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In the summer of 2024, Squarespaces chief marketing officer, Kinjil Mathur, attracted criticism when she told Gen Z job seekers that they, like her, should be willing to do anything to land their first job. I was willing to work for free, I was willing to work any hours they neededeven on evenings and weekends, Kinjil told Fortune. You really have to just be willing to do anything, any hours, any pay, any type of job. The online backlash to Kinjils statement was immediate and brutal, forcing her to walk those comments back. I shared my own college internship experiences, and my words were misrepresented as career advice for a whole generation, Kinjil later said in a statement. The episode demonstrates a growing clash of values between the various generations in todays workplace. While some still take pride in sacrificing their well-being to demonstrate their commitment, othersprimarily younger workerssee things differently. I think they have more of an attitude of work-to-live as opposed to live-to-work that many of us grew up with, said Ravin Jesuthasan, the global leader for transformation services at the consulting giant Mercer, on stage in Davos in 2024. This is particularly true in the West. They have seen the legacy of all these broken promises. In the old days and in many parts of the West, they would promise you if you worked for 30 years, youd have this defined benefit pension, youd have retiree medical care, etc. None of that exists today. One of the many points of differentiation between todays young people and older workers is their perception of stress. Historically, Western workplace cultures equated stress with importance. If you were stressed, it often meant your job was more demanding and thus more important, encouraging some to complain about stress as a way to subtly communicate their value. Rather than seeing stress braggingor talking about being overworked with a sense of prideas a badge of honor, however, young people are more likely to interpret it as indicative of poor time management at best and an unhealthy relationship with work at worst. According to a 2024 study by researchers at the University of Georgia, those who brag the most about being stressed are now perceived more negatively by their peers. In fact, the research suggests those who stress brag are perceived as less capable, not more. After generations of equating time with effectiveness and busyness with importance, Gen Z has come to view the value of their time through a different lens. Its not just that Gen Z grew up in an era when many of the traditional promises of work and loyalty had long since been broken, when individual time commitments had been largely divorced from actual results. Those born in the late 1990s through the early 2010s have also already lived through a once-in-a-century economic crisis, endured a once-in-a-century pandemic, and are regularly bombarded by what were formerly considered once-in-a-century extreme weather events. This generation, which is just entering the workforce, spent their childhoods hearing their parents panic over financial challenges during the 2008 economic crisis, had their brains shaped by an unregulated social media machine that has proven detrimental to their mental health, lost some of their formative years to pandemic restrictions and lockdowns, and continues to face a barrage of new challenges almost daily. More so than any generation before them, this group of young people has developed an appreciation for proper time management, mental health, and well-being. Their well-documented emphasis on meaning and joy has come to replace past generations keeping-up-with-the-Joneses, competitive pursuit of material wealth. People used to say that money cant buy happiness, but the most anxious and depressed generation in modern history has internalized that sentiment. Countless studies show that when it comes to their priorities in lifeand at workGen Zers seek a greater balance between economic and emotional stability, prizing quality time over financial excess. According to a 2023 survey by Intuit, three-quarters of Gen Zers say they would rather have a better quality of life than more money in the bank, and 66% say they are only interested in earning money as a way to support their personal interests. Part of the motivation, the study suggests, is that social comparison has evolved from homes, cars, and other material markers of wealth to social media posts. In fact, 33% Gen Z members said they compare themselves to people they see on social media, versus 14% of the general population, and 70% say they feel as if theyre falling behind those they see online, compared with 50% of other generations. In Deloittes 2024 survey of millennials and Gen Zers, the respondents ranked work-life balance as their top priority when choosing an employer, followed by flexible hours and reduced workweeksall of which outranked salary. In short, this is the perfect generation to champion a shorter workweek. Not only does the reduced schedule offer more leisure time, which this generation prizes over compensation, but