Even in an age when it is rather common to invite people, including leaders, to bring their whole self to work, what is actually rewarded at work is being our best self, in the sense of trying to be at the best of our behaviors, and fulfill as much of our potential as we can, as often as possible.
Importantly, many if not most people still compartmentalize their personal self as something separate from their work persona or professional self, even if both can co-exist as salient, albeit different, dimensions of their self-concept. Indeed, this aligns with the science of self-complexity, which basically shows that we inhabit multiple selves, in the sense that our identity is composed of different roles, habits, and adaptations which are activated as the situation demands, in response of each pertinent or particular environmental requirements.
So for instance, even if you adore your boss, it would be unwise to mistake them for your spouse: just because they give you feedback doesnt mean they want to hear about your weekend argument over who forgot to buy toilet paper, nor should you expect them to give you a gold star for behaving like a functioning adult for eight consecutive hours. Likewise, no matter how warm, empathetic, or inclusive your team may be, your colleagues are unlikely to respond well if you treat a project review like bedtime routine: for example, nobody wants to be tucked in after a PowerPoint or be asked whether they brushed their teeth before updating the CRM.
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The science of transilience
And yet, there are actually some pretty clear benefits in applying certain skills or dispositions from one of your identity dimensions to others, and that includes the surprising potential for transferring parent skills to both management and leadership skills. In fact, there is a powerful but largely unknown science of transilience, the process of extrapolating aspects of one of your roles or self-concept dimensions to others.
Recent empirical research validates this intuition with hard data. A study found that leaders who are supportive parents produce measurably better outcomes in their teams: higher employee performance, more voice behavior (employees voluntarily sharing ideas), and greater willingness to cooperate. The mechanism? Experiences of care and emotional support inherently developed in parenting roles transfer directly to leadership effectiveness.
Parenting skills, translated
Here are five ways in which parenting skills may come in handy to boost your leadership effectiveness:
1. Patience as a performance multiplier: Parenting teaches you very quickly that progress rarely unfolds on your preferred timeline. Toddlers dont walk when you want them to, teenagers dont reply to messages when you need them to, and nobody in between ever hurries because you said please. Good leaders internalize the same logic. Teams learn at different speeds, projects require repetition, and people need space to make mistakes before they improve. In both domains, impatience is the illusion that reality will adjust to your mood; patience is the skill of adjusting your expectations to reality.
Developmental psychology introduces the concept of “scaffolding”: building temporary support structures that help someone achieve just beyond their current level[1]. Good parents instinctively identify their child’s “zone of proximal development” and provide calibrated support. Transformational leaders do the same: they identify where each person is ready to grow, provide coaching without doing the work for them, and gradually step back as competence develops. This requires the same calibrated attunement that parenting demands.
2. Clear boundaries create psychological safety: Parents know that children thrive with consistent expectations and predictable guardrails; ambiguity breeds anxiety and chaos. The same is true at work. Teams feel safer when the rules of engagement are clear, when no really means no, and when leaders enforce boundaries reliably rather than arbitrarily. A boundary at home might be a bedtime; a boundary at work might be a deadline. In both settings, structure reduces stress, and consistency builds trust.
Our own research in attachment theory predicts that both parents and transformational leaders fulfill two critical functions: they provide a “secure base” from which people can explore confidently, and a “safe haven” to return to when difficulties arise. This isn’t about creating dependency. Studies show that when people feel psychologically secure – knowing support is available if needed – they actually become more autonomous, creative, and willing to take risks. The leader’s availability enables independence, not dependence.
3. Listening beats lecturing: Every parent has learned the hard way that lecturing a child rarely produces enlightenment; it mostly produces eye rolls, resistance, or creative reinterpretations of your instructions. Leadership isnt much different. People follow more readily when they feel heard, understood, and included in the problem-solving process. Just as a good parent listens to what a child is trying to say, a good leader listens to the concerns behind employees objections – because you cant influence what you havent first understood.
