This article is republished with permission from Wonder Tools, a newsletter that helps you discover the most useful sites and apps. Subscribe here.
Books offer a compelling, slower alternative to the onslaught of negative news. With terrific new free tools, its increasingly easy to access print, digital, and audio books. Read on for my favorite book sites and apps.
The heavy-hitters
Libby lends out free e-books and audiobooks through libraries in 78 countries. It works for 90% of U.S. libraries. You can search for and check out nearly anything, instantly, for free, on any device.
Audiobooks: Check out and listen to audiobooks at any speed. You may not need to pay for an Audible subscription.
Definitions: Click on any word in an e-book youre reading in Libby for its definition or to see where else that name or phrase appears.
Highlight: Save memorable passages for your notes.
Multiple cards: You can use multiple library cards within a single Libby account. That helps you check which library has the shortest waiting list for a book in high demand. (See where you can get non-resident library cards).
Limitation: Libby is digital-onlyyou cant use it for physical books. That requires a separate app or site, like the NYPL app in New York.
Kanopy provides free access to top-notch feature films and documentaries. I log in with my library card. Watch on the Web, iOS or Android, or on a SmartTV app like Google TV, Roku, or Amazon Fire TV.
Limitation: libraries limit the number of videos you can watch monthly.
Hoopla is an alternative to Libby that works with 3,900 library systems in the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Like Libby it hosts audiobooks and e-books, but also bundles in comics, movies, TV shows, magazines, and music.
Use Hoopla to read, watch or listen from the Web or on a mobile device. I recently discovered its free Bingepasses, which allow instant access to a collection of magazines or videos for a week.
World Cat tells you which of 10,000 global libraries near you have a particular book. It works in multiple languages. Search for books in print, e-book, braille, audio, or other formats.
Find your next read
Most Recommended Books shows you a list of smart people. Pick an expert or celeb you like and see which books they recommend, along with brief quotes on why they like each book. Check Goodbooks.io and ReadThisTwice for more expert/celeb book picks.
Whichbooks World Map offers a creative way to find a book about any part of the world. Select a country and see books set in that region.
Where to find book recs is a nice list from a Writing About Reading post. I also like the eclectic recommendations in the New York Times Read Like the Wind newsletter.
BookClubs lets you find a book group near you or organize your own.
Fable hosts book clubs & communities for sharing what youre reading.
Find free and cheap books
Project Gutenberg has more than 75,000 free e-books and audiobooks. No registration required. See the top 100 list for free reading inspiration.
The Internet Archive has searchable e-books and a free library collection.
Bookbub is handy for bargain hunters. It shows discounted and free e-books. Available as a newsletter or check the site for deals.
Support Independent booksellers
Alibris has 200 million titles from indy booksellers around the world.
Powells is the worlds largest independent bookstore.
Bookfinder lets you search online to find any book at the cheapest price.
Indiebound helps you find a nearby real-world indy bookstore.
Abebooks has great deals from independents. Check its bargain books + collections. Caveat: Amazon has owned it since 2008.
Tertulia is a well-designed online co-op bookshop owned by readers.
Make your own book list
Listy is free. Its easy to look up & add books, and later export your list. (See my prior post about it).
LibraryThing is free and easy for cataloging books & tracking reading.
Free Notion book tracking template lets you customize a collection page.
Free Airtable book list template & my Airtable exmple: 30 authors I like.
Find great childrens books
Sora is a digital library for kids. Schools make e-books and audiobooks available on the app. It works well with graphic novels, picture books, as well as comic books and textbooks. (We also use Libby for kids books).
Epic is another popular kids e-book app. Its fun to use, but be aware that it leans into gamification and extrinsic motivationusing points and streaks to entice kids to repeatedly open the app.
Kanopy has a great kids section with video versions of books by Eric Carle, Mo Willems and other great authors to spark an interest in reading. It also has math and science lessons.
This article is republished with permission from Wonder Tools, a newsletter that helps you discover the most useful sites and apps. Subscribe here.
Middle managers have had a hard go of it over the past five years. There was the upheaval of the pandemic, followed by ongoing changes in the workplace as companies adjusted to remote work and then, in many cases, eventually brought employees back into the office. Amid all these fluctuations, managers have been tasked with mitigating low morale, parrying employee discontent, and juggling their mounting responsibilities, especially as recurring layoffs thin their ranks.
It doesnt seem like the challenges middle managers are facing will disappear anytime soon, which could lead to high rates of turnover in the very near future. And its also not clear whether a new generation of workers is readyor willingto take their place if managers leave their posts.
In surveys, Gen Z workers have indicated they have little interest in middle management and that high rates of anxiety might keep them from taking on those jobs. As managers struggle, Gen Z sees the toll of the job and backs away, leaving fewer employees to rise into management roles, writes entrepreneur Jan Bruce. This puts more pressure on remaining managers.
Bruce argues that many companies could be facing a manager crash this year that would have far-reaching effects, particularly if younger employees dont want to step into those roles. But there are some things employers can and should do to help support their current middle managers, as well as those who might take their place in the future.
Invest in programs that support middle managers
One thing leaders can do is evaluate psychosocial risk, according to Bruce, which can identify some of the biggest stressors facing managers at the company. That can include everything from tight deadlines to workplace conflict or excessive workloads. Managers are also often expected to oversee day-to-day tasks while also taking on more strategic, long-term projects.
