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Lets circle back when we have the bandwidth to touch base on whether we need to hop on a call to tackle the low-hanging fruit. (If this corporate buzzword bingo sent a shiver down your spineapologies.) In the world of professional communication, business jargon is often a necessary evil. Email clichés: love em or hate em, we all use em. Many of us are trapped in a terminal cycle of reaching out and circling back to make sure were aligned. Recent analysis from email verification company ZeroBounce looked at more than one million real work emails to find out which overused email phrases are the most common offenders. To no one’s surprise, reaching out is the reigning champ with 6,117 appearances, shortly followed by follow-ups of all kinds (to follow up, following up, will follow up) with 5,755 mentions. Nearly 3,000 emails also started with a version of hope: Hope youre doing well, Hope this finds you well, or Hope all is well. Other honorable mentions include Happy Friday (as well as the slightly less popular Happy Monday). Touch base, hop on a call, bandwidth, and low-hanging fruit were commonly identified by researchers.. Language habits are some of the hardest to change, Liviu Tanase, founder and CEO of ZeroBounce, told Fast Company. Despite nearly one in four employees now using AI to help write emails, the language hasnt moved with the times. Even with smart AI tools embedded in our inboxes, people still fall back on familiar phrases because they feel safe and sometimes, we dont know what else to say. She added: Maybe its time we all circle back to sounding human again. Here, Gen Z is leading the charge. Young workers have no qualms including memes, emojis, slang, and abbreviations in their emailsjust as they would text in a group chat with friends. Around 71% of people surveyed by the U.K. bank Barclays in 2023 said they believed Gen Z was changing the formality of language in the workplace. What worked in formal business correspondence just a decade or two ago, can be received as cold or even rude among todays digital natives. For those looking to refresh their email etiquette, ZeroBounce offered a few easy swaps to test out in your next correspondence. Rather than penning hope this finds you well, you could ask, how’s your week going? Or open with, Good morning quick one. The ubiquitous just checking in or following up can be replaced with something more direct: What are your thoughts on the proposal? (Many of us default to using softer language to our detriment, anyway.) For those looking to shake things further and take a leaf out of Gen Zs playbook, one TikTok creator offered some suggestions to inject more mystery or foreboding in the workplace. I hope this email finds you, he suggests. This kind of implies that everyone thinks youre missing and they dont know where you are. This is something really good to send to your remote coworkers. Disclaimer: use at your own risk. But if you want to use a safer work email cliché, you can always just ask them to ping you.
Category:
E-Commerce
Every year, Audience Audit publishes a study on what agency clients really wantand the 2025 edition revealed a stat that should stop any agency leader in their tracks: 77% of clients say theyre more likely to hire an agency thats a recognized AI expert (not just self-proclaimed). But only 32% believe their current agency fits that description. Heres whats more telling: When asked what they expect from their agency when it comes to AI, clients didnt say efficiency or cheaper deliverables. They want new ideas, sharper analysis, and real guidance on how to use AI themselves. In other words, theyre not just looking for agencies that use AI. They want partners who know how to think with it. At Quantious, being AI-fluent isnt a role, its a team standard. Every producer, strategist, and designer is expected to not just keep up, but lead. And we dont just talk about it in pitches, we practice it every day. Want to build real AI fluency across your team? Here are five ways weve made it part of our everyday work. 1. Invest in professional development like its our job (because it is) Professional development isnt a once-a-year checkbox here, its a cultural value. We budget for AI courses, certification programs, and conferences because we believe time spent learning is time well spent. Weve encouraged team members to tackle everything from AI marketing bootcamps to building apps with vibe-coding tools like Replit, Lovable, Replay.io, or Base44 (Seriously, one project lead with no coding background just built his own app!). We believe in fostering a culture of experimentation, and to some, our approach looks a little risky. When we invest in our team members professional development, we know its not always going to instantly translate to value for our clients. But guess what? Innovation stems from learning and exploring, and thats exactly how our teams end up ahead of the trends, every time. 2. Host team-led AI workshops Our favorite AI tipsters are each other. When a team member cracks a new use caselike building out a personalized GPT, or using AI to develop complex Excel formulasthey host internal workshops to share what theyve learned. Weve had workshops on everything from AI product image generation to deepfake identification. We document our processes, record quick tutorials of what weve learned, and aim to keep knowledge moving fast. 3. Encourage experimentation on live work We dont treat AI like a lab project. We build with it every day. Designers test layout variations with image generation tools. Marketing producers use AI to pull research for brand sentiment audits or to map out user journeys. Copywriters turn notes into outlines, organizing their thoughts before drafting. Weve learned how to craft meaningful prompts, how to develop our own agents, and how to build out some seriously complex spreadsheet formulas using AI. We automate time-consuming processes, using Bluedot, Slack, and Limitless to transcribe company meeting notes in real time. We use these tools with our brains, not instead of them. In every aspect of our work, we remember that AI is a collaborator, not a replacement for hard work and creativity. Say it with me: You cannot just check out and have AI do it all for you. (Just ask Randy Marsh of South Park; it doesnt end well!) 4. Treat AI safety and usage guidelines as a living document AI is moving fast, and so are the conversations around safety, security, and ethical use. Thats exactly why we treat our AI guidelines as a work in progress, instead of a static rulebook. Leadership actively invites input from across our team to flag new risks, suggest safeguards, and share best practices. AI responsibility is a shared approach we take, and we want to ensure everyone has a role to play in mitigating data privacy and bias. This has led us to embrace a smarter, safer, and more thoughtful AI practice that evolves along with the tech. 5. Help clients navigate the AI maze AI tools are evolving dailyand most of our clients are trying to make sense of whats worth their time, whats secure, and what actually works. The real value lies in making AI feel less overwhelming, and more actionable. Thats why its vital to not just use AI to drive internal efficiencies, but to help clients make it work for them in their own workflows. Whether its creating custom GPTs, mapping out automated content workflows, or guiding teams through prompt strategy, we treat AI as a collaborative layer in the client relationship. And were transparent about it. When AI plays a role in our work, we explain how, why, and what it means for the outcomes. That clarity builds trust and helps future-proof our clients teams. Our job isnt just to use AIits to help our clients understand it, apply it responsibly, and stay ahead of the curve. Thats where the real value is. The future of creative work isnt going to be driven by opening up a browser tab and launching ChatGPT. Its going to be driven by humans who can automate a tedious quality assurance process, use AI to spot brand inconsistencies across campaigns, or extract insights from raw customer feedback, safely. Because knowing when not to use AI is just as important as knowing how. Lisa Larson-Kelley is founder and CEO of Quantious.
