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An overwhelming number of Americans are in the market for a new job. According to a recent Monster poll, 93% of workers think 2025 might be the time to change employers. With an increased number of applications, you could see tougher competition for roles, which makes the interview process even more critical. The way you approach the job hunt is similar to how a professional gambler approaches the poker table, says Jamie Wall, casino analyst and body language expert at Gamblizard, a website that evaluates online casinos and their offers. Both are high-stakes situations, considering you really want to land the job or win the game, he says. Both follow formal rules, have clear goals, and involve some initial inputs. In poker, its the cards you need to play right. In an interview, its your experience, which also needs to be presented strategically. In both poker and interviews, luck plays a role, but success largely depends on your skills and ability to read others, says Wall. Thinking this way shifts your mindset toward managing risks and maximizing rewards, he says. Plus, viewing the interview as a competitive game, where you and the interviewer are testing each others strategies, can spark excitement and drive, replacing anxiety with a sense of challenge. Before you go into your next interview, consider these poker-inspired tips that could help you stand out from the crowd of other candidates. 1. Read the Room At the poker table, players try to read their opponents so they can adjust their game. In the interview process, the goal is to build a rapport with the person interviewing you by matching energy and gestures. Wall recommends reading the room by picking up on non-verbal cues that help you adjust your actions. In-person interviews give the full spectrum of information: facial expressions, posture, movements, and real eye contact, he says. For example, engagement can be shown by the interviewer leaning forward or maintaining consistent eye contact. Mirroring someones movements can help forge a subtle connection. Just dont be blatant about it.If your interview is on video, Wall suggests looking for micro-expressions, which are involuntary facial movements that can reveal someones true thoughts. Raised eyebrows, for example, could indicate that the interviewer is surprised by your answer. You may want to take this as a clue to provide more information. If your interview is over the phone, Wall says tone, pacing, and pauses become the primary indicators. A quick intake of breath might mean theyre eager to interject or intrigued by your answer, he says. Unusually long pauses [mean that theyre] skeptical or distracted. 2. Maintain a Poker Face You may think having a poker face means being blank and expressionless, but Wall says its about controlling your emotions in high-pressure situations. Fortunately, this is a skill you can practice with friends, such as trying to keep a straight face while engaging in a heated debate when emotions want to break through, he says. In an interview, a poker face is useful during tough or unexpected questions. For instance, instead of nervously tightening your lips, looking down, or mumbling, maintain steady eye contact, take a pause, and answer with a calm tone to project confidence, says Wall. You dont need to stay neutral the whole time, he says. Show enthusiasm, smile, and connect authentically when it feels right. A poker face is just a tool to help you stay composed when it matters most. 3. Use the ‘Check-Raise’ Strategy In poker, a “check-raise” is when a player starts off weakly, then surprises their opponent with a strong move later. They may match bets in early rounds to keep people in only to go all in at the end. You can use this strategy in interviews by downplaying your strengths in areas where you exceed. This often prompts the interviewer to dig deeper, giving you a chance to provide a well-prepared and impressive response that catches their attention, says Wall. The main danger of this strategy is withholding information that could be critical for decision-making, he says. To minimize risks, hold back only information already in your résumé and always leave an opening to elaborate, like One thing Id also like to highlight [is]. . . .Wall says this strategy works best when withholding doesnt underplay your potential. For entry-level candidates, where every detail matters, the risk is higher and likely not worth it. 4. Bluff (When Appropriate) Bluffing is a common technique used in poker. For example, only places a bet when they have a strong hand, they might throw off their opponents by raising big on a weak hand once in a while, says Wall. You can also bluff in an interview. While you dont want to outright lie, its possible to polish or reframe the narrative around your skills and knowledge by building on a truthful foundation. If youre asked about your proficiency in a skill youre still learning, Wall suggests saying, Im quick to pick up new skills, like I did with [X related skill]. This shows eagerness and flexibility, keeping the conversation positive while subtly showcasing your strengths, he says. A foolish bluff, on the other hand, is making a wild move that doesnt align with your story. Never bluff about hard skills, certifications, or major accomplishments that can be easily verified or are essential for the role, says Wall. But when it comes to things like reasons for leaving a previous job, gaps in your résumé, or your motivation for applying, a bit of creative storytelling can work to your advantage. 5. Make Your Final Bet At the end of the interview, Wall recommends placing your final bet. Just like the last bet in poker can win you the game, ending your interview on a high note can boost your chances, he says. Show enthusiasm and reinforce your value by saying something like, Thanks, I really enjoyed the interview. While Im exploring other options, this one stands out. This demonstrates you’re invested, confident, and aware of your worth. Sometimes the cards fall in your favor, and sometimes your opponent wins. The key for landing that next job is to stay in the game.