Being explicit about mental health resources and other workplace benefits can also be an important aspect of supporting middle managers, who often report feeling invisible and underappreciated. Mandatory vacations or disconnect periods can help alleviate some of the burnout and stress that managers are likely feeling. Beyond that, however, they also need adequate support from their higher-ups. Making sure managers have consistent, supportive check-ins with their own supervisors can help reduce isolation, Bruce writes.
Train the next generation of managers
In order to make middle management more appealing, companies also need to think about how to cultivate a new crop of workers who are equipped to step into those roles. Bruce notes that it is important to focus on some of the skills that are most valuable in managers and perhaps underdeveloped among Gen Z employees.
We have found the employees most skilled in handling change and challengethe realities that managers deal with dailyhave the highest levels of those very skills: emotion control, stress management, engagement, and positivity, Bruce says. These are the specific, actionable areas to focus Gen Z training efforts on in order to improve their ability to handle management demands.
What managers can do
If youre a manager looking for guidance, there are also steps you can take to better manage your workload and schedule. To avoid toggling between different tasks, management expert Lia Garvin recommends scheduling similar meetings on the same day. When our calendar looks like Swiss cheese, we can get in the habit of slotting in meetings whenever we have a free moment, but this reinforces the overwhelm of having to operate at so many different levels in one day, she writes.
Since managers are often hopping from meeting to meeting, it can be difficult to accommodate more strategic work or long-term projects. It can help to pencil that work into your schedule instead of assuming youll be able to carve out time in your day. Senior leaders can also help address this pain point by limiting meetings to certain days. Instead of fitting work in where you can, plan for it, Garvin says. Find and schedule one to two hours every week for project time, during working hours, that you dont schedule over.
Perhaps the most important strategy managers can adopt, however, is to delegate more and spend less time involved in the details of projects that dont require close attention. Think of this as a way to give your employees new opportunities while also freeing up time in your dayand hopefully making your job the slightest bit easier. Ultimately, the middle managers role is to empower their teams to grow, Garvin adds. Its impossible to do this when were too stuck in all the details and barely able to come up for air.
Longevity with freelancing is entirely possible if youre intentional, adaptable, and development-oriented. Freelancers should think of themselves as a business of one as opposed to an outsourced employee for other companies. And it’s import to always be improving that business. As E-Myth Revisited author Michael Gerber once wrote, Most entrepreneurs fail because they are working in their business rather than on their business.
Theres always going to be more competition, new technology, shifting market conditions, and stuff happening in your life that will impact your career as a freelancer. After nearly 12 years of freelancing, here are my recommendations on how to level-up your approach and ensure self-employment remains a sustainable option in 2025.
Look for new sources of leads
You dont need to be everywhere, but building a consistent flow of outreach from clients who want to hire you happens when you’re visible on multiple platforms. Any marketing channel or relationship thats led to you landing a project will ebb and flow with time and at some point become less reliable as a way of attracting clients. To offset the risks of a downturn in client outreach, Ive found that actively using two different promotional platforms makes all the difference.
A promotional platform could be a Slack community, social media network, local networking group, hosting a podcast, running a newsletter, or freelancer marketplace. What matters is that its a place where clients are looking for your products or services, and you can show up consistently to communicate the value of your offerings and expertise.
Marketing yourself takes time and resources, so identify another promotional avenue where you dont need to start from scratch and could repurpose existing insights there.
Provide certainty and reliability
Its fair to feel like we live in uncertain times. Now more than ever, you can help offset this shared feeling by aiming to make your engagements and interactions with clients and partners frictionless. Showing up as a source of certainty and reliability can help others see you as a valuable partner whos easy to work with and makes their jobs easier.
This can play out in small ways like always showing up on time or sharing meeting invites in a clients time zone to save them the effort, so engaging with you is seamless. And of course, this can be expressed in big ways like delivering outcomes youve promised on a project and when possible, exceeding those expectations.
Getting hired again by a past customer is often because you were enjoyable to work with the first time, delivered as expected, and helped them look good for hiring you.
Check-in with past clients
Its up to you to stay in touch with past colleagues and clients. Often thats the touchpoint needed for them to remember to hire you again and retain your services. Be intentionally persistent by following up with them in non-invasive ways like inviting them to a coffee, interacting with their LinkedIn content, or sending them an email.
Sometimes youll pitch them on how you can provide them value through another project, but most of the time thats not the goal. Most of this outreach should be checking in on their progress, delivering them help like free advice or support of some kind, and genuinely maintaining the relationship.
Long-term, these connections youve built can deliver more client referrals, provide partnership and mentorship opportunities, and help you grow professionally.
Find your own networking style
Networking doesnt have to be awful like many make it out to be. In fact, its one of the ways youll be able to sustain a business as an independent contractor when done right. But dont wait until you’re between clients to startthats whats most important.
It doesnt need to be cringy or self-serving: Just staying in touch with people you actually like or have common interests with, or ideally both. Its up to you to make it happen though. Most people put it off at all costs, so take the lead here.
Dont have clients you actually like or have anything in common with? Put yourself out there and fix it so networking is more enjoyable and less of a cumbersome task. Reach out to someone connected to a colleague, attend a workshop in your area, or tap into your alumni network. Theres no shortage of options. Just get started.