4. Modeling behavior is more powerful than mandating it: Children copy what you do, not what you say; telling them to share nicely while you shout at traffic sends a very different message. Adults are not immune to this principle. Teams take behavioral cues from leaders: if you stay curious under pressure, they will too; if you treat others with dignity, so will they; if you panic, micromanage, or blame, the contagion spreads instantly. Parenting teaches you that you are always on stage; leadership simply gives you a bigger audience.
5. Encouragement fuels growth more than criticism: Parents quickly discover that reinforcing effort not just outcomes keeps children motivated and resilient. The same dynamic applies to adults: people double down on behaviors that are noticed and valued. A leader who acknowledges small wins, progress, and perseverance cultivates a culture where people want to stretch themselves. Think of encouragement as the organizational equivalent of the proud look what you built! moment with a child – a small gesture that accelerates confidence, capability, and engagement.
The bad parenting connection
Perhaps more obviously, there are some clear parallels between bad leadership and bad parenting. Here are some rather striking similarities:
1. The Because I said so manager: Just as authoritarian parents shut down questions with rigid commands, authoritarian leaders mistake obedience for alignment. They confuse compliance with commitment and then wonder why nobody shows initiative.
2. The inconsistent rule-setter: Parents who punish a behavior one day and ignore it the next produce anxious, confused children. Leaders who do the same create cultures where people waste more energy interpreting the bosss mood than doing their actual job.
3. The distracted, phone-addicted caregiver: A parent who nods absentmindedly while scrolling sends a clear message: Im here, but not really. Leaders who multitask through meetings, check emails while someone speaks, or listen with one AirPod in convey the same emotional absenteeism.
4. The praise-inflation expert: Some parents shower children with empty praise to avoid conflict; the workplace equivalent is the leader who never gives honest feedback, inflating performance reviews until they become meaningless. In both scenarios, reality eventually delivers the correction the adult avoided giving.
5. The helicopter micromanager: Just as hovering parents undermine a childs autonomy and problem-solving skills, micromanaging leaders suffocate initiative. Both end up producing dependency, resentment, and a deep fear of making mistakes, which ironically reinforces the very behavior they complain about.
A rich laboratory
In the end, parenting offers an unusually rich laboratory for understanding human behavior, motivation, and development, precisely the same ingredients that make leadership effective. What parents learn through necessity, leaders can apply with intention: patience, boundaries, attentive listening, behavioral modeling, and encouragement are not soft skills but core mechanisms for eliciting growth in others. And the darker sides of parenting (inconsistency, distraction, micromanagement, avoidance) map almost perfectly onto the classic derailers of bad leadership. The parallels arent coincidental; they reflect universal principles of how humans respond to authority, structure, and care.
Multiple streams of research now converge on this point. Studies demonstrate that parenting and transformational leadership share core psychological processes: both develop through creating secure bases for exploration, both transfer caregiving orientations across domains, and both produce similar developmental outcomes in their “followers”, whether children or employees. The science is clear: this isn’t metaphor, it’s measured mechanism.
This is why transilience matters: the ability to draw on one dimension of the self to enrich another is a feature, not a flaw, of our complex identities. Rather than pretending our roles exist in sealed compartments, we are better off asking what each role teaches us about being more effective, more humane, and more self-aware in the others. Parenting doesnt make you a leader, but it can make you a better one if youre willing to notice the patterns, learn from the mistakes, and apply the lessons where they matter most: not just at home, and not just at work, but across the full constellation of selves that make you who you are.
That doesnt mean, of course, that the next time you interview for a leadership role you should brag about being a parent, or showcase the number of children you have as evidence of managerial brilliance. Most people are still unaware of transilience and the value of transferring skills from one identity domain to another, so the connection will likely be lost on them. Still, the real advantage lies not in announcing your parental status but in internalizing the lessons it quietly teaches: managing emotions under pressure, nurturing growth, setting boundaries, and modeling the behavior you hope to inspire. These are not résumé lines; they are capabilities that, when consciously activated, enhance your effectiveness as a leader far more than any abstract leadership competency model ever could.