it has also been proven to reduce stress, anxiety, burnout, and depression. Furthermore, the four-day workweek represents an opportunity to address some of their greatest collective challenges, like improving family and community ties in the digital age, improving gender equity, and addressing climate change. Finally, the four-day workweek offers this generation more time to engage in causes that are meaningful to them, a primary motivator for this generation, according to research. Gen Z is the most enthusiastic generation about the concept of a four-day workweek and the most convinced of not just its feasibility but also its inevitability. In a 2024 survey of Gen Z students and professionals in the United States age 18 to 27, 80% said the four-day week should be standard, up from 76% the previous year. The same study also found that most young people were already utilizing new AI technologies to get more done in less time, with 72% saying they felt comfortable using generative AI regularly. In fact, 72% of Gen Z AI users said they save between 1 and 10 hours of schoolwork per week by leveraging the technology, and 14% have reduced their work time by more than 10 hours. Young people are so keen on a shorter workweek that theyre even willing to forgo other traditional workplace perks. In a 2023 survey by Bankrate, 92% of Gen Z and millennial respondents said they would sacrifice other common benefits in exchange for a four-day workweek, compared with 89% of Gen Xers and 80% of baby boomers.The most common workplace perks and norms that respondents of all generations would sacrifice for one less workday is the eight-hour day, with 54% saying they would work longer hours during the remaining four days. The second-most-popular trade-off was changing industries, jobs, or companies, with 37% saying they would leave their current role for a shorter schedule. According to a 2023 survey of 12,000 workers in the United Kingdom by Hays, 62% would prefer to work a four-day workweek in the office rather than a traditional five-day hybrid schedule. In its 2025 annual review, global HR firm Randstad, which has been asking thousands of workers around the world about work preferences since 2004, found that they ranked work-life balance ahead of pay for the first time. In the companys global survey of 26,000 workers, 83% put it at the very top of their priority list, nd this preference was even stronger among Gen Z workers. Even if other generations are slow to take up the cause, there is good reason to believe the four-day workweek is inevitablebecause it will be so highly valued by a generation of future leaders. Reprinted by permission of Harvard Business Review Press. Adapted from Do More in Four: Why Its Time for a Shorter Workweek by Joe OConnor and Jared Lindzon. Copyright 2026 Joe OConnor and Jared Lindzon. All rights reserved.
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E-Commerce
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday that Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence chatbot Grok will join Google’s generative AI engine in operating inside the Pentagon network, as part of a broader push to feed as much of the military’s data as possible into the developing technology.“Very soon we will have the world’s leading AI models on every unclassified and classified network throughout our department,” Hegseth said in a speech at Musk’s space flight company, SpaceX, in South Texas.The announcement comes just days after Grok which is embedded into X, the social media network owned by Musk drew global outcry and scrutiny for generating highly sexualized deepfake images of people without their consent.Malaysia and Indonesia have blocked Grok, while the U.K.’s independent online safety watchdog announced an investigation Monday. Grok has limited image generation and editing to paying users.Hegseth said Grok will go live inside the Defense Department later this month and announced that he would “make all appropriate data” from the military’s IT systems available for “AI exploitation.” He also said data from intelligence databases would be fed into AI systems.Hegseth’s aggressive push to embrace the still-developing technology stands in contrast to the Biden administration, which, while pushing federal agencies to come up with policies and uses for AI, was also wary of misuse. Officials said rules were needed to ensure that the technology, which could be harnessed for mass surveillance, cyberattacks or even lethal autonomous devices, was being used responsibly.The Biden administration enacted a framework in late 2024 that directed national security agencies to expand their use of the most advanced AI systems but prohibited certain uses, such as applications that would violate constitutionally protected civil rights or any system that would automate the deployment of nuclear weapons. It is unclear if those prohibitions are still in place under the Trump administration.During his speech, Hegseth spoke of the need to streamline and speed up technological innovations within the military, saying, “We need innovation to come from anywhere and evolve with speed and purpose.”He noted that the Pentagon possesses “combat-proven operational data from two decades of military and intelligence operations.”