Befriend other freelancers
Working on your own brings a lot of benefits, like having more control over your schedule. But one downside is that you can feel isolated. It’s helpful to connect with other freelancers.
Whether they do the same work you do, or provide adjacent services and skills, these relationships can provide you with motivation, friendships, or opportunities to learn.
Sometimes these connections can even refer you to relevant projects or keep an eye out for opportunities you should considerjust dont go into this looking for that directly.
Re-examine your offerings
Once or twice a year, I take a look at how Im framing my services in terms of the structure of packages, pricing options, and how Im communicating the benefits.
Early in my freelancing journey Id set standards like, Im not taking on this type of work for less than this dollar amount or unless its a project of this kind of duration. It can be helpful to set limits on the kinds of work youre open to so youre not inundated with low-paying engagements or misaligned clients. But sometimes, these self-imposed limitations can be too rigid or misaligned to what the market is currently interested in. As a result, you could miss out creatively and financially.
For a while, I only took on marketing consulting projects where I worked with a client on a month-to-month basis and partnered with their team to build out a strategy. Each month was centered on completing a set of agreed upon deliverables from making the marketing plan to training their team to execute on the programs over a few months.
While this was a successful way to frame this kind of project for large companies with the budget and resources to collaborate in this way, many other firms couldnt afford to work with me in this capacity. To capture this business, I reframed this offering to include two options, one is high-touch and low-touch consulting.
High-touch was the original offer where I worked closely with the company over a few months to build out their strategy, best suited to large, well-resourced teams. The new optionlow-touch consultingoffers similar support but at a lower cost and provides advice and counsel across a set number of meetings per month. Instead of working closely with the team on deliverables, Im providing them with strategic direction across select meetings, and its up to them to put our work into action.
As a result, I was able to land more of these clients when I offered more options suited to businesses with a wider range of circumstances. And at the same time, I’m protecting my bandwidth and ensuring Im not taking on more than I can handle by setting different constraints for these kinds of projects. Structure and limitations are essential to a smoothly running business, but get more creative with how you’r framing your projects to adjust them to your clients circumstances.
Look beyond social media
Social media is often the go-to method of promoting your work as a freelancer, but its far from the only choice. More professionals, for a variety of justified reasons, are trying to spend less time using social media personally or for work.
Theres many other options out there as long as you choose destinations where your audience is spending time and that align with the way you prefer to share your ideas.
If youre more of a talker than writer, create your own podcast or become a regular guest of podcasts in your industry. If writing is your strong suit, you can contribute thought pieces to a trade publication. If you enjoy being in front of the camera, you could periodically host webinars.
Look out for AI susceptible projects
AI hype is exhausting at times. Dont let it lead you to tune out. Whats important to focus on is areas of your work that are most likely to be disrupted by AI so you know where to scale back or adjust.
Review what you offer to clients and identify any aspects of your work that are execution-based, repetitive, formulaic, or require a little active thinking. These are the types of tasks most likely to be entirely replaced or change significantly with the integration of AI, and its necessary youre not overly reliant on this kind of work.
For a freelance web designer, this might be a task like creating the initial wireframe for a website, which is an outline of sorts that details a sites structure and hierarchy. While critical to the early stages of planning the design of a website, AI can create a comprehensive wireframe quickly and adapt it to a particular clients needs.
Combining your expertise and AI might help you deliver quality wireframes at a faster pace and streamline the design process for clients in the process. However, if a majority of your freelance work is wireframing without AI, Id strongly recommend reducing your focus on this output and diversifying your offerings to clients.
Thats one instance of the kind of work that is likely to dry up in the not so distant future, and the goal is to avoid being in that position. Instead, prioritize delivering work thats centered on strategic problem solving, leverages your unique perspective shaped by your experience and skills, taps into your relationship building capacity, and draws on your emotional intelligence. And of course, consider hybrid services where youre using AI-powered processes and your professional expertise to deliver outcomes with more speed, efficiency, and accuracy.
Always be learning
The number one way to maintain a career as a freelancer, and really most career paths, is prioritizing ongoing skill development. No matter the industry, enhancing your existing skills and acquiring new, complementary ones is what ensures you remain relevant in the workplace.
Change has always been a constant across industries, but the speed at which conditions are shifting is intensifying and requires you to make learning a regular habit. Direct your efforts towards passive and active learning, two modes of professional development thatll better equip you to stay ahead of the curve.
Passive learning is one-way engagement with educational materials where youre not immediately applying the learnings, getting hands on, and engaging with others. This involves asynchronous courses, reading articles, listening to podcasts, and consuming newsletters, and should be a daily or weekly practice of absorbing new information. Easier to incorporate into your workday and completely self directed, you create the curriculum that aligns with your expertise as a freelancer.
Active learning is two-way interactions with instructional materials through engaging with others by discussing, analyzing, and applying the lessons learned. More time-intensive, active learning happens in cohort-based courses, networking, masterminds, group workshops, coaching, and educational bootcamps. Its deeper immersion into the subject matter and focused on collaborating with other learners, instructors, mentors, or coaches to help explore and integrate the material. Aim to incorporate active learning once a quarter or every few months to explore new skills more comprehensively.
Adding both to your routine will help make you a more adaptable and dynamic freelancer better suited to meet the ever-evolving demands of your industry.
