business functions day-to-day, so this isnt about whether they have a perfect plan but more about how they approach the problem.
With all the interviews and projects, you still may not get it right every time. Again, hiring is hard. Thats why the try-before-you-buy approach is often the best way to go for both the candidate and your startup. One way to ease that process, if a trial candidate can work full time before converting to a permanent employee, is to offer them equity in your startup that will be granted when they convert, but with a backdated vesting schedule to when they started their trial.
If youre hiring for a role for the first time and no one on your team has experience with that roleso no one knows what good looks likeask an experienced advisor, investor, or friend with experience to be part of the interview process. They should be able to interview the candidate and help you formulate the projects you may assign.
Excerpted with permission from After the Idea: What It Really Takes to Create and Scale a Startup. Copyright 2025 by Julia Austin. Available from Basic Venture, an imprint of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
Whats the quickest way to get attention on LinkedIn? Some users think theyve cracked the code by flaunting elite schools and prestigious firms at the very top of their profile where job titles typically go. Alums from the likes of consulting giant McKinsey, Harvard Business School, and investment bank Goldman Sachs are now shouting about their networks from the digital rooftops.
But does name-dropping on your LinkedIn profile work? What about if you did a short stint at a company? Some people, like my husband, swear by this strategy, others think its pretentious. Ultimately, it depends on who is looking.
The benefits
Leslie Danford, founder of Vitaminis, a vitamin juice shot brand sold nationally, says adding Bain, the consulting firm, and HBS to her LinkedIn headline has opened doors, especially since she had to fundraise for her company. Bain and HBS are standardized experiencesits almost shorthand, says Danford.
Danford says that cluttering the top of her LinkedIn with something more detailed risks people skipping over her profile, whereas elite brand names can make a profile stand out. (LinkedIn caps headlines at 220 characters.) Its almost like a marketing headline, she says. Its quick and delivers a message.
Unsurprisingly, the people who could benefit the most from this strategy are the ones who are not part of these elite networks to begin with, says Eric Lin, an associate professor at Oberlin College and Conservatory and chair of the business program. Lin has studied whether more detailed LinkedIn profiles boost pay. He found that people with more detailed LinkedIn profiles had higher pay and access to better opportunities, but this did not hold true for individuals with elite educational or work backgrounds. They have less to gain because they already have these networks, he says. For those outside these circles, showcasing prestigious brands on a public platform like LinkedIn could help them reach people and opportunities they otherwise wouldnt.
The Drawbacks
However, there can be downsides to name-dropping. For one, insiders may notice when someone is inflating their résumé such as listing a short course at HBS instead of a full MBA or an administrative role rather than client-facing work. If some people dont understand the differences, then the signal kind of works, for others it doesnt hold as much weight and maybe it backfires, says Lin.
In addition, Lin, who has researched scandal firms and halo firms, says perceptions can change at any moment. At one point, working for Enron, the energy giant, or Arthur Anderson, a top-tier accounting firm, was considered prestigious. In his research, Lin found that even when former employees mentioned those firms but had nothing to do with the period or position that caused the reputational fallout, they were more likely to take a hit on future pay just by association.
Yet, its not always clear how someone will feel about a company. Despite McKinseys enormous brand value, some feel less warmly about the consulting firm due to its role in the opioid crisis. As things do or dont fall into favor, theres a loose association of stigma, Lin says. (Lin has experience with both McKinsey and Harvard Business School, but does not name-drop them on this LinkedIn headline.)
Many of those firms signal access to top-flight networks, not present-day experience, adds Megan Van Buiten, cofounder of People Conduit, a coaching firm. While its likely the candidate had to endure a rigorous selection process to get into these elite companies, these brands dont tell recruiters much about an individuals skill set. Its kind of a networking magnet, but it can definitely raise red flags, she adds. Some hiring managers may be suspicious about workers relying too heavily on gaining credibility from the elite institution versus showcasing skills like leadership or adaptability.
Van Buiten recommends creating a LinkedIn headline that speaks to your current role and what impact youve had at your prior companies rather than tossing out names. Those interested in learning more about your experience can scroll your profile to find additional detail, she adds. It should not be used as a crutch, she says. You want to convey more how you are as a person rather than a brand. For instance, instead of saying ex-McKinsey, you might mention that youre a global strategy and transformation leader or have built high performing teams, she explains.