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Rejoice, New Year’s dieters: Oreos are getting a sugar-free option.Mondelez said Tuesday that Oreo Zero Sugar and Oreo Double Stuf Zero Sugar will go on sale in the U.S. in January. They’re a permanent addition to the company’s Oreo lineup.It’s the first time Mondelez has sold sugar-free Oreos in the U.S. They’re already sold in Europe and China, the company said.Mondelez said consumers are increasingly seeking what it calls “mindful indulgence,” and the new Oreos will fill an existing gap in the market for sugar-free sandwich cookies.
[Image: Mondelz International]
Others have also noted the trend toward healthier snacks. In a report earlier this year, the market research company Circana found that a majority of Americans are seeking out snacks they consider “good for them.” Conagra Brands, which makes popcorn and Slim Jim meat snacks, said in a recent snacking report that Millennials and Generation Z consumers, in particular, are seeking portion-controlled and wellness-focused snacks.Coca-Cola Zero Sugar, which was introduced in 2017, saw sales jump 9% last year, while original Coke sales grew just 2%. Mondelez is also facing competition from Hershey, which sells zero sugar versions of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and other candies, and Voortman, a sugar-free wafer cookie brand.Mondelez said it spent four years developing no-sugar Oreos so it could ensure the cookies still tasted like the originals. For sweetening, the Oreos contain maltitol, a type of sugar alcohol that’s also found in some fruits and vegetables; polydextrose, a soluble fiber; sucralose, a sweetener derived from sugar; and acesulfame potassium, a synthetic sweetener.Comparing the nutrition data on Zero Sugar and regular Oreos is tricky, since the serving sizes differ.A serving of Oreo Zero Sugar cookies, which is defined as 22.6 grams, has 90 calories, 4.5 grams of fat and 16 grams of carbohydrates. A serving of regular Oreos, which is defined as three cookies or 34 grams, has 160 calories, 7 grams of fat and 25 grams of carbohydrates.The biggest difference: a serving of regular Oreos contains 13 grams of added sugars, or 26% of the recommended daily amount. Zero Sugar Oreos contain none.
Dee-Ann Durbin, AP Business Writer
Cracker Barrel posted lower-than-expected sales in its fiscal first quarter and trimmed its revenue forecast for the year as it continued to feel the fallout from a botched plan to revamp its logo and restaurants.The Lebanon, Tennessee-based restaurant chain said Tuesday its revenue fell 5.7% to $797.2 million in the three months ending Oct. 31. That was lower than the $800 million Wall Street anticipated, according to analysts polled by FactSet.Cracker Barrel said its same-store restaurant sales dropped 4.7% while sales in its retail shops dropped 8.5%. Those declines were also slightly higher than analysts forecast.Cracker Barrel said it now expects total revenue of $3.2 billion to $3.3 billion in its 2026 fiscal year. That’s down from $3.35 billion to $3.45 billion previously. The company also said it expects adjusted pre-tax earnings of $70 million to $110 million, down from $150 million to $190 million previously.Cracker Barrel shares fell more than 10% in after-hours trading Tuesday.Cracker Barrel announced in August that it was simplifying the chain’s logo as part of a larger plan to modernize the chain’s dark, antique-filled restaurants.But the move had disastrous consequences. Fans didn’t like that the new logo didn’t include Cracker Barrel’s longtime mascot, an overall-clad man leaning on a barrel, or the words “Old Country Store.” They also rebelled against the store redesigns.Cracker Barrel backtracked a week later, saying it would keep the logo. In September, the company also suspended its plans to remodel stores. The chain operates around 650 restaurants nationwide, with many in Texas, Florida and Tennessee.Cracker Barrel shareholders voted late last month to keep company CEO Julie Felss Masino in place despite the logo debacle.But one of the company’s directors, Gilbert Davila, resigned from Cracker Barrel’s board Thursday after preliminary results indicated that shareholders rejected his reelection. Davila, who joined Cracker Barrel’s board in 2020, is the president and CEO of DMI Consulting, a multicultural marketing firm. He reviewed Cracker Barrel’s advertising as part of his role on the board.