Its almost time for the most heartfelt accolades of Hollywoods award season. The Screen Actors Guild Awards, hosted by the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), is set to take place tonight (Sunday, February 23) at 8 p.m. ET. This tribute to actors gets its emotion from the fact that it is put on by actors.
For the nominees, theres something extra moving about being honored by a group of your peers who have been in the same foxholes as you. So grab the tissuesespecially for those I am an actor opening monologuesand keep reading so you know how to tune in and go into the ceremony prepared.
Who are the SAG Awards nominees this year?
Like the Golden Globes, the SAG Awards honor performances in television as well as films. For movies, Wicked leads the pack with five nominations. Shgun is the most celebrated television series, also with five nominations.
Because of its performance focus, the SAG Awards nominations also honor actors whom the Oscars have overlooked or snubbed, such as Queers Daniel Craig, The Last Showgirls Pamela Anderson and Jamie Lee Curtis, and Wickeds Jonathan Bailey.
Stunt personals also get some love here with shows and films such as Fall Guy and The House of the Dragon up for awards in these categories.
You can find the full list of nominations here.
Beyond the competitive categories, actor and activist Jane Fonda will be presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Her impressive resume already includes two Oscars, two BAFTAs, seven Golden Globe Awards, and a Primetime Emmy Award.
What about the SAG Awards pre-show?
Since 2023, Netflix has been responsible for airing the ceremony. It also has the official pre-show coverage. This kicks off one hour before the official awards show, so tune in at 7 p.m. ET / 4 p.m. PT to catch it.
Hosts Lilly Singh and Sasheer Zamata will guide viewers through all the fashion and interviews, and even announce the stunt award winners.
Another alternative is to stream People and Entertainment Weeklys live-streamed coverage on YouTube.
This will feature Real Housewives of Salt Lake City star Bronwyn Newports hot take on the evening. She will be joined by People editor at large Janine Rubenstein, EW general manager Patrick Gomez, and EW editorial director of TV and music Gerrad Hall.
Who is the host of the SAG Awards?
The SAG Awards dont always have a host, but this year Kristen Bell is stepping up to the plate.
This isnt her first rodeo and she initially balked at the idea of having awards ceremonies after the devastating Eaton and Palisades fires that greatly impacted large portions of the Los Angeles area in the beginning of the year. She later had a change of heart and saw the bigger picture. Beyond the glamour and spectacle, award shows create and drive a massive ecosystem of professionals and services.
I realized these awards shows are a huge part of Los Angeles’ economy, employing hundreds, if not thousands, of gig workers: drivers, hair and makeup artists, musicians, Bell stated to USA Today.
Tune into Netflix at 8 p.m. ET / 5 p.m. PT to see Bell and the rest of the acting community in action.
Your insurance needs change over time. The policies that work for a single, 20-something professional renting an apartment with three roommates may be completely wrong for the same person after marriage, babies, and a cozy mortgage in a good school district.
If youre struggling to determine how your coverage should change over time, the following guidelines can help.
Auto insurance: Follow the bell curve
Basic car insurance offers liability coverage, in case you cause an accident that injures a third party or damages their property. This is the kind of insurance that nearly every state in the nation requires drivers to carry. While liability coverage protects your finances if you cause an accident, its legally mandated because it offers protection for accident victims.
But drivers can also purchase full coverage car insurance. This typically includes collision coverage, which pays for damages from a collision that doesnt include another vehicle (such as running into a tree), and comprehensive coverage, which pays to repair or replace your car if its damaged by something other than an accident, such as extreme weather or theft.
Deciding how much auto insurance you need can feel overwhelming, especially considering the high cost of car insurance coverage. While all drivers must carry no less than the minimum required liability insuranceand should also consider increasing the liability limits to further protect themselves and othersit can be difficult to figure out if you need full coverage or other optional add-ons.
To help you figure out your changing need for auto insurance coverage, think of this kind of insurance as a bell curve that corresponds with age.
Young drivers
Young drivers pay the highest premiums of any age demographicsince these wet-behind-the-wheel motorists are the most likely to get into accidents. That means purchasing full coverage when youre young is going to cost a pretty penny.
In addition, teens and 20-somethings are more likely to be driving beater cars. (No, your cousins 1992 Buick Le Sabre is not vintage even if it does qualify for historic plates.) These vehicles have low actual cash values, which means a minor fender bender could render it a total loss.
In other words, if your vehicles cash value is lower than the cost of your favorite Starbucks order, theres no reason to purchase collision and comprehensive coverage.
Midlife motorists
The auto insurance calculation changes as you hit your 30s and beyond. To start, the cost of auto insurance starts to go down for most middle-age drivers, provided they have a clean driving record.
Midlife also represents your prime earning years, as well as the time youre most likely to be starting a family. Not only does that mean the interior of your vehicle will be permanently covered in a thin layer of crushed Goldfish crackers, but youre also more likely to be driving a car that is worth the cost of fixing.
In other words, you have more to lose financially as a midlife driver than you did while you were still rocking the Le Sabre. That means carrying higher levels of coverage makes more sense in midlife than it did in your 20s.
Seniors on the road
Since older drivers tend to have the most experience and are least likely to make impulsive driving decisions, they enjoy the least expensive auto insurance of any age group. Seniors are also more likely to have a higher net worth and easier access to cash, which means theyre in a better position to pay out of pocket for a car repair (or even replacement) after a collision.
