• An Audible ad has sparked a debate on TikTok over audiobook speed preferences.
• Someone in the ad said that anyone who listens to audiobooks "real fast" is a "psychopath."
• Critics argued the ad's tone was condescending, while others said taking offense was an overreaction.

An Audible advertisement has caused a stir on TikTok, upsetting some fans with the suggestion that there is a right — and wrong — way to listen to audiobooks.

Over the weekend, Audible released an ad promoting its narration speed feature in which celebrities, authors, and audiobook narrators were asked for their thoughts on the ideal listening speed.

Some said they liked to listen at 1.5 or above ("SNL" star Bowen Yang said 1.8). Others, however, were purists and thought the right pace was "the speed at which it was recorded."

But one remark struck a nerve, particularly on BookTok — the community of literary fans on TikTok.

One respondent suggested that she thought people who "go real fast" were akin to being a "psychopath."

While some viewers saw the video as lighthearted fun, others took offense and felt Audible was alienating its audience.

"I listened to your judgmental ad on 2x speed 🙄" one viewer commented. Another asked: "Is this rage bait??"

Some said they found the tone of the ad condescending, especially as consuming audiobooks and other media at a faster speed can be helpful for some people with ADHD.

Sonya Barlow, an author and presenter who has been diagnosed with ADHD, for example, told Vice in a piece about speed-watching movies that she thinks it helps her to focus.

"I'm used to running around. So when I watch TV or listen to podcasts, it's not that I am rushing the show; more that I'm avoiding the silences and long pauses in between, which can slow things down," Barlow said.

Stephanie Mitropoulos, who posts book reviews to her 88,000 followers on TikTok, made a video in response.

"They literally have a clip of someone saying that if you listen over one time speed, you are psychopathic," she said in her video, which amassed more than 300,000 views.

Mitropoulos said her preferred speed was somewhere around 1.85, and she knew of many other people who liked to listen to 1.5x or above.

She said she thought it was "absurd" to make such a flippant comment.

"Why would you even post that? Why would you put that out there? Why are we trying to shame people for listening at the speed that is most comfortable for them?" Mitropoulos said. "I don't spend $16 a month to be called a psychopath."

Many commenters echoed Mitropoulos's views, but others thought it was an overreaction.

In the comments under Auduble's original video, viewers have shared dismay that some were upset by it.

"This is what made people upset?" one person wrote. "This can't be it."

A TikToker called Emma Skies, who has 174,000 followers on her BookTok account, said in a video she feared society was "losing context" and taking the ad too seriously.

"Do we truly think that it's strange or anger-inducing or offensive that when a performer, an audiobook narrator, is asked, Hey, at what speed do you think your performance and your peers' performances are best consumed? And that that performer says, 'the speed at which I performed it'?" Skies said.

She felt the ad was intended as a joke and not meant to mock anyone — especially as Audible was promoting the speed function.

"Nobody cares. They're not going to stop you," she said. "There's a reason that that's an option on Audible."

In a message to Business Insider, Skies said her video was less about Audible and more about "encouraging people to keep in mind the context of any piece of media they see, even silly little ads."

Skies also pointed to Audible's royalty rates, which, at 25%, have been criticized as lower than the industry standard.

Authors who are exclusively linked with Audible benefit from a higher rate of 40% — something Skies also took issue with.

"Audible Exclusives are hoarded not only from other retailers (as one might expect of a retailer exclusive), but also from being available to public libraries because of Amazon's monopolistic business practices," she said.

Amazon and Audible did not respond to requests for comment from BI.

• AI is reshaping job searches, offering speed and automation for rudimentary tasks.
• There are pros and cons for recruiters, who are now getting more applications than ever.
• Candidates should use AI as a tool, experts say, adding personal touches to stand out.

AI is transforming job searches for both candidates and recruiters.

But with all the tools that make the application process easier and faster than ever, there are traps you can fall into.

Andrea Miller, the founder of LeadWell Company, a global leadership consultancy that helps organizations navigate the future of work, told Business Insider that while AI can save time and effort by streamlining applications, optimizing resumes, and improving interview preparation, it also comes with some challenges.

"Generic, AI-generated applications can fail to stand out," Miller said, "And relying on AI without reviewing its output can lead to mistakes or misrepresentations."

Recruitment and AI pros explained to BI the dos and don'ts of using these tools and how candidates can make the most of the technology available when job hunting.

Mock tests, interviews, and portfolios

James Uffindell, the founder and CEO of the graduate recruitment platform Bright Network, told BI that AI can be very advantageous in the job hunt, especially for underrepresented and neurodiverse candidates.

"It helps level the playing field by offering better preparation opportunities, such as practice assessments and mock interviews, that may not have been otherwise available," he said.

Candidates can take advantage of many tools, such as CV builders like Kickresume and mock interview platforms like Interview Warmup by Google. Indeed's Pathfinder also helps people discover career paths that fit their skills.

Jason Heilman, the senior VP of product, automation, and AI at the staffing industry software company Bullhorn, told BI the company has a screening agent where candidates can conduct their first interview with an AI — something that could one day replace resumes entirely.

"You really get to see so much more," Heilman said of the technology. "It unlocks so much more of the person's potential beyond what a résumé could ever capture."

Heilman said it benefits candidates to be responsive and open to changes, even if it feels a bit strange at first.

"Be willing to try out these screeners," he said. "Lean into the opportunities to respond, and lean in when you are faced with new AI tools like this."

Cori Lunnen, the VP of recruitment marketing operations at HireClix, told BI that candidates should not hesitate to use AI tools to create a résumé, cover letter, or portfolio.

"The future is undeniably AI-driven," she said. "So some recruiters will want to see examples of how a candidate can successfully integrate AI-generated content with their own creativity."

The goal should be to use AI as a starting place, Lunnen said, "but then ultimately create something more unique or tailored to the opportunity it's designed to engage."

Be careful with prompts

According to Jennifer Burns, director of career development of Cornell University's executive MBA program, learning to put in the right prompts is crucial.

She advises candidates to put their resumes into ChatGPT along with the job description and ask a question like: "What are the 10 most important skills and keywords a hiring manager will look for to fill this role?"

"For the most useful output, you want to begin with input. For example, you can provide details such as your degree, your major, and your past experience," Burns told The Wall Street Journal.

"You can also input information about your major accomplishments, some of your highlights, and what motivates you, thinking about what you're good at and what you like doing. Then, after you share that information, you can ask specific questions."

Burns said AI tools can also help you determine good questions to ask at the end of the interview.

But she warned that candidates must ensure that everything makes sense and that they have a thorough understanding of the role. "Just putting in keywords for the sake of putting them in to match a job description isn't going to serve you well," she told the publication.

A personal touch is still important

On the recruiter's side, implementing AI can free up mental bandwidth, previously dominated by administrative tasks like scheduling, so recruiters can focus on providing a better experience for the candidates who move to the next stages.

But this has its downsides too. Uffindell said some recruiters are seeing a 500% increase in the number of applications, which makes it important to still stand out.

"It's important to view AI as a tool to support, not replace, your own words," Uffindell said. "While AI can help streamline the process, relying on it too heavily can lead to generic applications that fail to showcase a candidate's unique qualities."

Vrijen Attawar, a former career coach and now the founder and CEO of the AI-powered career guidance platform Careerspan, told BI that in this current environment, candidates should apply to fewer jobs so as to "not contribute to the application spam pile."

"Avoid the temptation to use easy apply or other similar tools to apply for jobs," he said. "Instead, save your time and sanity for the opportunities you can verify are real and excite you."

All AI tools have limitations. Some make things up or exaggerate information, so it is a candidate's responsibility to proofread everything and ensure it is accurate before submitting an application.

"ChatGPT 4's knowledge cut-off is April 2023, for example," Uffindell said. "So any major industry updates or company changes since then won't be included in ChatGPT outputs, so you'll need to do your own research, too."

Uffindell said personalizing each application to the specific role is still crucial because employers are looking for candidates who can communicate their strengths well and who have good soft skills.

"The strongest applications will combine AI's efficiency with the candidate's own knowledge," he said. "Showcasing not only the right skills but also the ability to navigate AI's limitations."

• MrBeast appears to be plotting to recreate "Squid Game" season 2.
• His $3.5 million version of season 1 is likely partly why Amazon greenlighted "Beast Games."
• However, the project has been marred with controversy.

MrBeast is already plotting his next move to stay ahead of the competition. The second season of "Squid Game" premiered on Netflix on December 26, and the YouTuber has teased a plan to recreate it.