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So you flew too close to the sundownloading app after app, recording hi-res video, binging podcastsand now youre faced with the dreaded Storage Almost Full pop-up on your iPhone. Its OK: we can handle this together. Here are three extremely expeditious tricks you can use to clear out the clutter and get back to a carefree life of digital hoarding. Detach from big message attachments Every hilarious GIF. Every video of someones kid skiing. Every duck-faced selfie. They’re all taking up space, and youll almost never need to revisit them. Free up a metric pant-load of storage in mere moments by heading to Settings > General > iPhone Storage > Review Large Attachments (you may need to tap Show All to see it. All your space hoggers will be presented, from the largest to smallest. Hit the Edit button and eradicate with extreme prejudice. Ive found this to be the best way to clear up a ton of cruft quickly. Id say your mileage may vary, but it wont. Weve all been clinging to this stuff for way too long. Intelligently offload unused (or seldom used) apps Finally, a useful application of artificial intelligence. Yes, my family and I elf ourselves one day every December. No, the app doesnt need to be taking up space the rest of the year. For all the one-off, long forgotten, and rarely used apps, theres Apples offloading feature. It doesnt get rid of apps entirely it just gets rid of them until you need to use them again. Navigate to Settings > General > App Store > Enable “Offload Unused Apps” (way at the bottom) to mothball them. When you need them again, one tap brings them back, complete with all your settings. Send your photos to the cloud I realize the irony of suggesting you pay for cloud storage to house all the photos that are taking up too much space on your phone, but the fact of the matter is that at some point, youre eventually going to have so many photos they wont even fit on your phone anyway. For that, theres iCloud, and shelling out $3 a month for 200 GB of storage isnt outrageous. Now, that doesnt mean you should let a bunch of other digital junk take up too much iCloud space. If you think of it primarily as a photo backup tool and work to keep your other files pruned, pared, and organized, youll be able to optimize your storage. Speaking of optimization, head to Settings > Apps > Photos > Optimize iPhone Storage to enable the feature. Youll need to enable the iCloud Photos toggle if it isnt already, at which point the Optimize iPhone Storage Option will appear. This keeps a smaller copy of each photo on your phone itself, while housing its higher-resolution version in iCloud. If you take a lot of photos, this is a great way to keep their respective storage sizes in check.
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E-Commerce
If you own a house, your insurance premiums have probably surged over the last several years. A new report outlines how much worse it could get as climate disasters keep growing: In Florida, for example, the insurance cost for an average house could go up 89% in the next 30 years. In Miami, the cost for a homeowner could go up by 322%, or an additional $11,000 a year. As you pay more for insurance, the value of your house is likely to simultaneously drop if you’re in a high-risk area. The report, from the climate risk analysis nonprofit First Street, estimates that an average house in Florida will lose around 29% of its value by the 2050s. Meanwhile, home values will rise in certain areaslike Madison, Wisconsinthat face lower climate risk. The report classifies around 21,000 communities as climate abandonment neighborhoodsplaces with high climate risk and spikes in insurance premiums where populations are likely to decrease. Thousands of other areas are likely to later reach that tipping point. In other high-risk areas, like Miami, populations will keep growing because there are enough other amenities that people are willing to live with the risk and expense. What were seeing is that in some places where the economic structure is a little bit weaker, the impact of climate is stronger, says Jeremy Porter, head of climate implications research at First Street. Its something thats just an additional factor that people decide, Okay, thats enough. I cant get a job here, and I also dont want to put up with persistent extreme rainfall events’ or something like that. As more people leave and cities have lower tax revenue, those local economies will struggle even more. Nationally, home insurance premiums are expected to rise by an average of 25.3%, with some of the steepest jumps in the West and Southwest. Idaho will see costs rise 50%; premiums in New Mexico could go up by 82%. In the past, insurance costs were relatively stable. In the 2000s and early 2010s, they were 7%-8% of mortgage payments. But over a little more than a decade, theyve grown by 115%. Thats because of the enormous losses that insurance companies are facing as disasters grow. In 2023, insurers paid out around 10% more than they collected in premiums. (Ironically, despite the impact on their business from climate change, insurance companies continue to invest in fossil fuels.) The report calculated how much insurers costs are likely to grow because of climate change, and how much premiums will correspondingly rise. When a homeowners insurance premiums go up, their house will be worth less when it sells. And as buyers better understand climate risks, that also impacts value. When a house gets added to a FEMA zone, for example, that discounts the value by 4%. Once awareness is raised around it, it does make the property a little less desirable, Porter says. It raises the flag that theres going to be a little more in terms of cost of homeownership for this property. In Paradise, California, after a devastating wildfire in 2018, insurance costs rose 36.8% by 2023. Property values dropped by 42%. First Street makes tools that homebuyers can use to better understand the risk of climate disasters like flooding or wildfire for a specific house. Now, if you search for a house on Zillow, Realtor.com, Redfin, or Homes.com, that data is integrated. A recent Zillow study found that 80% of homebuyers now consider at least one climate risk when theyre searching for a house. Homeowners can use the same tools to find ways to make their houses more resilient. If you live in a neighborhood that hasn’t flooded in the past, for example, but First Street’s models tell you that there’s now a strong likelihood of flooding, you might invest in a rain garden, permeable pavement, or ditches in your yard (or, depending on your risk, you might spend much more to elevate your house). Insurance companies are beginning to more proactively encourage homeowners to make changes to prepare for disasters, including a California startup that focuses on homes in high-risk fire zones. City planners can use the same tools to plan for resilience, and try to help residents avoid some of the financial costs that the report predicts. While only a handful of large cities have teams focused on climate risk, the tools can help fill the gap for others. “Understanding what parts of the community are at risk, which residents, which assets, which infrastructure pieces, gives them the ability then to effectively and efficiently allocate resources to protect the community and really adapt to the climate risk,” Porter says.
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