All of which is to say that most senior drivers have a lower need for auto insurance coverage than their middle-age counterparts.
Adjust your deductibles
Your insurance deductible is the amount of money youre responsible for paying before the insurance coverage kicks in to pay for the rest. Nearly every type of insurance has a deductible, from health insurance to auto insurance to homeowners, renters, umbrella, and business insurance. And for each type of insurance you carry, you need to be prepared to pay the deductible if you make a claim.
But insurance policyholders have some control over the size of their deductible. You can lower your deductiblemeaning youd pay less before your insurance company has to open its own wallet when you make a claimby paying a higher premium. You can also lower your monthly premium by increasing your deductible.
Typically, most people will opt for the higher premium and lower deductible when they are young, since dealing with a monthly premium cost thats a little higher is easier than keeping a spare $1,000 (or more) kicking around in case of an emergency.
But as you age, you are likely to become more financially settled, which includes having a more robust emergency fund. Once youre in a place where you can afford a higher deductible, you can lower your premiumwhich reduces your monthly outflow.
Since we can all be victims of set-it-and-forget-it thinking, it can be easy to forget to check the deductible levels on long-standing insurance policies. But theres no need to pay your insurance company a higher premium when you can easily afford a higher deductible.
Self-insurance
Just as your financial stability can help you outgrow the need for a low deductible, increasing wealth may also allow you to self-insure instead of relying on insurance policies.
With this strategy, which is similar to creating an emergency fund, you set money aside to use in case of an unexpected loss, rather than paying a premium to an insurance company to assume the risk for you.
If you dont experience a loss, self-insurance saves you money, since youre not out the cost of premiums and you still have the full pot of self-insurance money available to you. Additionally, you can potentially invest your self-insurance moneyas long as its in an investment that you can liquidate in a hurryand let the money grow for you.
Self-insurance can be a risky strategy for any kind of serious financial loss, such as liability, flooding, or healthcare. But depending on your financial situation and assets, you may choose to self-insure for things like long-term care or full-coverage auto insurance.
Know your insurance needs
Recognizing how your coverage needs change can help you get the insurance you need while saving money. For auto insurance, remember that your coverage level will probably look like a bell curve, with younger and senior drivers purchasing lower levels of coverage while middle-age drivers go for more comprehensive coverage.
For all of your insurance policies, remember that your ability to afford a higher deductible as you gain more financial stability means you can reduce your premium. And a higher level of wealth can open up the possibility of self-insurance for some types of hazards.
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Economic forecasting has never been an easy task, and it becomes even more challenging when confronted with unprecedented economic events like COVID-19 lockdowns and unparalleled levels of government intervention, followed by a rapid cycle of interest rate hikes.
Look no further than recent mortgage rate forecasts. Last year marked the third year in a row that mortgage rates ended the year higher than forecasters expected.
Will they finally get it right this year?
ResiClubs latest roundup of quarterly mortgage rate forecasts shows that most forecasters still expect mortgage rates to gradually decrease over the next 18 months.
The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate as of Thursday was 6.96%.
By the final quarter of 2025, Fannie Mae expects that to slide to 6.6%. Meanwhile, Wells Fargos model expects 6.5%, and the Mortgage Bankers Association estimates 6.5%.
But even if those forecasts are right, it would mean that housing affordability would still remain strained in 2025 and 2026.
Police in Munich are investigating a mystery: More than 1,000 stickers were put on gravestones and wooden crosses at three cemeteries in the German city, without any indication of where they came from or why.
The 5×3.5-centimeter (1.95×1.2-inch) stickers are printed with a QR code, that, when scanned, shows the name of the person buried in the grave and its location in the cemetery but nothing else.
We haven’t found any pattern behind this yet. The stickers were put both on decades-old gravestones and very new graves that so far only have a wooden cross, police spokesperson Christian Drexler told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
People who have witnessed anybody putting the stickers on the graves are asked to reach out to the respective cemetery’s administration,” Drexler said.
The stickers surfaced in recent days at the Waldfriedhof, Sendlinger Friedhof and Friedhof Solln cemeteries.
Police are not only trying to find out who is behind the stickers, but are also investigating property damage, because the gravestones were partially damaged and discolored when the stickers were removed.
National Leadership Day, which takes place every Feb. 20, offers a chance to reflect on what truly defines leadership not just strategy or decision-making, but the ability to build trust. In an era of rapid change, when teams look to leaders for stability and direction, trust is the invisible currency that fuels organizational success.
As an economist, I know theres a lot of research proving this point. Ive conducted some myself, including work on how trust is essential for leaders in cross-cultural business environments. In an expansive study of Chinas fast-paced restaurant industry, my colleagues and I found that leaders who cultivate trust can significantly reduce employee churn and improve organizational performance.
While my study focuses on one sector, its lessons extend far beyond that. It offers insights for leaders in any field, from corporate executives to community organizers.
Understanding the impact
In China, as in the U.S., the restaurant industry is known for high turnover rates and cutthroat competition. But our study found that managers who demonstrate trustworthiness can keep employees from fleeing to rivals, creating a more stable and committed workforce.
First, we conducted a field experiment in which we asked managers at around 115 restaurants how much money they were willing to send to employees in an investment game an indicator of trust. We then found that for every 10% increase in managers trust-driven actions, employee turnover fell by 3.7 percentage points. Thats a testament to the power of trust in the workplace.
