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Todays workforce often spans foursometimes fivegenerations. Gen Z, millennials, and baby boomers bring distinct experiences and expectations that enrich organizations yet complicate workplace design. The core challenge is building physical and cultural environments that serve these differentand sometimes conflictingneeds. The stakes are high. Gallups 2024 State of the Global Workplace shows global engagement falling to 21%, the second decline in 12 years. Engagement drops fastest when generational needs go unmet. Nearly 60% of employers say their workforce spans four or five generations, and in a recent AARP study, 83% said creating a more multigenerational workforce would drive their success and growth.” Addressing this divide demands more than new policies. It requires intentional design, empathetic leadership, and norms that respect every age group. Flexibility is a universal demandbut for different reasons If one expectation transcends generational lines today, it’s the desire for flexibility. But the why behind that desire differs. Boomers and Gen X often see flexibility as a tool for managing work-life balance or caregiving responsibilities. Millennials view it as a non-negotiable element of trust and autonomy, while Gen Z perceives it as a reflection of an employer’s adaptability and tech-savviness. Offering hybrid or remote options alone isn’t enough for workplace designers and change managers. Organizations must clearly define flexibility across roles and levels and be prepared to support it through policies, digital infrastructure, and space planning. PDR collaborated with one client to develop a “living lab” that tested various workplace design solutions to enhance collaboration, flexibility, and employee wellness. This pilot provided valuable data and feedback that informed the design of that firms future workplaces. Design implication: Create dynamic office environments with zones that accommodate focused work, collaboration, and social interaction, allowing people to work where they’re most productive. Technology adoption isn’t about ageit’s about mindset Gen Z quickly embraces chat-based apps but abandons clunky software, while Gen X and boomers master enterprise systems, once trained. Blanket assumptions of digital fluency miss these key facts: 75% of knowledge workers already use generative AI at work, 46% adopted it in the past six months, and even boomers (73%) bring their own AI toolsalmost as many as Gen Z (85%). Relying on outdated platforms frustrates younger staff who expect real-time collaboration, yet rolling out new tools without support sidelines those who learn differently. True adoption comes from aligning technology with workflows and giving every generation trainingand a voicein the process. Leadership implication: Invest in tech that meets a real need, then train, support, and listen to feedback from all generational perspectives to drive adoption and equity. Career growth means different things The way each generation defines career success has changed over time. For baby boomers, upward mobility and long-term job security were often measured as success. Gen X shifted the focus toward autonomy and work-life balance, shaped by layoffs, economic uncertainty, and institutional skepticism. Millennials redefined success around purpose, growth, and social impactvalues that Gen Z amplifies, viewing each career move as part of a broader personal brand strategy. Traditional annual reviews and fixed career ladders no longer fit a multigenerational workforce. Provide clear growth paths, mentorship, and real-time feedback that align with diverse definitions of success. According to PWC, more than half of workers feel theres too much change at work happening at once, and 44% dont understand why things need to change at all. HR implications: Offer multiple development tracksnot everyone aspires to management. Emphasize mentorship, skills development, and lateral mobility. Values matterand not just for Gen Z Much has been said about Gen Z’s insistence on social responsibility, sustainability, and inclusion. However, research increasingly shows that employees of all ages are asking their employers to take principled stands. What differs is how those values are communicated and operationalized. Boomers may appreciate top-down statements of ethics. Millennials and Gen Z want visible, measurable action through diverse leadership, mental health support, or environmental policies. The credibility gap between rhetoric and reality is especially noticeable to younger staff, who grew up in an era of brand transparency and accountability. Cultural implication: Values must be lived, not just listed. Leaders must model behaviors and allow employee-led initiatives. Toward a multigenerational mindset Gen X was raised to push through so many still see mental health support as optional, even though 76% of C-suite leaders say the pandemic harmed their well-being. Companies need to reframe self-care as a productivity strategy: When Gen Z employees request a mental health day, it signals resilience, not fragility. That matters because nearly half of Gen Z reports feeling stressed most of the time, and only 57% of workers worldwide rate their holistic health as good. Workplace expectations also diverge by age. Younger employees value remote work yet still want mentorship, networking, and a sense of belonging. Many boomers and Gen Xers appreciate the structure of an office but reject a strict 9-to-5 schedule. Reflecting this tension, CBREs 2023 survey shows 65% of occupiers require some office attendance, while 30% leave it entirely up to employees. The question is no longer Should we return to the office? but What purpose should the office serve now? Space must earn its keep by fostering collaboration, connection, and creativity. When a Houston-based Fortune 500 energy company faced a renovation-versus-relocation decision, it engaged PDR to crate a modular, home-like headquarters. The adaptable design cut costs and heightened both teamwork and employee satisfaction. Design strategy implications: Involve employees across generations in co-creating the space. The more they see their needs reflected in the outcome, the more likely they will embrace it. PDR sees the future of work shaped by design, not policy. Through design, strategy, and change management, we help organizations transcend compliance to create spaces that spark conversation, preserve knowledge, and elevate diverse voices. Resilient workplaces mirror their peoples adaptability. Lauri Goodman Lampson is principal emeritus at PDR.