Jimmy Donaldson, better known as MrBeast, is the biggest YouTuber in the world with 340 million subscribers.

In November 2021, Donaldson built his own version of the "Squid Game" set, complete with the "red light, green light" doll, bunk bed dorm, huge tug-of-war arena, and $456,000 prize.

The costs set him back $3.5 million, but that's not deterring him from looking to try it again.

"Should I recreate Squid Games 2 in real life like we did with the first season?" Donaldson asked his followers on X on December 27.

Responses have been mixed, with some excited by the prospect of another real-life "Squid Game." The first video racked up 685 million views, so the appetite is likely there.

But others recommended Donaldson look inward and address some of the controversy that has surrounded his own show first.

Squid Game vs Beast Games

The second season of "Squid Game" has been hotly anticipated for three years. The Korean-language Netflix series follows characters who, downtrodden and disadvantaged, opt into a lethal contest where they play children's games for a huge cash prize — being brutally killed if they lose.

Meanwhile, Donaldson has been furiously promoting his new show, "Beast Games," on social media since the first episode aired on December 17. For example, he said he would give away a share of $100,000 to 10 random people who reposted a promotion of "Beast Games" on X.

Donaldson also used Netflix's promotion of "Squid Game" to draw attention to "Beast Games," commenting under posts to remind people that the third episode would be dropping on December 26 as well.

Reviews of "Beast Games" have been mixed. Business Insider's Katie Notopoulos said it was entertaining but she worried about what message it sends about money to younger viewers.

The Guardian gave the show two stars and labeled it "one of the most undignified spectacles ever shown on TV," while an IGN review determined the show to be "almost entirely wearisome."

Before the show's release, Donaldson had to defend himself against allegations about treatment on set.

Some contestants told The New York Times they weren't given enough food and had to wait hours or sometimes days to receive their medication or basic hygiene supplies during the promotional shoot in Las Vegas. They also alleged that some contestants were injured during challenges, and many needed medical care.

Five contestants are seeking class-action status for a lawsuit filed in September alleging dangerous working conditions.

Amazon declined to comment on the lawsuit to BI. A spokesperson for Donaldson previously told BI that Amazon was not involved in the Las Vegas round of the show.

The spokesperson also said that this shoot was "unfortunately complicated by the CrowdStrike incident, extreme weather, and other unexpected logistical and communications issues."

While things seemed to improve in Toronto, where the majority of the Amazon show was filmed, some crew members told Rolling Stone that it continued to be "wild" and "disorganized," with a lack of air conditioning and some unsafe conditions due to flooding.

Beyond Beast Games

Donaldson's ambitious recreation of "Squid Game" and his reputation for pushing the limits with his content was likely one of the reasons Amazon wanted to partner with him for "Beast Games."

The YouTuber has a way of staying on top with his philanthropy and the scale of his stunts, so the negative public perception of "Beast Games" could blow over in time.

But partnering with a giant like Amazon has put more eyes on him than ever. Creator economy experts previously told BI that Donaldson may find it harder to fund his next big project because of the negative headlines it has generated.

"They'll still do partnerships with him," Diana D'Angelo, the CEO of Breaking Creatives Agency, told BI. "But maybe they'll put a bigger check on what he's actually doing and how it's being done."

• Mark Cuban tried to invest in Musical.ly, the platform that would become TikTok.
• Cuban says the platform lost its spark, becoming "corporate."
• In an interview, Cuban said focusing on monetization often harms the user experience.

Mark Cuban tried to invest in TikTok's precursor years ago, but said the company turned him down.

Cuban told content creator and journalist Jules Terpak in an interview on her YouTube channel that he enjoyed using TikTok when it was called Musical.ly.

The platform rebranded to TikTok in 2017 when it was acquired by its current owners, ByteDance.

"I loved it because I could just turn it on and there would be 15,000 people live immediately that I could talk to," Cuban said of Musical.ly.

"It was insane. I loved it. And then, as it got into the dances and everything, it was fun."

Cuban told CNBC he tried to invest in Musical.ly but was unsuccessful because the company wasn't looking to raise more funds at the time.

Cuban told Terpak he thinks TikTok is less fun than it used to be and "more corporate."

He said that the dance-focused version of the app was losing billions of dollars, "and so at some point, they had to start trying to make some money."

"I liked it better when it was dances and music," Cuban said. "Now it's a business."

Cuban said TikTok's early beauty was that its algorithm served users with more of what they liked than any other platform.

"Now it's corporate," he said. "It's how many followers can you get and how can you engage those followers."

There's "a diminishing return" for users when platforms monetize, Cuban said, driven by business realities.

"At some point, if you're there to make money, you have to figure out how to make money," he said.

Cuban's thoughts hit on an increasing frustration many users have with TikTok, where they are flooded with ads and many see the platform as a pseudo-shopping channel.

Cuban has a TikTok account himself, where he has 1.1 million followers — though he doesn't post often.

In 2023, he faced some backlash for a "tip of the day" on making money, in which he told people to cut back on extra lattes and streaming services.

"You want to put that in a money market account earning five, maybe more, percent and watch that sucker grow," he said. "That'll make you feel a whole lot better than that extra latte that you had that day."

Some criticized the advice for being unrealistic and out of touch with the majority of people.

Cuban didn't address the critics, only posting another tip of the day to "be nice" and "smile."

According to Bloomberg, Cuban has a net worth of around $8 billion. In 1990, he sold his first tech company, MicroSolutions, for $6 million and went on to invest in several successful businesses through "Shark Tank."

In October, Cuban announced he would be leaving "Shark Tank" after its 16th season to spend more time with his kids.

• Hannah Witton, a sex education YouTuber, quit her popular channel a year ago.
• She cited burnout and becoming a mother as reasons for her shift.
• She now helps creators navigate career changes, focusing on those who have hit a content wall.

Last December, Hannah Witton decided 12 years with her enormously popular YouTube channel, where she became a beacon of knowledge for sex education, was enough.

Now, she wants to be the crisis clinic for struggling creators, using her 12 years of experience to help other YouTubers figure out their next steps.

Witton stepped away from her channel with over a decade's worth of content on sexual health, with a particular focus on sexuality with a disability.

Witton was one of a wave of long-standing YouTubers who left the channels on which they built their businesses over the past year, including MatPat of The Game Theorists and Tom Scott, who ended his famed "Things You Might Not Know" series.

They all did so for different reasons, but burnout and a sense they had hit a wall was a common thread in their decisions.

Witton told Business Insider that having a baby was the biggest factor for her. She had been on the content hamster wheel for so long, beholden to the ever-changing YouTube algorithm, that she didn't realize she was running on empty.

But being raised a feminist, she previously thought becoming a mom wouldn't change her career at all.

"Then when it actually happens, it's like, oh, wait, it's totally normal for this to completely rewire you," she told BI. "Not just physically and mentally, but actually logistically — your circumstances changing and the impact it has on your time, your energy, your resources, and all of that."

So, Hannah retired her channel and her Doing It Podcast, unsure of exactly what was next, but certain of one thing: she was taking a break.

"I was like, oh, I don't have to do that anymore," she said. "It was a risk I was willing to take."

One year after retirement

Witton started making content in 2013 and evolved as a dominant voice in the sex and relationships space, with a particular focus on enjoying sexuality while living with a chronic condition.

Witton herself has been diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, a chronic autoimmune illness where her digestive system gets regularly inflamed and has a stoma bag — an external pouch that takes on the role of the colon.

One year on from retirement, Witton has leaned into her Patreon. She has a second YouTube channel which she uploads to occasionally and when she feels like it, but it's not a priority in terms of income and career moves.

"Growth isn't one of my main goals at the moment," Witton said. "I'm really judging the success of videos on my enjoyment of it, and then the comment section, and just if other people enjoyed it too."

Witton said her finances did take a hit initially, but in the long term, it worked out. Struggling to keep up with the content mill meant Witton was draining her bank account by hiring freelancers and paying her team.

"I did cut down on a lot of my overheads at the end of last year because, of course, I also removed a big part of my income," Witton said. "But for the most part, I have been a lot financially healthier this year."

The YouTuber crisis clinic

After retirement, Witton organically started having conversations with many other creators about what they wanted to do next. This turned into a business in itself.

"I originally went in being like, I'm going to be a project manager," Witton said. "But it's more that I come in as a consultant or a coach, and then the rest is kind of up to them to execute."

For example, Witton coached a pregnant creator for a few months before her maternity leave, helping her figure out her priorities and what kind of schedule she could realistically keep.

Helping creators launch their Patreon pages is a big part of this process, Witton said, as she's been on there for 10 years and knows how it works inside out.