When managers are trustworthy, workers tend to be more loyal, engaged in their job and productive. Employees who perceive their managers as trustworthy report higher job satisfaction and are more willing to exert extra effort, which directly benefits the organization.
We also found that when employees trust one another, managers get better performance evaluations. That makes sense, since trust fosters improved cooperation and innovation across the board.
Practical steps to foster trust
Fortunately for managers and workers theres a lot of research into how to be a more trustworthy leader. Here are a few insights:
Empower your team. Let employees take ownership of their responsibilities and make decisions within their roles. This not only boosts their engagement but also aligns their objectives with the broader goals of the organization. Empowerment is a key strategy in building trust.
Be fair and transparent. Managers should strive to be consistent in their actions, address concerns promptly and distribute rewards equitably. Those practices can create a psychologically safe and supportive work environment.
Promote collaboration. Encourage an atmosphere in which employees can openly share ideas and support one another. Activities that promote team cohesion and open communication can significantly enhance trust within the team.
Measure and manage trust. Implementing regular surveys or feedback sessions can help assess and manage trust levels within an organization. Consider integrating trust metrics into performance evaluations to emphasize their importance.
Some takeaways for National Leadership Day
Whether helming a business, a nonprofit or a local community initiative, leaders should recognize that being trustworthy isnt just a soft skill. Its a measurable force that drives success. By making trust-building a deliberate goal, leaders can create stronger, more resilient teams.
So this National Leadership Day is a good time to reflect: How do you build trust in your leadership? And how can you foster a culture of trustworthiness?
Managers should commit to leading with trust, acting with integrity and fostering workplaces where people feel valued and empowered. The impact will speak for itself.
Yufei Ren is an associate professor of economics at the Labovitz School of Business and Economics at the University of Minnesota Duluth.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Andrew Brodsky is a management professor at McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also CEO of Ping Group and has received numerous awards, including being chosen by Poets & Quants as one of the Best 40-Under-40 MBA Professors of 2023.
Whats the big idea?
Instant messaging, email, video calls, and other digital tools have largely replaced in-person communication for most workplaces. We have all become virtual communicators, and with this comes a new set of rules for interpersonal success. The PING framework distills best practices for optimal outcomes when relying on technology to communicate.
Below, Andrew shares five key insights from his new book, Ping: The Secrets of Successful Virtual Communication. Listen to the audio versionread by Andrew himselfin the Next Big Idea App.
1. P is for perspective taking.
When interacting virtually, misinterpretations and misunderstandings are more likely. But this is due to more than the commonly cited fact that we pick up on fewer nonverbal behaviors. In person, it is hard to forget that you are interacting with a human being because they are standing right in front of you. But when looking at a thumbnail-sized video of the person you are interacting with, hearing only their voice through the phone, or seeing nothing but their words in an email, it can be easy to forget that another person is on the other end of your communication.
As a result, theres a tendency to be more self-focused virtually than when interacting in person. To see this in action, think of a song you are confident other people would recognize. Then, tap out that song on the nearest hard surface. Once youve done that, estimate how likely it would be for someone else to identify the song if you tapped it out again.
This same scenario was played out by Stanford researcher Elizabeth Newton. She found that participants expected 50 percent of listeners would be able to correctly identify their song. However, listeners only recognized the song three percent of the time. This huge discrepancy happens because we hear the music in our heads as we are tapping it out, so it seems obvious to us. All the listeners are just hearing a series of taps.
The same applies to virtual communication. We may think our meaning was clear, but because we are so self-focused when interacting from behind a screen, we dont realize the person on the receiving end doesnt have the same context for accurately understanding our meaning. What you think is an obviously friendly and supportive email may come off as condescending to your coworker if they arent privy to all the same information as you.
The solution is pausing to consider the recipients perspective before sending or speaking a message virtually. One research-proven strategy for this in text-based communication is reading aloud what you wrote in a different tone than you intended, such as sarcastic or enthusiastic. Does the meaning drastically change? Knowing that the voice someone hears when reading a message isnt necessarily the same one you heard while composing it will help avoid self-focused overconfidence that leads to misinterpretations.
2. I is for initiative.
You may have heard about the Fyre Festival debacle in 2017, when a team led by Billy McFarland created hype for a festival that was supposed to have the best of the best in food, music, celebrities, and even buried treasure. What festivalgoers actually found when they arrived were barren parking lots, soggy cheese sandwiches in Styrofoam containers, and a lack of bathroom facilities. Pretty disappointing for what was billed as the biggest FOMO-inducing event of the year. This incredible mismatch in expectations and reality resulted in a $26 million fine and jail time for McFarland.
In virtual communication, theres often a disconnect between impressions and reality. Consider how these disconnects can make someone who works incredibly hard seem like a low performer. Imagine you are a manager with two subordinates. From one, you get a single five-paragraph email each Friday about the work they did for the week. From the other, you get a few-sentence email each day, updating you on their tasks. Which one seems to be a harder worker?
To show effort and engagement, take the initiative to communicate more frequently.
Despite the fact that both employees sent the exact same amount of text, if you are like most managers, you will say the employee who sends a brief few-sentence update each day is a harder worker because that employee seems like they are likely working each day. The one who sends the longer Friday update might just be doing all their work at the end of the week. This is why an important strategy in virtual communication is taking initiative in showing your effort.