Category:
E-Commerce
The resurgence of high-profile IPOs in 2025 shows no sign of abatingespecially in the fintech space. This week, Wealthfront Corporation announced its intention to go public. Heres what you need to know: What is Wealthfront? Wealthfront Corporation was founded 17 years ago, in 2008. It is headquartered in Palo Alto, California, and is led by CEO David Fortunato. The company is one of a number of fintech firms that operate in the robo-advisor space. It offers a financial platform and dedicated smartphone app that allow users to invest in various assets, including stocks and bonds. The company also offers cash accounts and automated index investing. Wealthfront specifically targets digital natives, which it defines as those born after 1980. These are consumers who use digital platforms for the vast majority of their everyday services ranging from entertainment and commerce to food delivery and ride sharing, the company stated in its Form S-1 registration statement filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The demographic includes millennials, Gen Z, and later, and Wealthfront describes them as typically having large liquid savings with long time horizons ahead,” and being “undeterred by corrections and bear markets.” The companys registration statement also noted that these individuals lost trust in traditional financial institutions which they blamed for high unemployment and an economic downturn. A study by Oxford Economics, commissioned by Wealthfront, found that the total wealth of digital natives is expected to grow from $12 trillion in 2022 to $140 trillion in 2045. Wealthfront by the numbers According to Wealthfronts SEC filing, the companys key metrics include (as of the companys Q2 2026): Platform assets of $88 billion Year-over-year (YOY) platform asset growth of 24% Revenue of $339 million over the last 12 months (LTM) LTM YOY revenue growth of 26% LTM net income of $123 million Around 1.3 million funded users When is Wealthfronts IPO? At this time, the exact date of Wealthfronts public offering is unknown. On September 29, the company issued a statement announcing its intention to go public, but it has not specified a date. Whats interesting about its IPO filing is that Wealthfront actually filed for an IPO with the SEC in June, but the filing was confidential until now. As for when the company might actually debut on public markets, CNBC notes that most companies typically have their IPO within weeks of the S-1 filing being made public. If Wealthfront adheres to the typical schedule, the companys shares could debut sometime in October. What is Wealthfronts stock ticker? Wealthfronts shares will trade under the stock ticker WLTH. What market will Wealthfronts shares trade on? Wealthfront shares will trade on the Nasdaq Global Select Market. What is the IPO share price of WLTH? In this weeks announcement, Wealthfront declined to specify an IPO share price or expected price range. The company stated that the “number of shares to be offered and the price range for the proposed offering have not yet been determined. Its likely Wealthfront and its book-running managers, which include Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan, are waiting to price WLTH shares until they can better gauge investor interest via its “roadshow”which is when a company markets it shares to potential investors. How many WLTH shares are available in its IPO? As with its share price, Wealthfront has also declined to say just how many shares of WLTH will be available in its IPO. The company said the number of shares on offer is yet to be determined. How much will Wealthfront raise in its IPO? Until Wealthfront announces the number of shares on offer and the price of those shares, it is impossible to say how much Wealthfront will raise in its IPO. Its also worth noting that Wealthfront has cautioned that, despite announcing its IPO, theres always the chance that the public offering may not come to pass. The offering is subject to market conditions, and there can be no assurance as to whether or when the offering may be completed, or as to the actual size or other terms of the offering, the company stated. How much is Wealthfront worth? Its currently unknown what Wealthfronts current valuation is. However, as noted by CNBC, in 2022, Swiss banking giant UBS announced its intent to purchase Wealthfront for $1.4 billion in cash. The bank later abandoned that deal. High-profile fintechs IPOs are a thing in 2025 If Wealthfront does indeed go through with its proposed public offering, the company will be far from the only fintech firm to make its public debut this year. Numerous other high-profile fintech companies have already gone public in 2025, including Klarna, Chime, Circle, eToro, and Bullish. As Reuters notes, several years ago, fintech firms began falling out of favor with investors due to the challenges associated with rising interest rates, leading ot a dearth of related IPOs. However, in 2025, the fintech industry has gained increasing favor with investors, resulting in numerous IPOs this year.