"It's been really fun and rewarding to use all of this insight and knowledge and experience that I have," Witton said. "It's reassuring for me as well that I do know stuff. I haven't just been talking to a camera — I've been building up all of these skills."

While Witton sees the value she could bring to newer creators, she finds working with more established ones more interesting.

"I want the creator who's going through a crisis," she said. "I want the creator who's been doing it six years and is like, what am I doing in my life?"

That's what gets her excited, she said — helping creators who are burned out, stressed, and confused about the future figure out their next steps.

"A lot of creators are getting to the age where they may be having children or different life responsibilities, or just generally having a different pace of life," Witton said. "It's the life cycle of a creator."

It's hard to turn off the creator voice in her head that tells her she should be doing more, so Witton has to listen to her own advice and not let the hamster wheel take her away again.

She would like a silver play button for her second channel one day, but right now, her priority is creators in need.

"The clinic is open," Witton said. "You can come to me when you're having your existential crisis."

• An off-duty pilot stepped in to help fly a Boeing 737 after the first office was taken ill.
• The off-duty pilot was a passenger on a Westjet flight from Calgary to Vancouver.
• Pilots are trained for emergencies, and flights always have multiple pilots for safety.

An off-duty pilot stepped in and helped to fly and land a Boeing 737 when the flight's first officer was suddenly incapacitated mid-flight.

The transportation website Paddle Your Own Kanoo first reported that the incident took place on a WestJet flight from Calgary to Vancouver on the morning of December 4.

The off-duty pilot was known to the crew and could be called upon to assist in flying the Boeing 737. The pilot then sat in the cabin for the rest of the flight.

"During cruise, the first officer reported feeling ill and was unable to continue their duties. One of the passengers on board was a Westjet pilot who was able to assume the first officer's duties," a preliminary report from the Canadian Transportation Safety Board said, per the Aviation Herald.

"The incapacitated first officer sat in the cabin for the remainder of the flight. The flight crew did not declare an emergency or request a priority handling. The aircraft landed without further incident," the report added.

WestJet did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider on the incident.

If a pilot is taken ill, airlines normally declare an emergency and land the plane as soon as possible.

Retired US pilots Kent Davis and Mark Stephens previously told Business Insider that it is "not a big deal" when pilots become unwell during a flight because they are trained to handle these situations.

Stephens said there are at least two pilots on domestic flights, while international flights can have two pilots and two captains.

"Pilots know what they are doing, and they do it repeatedly," he said.

Sometimes, pilots become more seriously ill. In July, an Airbus A320 from London Luton to Lisbon, which was carrying almost 200 passengers, was met by paramedics on landing after the copilot fainted in midair.

"The captain landed the flight routinely in line with procedures and passengers disembarked normally," an airline spokesperson told BI at the time. "At no point was the safety of the flight compromised."

In October, it was reported that a Turkish Airlines captain died in midair on a flight from Seattle to Istanbul, and the plane was diverted for an emergency landing in New York.

"After the initial medical intervention on board proved ineffective, the cockpit crew, consisting of one captain and one co-pilot, decided to make an emergency landing," an airline spokesperson said at the time.

One pilot named Ken Allen told BI he suffered an aneurysm while flying a small plane with a friend and one passenger. He fell unconscious, and the passenger managed to safely land the plane instead.

Stephens, one of the retired US pilots, told BI that there are procedures in place for life-threatening situations. Flight attendants are trained in CPR and have defibrillators, and many planes have a direct line to medical staff.

• Madeleine White's pajama brand faced backlash over pricing and material quality.
• She took the website down and relaunched it seven months later with higher quality and lower prices.
• White told BI building back trust with her audience is the most important thing for her.

Madeleine White learned what happens when your brand is a huge miss with your fans the hard way.

When she launched her pajama brand, See You Tomorrow, in May, White was thrilled because designing fashion was all she ever wanted.

But the launch went awry. Fans didn't like the price point or the materials used in many of the garments, leading to cries that White was out of touch and had lost the authenticity she had grown her millions of followers for.

"It was always a dream starting my own business," White told Business Insider. "But I could not have been prepared for how difficult it's been.

A clothing launch backfires

White started making content after she lost her job during the COVID-19 pandemic and decided to learn how to use a sewing machine.

Using her decade of experience in modeling, White became known for sharing thrifting videos and industry insights.

On Instagram, she now has 1.6 million followers, and on TikTok, she has 4.7 million.

But after See You Tomorrow launched, fans lamented that she'd forgotten her roots.

White's aim was always to create a brand that would resonate with her followers: one that wasn't budget or fast fashion but also wasn't high-end and unaffordable.

But while things started off well with over half a million visitors on the website, customers felt See You Tomorrow fell short on price point and quality.

"I feel like her original fan base have nothing in common with her current ventures," one said on the InfluencerSnark subreddit.

Under one Reddit post showing a $145 pajama set, customers said they weren't too eager about the price or the materials.

"They're cute, and I've been trying to focus on a smaller but more quality wardrobe, so the price didn't immediately turn me off," one said. "$145 for 100% polyester is absolutely insane though."

"She should get backlash for this, because choosing fast fashion materials but selling it at a high-end price is wild," wrote another. "Were this made from cotton satin or even a cotton silk voile it would be worth it. It would be sustainable."

White told BI she was aware of the complaints immediately and decided to take action. She took the site down and started rethinking the entire brand.

"We went back to the drawing board after a couple of days," she said. "I decided that unless I could fix most of these concerns that people had and really give it a proper shot, then it wasn't really worth continuing the business."

7 months later

White didn't want to make any announcements while things were in flux, which was hard to do with so many fans eager to know what was happening.

Seven months later, in December, See You Tomorrow relaunched with new, higher-quality pieces and lower prices.

"I decided to bet on myself and put my money where my mouth is and to create the product that I wanted to make," she said. "I trusted my instincts that something wasn't right and that we could do better — and we are doing better."

White had to find new manufacturers and pay for everything herself. She said that though it was hard, she's glad she took that leap of faith.

"I felt like it would be so much more powerful to my audience if I could prove to them that I actually cared about their opinions and I cared about that feedback," White said.

"It's easy to say, I'm so sorry, I fucked up," she added. "But it's much better to say I'm so sorry, I fucked up, and here is how I fixed it."

White told BI that the last few years have been a mad rush because she was so eager to start her own brand. In hindsight, she would have spent longer researching what she wanted to do and not taken the first offer that came along, she said.

"It was definitely an eye-opener," she said.

Trust is everything

White posted a TikTok this month explaining everything. She said what was most important to her out of everything was building trust again with her audience.

It seemed to pay off, with followers thanking her for her transparency and applauding her for listening to their concerns.

White said she doesn't care if she sells one product or a thousand with this new launch — she just wants to repair her relationship with her supporters.

"I've definitely learned just how badly launching a brand that people don't like can hurt your public image," she said. "It just goes to show how important it is for us as people with large followings to do things right."

She said she's also learned that people are happy to pay for quality as long as they know how a price point was reached.

White said influencers are held to a high standard, but ultimately, she sees that as a good thing.

"It just makes the brand better," she said. "I've learned so much, and I've definitely learned not to put my name on anything until I'm 100% happy with it."

• The Too Good To Go app aims to help consumers save money and reduce food waste.
• I tried it for a week to see how much I could save.
• I found it was most useful for fresh produce, but the pastries weren't always great.

Everything is expensive right now. It's rare that I ever leave the grocery store having spent less than I wanted to.

I've heard of apps like Too Good To Go, which sell surplus food at a discount, but never gone much further than signing up.

To test it out, I spent a week in early December only buying food from the app. I wanted to see if it was a viable way of saving money, sticking to a budget, and learning to be a bit more flexible with my cooking.

I also want to be more mindful about the groceries I buy and, unfortunately, sometimes waste.

Too Good To Go's CEO, Mette Lykke, told me in a recent interview that the app now operates in 19 countries across North America, Europe, and Australia, and covers 170,000 stores.

Lykke said the company hopes to inspire people "to make that the first step in a journey toward having a more responsible relationship with food."

"If we look at the state of the planet and the climate crisis, then it's pretty clear that something needs to change," Lykke said.

It was fun trying out new places in my city, London. While the pastries I received were hit-and-miss, the fresh produce from local stores was a real highlight.

Monday

Monday was largely spent figuring out the platform. I found that its map feature was the best way to find local cafés and stores.

I saw that an expensive café on my local high street offered pastries, so I opted for that — £3.90 ($4.95) for a blueberry muffin, chocolate chip cookie, and slice of banana bread.