Whether sending an email to your boss while working remotely or sending them an instant message from the next cubicle over, without taking this kind of initiative you end up in the of out of sight, out of mind pitfall. To show effort and engagement, take the initiative to communicate more frequently. Also, turning on your camera during meetings can help to show that you are physically and mentally present. These small steps make it more likely that those you interact with will perceive your work as a high-end lobster feast as opposed to a Fyre festival soggy cheese sandwich.
3. N is for nonverbal.
A Canadian farmer got himself into trouble when he responded to a customers text about an order of flax seed with a thumbs-up emoji. The issue was that the customer thought the thumbs up meant the contract was accepted. The farmer disagreed, saying he hadnt planned on accepting it just yet. The court sided with the customer, stating that the thumbs up constituted a legally binding agreement. The farmer had to pay almost $62,000.
Undergraduates and MBA students often ask me, Should I use emojis in my virtual communication? The answer isnt simple because research shows emojis can help or hurt depending on the situation. Dont focus so much on what cues are best or worst. Rather, pay attention to how the person you are interacting with communicates and become a conversational chameleon. If they fill their texts with emojis and exclamation points, then feel free to do the same. If they use business jargon, follow their lead. If they take a more formal approach, it can behoove you to do the same.
A study led by Kate Muir found that negotiators who mimicked their partners behavior style by using similar nonverbal behaviors improved their individual outcomes by 39 percent and joint outcomes by over 30 percent. These mimicry effects are driven by two factors. First, we generally all think that our own communication style is the best, so when someone else communicates like us, we think they are doing it effectively. Second, we trust people who are similar to us, so when someone communicates in a way that feels familiar, we tend to trust them more. Even in the barest of virtual communication modes, nonverbal behavior plays a central role in how our messages are perceived.
4. G is for goals.
Should you schedule a meeting or send an email? Is phone or video better for reconnecting with old contacts? Whats the best mode to use when meeting someone for thefirst time? Too often, people thoughtlessly approach these and similar questions by defaulting to whichever mode is right in front of them without considering the consequences.
A while back, I was giving a talk to a group of retail executives, and someone asked a great question: whats the best mode choice when you need to display emotions you might not really be feeling? Such as needing to seem excited during a customer interaction, even when you may be stressed or frustrated for unrelated reasons.
Telephone seems much higher effort and thus more authentic than email, yet it allows you to avoid leaking nonverbal behavior indicating your true emotions.
I ran a series of studies on this topic, using study contexts including negotiators, coworkers, and teachers and parents from international schools in Vietnam. Imagine you are a teacher in a school where parents pay a lot of money for their child to attend. Now, you have to tell one of these parents why their perfect angel is failing your course and being suspended due to serious misbehavior. Despite your frustrations with the studentand the parents for not helping improve mattersyou need to put on your best smile to ensure the interaction goes smoothly.
There were three key findings in these studies. First, if you are being authentic, then the richest mode of interactionface-to-face or videois best as it comes off as the highest effort and lets your authenticity shine through. If you need to fake it, I found that many people choose email, but that is the worst choice because email seems so low effort that it comes off as most inauthentic. For those who aimed to appear authentic while masking underlying emotions, audio interactions were the sweet spot. Telephone seems much higher effort and thus more authentic than email, yet it allows you to avoid leaking nonverbal behavior indicating your true emotions.
This choice was consequential as in my studies. It determined everything from parent satisfaction with their teacher, how much coworkers were willing to engage with each other going forward, and to what degree negotiators punished one another with severe counteroffers. By defining your interaction goals, you will be able to strategically select the right mode and message to improve outcomes and avoid situations that risk you making bad impressions.
5. AI will never replace the human touch.
Imagine receiving a sympathy email from a colleague after the death of a loved one. The email is supportive, but you immediately recognize the message was AI-generated because your colleague doesnt normally use formal words like elevate and profound. After making this observation, you probably think your colleague doesnt really care about you because they did not write the message themselves. When it comes to the most important interactions, theres no replacement for the human touch.
Researchers have found that people instinctively think of everything from songs to recipes to paintings as more authentic when we believe they were created by a human, as opposed to identical ones that were AI-generated. When something is hand-crafted, it seems more effortful and special.
In the vast majority of interactions, it will be impossible for others to tell that you used AI to create something on your behalf, but all it takes is one slip up for your interaction partner to suspect you did not write the message personally. Then, they will question every single virtual interaction youve had with them and wonder whether you were simply outsourcing your communication and not putting effort into the relationship. They will ask themselves why they interact with you personally in the first place if all they are doing is speaking with an AI.
There are times when AI increases productivity, such as using AI as an assistant for ancillary aspects of communicationsuch as generating ideas, editing, and summarizing conversations. This can free up valuable time and mental energy for more complex, nuanced interactions. But, as AI replacing human communication becomes more common, adding that human touch to core parts of communication is likely to become an ever-more-valuable signal of how much you value a relationship and how vital you are as a person to that interaction.
This article originally appeared in Next Big Idea Club magazine and is reprinted with permission.
It might sound a little silly that theres an entire subgenre of influencers who offer investment advice around Pokémon trading cards. Probably because it is a little silly. The idea of some YouTube Jim Cramer breathlessly warning viewers that Surging Sparks is setting a fire under collectors and investors is the stuff Saturday Night Live sketches are made of.