Dee-Ann Durbin, AP Business Writer
Want more housing market stories from Lance Lamberts ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter.
When assessing home price momentum, ResiClub believes it’s important to monitor active listings and months of supply. If active listings start to rapidly increase as homes remain on the market for longer periods, it may indicate pricing softness or weakness. Conversely, a rapid decline in active listings beyond seasonality could suggest a market that is heating up.
Since the national Pandemic Housing Boom fizzled out in 2022, the national power dynamic has slowly been shifting directionally from sellers to buyers. Of course, across the country that shift has varied.
Generally speaking, local housing markets where active inventory has jumped above pre-pandemic 2019 levels have experienced softer home price growth (or outright price declines) over the past 36 months. Conversely, local housing markets where active inventory remains far below pre-pandemic 2019 levels have, generally speaking, experienced more resilient home price growth over the past 36 months.
Where is national active inventory headed?
National active listings are on the rise on a year-over-year basis (+13% between November 2024 and November 2025). This indicates that homebuyers have gained some leverage in many parts of the country over the past year. Some sellers markets have turned into balanced markets, and more balanced markets have turned into buyers markets.
Nationally, were still below pre-pandemic 2019 inventory levels (-6% below November 2019) and some resale markets, in particular chunks of the Midwest and Northeast, still remain tight-ish.
While national active inventory is still up year-over-year, the pace of growth has slowed in recent monthsmore than typical seasonality would suggestas some sellers have thrown in the towel and delisted in weak/soft markets.
Here are the November inventory/active listings totals, according to Realtor.com:
November 2017 -> 1,228,077
November 2018 -> 1,273,047
November 2019 -> 1,143,332
November 2020 -> 683,822
November 2021 -> 512,241
November 2022 -> 750,200
November 2023 -> 755,489
November 2024 -> 953,452
November 2025 -> 1,072,417
If we maintain the current year-over-year pace of inventory growth (+118,965 homes for sale), we’d have 1,191,382 active inventory come November 2026.
Below is the year-over-year active inventory percentage change by state:
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While active housing inventory is rising in most markets on a year-over-year basis, some markets still remain tight-ish (although it’s loosening in those places too).
As ResiClub has been documenting, both active resale and new homes for sale remain the most limited across huge swaths of the Midwest and Northeast. Thats where home sellers next spring are likely, relatively speaking, to have more power than their peers in many Southern markets.
In contrast, active housing inventory for sale has neared or surpassed pre-pandemic 2019 levels in many parts of the Sun Belt and Mountain West, including metro area housing markets such as Punta Gorda and Austin. Many of these areas saw major price surges during the Pandemic Housing Boom, with home prices getting stretched compared to local incomes.
As pandemic-driven domestic migration slowed and mortgage rates rose, markets like Tampa and Austin faced challenges, relying on local income levels to support frothy home prices. This softening trend was accelerated further by an abundance of new home supply in the Sun Belt.
Builders are often willing to lower prices or offer affordability incentives (if they have the margins to do so) to maintain sales in a shifted market, which also has a cooling effect on the resale market: Some buyers, who would have previously considered existing homes, are now opting for new homes with more favorable deals. That puts additional upward pressure on resale inventory.
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At the end of November 2025, 18 states were above pre-pandemic 2019 active inventory levels: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Washington. (The District of Columbiawhich we left out of this analysisis also back above pre-pandemic 2019 active inventory levels too. Softness in D.C. propers predates the current admins job cuts.)