After the sugar rush I was still hungry, so I chose a bag of sandwiches and pastries from my local Costa Coffee for £3.50 ($4.44).

I got a slightly stale pan au raisin and two sandwiches — one seasonal turkey feast, and a BLT which my boyfriend took for lunch the next day.

In total, I spent £7.40 ($9.39) on items worth at least £22.90 ($29.08), so the week was off to a good start.

Tuesday

On Tuesday, I switched things up by trying out fresh produce from a couple of local stores. They offered "surprise bags" of groceries for £4 ($5.08) each.

While I was slightly overwhelmed with what to do with it all, it was an absolute hit with my boyfriend, who is always thrilled to be met with a culinary challenge.

One of the bags had Padron peppers, garlic, tomatoes, mushrooms, radishes, and beets. I also received three packets of pita bread, a sourdough baguette, a fruit bar, some buttermilk, and fresh herbs.

The multivitamin patches were a curveball, which I have to admit I didn't try.

In the other bag, I got a melon, some Greek yogurt, lettuce, butter, rainbow chard, and sausages.

The sausages went in the freezer, but almost everything else was used to make a pasta sauce, roasted peppers, sauteed mushrooms, buttermilk pancakes, and basil oil. The beets got pickled.

The only thing we ended up having to waste was the watercress, which was already looking past its best.

In total, I spent £8 ($10.16) on items worth at least £24 ($30.48).

Wednesday

Tuesday's groceries went further than expected, so I bought another pastry bag to satisfy my snackiness during the day.

I'm not convinced the sourdough loaf and pastel de nata (which I squashed) I got for £4.09 ($5.19) truly had a full sale value of £12 ($15.24), but they were both pretty good.

The server recommended putting the loaf in the freezer and toasting the slices, which was a great tip that lasted me the rest of the week.

Thursday

I knew I was out for dinner with friends on Thursday so I picked up some Starbucks pastries on the way. This was the biggest letdown of the experiment.

Throughout the week, I realized that several cafés don't offer anything until quite late in the day, by which time the food has been sitting out for hours. This makes sense from their perspective, but it does mean that some of the food isn't at its best.

But for £2.50 ($3.18), a muffin, cookie, cinnamon bun, and cheese stick is certainly better than nothing.

In total, I spent £2.50 ($3.18) on items worth at least £7.50 ($9.52).

Friday

I'd been eyeing up a nearby Bangladeshi restaurant all week, so knowing I had a night in alone on Friday, I went for the £4.09 ($5.19) curry bag they were offering.

I got a few bhajis, some chicken and rice, two veggie curries, more rice, some okra, and what I thought was probably cabbage.

It was all good and spicy, though the bhajis were slightly stale.

In total, I spent £4.09 ($5.19) on items worth at least £12 ($15.24).

The results

For the whole week, I spent £26.08 ($33.11) on £78.40 ($99.54) worth of food.

Not every bag felt like amazing value. But some, especially the grocery bags, were genuinely impressive.

The experience taught me a lot about how to be flexible. I'm now committed to focusing less on "use by" dates on food and sticking to the safety assessment Lykke taught me — "look, smell, taste, don't waste" — before throwing things out.

My advice for anyone downloading Too Good To Go is to use it with foresight. The app is great for saving money for those on a strict budget who are OK with some compromises.

Too Good To Go is available in huge stores in the UK (such as Asda) and the US (including Whole Foods), so there are plenty of places to try.

Lykke told me the nice thing about Too Good To Go is you don't have to give anything up, and she's right. From a quick scan of my area, there is bubble tea, ice cream, Turkish food, burgers, doughnuts, and more. You don't get to choose exactly what you want, but as long as you don't mind a bit of a surprise, it's worth a try,

"You actually get good food, it's a good deal, and you do something good," Lykke said. "It's win-win for businesses, for consumers, and for the planet."

• Companies use "stealth firing" to quietly reduce staff without public layoffs.
• It involves dismissing employees for minor offenses to avoid public backlash.
• This tactic can harm company culture, leading to low morale and potential legal issues.

Some companies are opting for a new tactic in slimming down employee numbers — "stealth firing."

Meta let go around two dozen staff in October for using their $25 meal credits to buy other items, including laundry detergent and acne pads, while EY fired many more for "cheating" and taking multiple training courses at once.

The Financial Times, which first reported the EY firings, referred to these instances of being dismissed for minor offenses as "stealth firing."

Joe Galvin, the chief research officer at the executive coaching platform Vistage, told Business Insider that this sneaky sacking is "a "covert behind-the-scenes activity" that "violates the principle of respect for the individual."

A corporation might think: "I'm trying to downsize a little bit without saying I'm downsizing a little bit," Galvin said.

"So you go through this process that does nothing but break trust."

Short-term gain for long-term problems

Stealth firing leads from an era of "quiet firing," where companies methodically made employees' roles increasingly uncomfortable and less appealing, such as implementing strict return-to-office mandates.

This trend, along with the quietly agreed-upon severance packages of "silent layoffs," is a tactic to avoid the optics of publicly cutting dozens of staff.

Cynthia Patterson, the founder of the HR consultancy firm PeopleOps.how, who has 20 years of experience in HR across tech, AI, healthcare, and retail industries, told BI that while quietly trimming headcounts in these ways may work in the short term, they can cause serious issues for a workplace.

"Any short-term outcome is offset by the negative cultural impact," Patterson said. "Employees are left second-guessing their own value and stability, creating an environment of anxiety and mistrust."

A lack of trust and stability can lead to low morale, reduced productivity, and a stressed-out workforce.

"This dynamic mirrors the patterns of toxic and/or abusive work cultures, where fear and uncertainty are used — intentionally or not — as tools for behavioral control," Patterson said.

A shift in power

People are also perceptive, and employees who see their colleagues be shown the door for minor indiscretions will only make them wary and dissatisfied.

Patterson told BI companies who push people out in arbitrary ways are mistakenly viewing avoidance as kindness.

"Employee performance management is part of running a business," she said. "And it can't be skipped because it feels uncomfortable or inconvenient to the employer."

Stealth firing, Patterson said, simply exposes a company's inability or unwillingness to have honest, necessary conversations about performance — and "signals to employees that the organization doesn't have integrity."

Galvin told BI that companies willfully harming their reputations in this way may find they are the ones suffering and bleeding talent if an era of revenge quitting hits in 2025.

"The signs are pointing up toward a really strong 2025 — our community is energized, hiring's going back up again, investments are going up, expectations for profits and revenues are up," he said. "The power shifting."

Weigh up your options

It's always a smaller world than you think when it comes to work and looking for your next job, Ciara Harrington, the chief people officer of the leadership training platform Skillsoft, told BI.

"It's in the interest of everybody to keep good relationships," she said. "I don't think anybody really wants to leave a company on bad terms."

Sometimes, companies have to let their staff go, and the best thing for everyone is to do so with respect and honesty. That way, while the news isn't what the employees hope for, they still maintain a level of respect for the company.

The alternative is that employees post on public platforms such as LinkedIn, TikTok, Reddit, and job review sites about their negative experiences, such as how they felt undervalued and lied to.

Patterson said these stories could reach future employees, customers, investors, and even employment lawyers, opening up companies to potential legal disputes.

"Strong companies know their employees are human beings and deserve to be treated as such," Patterson said.

Galvin told BI that if there are signs that your company is looking to stealth fire you, it's time to start weighing your options.

Even if your employer isn't planning on firing you, if their communication is poor, and you feel unsafe, it's best to get out anyway.

"In the absence of a story, we create one," Galvin said. "If you sense that's happening to you, you either have the direct conversation with your manager or start looking for your next job."

• Some leaders, including Airbnb's CEO, argue that favoritism can nurture excellence.
• But it can also breed resentment and further detachment among employees.
• Experts suggest balanced recognition to maintain motivation and prevent tensions.

Playing favorites at work is something some swear by, but it can be a risky strategy.

Airbnb's cofounder and CEO Brian Chesky, for example, told Fortune in November that he believed that nurturing high performers helps foster a culture of excellence.

"If you can't have favorites, if you can't say this is a high performer, and this is what excellence is, then you are going to be in big, big trouble," he said. "That's just not good leadership."

Chesky admitted that playing favorites "would be considered unfair and not systematic" at most companies and that doing so has to be done in the right way — free from bias and discrimination.

In fact, a bit of healthy competition can boost productivity and engagement among colleagues, but giving a select few people blatant and unfair preferential treatment will only fester resentment among teams in an already detached workforce.