Yet, theres nothing silly about the amount of money changing hands in the Pokémon card space these days. Especially right now.
If it werent clear from all the viral videos of brawls at various Costcos, the soaring popularity of Pokémon cards has lately reached stratospheric new heights. (Costco ultimately had to institute a one unit per membership per day policy on its Pokémon offerings.) Overall value of the cards has spiked by 20% in the past six monthsaccording to Elizabeth Gruene, who oversees Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA)’s pop culture and trading-card-games divisionwith some individual cards skyrocketing by as much as 150%. And a lot of that increase has happened in just the past few months.
Whats behind the surge? A confluence of events Gruene describes as a perfect storm, building on several years of intense interest in Pokémon.
The Pokémon phenomenon originally began in 1996 when Japanese boutique video-game company Game Freak launched the first-ever game in the series. Players set out to capture all 151 species of pocket monsters dispersed throughout a magical realm, hence the catchphrase, Gotta catch em all. The game was an instant, monster-size hit that spawned a multibillion-dollar empire of movies, TV shows, theme parks, and, of course, trading cards. When it reached the U.S. in 1999, kids across America quickly adopted the catch-em-all ethos, tearing through packs in search of rare cards to impress their friends with oramong the more enterprising youngstersto appreciate in value.
Those kids have since grown into working adults, many of whom now have enough disposable income to buy the rare cards that once eluded themsay, a first-edition Shining Charazard now worth $4,000or buy packs for their own kids from the Pokémon vending machines now at grocery stores around the U.S. (The standard price for unopened packs is generally $4.49, but good luck getting your hands on them at the moment.) Millennial nostalgia, combined with high-profile superfans like Logan Paul, led to a veritable pokéssance, so to speak, starting in the early part of the pandemic. Pokémon trading cards have since become so popular as a game, as a series of collectibles, and as an investment opportunity, that PSA, the industry leader in assessing the condition and legitimacy of trading cards, now grades more Pokémon cards than baseball or any other sport.
Even with Pokémon interest already fairly high, though, Gruene noticed a massive uptick of late.
Our submission numbers are just insane right now, she says. We have quite a big backlog that we’re working through.
[Photo: John Keeble/Getty Images]
One of the main drivers of the surge, according to Gruene, is a newly strong release slate. While 2024 was mostly soft in terms of excitement around new Pokémon offerings, Novembers Surging Sparks series introduced a lot of highly sought-after cards. That release was followed in January by a new one, Prismatic Evolutions, featuring some extremely popular characters from Pokémon lore, including Eevee and the Eeveelutions. (Some of the chase cards from Prismatic Evolutionsan Umbreon ex Special Illustration Rare card, for instanceare so sought after that theyre already reportedly worth more than $1,500.)
One reason the excitement around certain new releases reverberates beyond players and over to the purely investment-minded crowd is because more new Pokémon cards have instant high value than their sports-cards brethren. While the most valuable baseball cards are overwhelmingly vintage cards, Pokémon produces a greater volume of high-value new cards. A particular rarity from Novembers Surging Sparks release, for instancePikachu ex Special Illustration Rarerecently sold for $1,000 on eBay.
With the new sports releases, it has to be a one-of-one or some really low population-count card to have a ton of value, but we don’t really see that as much in Pokémon, says Gruene. There might be a new card that comes in 10,000 or 20,000 packs that could each still sell for $1,000-plus. The total market cap for these cards is just a lot bigger than what we see in sports.
The value of any trading card is determined by the secondary market, and whatever people are willing to pay for it. In the case of Pokémon, people are willing to pay five, six, and in some cases, seven figures, though since the vast majority of packs contain only cards worth as much as the paper theyre printed on makes card-flipping more like gambling than an investment. But booms in value like the one were now experiencing, tend to follow excitement around the cardsa hype cycle in which resellers can charge more once demand outpaces supply. While some coveted new releases have helped fuel the current enthusiasm around Pokémon cards, another factor driving it is the Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket.
The game, which came out October 30, recreates the experience of opening packs of Pokémon cards but also adds an immersive element, transporting players into the pocket monsters world. By mid-December, the mobie app had already been downloaded more than 60 million times. Popular streamers on Twitch and on YouTube had turned the act of opening packs into a vicarious thrill; TCG Pocket gave those onlookers, and newcomers, a way to experience it themselves. It seems quite likely that the games explosive popularity enticed droves of new fans to take the leap from opening virtual packs of cards to seeking out the real thing.
That was a big cultural moment, Gruene says. And we did see a big bump in trading-card submissions around that time frame last year too.
A final potential factor in the recent spike in Pokémon card value, according to Gruene, is the new partnership between PSA and GameStop. Sending cards off to PSA for grading can be a complicated process for newcomers, but ever since the partnership began last October, card owners can now just drop off their wares at a GameStop and let the workers do the rest. That increased accessibility for a necessary step in selling high-value cards, arriving alongside the new mobile game and some sensational new card series, may have added to the recent value surge. It certainly couldnt have hurt, at least.
Of course, the danger around this boom is that it could end up being a Beanie Babies-like bubble (and fodder for an Apple TV+ original movie a decade or two after it bursts). Whether the current hype lasts much longer is a mystery for Detective Pikachu, but considering that next year is the 30th anniversary of Pokémon, many more people just may catch it.