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Big picture: Over the past few years, weve observed a softening across many housing markets as strained affordability tempers the fervor of a market that was unsustainably hot during the Pandemic Housing Boom. While home prices are falling some in pockets of the Sun Belt, a big chunk of Northeast and Midwest markets still eked out a little price appreciation this year. Nationally aggregated home prices have been pretty close to flat in 2025.
Below is another version of the table abovebut this one includes every month since January 2017:
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Researchers on the forefront of artificial intelligence (AI) and leaders of many of the major platformsfrom Jeffrey Hinton to Yoshua Bengio, Demis Hassabis, Sam Altman, Dario Amodei, and Elon Muskhave voiced concerns that AI could lead to the destruction of humanity itself.
Even the stated odds from some of these AI experts, with an end-days scenario as high as 25%, are still wildly optimistic, according to Nate Soares, president of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI) and coauthor of the recent best-selling book If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies.
Thats because, as he argues in the book, the track we’re on with AI is headed for disasterunless something radically changes. The book, cowritten with researcher Eliezer Yudkowsky, explores potential threats posed by “superintelligence,” or theoretical AI systems that are smarter than humans.
We’re sort of growing these AIs that act in ways nobody asked for, that have these drives and emergent behaviors nobody intended, Soares said at last months World Changing Ideas Summit, cohosted by Fast Company and Johns Hopkins University in Washington, D.C.
If we get superhumanly intelligent AIs that are pursuing ends nobody wanted, I think the default outcome is that literally everybody on earth dies,” he added.
A reckoning for the world
Likening the work of some AI leaders to building an airplane while flying with no landing gear, Soares said that not enough attention is being paid to the technologys potentially negative outcomes.
The amount of global investment being poured into AI shows that people are betting it wont be a total dud, he said, but there are two other crazy options: AI radically automates all human labor, so the economy is captured by a very small group, or it becomes super intelligent and kills everyone.
The world hasn’t really quite come to understand just how crazy this AI stuff is, Soares said.
But there is some reason for optimism, Soares said, as a lot of people are worried about the future of AI, which makes for a brittle situation if more peopleall of us includedvoice their concerns.
Maybe if enough people are like, Wait, we’re doing what now? What the heck? Soares said. Maybe that will shake the whole world into saying, Holy crap, let’s change course.
The Senate is heading toward dueling partisan votes on health care this week after Republicans said Tuesday that they had united around a plan, for now, that would allow COVID-era health care subsidies to expire.Both the Republican plan, which would replace the subsidies with new savings accounts, and a Democratic bill to extend the enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits for three years lack the bipartisan support needed for passage. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said Tuesday that the Democratic legislation does not include enough reforms to curb fraud or limit high-income recipients. That legislation “will fail,” Thune said.At the same time, Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer called the Republican plan “phony” and said the bill is “dead on arrival.”The burden is on Republicans “to vote with us,” Schumer said of Democrats, who forced a 43-day government shutdown over the issue.With Republicans and Democrats unable to agree or even really negotiate with each other millions of people could see increases in their premium payments when the tax credits expire in January. Both sides blame the other for the increasingly likely failure of Congress to act, bringing the issue into the midterm election year with political talking points but little in the way of compromise on the subsidies that have helped keep costs down for many of the more than 24 million Americans.
Tentative GOP unity after years of disagreement
The Republican unity around a single plan, in the Senate at least, comes as the party has wrangled for more than a decade over how to replace former President Barack Obama’s signature law, also known as Obamacare.The legislation by Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, the chairman of the Senate Health, Labor, Education and Pensions Committee, and Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, emerged this week from many different proposals from Republican senators, including some that would have extended the tax credits with new limits.Despite those differences, Republicans worked to project unity as they emerged from a lunch meeting Tuesday. Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno, who had just recently proposed legislation to extend the subsidies with new income caps, said he is now “hyper-focused” on Cassidy and Crapo’s legislation. Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley, who had his own bill to reduce taxes on health care, said the consensus bill “isn’t perfect, but I’m willing to give it a go.”“I just think that Republicans can’t do nothing,” Hawley said after the meeting. “I think we ought to be doing everything we can to try and get down the cost of health care.”Thune said there will now be “something out there that Republicans will be able to talk about and support and vote for, and then we’ll see.”There was less consensus in the House, where moderate Republicans who are up for reelection have been pushing Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to extend the subsidies with new reforms while the right flank of the party has demanded deeper reforms to the ACA. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise told reporters that GOP leadership will present options to members on Wednesday for potential votes next week.
