Friday 10th May 2024

Fewer Workers Expect to Retire Past 62, Reaching a New Low

In the years before the pandemic, Americans said the likelihood of them working full time past age 62 averaged 54.6 percent. But in the four years since, there's been a "persistent decline," dropping to an average of 49.4 percent, according to a new analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, based on data from the triannual Labor Market Survey. In March 2024, the average likelihood reached a new series low of 45.8 percent.

This new data seems to contrast with the growing older workforce evident in today's labor market. The share of Americans still working at 65 or older nearly doubled in the 35 years leading up to 2023, according to a report from the Pew Research Center. In fact, after leaving the workforce during the pandemic, many retirees ended up returning to work.


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How to Learn Through Loss

When we face the loss of a person, an animal, or a possession, our very core can be permanently altered. The impact resonates within our souls, and the memory of loss is etched into our long-term memory forever. However, the experience of loss is deeply personal and unique to each individual.

Recent advancements in neuroscience may unlock the mystery of how our brains navigate grief, shedding light on the diverse ways people experience mourning. With this insight, we can extend more grace to colleagues, friends, family, and even strangers as they traverse grief's varied terrain. Importantly, this awareness empowers us to grant ourselves permission and compassion in seeking the necessary support and resources to navigate our own grief.


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Microsoft Just Shared One Big Tip for Managing AI at Your Business

While business leaders fret about how to responsibly integrate GenAI, workers have embraced the tech wholeheartedly. According to Microsoft and LinkedIn's 2024 Work Trend Index Annual Report, 75 percent of knowledge workers are currently using AI at work, but 60 percent of business leaders are dragging their feet on AI adoption because they don't have a plan or vision for how to use the tech. Brenna Robinson, general manager of Microsoft's small-business-focused Modern Work team, says the best way for leaders and employees to align on AI use is to identify and amplify your organization's "power users." 

The Microsoft report, which surveyed 31,000 business leaders and employees across 31 countries, found that 80 percent of AI-users at SMBs are using their own AI tools at work, but around half of those users are afraid to admit to using AI for their most important tasks because they worry it could make them look replaceable. These employees, especially the ones who have spent extensive time using GenAI to solve problems at work, are a company's "power users." Robinson, who works with small-businesses to help make the most of Microsoft's workplace tools, says these power users are the key to driving widespread AI adoption. 


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Minority-Led Small Businesses Are Using Generative AI in High Numbers, Citing an Increased Ability to Level the Playing Field

For all the doom and gloom surrounding generative artificial intelligence, there might also be a silver lining, especially for the underdogs of the businessworld. What happens when you combine a new technology that has nearly limitless potential with a small business with limited resources? Survey says: a better fighting chance.Nearly half of small businesses say that AI will help them level the playing field with bigger businesses, according to a recent survey by GoDaddy. Top use cases range from creating content to customer service to sales generation.

Most entrepreneurs (77 percent) used GenAI to create content for social media posts and advertisements for marketing campaigns (48 percent), per the GoDaddy survey. What's more, they aren't as concerned about the downsides of using the tech. A little more than half of the respondents (55 percent) say they are confident in their use of GenAI for their business.


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Remember the SPAC Craze? More Than a Third of Them Have Liquidated Since 2020

New research from SPAC Track, an independent monitor of the SPAC market, suggests that the craze was ill-fated for more than a third of the companies that made the jump: Of the 986 U.S. SPACs that have IPO'd since 2020, 362 have liquidated, according to the research shared exclusively with Inc. 

As low interest rates and surging public markets set the temperature during the pandemic, investors sought an opportunistic approach, and SPACs became a lucrative fad between 2020 and 2021. This backdoor route -- when a public holding company is created with the sole purpose of acquiring a private company and taking it public -- accounted for 613 IPOs, or 59 percent of all new listings in 2021, according to Nasdaq.


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More Banks Tightened Lending Terms in the First Quarter of This Year. Some Are Charging More, Too

Getting a bank to approve your loan application is a tough proposition in this still chilly credit environment--and it's getting even more difficult. Over the first three months of this year, 21 percent of banks tightened lending standards for small businesses with less than $50 million in annual sales, according to the Federal Reserve's most recent Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey released on Monday. That marked an increase from the fourth quarter of last year when 19 percent of banks tightened loan standards. Only two percent of banks eased lending standards for small businesses during the first three months of this year.

What may be most troubling to entrepreneurs is the type of banks that are stiffening their criteria for small business lending. The credit pullback was most pronounced in small and medium banks, which tend to be the go-to lenders for small businesses, with 30 percent of non-large banks tightening their loan standards for small businesses.


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Biden Announces New $3.3 Billion Wisconsin AI Data Center...and It's the Ultimate Jab at Trump

That locale might ring a bell: It's the same site that was supposed to host a new Foxconn facility, a Taiwan-based electronics manufacturer that invested $10 billion in the region. Former president Donald Trump once lauded the project as "the eighth wonder of the world," but it ultimately failed when Foxconn ditched the deal.

The Biden administration estimates that the new center will create 2,300 union construction jobs, plus 2,000 full-time jobs at the center on Microsoft's payroll. The center is also anticipated to create pipelines to new industry in town, according to Jon Donenberg, the deputy director of the White House's National Economic Council.


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When Someone You Manage Isn't Following the Return-to-Office Policy

What should you do if some of your team members still don’t want to come into the office after your company has imposed a mandate? How do you strike the right balance between following company policies and understanding the needs of your employees? In this article, the author shares advice from two experts on how to navigate this complicated situation. 

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How to Rethink Your Career as an Empty Nester

When children leave the house for college or other opportunities, the sudden change and loss of predictability can be disruptive for working parents and their careers. It’s common for parents to feel grief when kids leave the house. Perhaps you’ve been caught unaware: you haven’t fully anticipated this time and season, and now your life looks like a blank canvas. How do you fill it? If you’re an empty nester (or will be soon), this article offers some questions for you to reflect on and strategies help you re-shape your life and find meaning — both personally and professionally — during this time.

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Dynamic Pricing Doesn't Have to Alienate Your Customers

Inflation-fatigued shoppers are witnessing prices fluctuate across categories with unprecedented scale and frequency — a trend often seen as yet another cunning commercial scheme. Is the extra profit companies see from dynamic pricing worth the risk of alienating customers? If done well, companies shouldn’t be making that trade-off — dynamic pricing should serve the long-term interest of companies and customers alike. This can only happen under two conditions. First, it must represent a better alternative to static prices. Second, companies must view dynamic pricing as an integral part of customer centricity, not something antithetical to it.

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