Category:
E-Commerce
What if, instead of working toward an exit strategy, we built companies for longevity? Thats the question at the heart of employee ownership. Its not just a perk to lure talent. Its a fundamentally different way of building a business, and one that might just be the key to long-term resilience. Ive spent nearly my entire career inside a 100% employee-owned architecture, engineering, planning, and interiors design firm. Today as CEO, I lead its 1,800 employee-owners. Ive seen firsthand how this model changes everything, from how team members treat clients to how the organization is able to weather change. But this isn’t a story about just one company. It’s about a mindset shift that could help more companies build lasting value instead of just quick wins. RETHINK OWNERSHIP: BEYOND THE CAP TABLE When most people think of ownership, they picture equity grants or stock options. But real employee ownership is more than a line item. Its a structure that changes incentives, yes, but also culture, leadership, and accountability. Being 100% employee-owned has shaped how we make decisions, collaborate, and deliver work. When you know your colleagues have skin in the game, you trust them differently. You lead differently. You take responsibility in a way that doesnt hinge on hierarchyit stems from care rooted in real ownership. And when your clients know theyre dealing with employee-owners, not just employees, that builds trust in return. Clients can feel the difference. Its not always easy to define, but its palpablein the commitment, the deep sense of shared responsibility, the pride people take in the outcome. WHY IT’S SUSTAINABLEAND SCALABLE One of the most compelling reasons to explore employee ownership is its long-term viability. When a company is built around shared responsibility instead of individual power, it becomes more resilient to leadership changes. I once spoke to a CEO who said he wasnt sure his company would survive without him and his fellow majority owners. I cant imagine building something without knowing that it would endure for future generations. The companys legacy shouldnt rest on any single person. Our founding partners built the company on the idea that if you invest in the company, the company should invest in you. That spirit helped guide our transition to full employee ownership decades ago. Shared ownership encourages leaders to think beyond the present moment. In my experience, it also invites more people into that conversation. When ownership is broad-based, strategic planning becomes a collective effort, not just a top-down mandate. Teams are more likely to align on long-term goals, and more willing to adapt when circumstances change, because theyve helped shape the direction. Ownership changes the timeline youre working on. You stop optimizing for the quarter and start asking bigger questions: What will serve our team, our clients, and our communities for the next 5, 10, 15, or even 50 years? INNOVATION THROUGH INCLUSION One possibly unexpected benefit of employee ownership is what it unlocks creatively. When people feel a genuine sense of agency, they collaborate differently. Our firm uses a matrix leadership model that gives different types of experts the chance to lead depending on the problem at hand. That level of collaboration always brings its own challenges, but more importantly, it creates room for new ideas and cross-disciplinary solutions to emerge. Ownership doesnt just empower decision making; it encourages experimentation. We support things like personal development grants that allow employee-owners to pursue research projects outside their day-to-day work. One grant led to a neuroinclusive design exhibit featured at a major international architectural showcase. These kinds of initiatives dont just enrich culturethey advance innovation. WHAT LEADERS SHOULD ASK THEMSELVES Employee ownership isnt right for every company. But its a model worth serious consideration, especially for leaders thinking about employee engagement, long-term value creation, or succession. If you’re a founder or executive, ask yourself: What will happen to your company when you step away? Will the culture, vision, and value you’ve built live on? Or does everything rest on the shoulders of a few people at the top? Ownership changes that equation. It puts real sustainability at the core of how a business operates. Ive seen what happens when people arent just asked to think like owners, but actually are owners. It creates a different kind of business: one thats more resilient and more invested in the long term. In a world full of companies built for the exit, we need more that are built to last. Steven McKay is the chief executive officer of DLR Group.
Category:
E-Commerce
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