John Peters, founder of shoe company Amberjack, recalls changing his LinkedIn headline roughly six years ago from listing his job as a management consultant to listing his elite affiliations. He needed to do cold reach outs on LinkedIn for his new company, which did not yet have a name, and he wanted to increase his chances of a reply. His LinkedIn now says: Founder | Ex-McKinsey | Cornell, which he feels is a testament to his credibility as an entrepreneur. Still, he admits to being on the fence about adding an Ivy League school and a top consulting firm to the headline. I really dont like that it feels braggadocio, but I felt inclined to do it, says Peters. Im trying to increase any chance of a reply.
Peters says he will never have empirical evidence of whether this is working, but since his current company does not have the name recognition, hes willing to risk it. Even when someone looks up his name outside of LinkedIn, they can see the elite education and work background without clicking on his profile. Every inch counts, he says.
Whats the big idea?
In the book Apocalypse, the term itself is understood as a rapid, collective loss that fundamentally changes a societys way of life and sense of identity. Viewed as an ending of existence as we know it, rather than an end of all existence period, helps reframe such terrifying times of upheaval as our greatest opportunities for growth and improvement. Human history shows that our species has approached and retreated from the brink of annihilation time and again, offering inspiring wisdom and tales of resilience that should empower the modern reader to seize our turbulent moment by the horns.
Below, Lizzie Wade shares five key insights from her new book, Apocalypse: How Catastrophe Transformed Our World and Can Forge New Futures. Listen to the audio versionread by Lizzie herselfin the Next Big Idea App.
1. Weve been here before
Life in the 2020s started out scary, and its only getting more terrifying. The decade began with the worst pandemic in a century, upending our lives, health, and politics in ways were only beginning to understand. Climate disasters that may have seemed like distant possibilities are now upon us, no matter who we are or where we live. Political and economic systems that once seemed durable, even natural, are proving to be frighteningly fragile, cracking under the weight of an increasingly apocalyptic world.
As the world we knew comes to an end, its easy to feel alone. But by spending time with archaeologists, I learned that cataclysms like climate change, societal collapse, global pandemics, total war, and even human extinction are not uniquely modern problems. Our ancestors experienced all those apocalypses. More importantly, they survived them all. We are the heirs of a long history of resilience, adaptation, and creativity that has already seen countless human beings through the worst of times. Our ancestors have so much to teach us about our future, if we can cast off our assumptions and learn how to listen to their stories.
2. Community and collaboration are keys to survival
Around 47,000 years ago, humans in northern Europe found themselves facing a jumpy and unstable climate. Conditions swung between cold and warm and back again relatively quickly. Those who ventured out to new lands during warm periods could find themselves cut off from food, resources, and other communities when the cold suddenly returned. The animals they hunted started dying or migrating, and humans struggled to continually adapt to an environment they could no longer trust or predict. These humans were Neanderthals, and they would soon find themselves confronting another challenge: the arrival of Others who looked and lived just enough like them to rely on the same resources.
Homo sapiens and Neanderthals were not competitors and enemies, nor victors and victimsor at least, not only those things.
Early paleoanthropologists believed that what happened next was the apocalypse that set it all in motion. They believed those Others, Homo sapiens, eliminated Neanderthals through violence, competition, and domination, in a process that looked suspiciously like 19th-century colonial genocides. But 21st-century research has revealed that Homo sapiens and Neanderthals were not competitors and enemies, nor victors and victimsor at least, not only those things. By sequencing the Neanderthal genome, paleogeneticists were able to find pieces of it in almost every person alive today. That proved that Neanderthals and Homo sapiens had children together, in many places and at many times, and that those children would go on to have their own children, so successfully that our shared ancestry spread around the world. Neanderthals became us, and we also became them. We survived, together.
3. Apocalypses destroy old worlds, but they also create new ones
I define apocalypse as a rapid, collective loss that fundamentally changes a societys way of life and sense of identity. An isolated drought might make for a few bad harvests and some tough years, but it wont force society to give up on farming entirely. A drought that lasts for decades, however, might do that. It could also lead to the overthrow or disintegration of the government that failed to prevent such a crisis. In this manner, environmental apocalypse spurs a political one in a feedback loop of destruction.