Beth Hood, the founder and CEO of leadership and management training platform Verosa Leadership, told BI that favoritism in the workplace "is a slippery slope."

"While recognizing and nurturing high performers can drive excellence, if not handled carefully, it risks creating a culture of resentment and undermining team cohesion," she said.

"The challenge for leaders lies in striking a balance between celebrating outstanding contributions and maintaining the motivation and engagement of the wider team."

Nurturing high performers

Research from the Stevens Institute of Technology, the University of Illinois Chicago, and Hang Seng University of Hong Kong, published in the journal Personnel Psychology in 2022, found that one upside of workplace favoritism is that it can help clarify roles within teams and guide collaboration.

Hood said that for individuals who are highly motivated by positive reinforcement, "being openly acknowledged can act as a powerful catalyst for continued high performance. In this sense, leaders can use recognition as a tool to set a standard of excellence that inspires others to raise their game."

But favoritism can also get leaders into trouble.

Leena Rinne, the vice president of coaching at Skillsoft, a corporate training platform, told BI that favoritism is often "in the eye of the beholder."

"A leader can have really good intentions and still be perceived as playing favorites," she said.

"Recognition by a senior-level person does feel special," Rinne added. "So if that senior-level person is just even talking to or corresponding with or inviting people to different meetings, all of that can be perceived as unfair."

In a Harvard Business Review article published earlier this year, the authors pointed to the CEO of a Scandinavian robotics company who addressed just three of his nine direct reports in leadership meetings, and was seemingly unaware of the bias he was showing.

Pitting colleagues against each other — on purpose or not — can be hugely detrimental, Hood said.

"While in the short term this may seem like a powerful lever to pull, in the long term it is likely to cause significant performance challenges," she said.

Hood added: "It's a cynical leadership style that rarely ensures leaders can fully leverage everyone's potential, as it is predicated on a win/lose psychology."

Everyone appreciates recognition

Recognition is always appreciated, and it doesn't have to be big or costly.

Rinne said some of the most profound recognition she has heard people speak about years later is an email they received from their company's CEO.

"It takes almost no time on anyone's part, but really impacted how valued people felt, how seen they felt," she said.

If there are people in the organization shining brightly but not being recognized, you risk them feeling undervalued and ultimately leaving.

Rinne said praise works best when leaders communicate the link to performance, "ensuring that people feel that it's justified and fair."

Dilan Gomih, the founder and CEO of workplace performance and wellness consultancy Dilagence, told BI that words matter.

She said it's fine for leaders to favor people who are passionate about their work and do it tremendously well, but everyone has to be given the tools and opportunity to do so.

"It's got to be an equal playing field for anybody to be a favorite," she said.

Overall, Gomih said she struggled to see the benefit of having employees worry about being a favorite rather than about their work.

"Do you really want people wasting their mental energy thinking about favoritism? Or do you want their brains thinking about 'how do I perform my best at the job that I've been hired to do?'" Gomih said. "Because if they're doing that, it's win-win."

A better tactic may be to make that competition external and say, "It's us against the world," she said, to boost camaraderie and teamwork.

Rinne also said that the idea of "healthy competition" in companies could be reframed.

"It's always the team competition, the collaborative competition, that gets the organization the results we want," she said. "In my career, I haven't seen pitting team members against each other work in any context — except maybe the offsite scavenger hunt."

Airbnb declined a request to comment.

• Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck views paranoia as a leadership superpower.
• Experts warn Beck's mindset may lead to burnout and a toxic work environment.
• Effective leadership requires resilience and fostering a culture of trust, workplace pros say.

Peter Beck doesn't sleep soundly and thinks paranoia is a "superpower."

The founder and CEO of the aerospace company Rocket Lab told CNBC in an interview that going home and sleeping soundly every night "just doesn't seem a tangible possibility."

He also described himself as a "chronic workaholic" and a "micromanager," and said he was "paranoid about everything, especially failure."

While some other leaders share Beck's views, workplace pros think it might be a recipe for burnout and stress.

Heather Lamb, a workplace well-being expert and author of "How Not to Be a People Pleaser," told Business Insider that while constantly being on your toes may feel like a way to stay sharp, this mentality "breeds a toxic work environment."

"Instead, constant stress and fear of falling short can inspire anxiety, self-doubt, and burnout that is damaging to productivity and well-being alike," she said.

A recipe for success?

Beck became the "newest space billionaire" in November, according to Forbes, with his 10% stake in Rocket Lab worth $970 million, and having accrued $65 million from selling shares.

The company is currently valued at $11.2 billion, according to CNBC.

Still, he is lagging behind other space entrepreneurs, including Elon Musk (worth $354 billion) with SpaceX and Jeff Bezos (worth $240 billion) with Blue Origin.

Rocket Lab's stock price surged to an all-time high at the end of November. While the company rivals Musk's SpaceX, Beck previously told BI he has no intention of colonizing Mars.

Instead, Rocket Lab focuses on building and managing rockets and satellites.

"Rocket Lab will never have the capital that Jeff and Elon have," Beck told Bloomberg News in an interview. "But all that means is you have to be a bit better at hustling, a little bit better at being innovative. You can't break the laws of physics no matter how much capital you've got."

Caution vs fear

Beck believes that his paranoia and micromanaging have helped his career.

In the short term, paranoia and a hyper-vigilant mindset can drive exceptional results, Edel Holliday-Quinn, a business psychologist who has worked in senior roles at Citi and PwC, told BI, especially in high-stakes industries like aerospace.

Breese Annable, a licensed clinical psychologist and career coach who has worked with many high-achieving professionals, also told BI that some level of alertness can be valuable for leaders.

"Anticipating challenges and planning for contingencies are facets of strategic thinking," she said. "However, when vigilance crosses into chronic hypervigilance, the psychological and relational costs outweigh the benefits."

Lamb told BI that leaders who are always anxious about the next misstep may lose sight of their own well-being.

"The world thrives on fear — yeah, people take pride in their work, for sure," she said. "Wanting to do good work is a fine goal. But if paranoia is at the heart of it, you are working to inhibit yourself rather than improve."

There's a difference between exercising caution and being immobilized with fear of failure, Lamb added.

"Realistic caution is the practice of thinking about the future, having contingency plans, and being mindful of all of the hurdles we face," she said. "But it's about managing those worries in a way that won't overwhelm you."

Negative impacts are individual and workplace-wide

Sleep deprivation significantly affects cognitive functioning, decision-making, and emotional regulation, Annable said, and if it is experienced long-term, it has been linked to higher risks of cardiovascular disease and weakened immune function.

Chronic stress can also have physiological effects by contributing to chronic illnesses like high blood pressure.

And it's not just the individual who is affected.

Worrying too much about the future can have a lasting impact on the workforce as well.

Leaders who are on edge and driven by failure are likely to be micromanagers, Holliday-Quinn said, which can create a toxic workplace culture.

"Research consistently shows that employees under micromanagers experience lower job satisfaction, decreased engagement, and higher turnover rates," Annable said. "This creates a ripple effect that can undermine long-term organizational success."

Over time, this can lead to high turnover and low employee happiness.

"Employees may feel disempowered, undervalued, and overly scrutinized," she said. "Which stifles creativity and collaboration."

True effective leadership, Holliday-Quinn said, requires "resilience, self-awareness, and the ability to foster a culture of trust, collaboration, and empowerment."

"These are the hallmarks of leaders who leave a lasting legacy," she said. "Not just in terms of success but in terms of the positive impact they have on their organizations and the people within them."

Beck didn't respond to a request for comment from BI.

• MrBeast spent $14 million building a "city" for his "Beast Games" show.
• The show, premiering on December 19, features 1,000 contestants and a $5 million prize.
• Controversy has surrounded the show with complaints about conditions and a potential lawsuit.

MrBeast has shared some photos of the "city" he built as part of his upcoming game show, "Beast Games," which he says cost $14 million.

"We spent $14,000,000 building a city in a field for the contestants in Beast Games to live and compete in," MrBeast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, wrote on X, alongside four photos of the set. "December 19th is almost here 🥰"

Donaldson, YouTube's biggest star with 335 million subscribers, has already shared some details about the scale of production on "Beast Games."

In an interview with fellow YouTubers KSI and Logan Paul, Donaldson revealed he'd "spent way more than $100 million" on the show and recently shared that the production had broken 40 world records.

Amazon has also promoted "Beast Games" as "the world's largest live gameshow" with the "biggest single prize in the history of television and streaming" of $5 million.

It premiers on Prime Video on December 19 and is supposed to kick-start Amazon's video ad sales efforts by attracting a wide audience and appealing to advertisers.