“AI is only as good as the data that it receives, and we’re going to make sure that it’s there,” Hegseth said.The defense secretary said he wants AI systems within the Pentagon to be responsible, though he went on to say he was shrugging off any AI models “that won’t allow you to fight wars.”Hegseth said his vision for military AI systems means that they operate “without ideological constraints that limit lawful military applications,” before adding that the Pentagon’s “AI will not be woke.”Musk developed and pitched Grok as an alternative to what he called “woke AI” interactions from rival chatbots like Google’s Gemini or OpenAI’s ChatGPT. In July, Grok also caused controversy after it appeared to make antisemitic comments that praised Adolf Hitler and shared several antisemitic posts.The Pentagon did not immediately respond to questions about the issues with Grok. Konstantin Toropin and David Klepper, Associated Press
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E-Commerce
2025 saw several successful public offerings, especially from companies operating in the AI, cryptocurrency, and fintech spaces. What many on Wall Street are anxious to know is whether the IPO marketand its returnswill accelerate in 2026, or if investors will take a more cautious approach to newly public companies as inflationary pressures, the potential for a weakening economy, and a possible AI bubble weigh heavily on peoples minds. The first real test of investor IPO appetite may come later this month, when cryptocurrency custody firm BitGo Holdings, Inc. is expected to go public. Heres what you need to know about BitGos IPO. What is BitGo? BitGo Holdings is a cryptocurrency infrastructure company. One of its main functions is providing cryptocurrency custodial services. Crypto custody companies provide storage and security for digital assets. Such companies are often used by large institutional investors to help manage risk and also meet regulatory guidelines. In contrast, many individual cryptocurrency investors still rely on personalized digital wallets to hold their tokens. BitGo was founded in 2013 and is headquartered in Palo Alto, California. According to the companys S-1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, BitGo had 566 full-time employees as of September 30. Over the past 12 months, ending September 30, the company says it generated total revenue of $11.1 billion. Its platform currently supports more than 1,550 assets with a total value of $104 billion. When is BitGos IPO? BitGo hasnt set a date for its initial public offering yet. In its amended Form S-1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) yesterday, the company merely mentioned its intention to go public. However, the amended filing suggests that the public offering will likely happen soon. IPOscoop.com lists BitGos expected IPO date as Thursday, January 22, but BitGo has yet to publicly confirm that date. What is BitGos stock ticker? BitGos shares will trade under the stock ticker BTGO. What market will BitGos shares trade on? BitGo shares will trade on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). What is the IPO share price of BTGO? BitGo hasnt decided on an exact IPO price yet. However, in the companys amended SEC filing, the firm said it expects its shares to be priced at between $15 and $17. How many BTGO shares are available in its IPO? In total, 11,821,595 shares of BTGO Class A common stock will be made available in its IPO. Of those shares, BitGo itself is offering 11 million directly. The remaining shares will be offered by the companys existing shareholders. How much will BitGo raise in its IPO? BitGo will not receive any proceeds from the roughly 821,000 shares its existing shareholders will sell. The company will only benefit from the funds raised from its 11 million share offering. With an expected IPO price of between $15 and $17 per share, BitGo is thus expected to raise between $165 million and $187 million. When you add in the shares being sold by exiting shareholders, BitGos IPO could raise as much as $200 million in total. How much is BitGo worth? BitGos ultimate valuation depends on how much its shares finally list forand how they perform on the stock market. However, if BTGO shares do indeed IPO at the high-end range of $17 each, BitGo will have a valuation of around $1.96 billion, according to Reuters. BitGo is hoping to repeat 2025s crypto IPO successes If BitGo does IPO this month as expected, it will likely be closely watched as it is not just one of the first tech IPOs of the year, but one of the first operating in the hot (and volatile) cryptocurrency space. Its IPOs success or failure could signal whether investors have a robust appetite for public offerings in 2026, particularly those tied to crypto. In 2025, several companies operating in the cryptocurrency space made successful IPO debuts. These include Circle Internet Groups (NYSE: CRCL) initial public offering in June and Bullishs (NYSE: BLSH) IPO in August.