Thats what happened in ancient Egypt 4,200 years ago, when catastrophically low Nile floods hit during and just after the reign of a weak and ineffective king. The construction of grand monuments like the pyramids abruptly stopped, provinces broke away from royal rule, and scribes wrote of an upside-down world so full of suffering that people began committing suicide by crocodile. Old Kingdom Egypt had been unified for 800 years until this apocalypse tore it apart.
But in destroying the Egyptian state, this apocalypse also destroyed the strict social and economic hierarchy that had governed and constrained Egyptian lives for centuries. Wealth that had been concentrated in the capital flowed to newly independent provinces, and new leaders arose who boasted of taking care of their followers during the hardest of times, rather than extracting labor and resources from them as the pharaoh had done. Archaeological excavations reveal that commoners not only survived but also thrived during Egypts drought and state collapse. It was the elites of the old order who suffered most in the new, more equal world created by the apocalypse. And it is their perspective that written history is preserved and propagated, to the detriment of all our imaginations.
4. We already live in a post-apocalyptic world
Most of us have been taught to see human history as a march of inevitable technological, political, and cultural progress. Weve been told that the world we live in today is the pinnacle of that progress, and any disruption to it is a terrifying tragedy. As we face our own apocalypses, its easy to feel that we have everything to lose and nothing to gain.
These apocalypses connected the entire planet for the first time, sparking new identities, hierarchies, and ideas.
But archaeology can help us see that the modern world is already postapocalyptic. It was built from the rubble of the twin apocalypses of colonialism and slavery. These apocalypses connected the entire planet for the first time, sparking new identities, hierarchies, and ideas, including capitalism and consumerism. They also resulted in the deaths of hundreds of millions of people, the enslavement of millions more, and the attempted destruction of ancient communities and cultures. Unlike the apocalypse that destoyed, but also remade, Old Kingdom Egypt, colonialism and slavery precluded the conditions necessary for recovery. Through centuries of unchecked resource extraction, they created a world thats dangerous for all of us who inhabit itand they continue to ensure our present and future apocalypses will transform into the worst versions of themselves.
5. Apocalypses are the best chance societies have for change
The next apocalypse is no longer a specter on the horizon. It is here, no matter how much we wish we could delay or deny it. But that doesnt mean were doomed to the worst-case scenario. It means that this is our moment. This is our chance to harness the transformative energy of apocalypse to build a new, different, and better world. Weve misunderstood apocalypses as interruptions in the human story, unfortunate deviations from the path of progress and growth were supposed to be on. But in my research, Ive learned that apocalypses are the human story. Each and every one was a vital turning point that led to everything that came after, for better and for worse. Our apocalypse will be, too.
Like it not, our world is changing. If we can move beyond denial and fear and look straight at the apocalypse, we have the chance to participate in, and even guide, our own transformations. In ancient Greek, the word apocalypse means the unveiling. Apocalypses are moments when we can see the truth of what our society is and what it could become. The world we thought we lived in is over. What world do we want to build next?
Lizzie Wade is an award-winning science journalist and correspondent for the prestigious journal Science. She covers anthropology, archeology, and Latin America. Her work has appeared in Wired, The Atlantic, Slate, The New York Times, Aeon, Smithsonian, and Archaeology.
This article originally appeared in Next Big Idea Club magazine and is reprinted with permission.
At the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, top agencies and brands vie for awards and hustle to close deals. As this years event wraps up, Autodesk CMO Dara Treseder shares the insider buzzfrom the continued rise of creator-led content to how brands navigate getting the right kind of attention in a polarized market.
This is an abridged transcript of an interview from Rapid Response, hosted by Robert Safian, former editor-in-chief of Fast Company. From the team behind the Masters of Scale podcast, Rapid Response features candid conversations with todays top business leaders navigating real-time challenges. Subscribe to Rapid Response wherever you get your podcasts to ensure you never miss an episode.
What are you hearing people talk about here at the festival?