In one X post, Donaldson was asked how he planned to make up the money he spent on "Beast Games."

"The goal is to make the best content possible not make money," he replied.

In the trailer, which dropped on December 6, Donaldson promised that "Beast Games" would be "the most insane competition show you've ever seen" with 1,000 contestants. Clips included footage of the $5 million grand prize, a massive pirate ship, monster trucks, Navy seals, and stunts.

One of the photos Donaldson shared was "a render of the city," which had a moat running around the outside.

"We ran out of time and didn't get around to building the moat," he said in response to one query on X. "But everything else is accurate."

The set of the specially built "city" is in Toronto, CBC reported in September.

Toronto City Hall's film and entertainment department confirmed to the outlet that it was the site but declined to comment further for "confidentiality reasons."

Donaldson's rep confirmed the city's site as Toronto and told BI that Donaldson donated many of the goods used in the shoot, including mattresses, sleeping bags, and clothing, to local organizations afterward.

Paramedics and firefighters confirmed to CBC that they were aware of the production, and police told the outlet that its department's explosive disposal unit was consulted.

CBC drone footage showed a large cement tower and two rows of single-story houses surrounded by a red wall.

"Beast Games" aligns with Amazon's strategy of increasing spending on entertainment and sports content.

The show's coverage has not been entirely smooth sailing, though. Both Donaldson and conditions on set have faced bad press.

Some contestants have complained about inadequate living conditions, injuries, insufficient hygiene on set, and being subjected to sexism in a New York Times report. Five contestants are seeking to file a class-action lawsuit, though a rep for Donaldson told BI nobody has been served yet.

Amazon declined to comment on the lawsuit to BI. A spokesperson for Donaldson previously told BI that Amazon was not involved in the Las Vegas round of the show, where many of the allegations surfaced, which was "a promotional video shoot."

The spokesperson also said that this shoot was "unfortunately complicated by the CrowdStrike incident, extreme weather, and other unexpected logistical and communications issues."

Much of the rumors and allegations directed at Donaldson and the show went unanswered for months until Donaldson appeared on YouTube Oompaville's channel to address everything at once on November 23.

Donaldson said he could not address some of the allegations due to legal proceedings, but he described some of the claims about injuries on set as "disinformation."

• Brittany Broski focuses on community over follower count for lasting influence.
• Broski rose to fame in 2019 with a viral kombucha video and now has millions of followers.
• What she thinks will last in a crowded influencer market is authenticity and reliability.

Social media star Brittany Broski says she has always leaned into building her community over worrying about her follower count.

"What do numbers really determine when you can buy followers, when you can buy a check mark now?" Broski told Business Insider.

"I think the real power comes from community, the people that you can bring together."

Broski, whose real name is Brittany Tomlinson, rose to fame in 2019 following a mega-viral moment in which she tasted kombucha for the first time.

She now has 7.5 million TikTok followers and over 2 million subscribers on YouTube.

Broski, 27, now also has two podcasts: Royal Court, where she interviews celebrities in a free-flowing format, and The Broski Report, where she muses on whatever she is thinking about that week.

She thinks that influencers who are authentic and build loyal communities online will have more staying power, even if that means those communities are niche.

The influencer gap

There's some debate over whether brands still prefer to work with micro-influencers after engagement became the pinnacle in the past few years.

Some surveys and experts think things are going backward, and superstars are being favored once more, leading smaller creators to feel pushed out.

Others, however, see creators with small but mighty audiences thriving again in the near future.

Ultimately, algorithms change, and what is popular today may not be tomorrow.

Broski's advice for creators is to lean into what makes them different.

Broski felt she had been "pigeonholed as a meme" at the start of her internet career as the "kombucha girl," and she wanted to distance herself from this as soon as possible.

Instead, she strived to "build out an identifiable brand."

Community and connection

Community, both on and offline, has always been important to Broski. She told BI that's one reason she partnered with White Claw this holiday season in a campaign that focuses on making quality time with friends and family.

On Broski's shows, she also strives to "share a human moment with people" rather than repeat the same questions celebs receive at press junkets.

"More than anything, people just want to be heard and seen and felt like they're known," she said.

In Royal Court, Broski often asks her guests, including Saoirse Ronan and Daisy Edgar-Jones, to "prove their worth to earn a spot on Lady Broski's coveted small council" and has them dress up in medieval costumes.

"I really like leaning into this sort of silly nature of, I'm going to make you wear a cape and a hat, and you're going to like it," she said. "You get to see that person's personality more than just, let's talk about your work."

Broski thinks what is going to last is "authenticity and reliability."

"Those two words are so overused and so bastardized, but it doesn't take away from the core meaning," she said.

Her advice to creators is that people want to watch someone they relate to, Broski said — someone who makes them think, "She's just like me."

"That's all people want," she said. "So don't overthink it."

The audience also just wants the people they watch to be themselves.

"That seems so cliché, but what else can you do?" Broski said. "If you try to be anyone else, you're doomed to fail."

• It's looking like job market conditions will improve in 2025.
• Employees who are feeling burned out and dissatisfied may decide to "revenge quit."
• Bosses can prepare by focusing on empathy and meaningful communication.

With a job market heating up and employee resentment boiling over, "revenge quitting" looks to be on the horizon for 2025.

Edel Holliday-Quinn, a business psychologist, told Business Insider that some workers feel burned out and undervalued in part due to increased workloads and a back-and-forth about hybrid working.

In 2025, she said, many people are therefore thinking: "New year, new job."

"The job market is starting to loosen up, and for those who have been simmering with frustration, this might be the year they finally quit—not just quietly, but loudly," Holliday-Quinn said.

"Revenge quitting," she said, is where employees leave not just to move on "but to make a point."

Burnout and toxicity

Employment analysts previously told BI that the Great Detachment is plaguing workplaces and is one of the biggest challenges leaders face.

Partner that with the fact it might be easier to switch jobs next year, and employers could soon realize their best talent is jumping ship.

"If we as HR leaders don't act now, we do run the risk that a lot of those employees will just decide the opportunities are not there for them in the current company," Ciara Harrington, the Chief People Officer of the corporate training platform Skillsoft, told BI.

"Once the market opens up and they start getting the calls again, you could see an increase in your attrition," she said. "If any other employer wants this person, they're probably somebody you want to retain as well."

According to workplace experts, employees across all industries are increasingly engaging in "productivity theater" and performative busyness to get through their workday, and the workforce as a whole is disengaged.

They're struggling in other ways, too. For the ninth year in a row, the employee benefits platform Businessolver surveyed 20,000 employees, HR professionals, and CEOs across six industries on the state of workplace empathy. The report found that 42% of all respondents and 52% of CEOs reported working in a toxic environment.

In 2023, people were "rage applying" for jobs, angrily scrolling through job ads when they were fed up. Revenge quitting is similar, with the added vengeance of moving on to something better.

Stretched too thin

Beth Hood, the founder and CEO of the leadership and management training platform Verosa, told BI that employee dissatisfaction "rarely stems from a single event."

"It's often a gradual erosion of 'intrinsic motivators' such as connection, meaning, and safety," Hood said. "When these motivators are left unmet, resentment and detachment can grow, eventually leading to employees walking away, often in frustration or as a way of reclaiming control."

Holliday-Quinn, who has worked in senior roles at Citi and PwC, said employees have reported being stretched thin, due to cuts and heavier workloads, made worse by the attack on middle managers.

"Dissatisfaction has been quietly brewing," Holliday-Quinn said, with a period of layoffs and RTO mandates.

"This disconnect between leadership and the workforce isn't just a communication issue," she said. "It's a retention crisis waiting to happen."

Generational dynamics are also at play, with Gen Zers being skeptical about climbing the corporate ladder for little payoff. Younger workers are "less willing to tolerate outdated workplace cultures or rigid hierarchies," said Holliday-Quinn.

"Companies that don't adapt to these expectations will struggle to retain the next wave of talent," she said.

How to prepare

Harrington told BI that company leaders need to be trained to have crucial conversations with their direct reports because "most team members leave a manager, not a company."

The Businessolver report found that while 55% of CEOs believe they lead with empathy at work, only 28% of employees actually agreed.

Harrington said listening goes a long way, as does filtering down information from above effectively.

"I'm a really big believer in investing in leaders really is investing in the company as a whole," she said. "Because if they're doing their job, they're going to be working on the individual team member engagement, retention, and motivation."

Harrington said if an employee has been treated with empathy and felt heard in their current role, they're more likely to help with the transition or stay longer to meet deadlines during their notice period rather than being checked out and unhelpful.