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E-Commerce
Thousands of New York City nurses were set to return to the picket lines Tuesday as their strike targeting some of the city’s leading hospital systems entered its second day.The walkout, which comes during a severe flu season, involved roughly 15,000 nurses spread out across multiple private hospitals, including NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia, Montefiore Medical Center and Mount Sinai hospital.The affected hospitals have hired droves of temporary nurses to try to fill the labor gap. Both nurses and hospital administrators have urged patients not to avoid getting care during the strike.The labor action comes three years after a similar strike forced medical facilities to transfer some patients and divert ambulances.As with the 2023 labor action, nurses have pointed to staffing issues as a major flashpoint, accusing the big-budget medical centers of refusing to commit to provisions for manageable, safe workloads.The private, nonprofit hospitals involved in the current negotiations say they’ve made strides in staffing in recent years, and have cast the union’s demands as prohibitively expensive.On Monday, the city’s new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, stood beside nurses on a picket line outside NewYork-Presbyterian, praising the union’s members for seeking “dignity, respect and the fair pay and treatment that they deserve.” Associated Press
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E-Commerce
By now, the headlines almost write themselves: humanoid robots everywhere, AI in everything. Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2026 didnt disrupt that narrativeit confirmed it. What changed was the subtext. This was the year AI stopped feeling experimental and started feeling infrastructural. Intelligence has shifted from novelty to baseline, forcing harder questions about consequence, control, and agencynot just what technology can do, but how it reshapes systems once opting out is no longer realistic. For years, progress at CES has been measured in speed, scale, and spectacle. In 2026, a different metric quietly surfaced: judgment. The most advanced products werent the most aggressive or attention-seeking. They were the most considered, designed with an understanding that when intelligence becomes unavoidable, restraint becomes a competitive advantage. Beneath the obvious trends, the Seymourpowell team saw that a recalibration was underway. Trend 1: The Body Is the New Platform Computing has long lived in front of us, on desks, in hands, behind glass. At CES 2026, the more consequential shift was where technology is now choosing to settle: on the body, and within the social rules that already govern it. This wasnt about wearables as accessories. It was about gravitydeciding which parts of the body can host intelligence without demanding attention, breaking etiquette, or forcing users into performative behavior. The real innovation wasnt simply where technology sits, but how interaction becomes quieter, more physical, and often subconscious. Take iPolish, which turned fingernails into a programmable surface. Using digital clip-on nails and a magic wand connected to an app, wearers can shift between hundreds of colors instantly. The move is deceptively simple, but strategically sharp: Nails are already expressive, customizable, and socially accepted. No new behavior is required. Intelligence succeeds here precisely because it inhabits a place culture already allows. [Photo: .lumen] Elsewhere, interaction became even less visible. Naqis neural earbuds bypassed voice and touch entirely, using micro-facial signalsjaw tension and subtle muscle movementsto control devices without overt action. ModeX treated clothing itself as infrastructure, embedding power and compute into garments that dont announce themselves as tech. Orphes sensor-enabled insoles brought lab-grade biomechanics into everyday movement, while .lumens assistive glasses reframed accessibility as scalable augmentation rather than specialist accommodation. [Photo: ModeX] Across categories, the pattern was consistent: the next interface war wont be won by screens. It will be won by technologies that understand where theyre allowed to live, and how quietly theyre expected to behave. The takeaway: As intelligence migrates onto the body, social permission becomes as important as technical capability. The future belongs to products that feel natural not because they disappear, but because they respect the physical and cultural spaces they occupy. Trend 2: Agency Becomes a Design Problem As AI becomes infrastructural, the question is no longer whether systems act autonomouslybut how, when, and on whose behalf. CES 2026 revealed a growing recognition that trust isnt built through capability alone. Its built through boundaries. The most compelling products werent those that automated the most, but those that were explicit about where human judgment still sits. [Photo: Littlebird] Littlebird embodied this shift in the family context, offering predictive safety intelligence without screens, feeds, or surveillance theater. RestroomGuard Savvy applied the same thinking to public infrastructure, proving AI-driven safety doesnt require cameras or biometric intrusion to be effective. Sorcerics Lens extended the idea into the home, replacing dashboards and commands with contextual awareness that responds to situations rather than constant instruction. Even the Descent S1 buoy followed this logic, augmenting diver judgment with shared situational awareness instead of replacing it with alerts or automation. [Photo: UNIUNI Corp.] These systems didnt remove humans from the loop. They clarified where the loop should be. The takeaway: As opting out becomes unrealistic, agency becomes a design material. The most trusted systems wont be the fastest or smartest, but the ones that are clearest about when not to act. Trend 3: Care Moves From Apps to Infrastructure For