• Kim Perell is a serial entrepreneur who became a multimillionaire by age 30.
• Her dad, also an entrepreneur, often talked about his business failures.
• She says sharing mistakes and normalizing failures should be encouraged.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Kim Perell, author of "Mistakes That Made Me A Millionaire." It has been edited for length and clarity.

Ever since I was a kid living in Oregon, my life has been a roller coaster ride of entrepreneurship.

My parents were entrepreneurs who experienced big highs and big lows. Running their own business created a lot of stress in my household. We never knew if we'd have enough money to turn on the heat during the winter. There was tension between my parents and my two siblings, and I felt it, too.

When we sat down for dinner each night, my dad would ask about the worst part of our day, which always led to him talking about business troubles. He didn't ask about school or sports, but was always up for talking business, so we saw the difficult parts of entrepreneurship up close.

I didn't want to become an entrepreneur until I got fired

I didn't want to be an entrepreneur because I had seen the stress and inconsistency it caused in my family growing up. All I wanted was a stable job with a paycheck every two weeks. So, I went to college and got just that — or so I thought.

After about two years, the company I was working for went bankrupt. I was fired and broke.

That was an important lesson: whether you're an entrepreneur or an employee, there's no such thing as certainty and security. If nothing is guaranteed, the best bet you can make is on yourself.

I waited too long, but then jumped into digital advertising

After that, I was interested in starting a company, but I made the mistake of waiting for the ideal time. I've since learned that launching a business is like becoming a parent: there's no perfect time. You've just got to jump in.

So, I took a $10,000 loan from my grandmother to start a digital ad agency. My grandma didn't understand what the internet was, but she believed in me, and her loan allowed me to start the company at my kitchen table.

I sold my company for $20 million when I was 30

Growing up as a twin, I learned early on to differentiate myself. That gave me a lone wolf mentality that was hard to shake. That's another mistake I made: trying to do everything alone. Once I finally hired help, I was able to grow and scale. The company flourished.

When I was 30, I sold my digital ad company for about $20 million in cash and equity. I remember going to the ATM, and my bank balance had too many digits to print on the receipt. That was the best day of my life. My maxed-out credit cards and 3 a.m. worries had paid off. I had created security for myself.

As a mentor, I aim to normalize failure

I'm 48 now. Since selling that first company, I've become a serial entrepreneur, investor, and business mentor. I speak with my clients not only about my success, but about the failures I've had along the way.

I'm not sure my dad did the right thing by sharing his business woes at the dinner table each night, yet that normalized failure for me. If failure isn't normalized, you can become paralyzed by fear and get stuck. To succeed as an entrepreneur, you need to know you're going to make mistakes and do it anyway.

My failures have contributed to my success

I want my four kids to be comfortable taking risks. Make mistakes; think big; and fail occasionally. That's where you grow. Our children are going to need that adaptability and willingness to try new things in a world that is changing more quickly than ever.

As a young adult, I wanted consistency, but I've learned the only constant is change. Embracing change and failure has led to my biggest successes.

• Tech giant Dell carries out an annual employee engagement survey known as "Tell Dell."
• BI obtained a transcript of the internal video update where leaders shared results from the survey.
• The employee satisfaction score dropped by double digits for the second year in a row.

Every year, Dell asks its employees in a company survey how likely they are to recommend the company as a good place to work.

Last year, the results weren't great.

This year, they're worse.

On Tuesday, Jenn Saavedra, Dell's chief HR officer, announced that the employee net promoter score (eNPS) — an industry-standard measure of employee satisfaction — had fallen to 32, according to a transcript of an internal video update obtained by Business Insider.

The results mark a double-digit drop in the eNPS for the second year running at Dell — it fell from 63 to 48 in 2024 — and an almost 50% decline in two years.

Saavedra said the eNPS score was "below the benchmark we do aim to achieve, and we take that seriously," per the transcript.

Saavedra told employees that Dell had been "navigating a lot of change both within the company and in the broader environment," adding that the pace and scale of the change has been "a lot."