Proposed health savings accounts
The bill by Cassidy and Crapo would let the current subsidies, first put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic, expire. The legislation would then make payments to the new health savings accounts for the next two years, for enrollees making less than 700% of the federal poverty level who pick lower-cost, higher-deductible bronze or catastrophic health insurance plans.Eligible enrollees between the ages of 18 and 49 would get $1,000 per year, while those between 50 and 64 would get $1,500. The money could be spent to defray out-of-pocket expenses like copays and deductibles, or to purchase other qualified health-related items directly from companies, but not to cover monthly premiums.Cassidy and Crapo say their bill provides better support to Americans than the expiring subsidies do because it hands money directly to the people, giving them the power to decide how to spend or save it a message President Donald Trump has echoed in recent weeks. Republicans say the plan could also cut down on fraud in the health care system, pointing to a Government Accountability Office report that found some fake recipients were able to get coverage.The bill also includes new language limiting the use of Affordable Care Act money for abortion a dealbreaker for moderate Democrats who say they would have been willing to negotiate on the issue.
Uncertainty over costs
Health analysts warn that the plan won’t do much to help lower-income Affordable Care Act enrollees who rely on subsidies to afford their monthly insurance fees.The Republicans’ plan also requires enrollees to pick higher-deductible plans to be eligible for the payments meaning heavy users of health insurance may end up saddled with out-of-pocket costs far higher than the new influx of cash in their pockets.Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said the GOP proposal “leaves middle-class Americans saddled with sky-high premiums, and Big Insurance makes out like bandits by selling junk plans to families that desperately need health coverage.”“Instead of working with Democrats to stop this health cost crisis, Republicans are selling snake oil,” Wyden said.
Swenson reported from New York. Associated Press reporter Kevin Freking contributed to this report.
Mary Clare Jalonick and Ali Swenson, Associated Press
Reading the news, it can feel like no one is partying anymore.
People seem more excited to stay home than go out. Gen Z is drinking less than any other generation. Wellness clubs have replaced night clubs as the go-to spots to socialize.
But partying is not dead — priorities have simply shifted, as highlighted in the Evites Pregame Report 2026 released today.
The online invitations platform surveyed more than 5,000 party enthusiasts to uncover the hottest trends and the biggest pet peeves for party planning in 2026.
As it turns out, partying no longer happens only at the club. It has shifted to smaller, connection-focused affairs. After birthdays and holiday celebrations, watch parties came in as the third-most-popular event types at 49%, followed by book clubs at 43% and celebrating pets at 35%. After all, a dogs birthday party is still a party.
Gen Z has been declared generation stay-at-home. But that doesnt mean they arent inviting people over. According to Evite, home-based celebrations are booming as hosts prioritise comfort and intimate celebrations over big blow outs.
Post-pandemic, people discovered they prefer deeper, more meaningful connections over crowded events, and as a result their homes have become more central to their identity and social lives, Olivia Pollock, Evites Etiquette & Hosting Expert, tells Fast Company. Theres also a practical component at play. Hosting at home helps keep budgets manageable, 67% of respondents say they prefer affordable, personalized experiences.
If they arent going out, a new generation of hosts is instead getting creative at home, turning their apartments into makeshift coffeehouses and planning elaborate themed dinners designed with TikTok and Instagram in mind. If they are hosting outside the home, 69% favor outdoor and nature-based locations, with over half (52%) seeking unconventional venues.