years, wellness technology has asked individuals to self-optimize: track more, manage better, try harder. CES 2026 suggested a different direction. Care is moving out of dashboards and into systems that actively reduce cognitive, physical, and emotional loadwithout requiring constant attention or self-surveillance. Diligent Robotics Moxi captured this shift clearly. Rather than measuring caregiver performance, the hospital robot removes coordination work altogetherfetching supplies, running errands, and freeing nurses to spend time caring. The value isnt insight. Its relief. Elsewhere, neuro-wellness booths reframed focus and recovery as environmental conditions rather than personal failures to manage. By combining physiological sensing with adaptive lighting, sound, and temperature, they treated mental load as something a space can regulate, not something users must willpower their way through. The same logic appeared in everyday rituals. The AI rejuvenation shower treated water itself as a programmable medium, adjusting minerals and compounds in real time to deliver skincare without screens, tracking, or habit formation. Light Straight addressed a quieter hygiene pain pointmaintenance between reset momentsby cleaning and styling hair without water. It didnt promise transformation. It simply removed friction. [Photo: LOréal Groupe] Care also surfaced in less obvious places. Motion sicknesslong dismissed as an unfortunate side effect of travelwas reframed as a fundamental barrier to autonomous mobility. If passengers cant read, work, watch, or rest without nausea, self-driving cars dont create new freedom, they just extend commute time. Bosch addressed this not through wearables or behavioral coaching, but by redesigning vehicle dynamics at the software level. By controlling motion across all six degrees of freedom, the system reduces sensory conflict before it reaches the body, making it possible for passengers to safely disengage from driving altogether. In this context, motion sickness isnt a comfort issue. Its a gatekeeper. Solve it, and autonomous vehicles become environments for work, rest, and interaction. Ignore it, and adoption stalls. [Photo: Bosch] Across healthcare, mobility, beauty, and the home, the pattern was consistent: Care is no longer a niche vertical or a personal optimization project. Its becoming consumer infrastructure, embedded into environments and systems that quietly do the work for us. The takeaway: Care is no longer about empowerment through information. Its about relief through design. The next generation of care technology wont ask users to try harder, it will redesign the conditions around them. Trend 4: The Physical World Gets Its Software Update While much of the AI conversation still centers on digital products, CES 2026 made something else unmistakable: The biggest bottlenecks in technology are now physical. Infrastructure, energy, logistics, manufacturing, and housing are where intelligence is being stress-tested, not in prototypes, but at scale. This was the year the invisible layer of the tech stack stepped into focus. The Cat Ai Assistant interface on display at the Caterpillar booth during the 2026 CES event in Las Vegas on January 7. [Photo: Bridget Bennett/Bloomberg via Getty Images] Caterpillars keynote crystallized this shift. By embedding AI, autonomy, and edge intelligence directly into fleets, worksites, and heavy machinery, the company reframed physical infrastructure as something that can sense, learn, and adapt in real time. Not flashy. Mission-critical. The same logic appeared elsewhere. The AI Transformer Home Trailer treated housing as adaptive infrastructure rather than a fixed object, physically reconfiguring space on demand. Alpon X5 made enterprise-grade AI deployable at the edge, without cloud dependence, reframing intelligence as something that lives where work actuall happens. Perovskite color-conversion films pushed display progress not through software, but materials scienceanother reminder that some of the biggest leaps ahead wont come from code alone. CES 2026 wasnt just about smarter products. It was about making the physical world programmable. The takeaway: The next phase of AI growth wont be constrained by models, it will be constrained by matter. The companies that win wont just scale intelligence. Theyll modernize the physical systems it depends on. Trend 5: Restraint Becomes a Feature Perhaps the most telling shift at CES 2026 wasnt technological at all. It was tonal. After years of maximalismmore sensors, more screens, more AIa quieter maturity is setting in. The most confident products no longer feel the need to prove intelligence. They demonstrate judgment. Birdfy Hum Bloom used AI not to capture attention, but to slow it down, turning backyard observation into discovery rather than content. Toniebox 2 doubled down on screen-free interaction, resisting dopamine loops in favor of presence and routine. Even Legos Smart Play experiments pointed toward intelligence that scaffolds creativity rather than directing it. This wasnt visible fatigue so much as visible discernment. Companies are beginning to understand that adding intelligence everywhere isnt innovation. Knowing where not to add it is. The takeaway: In a world where intelligence is cheap and ubiquitous, restraint becomes premium. The most advanced products of the next decade may be the ones that know when to step back. CES 2026 didnt deliver a single, dominant narrative, and that may be its most honest reflection of where we are. AI is no longer a question mark. Its a condition. And once intelligence becomes unavoidable, progress is no longer about acceleration. Its about alignment between systems and people, automation and agency, capability and consequence. The future on display wasnt louder or faster. It was more deliberate. And that, quietly, may be the most meaningful shift of all.
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E-Commerce
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