A lot is going on. There’s a recurring theme. I think . . . everyone is trying to figure out, How can I cut through without being cut out? How can I cut through without alienating a core part of my audience? Because we’re living in such a polarized time, where there are very few things people can align on. And so there is really that, but we are also in an attention recession, where it’s so difficult to get attention, and getting attention is not enough, because you have to convert that attention into intention, right? To get people to actually go into discovery, consideration, and ultimately purchase.
So, it’s not just getting the attention, but the attention in the way that’s right for your brand.
Exactly. Getting attention in a way that’s right for your brand and drives action, drives engagement. And now, there’s just so much that grabs people’s attention, so grabbing attention isn’t enough. It’s actually converting the attention into intention, into buyer intent.
Are there any rules about it, or is it that each brand has to do it in its own way?
I think that there are some themes that we’re seeing about how brands in general are doing this, across all industries, B2B, B2C, healthcare, technology, beauty, retail. We’re seeing some recurring themes. And I think one of the big themes is leaning into creators and community, because people show up for people. They might not necessarily show up for brands in the same way as we’ve seen in the past. So a lot of brands are leaning into [that]. I mean, creators are all over the place. Creators and athletes. Because creators and athletes come with a more dedicated and a more engaged and a more, I’m going to use the word rabid, a little bit, fan base.
Yes, real fans.
Real fans, rather than just celebrities that you see.
I mean, we’ve been talking for a few years about influencers and how that has sort of changed the marketplace. It sounds a little bit like we’ve broken through to a new layer with that?
We’ve certainly broken through to a new layer. And in fact, they don’t want to be called influencers. They want to be called creators. Because they’re saying, “Hey, I’m not here to just influence. I’m here to co-create with you to drive a certain outcome.” So we’re seeing that happen more now.
And does that change the relationship that a brand like yours has with a traditional advertising firm? Are you going to creators in a different way?
It definitely changes, because creators have, I think, a lot more say and a lot more power, and they’re taking a bigger space at the table. So, gone are the days, I think, where it’s just you find a creator, you tell them exactly what you want to do. If you’re actually trying to drive real results and you want their fans to show up, they’re taking an audience-first approach. So first of all, you’ve got to find that creator that aligns with your values.
So you have to know they agree with you or they’re simpatico in that way before they start.
There’s got to be trust. . . . And the trust goes both ways. You have got to trust that they are aligned to your brand values, they are aligned to your customer base, because remember, you want to cut through, you want to break through, but you are not trying to cut out a big portion of your customer base. So you need to make sure that you have that trust that yes, they are aligned to your brand values, they’re aligned to your purpose, they’re aligned to the outcomes, but then you also have to trust them to give them the space to do what they do. Because it can’t come across as an ad. It has to come across as something more organic, something that they would truly want to do on their own, because that’s when their audience shows up, and that’s what determines the result.
Are you, in your conversations with your peers, with other CMOs, are you hearing them privately acknowledge like, Oh, we didn’t do that quite right? We alienated a group we didn’t want to.
One hundred percent, especially in today’s world. . . . As we’re having these private CMO roundtables, we’re all sharing, here’s what went wrong, here’s what went right, here’s what I learned. And a lot of it is just, the margin for error is a lot slimmer than it ever was. There is a very thin line between cutting through and cutting out. It’s like walking on high heels on a teeny-tiny thread. There is no margin for error. And so . . . a lot of CMOs are thinking about, How do I do this and how do I do this well? . . . And I think one of the things that’s really important is making sure that you have a broad pull at the table as these decisions are being made, and that you are also able to pivot and adjust very quickly.
I mean, you talked to me previously about this idea of opine with a spine, right?
Yes.
The idea that to break through, you have to say something sharp, but you’re also saying that the risk is higher than ever, but you have to take that risk. There’s no way out of this bind.
There’s no way out. Let me tell you. Weve got to give CMOs and marketers, all marketers at all levels, weve got to give [them] a break. It is a tough world out there. And so, yes, you have to opine with a spine, but you got to be careful what you opine on. So you need to pick the thing that truly makes sense for your brand and business. You cannot opine on everything. If you speak about everything, you’re speakingabout nothing. And if you end up speaking about things that you have not earned the right to speak about, you don’t have the credibility to speak about, you could end up in some real hot water that you don’t want to be on. Not the good kind of bath, the scalding kind of bath. So there really is that thoughtfulness that has to go into it.