In 2025, social media isnt just a tool, it’s the unofficial co-host at gatherings, says Pollock. Nearly a quarter of respondents plan to host content-friendly gatherings specifically designed to share online. That might mean a unique spin on a charcuterie board, a themed tablescape, or even personalized touches like namecards, knowing that guests will definitely want to take a post on their socials.
Partying, in whatever form, is more important than ever, particularly at a time when 57% of Americans are lonely. Younger generations are feeling it worse than older Americans, a recent Cigna survey shows. Those figures are unsurprising given that in 2023, only 4.1 percent of Americans attended or hosted social gatherings on a given weekend or holiday, data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows.
The antidote would be a nationwide effort to get out and party more. Even if that looks like hosting a wine and cheese night at home or a watch party for the finale of your favorite
show rather than shaking ass at the club.
It also means showing up. Evite found 62% of respondents cited guests RSVP-ing “yes” and then bailing as a top pet peeve, with ignoring RSVP deadlines just behind at 57%.
Hosts also have a role to play. Being underprepared with a lack of details about the dress code or schedule is the cause of headaches for 67% of guests. Not enough food or drinks (49%) and poor scheduling or timing (39%) also are etiquette faux pas.
Alcohol, once a party staple, is now less of a go-to, as the sober-curious movement continues to gain ground. Those aged 34 and under are drinking about 10 percent less now compared with two decades ago, according to a 2023 Gallup poll. Half of hosts now strive to offer a variety of beverage options, with soda (48%), crafted mocktails (39%), and tea or coffee (37%)topping the list of preferred guest beverages.
In 2026, partying isnt going anywhere. It just looks a little different. The common thread is that people just want to connect, said Pollock. Regardless of the occasion, or the venue.
Consider this: You want to book a multicity, international trip with flights from New York City to London, then Paris, and then back to New York City. There are numerous variables in the mixdifferent airlines, various ticketing levels, and morethat make the booking more complicated than anticipated. Accordingly, you may end up booking several separate flights, with multiple tickets and confirmation codes to keep track of.
If you travel a lot, that can be a lot to manage. But Navan, a corporate travel and expense platform, says it has smoothed the whole process out for booking flights.
Navanwhich went public less than a month and a half ago, and mainly competes in the same space as companies such as Ramp and Concurannounced on Wednesday that it has unveiled a huge upgrade to its multicity booking process, making it easier than ever to book complex travel itineraries. Thats something that amounts to a rather large engineering breakthrough, its team says. While users previously could use Navan for exactly these types of complicated, multicity bookings, doing so, following the upgrades, is now much simpler.
These types of itineraries amount to around 10% of bookings on the platform, says Ian Fette, vice president of Engineering at Navan, but it wasnt the feature that got all the attention and love. However, the process has been massively upgraded, he says, although it took some time. Navan started working on the improved process during the second half of 2024.
And, as noted, its the myriad variables that come into play when booking multicity trips that made it such a daunting task for engineers.
Whats hard about multicity [itineraries]is not all airlines can handle all the itineraries you can throw at them, Fette says. Some airlines have partnerships and can sell one ticket that covers the whole journey, or you can construct itineraries where one airline can fulfill all the routes, he continues, but it may not be price competitivewe try to break it up and see if we can fill it as one ticket, and get a good price.
Previously, balancing simplicity and pricing for multicity bookings has been the goal for travelers, and it generally involved a one-ticket approach (comprising all flights) or a series of one-way flights. Navans upgraded system spares travelers from trying to do all that mental work of trying to put it together.
Fette says users are already lauding the changes, and that the upgrades lay the foundation for future enhancements to the Navan platform. This unlocks our ability to continue to iterate our ticketing intelligencehow we use the knowledge and data we have to drive you to the best pricing, he says. This is an ongoing area of investment for us, and its a huge step up.
A SpaceX initial public offering might be on the horizon.