Dell declined a request for comment from BI for this story.

'Tell Dell' survey results

The eNPS score is the key metric from Dell's annual survey, called "Tell Dell."

One question asks employees to rank how likely they would be to recommend Dell as a great place to work to someone they know on a scale from 1 to 10. The eNPS is calculated as the percentage of promoters minus the percentage of detractors.

Four Dell employees who spoke to BI about the Tell Dell results raised factors like Dell's RTO, ongoing layoffs, fatigue with the company's AI push, and a shift in culture as reasons for the eNPS decline. They spoke on the condition of anonymity. BI has verified their identities and employment.

"There's been a general decrease in trust with all the regular layoffs and feeling like the company isn't listening to employee concerns," said one employee who is based at Dell's Round Rock headquarters.

The person said that office conditions, such as "noisy rooms and desks that feel temporary," were also contributing to low morale.

"Most people I know are not feeling secure in their jobs," they added.

"I was more negative on my Tell Dell than I have ever been," a Dell engineer who has been at the company for more than eight years, told BI.

The engineer said they felt the company's RTO push and layoffs had damaged Dell's reputation as a good place to work.

Previously, managers were flexible, workforce reductions were rare, and employees enjoyed a good work-life balance, the engineer said.

They said they felt company culture had changed as they had been "gradually and with decreasing compassion and understanding forced back into the office."

"The constant layoffs are just the cherry on top," the engineer added.

Dell has been steadily ramping up its RTO policy since February 2024, when it asked all US employees to classify themselves as either hybrid or remote — roughly 50% opted to stay remote. In September, the sales team was called back to the office five days a week, and in January, all staff living near a Dell office were told they were required to be in five days a week from March.

Vivek Mohindra, Dell's senior vice president of corporate strategy, previously told BI that having staff in the office brought "huge benefits," including "learning from each other, training, and mentorship."

"For all the technology in the world, nothing is faster than the speed of human interaction," CEO Michael Dell told staff in an internal memo when the 5-day RTO was announced.

Alongside the RTO push, Dell's workforce has shrunk significantly in recent years. An SEC filing from March showed that the company's staff numbers have fallen by 25,000 in the last two years — a 19% reduction. As of January 2025, Dell employs 108,000 people.

One tech support employee based at the company's RoundRock headquarters said the fall in head count had led to increased workloads on their team. At the same time, the ongoing workforce reductions have held back internal movement and promotions, the employee said.

Dell's leadership was a bright spot

While the survey shows employee satisfaction has fallen, Dell workers responded favourably to questions about leaders.

The leader net promotion score (NPS) was 76, with employees saying their leaders were supportive, collaborative, and helped them champion modernization, Saavedra said in the update.

Dell has been steering the company toward an AI future, rolling out AI across its internal operating model in 2024 and positioning Dell as a leading provider of the key infrastructure and servers that companies require as they deploy AI.

Dell's ISG division, which develops AI servers, has grown 29% year on year, the company reported in its latest annual results.

Total annual revenue was up 8% in its 2024 financial year to hit $95.6 billion — its third-highest result after the pandemic-era boom in sales helped push annual revenue to a peak of $102.3 billion.

Improving employee satisfaction

In the six-minute video update, Saavedra said Dell would be "increasing visibility" through quarterly updates and people leader meetings to help develop more transparent communication.

"Everyone wants direct communication from leadership and clarity on where we're headed and why," Saavedra said.

Leaders would also be reviewing their team's Tell Dell results and turning feedback into action, she said.

The HR lead encouraged more frequent two-way conversations between leaders and teams, and suggested employees use available well-being resources.

"Hopefully, the score getting cut in half over 2 years means they are going to make popular pro-worker changes," the tech support worker told BI.

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• Business Insider interviewed seven Gen Zers about the viral "Gen Z Stare."
• Ranging in age from 17 to 27, some agreed with the criticism — others flatly rejected it.
• "I think you're just talking to a rude person," one Gen Zer said. Another suggested Gen Zers may stare blankly while high.