"You're much more likely to get that really helpful and good transition," Harrington said. "Which will help massively with business continuity.

For others, though, "revenge quitting" could impact them greatly.

"2025 is shaping up to be a wake-up call for employers," Holliday-Quinn said. "Those who have relied on control over connection or ignored the mounting dissatisfaction within their teams are about to face the consequences."

• Larry Ellison plans to invest up to $165 million into research at the University of Oxford.
• The investment aims to transform research into products, focusing on key global challenges.
• The Ellison Institute of Technology is opening a campus in Oxford in 2027.

Larry Ellison is betting big on research and development in the UK by investing at least $127 million through his technology institute to help turn scientific discoveries at the University of Oxford into products.

The Ellison Institute of Technology, set up by the Oracle cofounder in 2015, plans to invest £130 million ($165 million) overall to fund joint research projects at the university in areas ranging from health to clean energy.

Ellison said in a press release that the joint venture's mission is to "have a global impact by fundamentally reimagining the way science and technology translate into end-to-end solutions for humanity's most challenging problems."

"This long-term, strategic partnership with the University of Oxford is at the heart of delivering on that goal," he added. "By collaborating on transformational, world-class research programs harnessing new technology and compute capability we will together deliver positive impact on society at scale."

The Oracle cofounder, now the world's fourth richest person, founded The Ellison Institute of Technology as a research and development center for healthcare.

The center announced plans to build a campus in Oxford in 2023, which is set to open in 2027. The $1.27 billion development will include labs, supercomputing facilities, and cancer research clinics.

The EIT will inject millions into joint research projects with the University of Oxford to dedicate to what Professor Irene Tracey, the university's vice-chancellor, described in a press release as "humanity's most pressing challenges."

The joint center's research will focus on EIT's four "Humane Endeavours": health and medical science, sustainable agriculture, clean energy, and government innovation in the age of AI.

Professor Sir John Bell, the president of EIT Oxford, said in a statement that the alliance "comes at an exciting time in the technological revolution."

"By combining world-class research with long-term capital investment and state-of-the-art facilities, we will tackle some of society's biggest challenges," he said. "Whether it's advancing new approaches for healthcare or solving the issues of food security, we will make progress using the brightest and most creative human minds available."

Bell told the FT the investment would also help secure the intellectual property rights of innovations that come out of the center and its researchers — something the science minister, Lord Patrick Vallance, told the outlet the UK had been falling behind on.

The deal also includes £30 million ($38 million) to provide scholarships to more than 100 undergraduate and postgraduate students, with the first intake starting in October 2025.

Ellison owns 40% of the business software company Oracle, and his net worth has more than doubled over the past two years to $181 billion.

He is in the process of purchasing Paramount for his son, David.

• A financial guru has criticized strict budgets, advocating for intuitive spending instead.
• Budget culture is seen as restrictive, leading to potential "budget burnout."
• Experts suggest balancing intuitive spending with realistic budgeting for financial health.

Saving money and paying off debts can feel like an endless cycle, which is why financial gurus are so keen on budgeting.

But Dana Miranda, a certified personal finance educator, told CNBC Make It in a recent interview that strict spending plans can be "toxic."

Miranda, who is also the author of "You Don't Need a Budget," told the outlet that budget culture is based on "restriction, shame, and greed," and there's little concrete evidence it works in the long term.

Instead, she recommended "intuitive spending" and thinking about your money "moment by moment." Rather than punishing themselves for overspending, people should reward themselves when they save, Miranda said.

Not all financial pros are in agreement, though.

Katrin Kaurov, the CEO and cofounder of the social financial platform Frich, told Business Insider it's true that "everyone hates budgeting."

But she isn't convinced intuitive spending is a good alternative. For some, it can increase debt and result in purchases they don't need.

To budget or not to budget

Doug Carey, a chartered financial analyst and founder of the retirement and financial planning software WealthTrace, told BI that whether to budget is a question that comes up with many of his clients.

Generally, he said he disagrees that people must have a set budget and stick to it. As long as someone can max out their 401(k) contributions and save enough for emergencies, "they can use their intuition for spending."

For these people, it is pretty obvious when they are spending too much, Carey said, because they'll dip into savings.

Budgets can be too limiting for people who are more flexible in their income, such as freelancers or contractors, for example, because these systems don't often allow for easy changes.

Carey said the "micromanagement" of daily things can also "obscure the bigger picture of your financial health," such as long-term financial goals such as retirement savings or building wealth.

"This can create a negative association with managing money and lead to 'budget burnout,'" Carey said. "Many give up on budgeting when they feel like they cannot live within the strict limits of the budget."

Trial and error

Budgets can be more universally helpful if they make room for flexibility.

Kaurov told BI that budgeting isn't inherently toxic, "but many people create budgets with too much enthusiasm and optimism for how little money they will spend from month to month."

People spend more during the holidays, for example. So using December's budget in January probably won't work.

Kaurov said a budget should be about creating a realistic guideline for spending and saving. If you've set one you can't follow, you should rethink it, she said.

"Budgeting is a tricky — but important — skill for people to learn when they're starting to manage their money," she said. "Trial and error is crucial and will allow people to find what kind of budget works best for them."

The grass isn't always greener

Intuitive spending sounds like a good idea, but it may be a case of "the grass is always greener," Kaurov added.

"For so many, especially younger people who are often on a tighter budget anyway, it's a really poor financial habit to develop," she said.

For those who are partial to impulsively buying trendy items from social media ads, "intuitive spending" can quickly turn into overspending on things you don't need.

Julie Guntrip, the head of financial wellness at Jenius Bank, told BI that rather than following absolute rules about their spending, people give themselves grace when things don't go to plan.

"Budgeting practices many times fail because people can't stick to them — an individual makes one misstep and decides to give it all up," she said.

A better course of action may be somewhere in the middle.

"Factoring splurges into a budget could be a great compromise for someone who may feel like budgeting is too constraining," Guntrip added. "This practice may actually help someone stick with a budget longer."

• Job seekers may face 'love-bombing' from hiring managers during interviews.
• Love-bombing involves excessive praise to keep candidates interested without real intent.
• Experts advise setting expectations and keeping options open to avoid being manipulated.

If a hiring manager is excessively complimenting you and telling you you're the top candidate during an interview, you may be being "love-bombed."

The term originated as a way to describe the manipulative tactics some toxic people employ in romantic relationships to hook in their victims, showering them with affection, gifts, and promises for the future, only to later flip the script and show their real selves.

But the same pattern may apply to the workplace, too. Many job seekers complain of inconsistent behavior from hiring managers, CNBC reported, being flattered and praised one minute and ghosted the next.

"Love-bombing during job interviews happens all too often when recruiters or hiring managers want to keep you interested in them while they figure things out behind the scenes," Renee Barber, the global director of recruiting for TYR Talent Solutions who has over 20 years of experience in the recruitment industry, told Business Insider.

"They may overhype your chances to keep you interested," Barber said. "Especially if they're not ready to make a decision or they need to buy time without being direct about the actual situation."

Janine Chidlow, the managing director of EMEA at the global talent firm Wilson, told BI that love-bombing not only disrupts a candidate's career expectations "but also raises questions about organizational integrity and employer branding."

"This phenomenon isn't new," she said. "But its frequency and impact have surged."

How to recognize love-bombing

It's looking like the job market may see a boost next year. But white-collar hiring is still in a slump, with tech jobs being hit the hardest.

Love-bombing may serve as a "morale-booster" for both candidates and interviewers, Chidlow said.

Amanda Fischer, an executive leadership and career coach who is the founder of AMF Coaching & Consulting, said that some recruiters and hiring managers want everyone they are interviewing to feel optimistic about the role so they don't lose out on the best candidates.

They may also want to create a strong connection so the candidate to make them less likely to negotiate further.

"In this particular instance, that is a highly manipulative move," Fischer said.

It may not always be a scheme, though, and some recruiters and hiring managers may be love-bombing without realizing it.

"They could genuinely be excited about a candidate and might not see how the excessive compliments could backfire," Barber said.

There are plenty of ways to recognize love-bombing during the interview stages.

According to Barber, some signs are excessive compliments, like being told you're exactly what the company is looking for, or that you're the best candidate being interviewed, or being given unrealistic promises, such as if they talk about you "being a great fit for the team" or "starting soon" before they've actually made a decision.

Fischer told BI that pressure for a quick decision is also "a huge red flag."

"From my perspective, there are very few circumstances where you should accept a role the moment it's offered," Fischer said.

Barber agreed, adding that if there is a long delay or no communication after the interview, "it's a sign that the praise might have just been a way to keep you interested before they made their decision."