The aerospace company, run by founder and CEO Elon Musk, is reportedly planning an IPO aimed at raising over $30 billion, according to Bloomberg, which cited people familiar with the matter.
The IPO could be as soon as mid- to late-2026 or 2027. In its recent 2026 US Venture Capital Outlook, PitchBook pointed to the rise in space-focused stock listings, citing favorable policies.
Fast Company has reached out to SpaceX for comment and will update this post if we hear back.
Reaching the $30 billion threshold would make SpaceX the largest IPO in historyand give it a reported $1.5 trillion valuation.
Oil company Saudi Aramco currently holds the record, raising $29 billion in 2019. It hit a $1.9 trillion valuation, selling 1.5% of its ownership.
Sources cited by Bloomberg claim that SpaceX will hit about $15 billion in revenue this year and estimate $22 billion to $24 billion in 2026. Most of that income is courtesy of Starlink, which has been used by governments and companies alike to provide satellite internet services.
Executives at SpaceX have floated the idea of Starlink spinning off and doing its own IPO. However, last year, CFO Bret Johnsen said it would likely be in the years to come.
Musk and the companys board have reportedly already started making plans for an IPO, including hiring. The funds would, in part, go toward developing space-based data centers, presumably to help power the enormous computing needs of the AI boom.
Stocks rise in space-adjacent companies
News of a potential SpaceX listing has led to a spike in share prices of related companies.
Take EchoStar Corporation, which sold spectrum licenses to SpaceX this fall. Between two separate deals, EchoStar received $11.1 billion in SpaceX private stock. The companys shares (Nasdaq: SATS) closed up about 6% on Tuesday and jumped nearly 7% in premarket trading on Wednesday.
Space transportation company Rocket Lab Corporation saw its shares (Nasdaq: RKLB) close up 3.6% and rise another 1.5% overnight.
Its a common experience: you search for white bean soup recipes one time on Instagram, and you are bombarded with white bean soup content on the app for seemingly all eternity.
Instagram wants to fix that. Starting today, the companys three billion users can have more control over their algorithm via a Your Algorithm feature. Its not quite Bluesky, or the Instagram of yore that only displayed content from accounts users followed, but it does let users select or unsubscribe from different topics.
The new feature, which leverages AI, lets users pick topics they want to see more or less of on their explore page. Users will first be able to see a list of suggested topics that their algorithm thinks they are interested in which they can modify. Users can also share their interests to their stories, allowing their followers to see and even replicate some of their feed.
[Image: Instagram]
We’re always trying to show people the best possible reels for them. After 2020 [we] slowly started figuring out how to do a good job of predicting people’s interests and showing them reels they’d be interested in, Tessa Lyons, Instagrams vice president of product, says. I think we do a pretty good job today, but we don’t always get it right, and we know that people’s interests change. What we really want to do is give people control over the experience that they have on Instagram.
In designing the feature, Instagram had to balance Reels’ utility as a discovery tool with the features that give users control over what they will see.
The ideal Reels experience is one that helps you go deeper on the interests you already have and then discover new interests that you might not even know about. And getting that balance right is really important, Lyons says, adding, [your algorithm] is one input we have into your Reels experience. So even if you add a handful of different interests, thats not going to be the only content you see. You’re still going to see other content as well.
Lyons also says that the feature can help Instagrams algorithm learn about users and serve them relevant content more quickly; after she adopted a cat and tuned her algorithm to feature more kitten content, her feed immediately updated to include relevant reels. In the past, the algorithm may have needed a few days to understand she wanted to see more.
By this same measure, the feature will likely improve the ad experience, as Instagram will be able to surface more targeted content for each user based on the interests they signal.
According to Lyons, the inspiration for the feature started as a meme on Threads a couple of years ago, when users started writing posts to their respective algorithms, asking it to connect them with different interests, like writers or books. It was just people expressing what they wanted from their Threads experience. Some of them would say, Dear Algorithm, I just dont want to see politics anymore. Im over it, Lyons says.