A 21-year-old from Boston thinks the "Gen Z stare" is overblown. A 20-year-old from the Bay Area said she sees it all the time. A 17-year-old heard from her parents that she had been inadvertently doing it.

Conversations with seven Gen Zers indicate young people are divided on the idea that their generation often responds to questions with blank, wide-eyed stares, as many millennials on TikTok have gleefully suggested.

Some told Business Insider they flatly rejected the idea that there is such a thing as the "Gen Z stare" — others said they saw it firsthand.

Those who said there could be some truth to it floated potential contributing factors, such as lingering effects of COVID lockdowns, an adolescence spent online, or maybe that blank stare is simply coming from someone who is high.

While not everyone agreed, they all had thoughts on the viral debate.

So listen up, millennials. It's time to pass Gen Z the mic.

Brenda Alarcon, 20

On a recent visit to Coldstone Creamery, Brenda Alarcon asked a young worker for their favorite flavor. The employee stared back at them. "The transaction was made with minimal words," Alarcon said.

Alarcon said she's seen the "Gen Z stare" in professional settings, too. At a recent networking event, she noticed that the other Gen Z networkers would "freeze up."

"I'm the one that's keeping the conversation going," she said. "It's not just one time, it's multiple."

She has her suspicions as to the root cause. The COVID-19 pandemic is an obvious answer, she said. Another theory stems from her earlier days as a waitress, when she would serve blank-staring young customers.

"It's because they hit their pen," she said, referencing the slim, THC oil vape pens that became popular in the last five years.

Trinity Starr Rutledge, 17

Trinity Starr Rutledge told BI she thought the trend was "pretty stupid." Working as a cashier and desk assistant, she's had many millennials stare back at her requests at small talk.

"I think you're just talking to a rude person," Starr Rutledge said. "I don't think it's right to label our generation as people who have this stare."

To the millennials posting about the stare, Starr Rutledge had a message: "It's not our fault that we're cooler."

Megan Easton, 26

Megan Easton said she accepts the idea that her generation is more socially awkward than the others, especially the younger members of Gen Z who grew up on social media. (At 26, Easton identifies as a "Zilennial.") Still, Easton said she mostly believes that her generation's stare is an air of nonchalance.

"It comes from a lack of caring as much what people think," Easton said. "Where an older generation might think it's rude or not socially acceptable, Gen Z is more to the point, and their humor's a little drier."

Easton said that the stare shouldn't make older generations think Gen Z is "disrespectful or unintelligent." It's merely a difference in how different generations communicate, she said.

Lindsey Cook, 27

Lindsey Cook likes to start her interactions with Gen Z baristas by saying, "I'm ready to order when you are, no rush." That way, if the barista does have social anxiety, it allows them to work on their own timeline and not just stare back.

"It's very uncomfortable," Cook said. "Things need to be relearned now that we're resuming life as normal as possible after COVID."

Online, some young people have retorted that small talk isn't mandatory, or that they didn't consent to a conversation. "But when they take a job in hospitality or customer service, it's their job to make people feel welcome," Cook said.

Emerson Hubbard, 17

Emerson Hubbard thought she was too nervous to give off a "Gen Z stare." Then, she talked about it with her parents.

"I was talking to my family today and they were like, 'You have done it before,'" Hubbard said. "I get it. Sometimes I just zone out in the conversation and I'm just staring at them."

Hubbard said she doesn't think of the stare as much of a problem. She sees a "one-sided" debate between millennials and Gen Z, especially in her TikTok comments, where she said a lot of millennials were "going ham."

Eli Toy, 25

Eli Toy was raised by Gen Xers, not millennials. Toy said that she's "open to conversation" — but that other Gen Zers may be less fluent in small talk because of that generational difference.

"From what I've seen, a lot of Gen Zers that were raised by millennials had more technology in their childhoods, so that could impact it," Toy said. "The biggest tech I had was a pink Nintendo."