What to do about it

Love-bombing during the interview process is symptomatic of deeper issues in recruitment, Chidlow said.

"While it may yield short-term gains in market perception, the long-term costs — disillusioned candidates, damaged reputations, and high turnover — far outweigh the benefits," she said.

"By prioritizing transparency and respect, organizations can foster genuine connections with candidates, ensuring a healthier, more productive recruitment process."

If you think the person on the other end of the interview desk is love-bombing you, it's good to set expectations early, Barber said.

"Before you wrap up the interview, feel free to ask when you can expect to hear back and what the next steps are," she said. "This can help you keep track of the process and avoid getting strung along."

Barber also recommended following up after the interview, sending a thank-you email, and asking for feedback.

"This allows you to gauge whether the praise was sincere and whether the company is genuinely interested," she said.

"If something feels off, trust your instincts," Barber added. "If it all felt too polished or disconnected from your experience, be cautious."

Keeping your options open is also a good move because being in a stronger position yourself makes you less likely to fall for manipulative tricks.

"Don't put all your eggs in one basket," Barber said. "Otherwise, you could be waiting around for a response that might never come."

• Influencers must adapt to keep up in an oversaturated market.
• Audiences are tired of ads and seek authentic, expertise-driven content.
• Platforms like VSCO and Reddit have gained traction, with users craving genuine communities.

A splintered social media world is on the horizon — and it's paving the way for a new, more authentic breed of influencer.

"People are just trying to find authentic communities," Eric Wittman, CEO of photo-editing app VSCO, told Business Insider.

Wittman pointed to Reddit's surge in users and skyrocketing earnings as an example. Bluesky's user base has also risen in recent weeks to 21 million, and Mastodon is seeing more modest growth, with about 90,000 new sign-ups this month, according to its CEO.

In a white paper published earlier last year, Chand Rajendra-Nicolucci, who researches digital public infrastructure at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, said there's a reboot taking place.

He believes that will include the rise of "very small online platforms" that host the kind of intimate conversations that are lacking on today's major platforms.

"It will create a lot more fragmentation in the market," said Wittman. "It's going to be more interest-driven and more community-driven, which I think is healthy."

Trust is key, losing it is costly

Audiences appear to be more discerning. Some are getting cynical about sponsored posts and bored of being sold to, especially when products or brands don't align with their values.

For example, TikTok can feel like a pseudo-shopping channel where every other video seems to be an ad.

Kate Smoothy, an SEO specialist and the founder and director of Webhive Digital, is also a content creator with 47,000 TikTok followers. She told BI she only partners with brands that she believes in because she values her audience's trust.

"As soon as you lose that trust, you may as well kiss the whole content creator thing goodbye," she said.

Smoothy said she sees things changing, with different "tiers" of content creators emerging from the industry's oversaturation. The top ones will have prioritized their community and built trust with their audience.

"Ultimately, the 'lower down' creators will struggle to establish themselves or pivot as the industry adapts to new platforms and changes in trends," Smoothy said.

New social media horizons

Lucy Edgerley, the head of influence at the global social media agency Born Social, told BI that Gen Zers, in particular, are craving creativity, entertainment, and inspiration.

Some may choose alternative platforms like VSCO, Bluesky, and Mastodon over the major players of Instagram, TikTok, and X.

Others are following their favorite creators to subscription services like Substack or Patreon.

"Platforms like Pinterest, which foster ideas-driven content, are thriving because they align with this demand," she said.

Wittman said that 57% of VSCO's user base is between the ages of 18 and 24, and the app is seeing a million new sign-ups a month. He pointed to the lack of ads on the platform — none if users opt for the paid service, which starts at a monthly fee of $2.50.

"We are very restrictive on who can advertise on our platform," Wittman said. "When we do these brand partnerships, we want to make sure that it's a brand that kind of suits our principles and philosophies as well."

Young people who have grown up with social media are learning the lessons about the dark side of it — the mental health toll, the bullying, and the over-consumerism — the hard way, he said.

"They're looking for healthier places to go to where they're not feeling manipulated," he said.

Intellectual influencers will thrive

Not everyone sees it this way. While newer platforms such as Threads and Bluesky are reporting impressive numbers, Kim Murray, the founder of the influencer marketing agency Virality Boost, told BI that many influencers are likely to stay put with what they know.

"Most creators find it challenging to build and maintain audiences across an ever-expanding array of platforms," she said.

Audiences are already more selective than they used to be, she added, so influencers will have to evolve wherever they are, regardless of their follower count.

"This shift signals a transformation rather than an endpoint," Murray said. "The real opportunity lies in how influencers adapt to meet this heightened selectivity by focusing on distribution strategies that deliver genuine value to both audiences and brands."

Wittman said the bar has been raised, and he sees a move toward "intellectual influencers" emerging, where people gravitate to creators who offer something unique.

"They actually want experts," he said. "They want it to be fun, and they want it to be creative. They don't want just some crazy infomercial."

Edgerley agreed we're witnessing a shift. Despite the success of YouTube shorts and TikTok, long-form storytelling is on the rise, she said, suggesting users want deeper engagement rather than endless scrolling.

"Ultimately, it's about meeting audiences with humor, inspiration, and substance," she said. "Not just ads."

• MrBeast said his Amazon show "Beast Games" broke 40 world records.
• It comes amid allegations of poor conditions and a class-action lawsuit filed by some contestants.
• MrBeast finally addressed a lot of the accusations this week, but questions remain.

MrBeast said his upcoming $100 million Amazon reality show "Beast Games" broke 40 Guinness World Records.

"Guinness just dropped off some of the world records we broke while filming Beast Games lol," MrBeast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, wrote on X on Wednesday. "IM SO EXCITED TO DROP THIS SHOW IN 22 DAYS 🥰"

While he didn't reveal the full details of the records, he hinted at a few, including the largest cash prize in a game show, the most cables for a show, and the "largest island given away in a show."

It's not been smooth sailing

Donaldson, 26, is YouTube's biggest creator, with 332 million subscribers. He rose to fame with his ambitious stunts, including recreating Netflix's "Squid Game."

"Beast Games" is along the same vein, featuring at least 1,000 contestants.

Amazon has promoted it as "the world's largest live gameshow" with the "biggest single prize in the history of television and streaming" of $5 million.

Amazon announced the reality competition in March. It was supposed to kick-start Amazon's video ad sales efforts, attracting a wide audience and appealing to advertisers.

However, coverage of the show has not been entirely smooth sailing.

As well as complaints from contestants about inadequate living conditions, some have also said they were injured, not given access to hygiene products and medical care, and subjected to sexism in a New York Times report, and a class-action lawsuit five of them filed in September.

Amazon declined to comment on the lawsuit to BI. A spokesperson for Donaldson previously told BI that Amazon was not involved in the Las Vegas round of the show, where many of the allegations surfaced, which was "a promotional video shoot."

The spokesperson also said that this shoot was "unfortunately complicated by the CrowdStrike incident, extreme weather, and other unexpected logistical and communications issues."

Much of the rumors and allegations directed at Donaldson and the show went unanswered for months until Donaldson appeared on YouTube Oompaville's channel to address everything at once on November 23.

Donaldson said he could not address some of the allegations due to legal proceedings, but he described some of the claims about injuries on set as "disinformation."

Since then, Donaldson has also been more outspoken on his social media.

"We have tons of behind-the-scenes dropping when the show does to show how blown out of proportion these claims were," he wrote on X in response to a user who enquired about the "terrible conditions" on the show. "Just can't release it now because it would spoil the games."

None of the above has tempered production of "Beast Games," with Donaldson releasing a teaser on November 25, saying he had "poured everything I have into this show."

"I'll see you December 19th," he said, confirming the show's release date.

Future projects could be more difficult

Donaldson previously revealed he'd "spent way more than $100 million" on "Beast Games." He didn't clarify if this was the budget for one season, but the show has only been commissioned for one so far.

The move lines up with Amazon's strategy of increasing spending on entertainment and sports content, which "Beast Games" was supposed to be a benchmark for.

Donaldson has largely shrugged off bad press over the years, but partnering with a giant like Amazon has put more eyes on him than ever.

Creator economy experts previously told BI that "Beast Games" would not be going anywhere despite the negative headlines. But they warned that the top YouTuber may find it harder to fund his next big project because of the headache it caused Amazon.

"They'll still do partnerships with him," Diana D'Angelo, the CEO of Breaking Creatives Agency, told BI. "But maybe they'll put a bigger check on what he's actually doing and how it's being done."