Category:
E-Commerce
Journalists who cover the Pentagon and the Trump administration are in a standoff about new rules that limit the access of the media to most areas within the Pentagon and appear to condition overall entry to the building on an agreement to restrictions in reporting.Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s team characterizes the changes as an effort to protect national security and the safety of those who work at the Pentagon, while many in the press see it as an effort to exert control and avoid embarrassing stories.Journalists who want to hold on to badges that permit access to the Pentagon were told on Sept. 19 they must sign a letter acknowledging the new rules by this Tuesday or the badge “will be revoked.” The new policy says that Defense Department information “must be approved for public release by an appropriate authorizing official before it is released, even if unclassified.” Classified material faces even tighter restrictions.That level of control immediately alarmed journalists and their advocates.“Asking independent journalists to submit to these kinds of restrictions is at stark odds with the constitutional protections of a free press in a democracy, and a continued attempt to throttle the public’s right to understand what their government is doing,” said Charles Stadtlander, spokesman for The New York Times. Dispute over what the new rules actually mean In a subsequent letter to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, Hegseth aide Sean Parnell suggested that journalists misunderstood some of the new rules. He said, for example, that the restriction against releasing unclassified information is the policy that Pentagon officials must follow not something the journalists must abide by.“It should come as no surprise that the mainstream media is once again misrepresenting the Pentagon’s press procedures,” Parnell said in a post on X. “Let’s be absolutely clear: Journalists are not required to clear their stories with us. That claim is a lie.”However, the new policy says that journalists who encourage Pentagon officials to break the rules in other words, ask sources for information could be subject to losing their building access.While it appeared that Parnell sought to soften some of the hard edges of his policy in response to questions raised by the reporters’ committee, there’s still enough confusion to merit a meeting to clear things up, said Grayson Clary, a lawyer for RCFP. There’s some wariness among news organizations about what they would be agreeing to if they sign the letter, and it’s not clear how many people if any have done so.The new rules continue a tense relationship between the press and the Hegseth team, which had already evicted some news outlets from their regular workspaces in favor of friendlier outlets and limited the ability of reporters to roam around the Pentagon. Hegseth and Parnell seldom hold press briefings.Parnell did not respond to a request for comment by The Associated Press. To one editor, it’s all about control “It’s control, just 100% control,” said Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine. Goldberg, who is not stationed at the Pentagon, wrote the most embarrassing story of Hegseth’s tenure so far when he was inadvertently included in a Signal group chat where Hegseth and other national officials discussed an imminent attack on Houthis in Yemen. The brouhaha became widely known as “Signalgate.”Pentagon leadership was also reportedly unhappy over a story that said Elon Musk was to get a briefing on military strategy for China, leading President Donald Trump to stop it, and other stories about initial assessments of damage in the military strike against Iran.No American reporter accredited to the Pentagon that he knows is interested in subverting national security or putting anyone in the military in harm’s way, Goldberg said.In his own case, Goldberg did not report on what he learned until after the attack was over. He said he contacted officials in the group chat to ask if there was anything he learned that was harmful to the country in any way. He did not include in his story the name of a CIA official mentioned in the messages who was technically still undercover, he said.“The only people in Signalgate who were putting American troops in harm’s way were the national leadership of the United States by discussing on a commercial messaging app the launch times of strikes on a hostile country,” he said.Access to officials in the Pentagon has been invaluable in helping reporters understand what is going on, said Dana Priest, a longtime national security reporter at The Washington Post who is now a journalism professor at the University of Maryland. With the exception of a few areas, reporters are not permitted under the new rules to walk through the Pentagon without an official escort.Priest said the corridors of the Pentagon were like areas around Congress where reporters buttonhole politicians. Priest recalled staking out military officials waiting for them to come out of a bathroom.“They know the goal of the media is to get around the official gobbledygook and get out the truth,” Priest said. “They may not help you. But some of them want to help Americans know what is going on.”Experienced national security reporters know there are many ways to get information, including through other channels of government and people in the private sector. “The Pentagon is always very well versed in the advantages of controlling the story, so they always try to do that,” she said. “The reporters know that. They’ve known that for decades.” Is there any room for common ground between the Pentagon and reporters? Reporters who don’t follow the new rules won’t necessarily be expelled immediately, Parnell told the reporter’s committee. But access will be determined by Hegseth’s team.While reporters already stationed in the Pentagon were given until Sept. 30 to sign, they were allowed to request an additional five days for legal review.Although the Times, Washington Post and Atlantic all put out statements against the Pentagon’s plan, none of the publications would say what they have recommended that their reporters do perhaps an indication that they consider negotiations potentially fruitful.President Donald Trump hasn’t hesitated to fight the media when he thinks he’s been wronged, launching lawsuits against CBS News, ABC News, The Wall Street Journal and the Times. Yet he’s also frequently accessible to the press, more so than many of his predecessors, and there has been some uncertainty in the White House about the Pentagon’s policy.When a reporter asked, “should the Pentagon be in charge of deciding what reporters can report on?” the president replied, “No, I don’t think so. Listen, nothing stops reporters. You know that.”Goldberg noted that it’s more than just an issue for reporters. “The American people have a right to know what the world’s most powerful military does in their name and with their money,” he said. “That seems fairly obvious to me.” David Bader writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social David Bauder, AP Media Writer
Category:
E-Commerce
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