Netta Dar, 21

Netta Dar has seen the "Gen Z stare" before.

She referenced the character April Ludgate from the TV show "Parks and Recreation," who often stared down her colleagues with non-responses. Interestingly enough, April, played by actor Aubrey Plaza, is a millennial in the show.

That could suggest that the "Gen Z stare" isn't specific to Gen Z, but to people who are still developing their social skills.

While Dar hasn't seen the stare among her college-aged friends, she said she does notice some social awkwardness in her younger sister's friends.

"It definitely depends on the age as well, and how far along you are in your development, where the frontal lobe is at," Dar said.

• xAI hired contractors to help Grok climb a popular AI leaderboard with the goal of overtaking Anthropic.
• Training documents show xAI wanted to "beat Sonnet 3.7 Extended," Anthropic's coding rival.
• AI leaderboards have become a key battleground for labs chasing clout and investment.

Tech companies are fiercely competing to build the best AI coding tools — and for xAI, the top rival to beat seems to be Anthropic.

Elon Musk's AI company used contractors to train Grok on coding tasks with the goal of topping a popular AI leaderboard, and explicitly told them they wanted it to outperform Anthropic's Claude 3.7 Sonnet tool, documents obtained by Business Insider show.

The contractors, hired through Scale AI's Outlier platform, were assigned a project to "hillclimb" Grok's ranking on WebDev Arena, an influential leaderboard from LMArena that pits AI models against each other in web development challenges, with users voting for the winner.

"We want to make the in-task model the #1 model" for LMArena, reads one Scale AI onboarding doc that was active in early July, according to one contractor who worked on the project. Contractors were told to generate and refine front-end code for user interface prompts to "beat Sonnet 3.7 Extended," a reference to Anthropic's Claude model.

xAI did not reply to a BI request for comment.

In the absence of universally agreed-upon standards, leaderboard rankings and benchmark scores have become the AI industry's unofficial scoreboard.

For labs like OpenAI and Anthropic, topping these rankings can help attract funding, new customers, lucrative contracts, and media attention.

Anthropic's Claude, which has multiple models, is considered one of the leading players for AI coding and consistently ranks near the top of many leaderboards, often alongside Google and OpenAI.

Anthropic cofounder Benn Mann said on the "No Priors" podcast last month that other companies had declared "code reds" to try to match Claude's coding abilities, and he was surprised that other models hadn't caught up. Competitors like Meta are using Anthropic's coding tools internally, BI previously reported.

The Scale AI dashboard and project instructions did not specify which version of Grok the project was training, though it was in use days before the newest model, Grok 4, came out on July 9.

On Tuesday, LMArena ranked Grok 4 in 12th place for web development. Models from Anthropic ranked in joint first, third, and fourth.

The day after Grok 4's launch, Musk posted on X claiming that the new model "works better than Cursor" at fixing code, referring to the popular AI-assisted developer tool.

In a comment to BI, Scale AI said it does not overfit models by training them directly on a test set. The company said it never copies or reuses public benchmark data for large language model training and told BI it was engaging in a "standard data generation project using public signals to close known performance gaps."

Anastasios Angelopoulos, the CEO of LMArena, told BI that while he wasn't aware of the specific Scale project, hiring contractors to help AI models climb public leaderboards is standard industry practice.

"This is part of the standard workflow of model training. You need to collect data to improve your model," Angelopoulos said, adding that it's "not just to do well in web development, but in any benchmark."

The race for leaderboard dominance

The industry's focus on AI leaderboards can drive intense — and not always fair — competition.

Sara Hooker, the head of Cohere Labs and one of the authors of "The Leaderboard Illusion," a paper published by researchers from universities including MIT and Stanford, told BI that "when a leaderboard is important to a whole ecosystem, the incentives are aligned for it to be gamed."

In April, after Meta's Llama 4 model shot up to second place on LM Arena, developers noticed that the model variant that Meta used for public benchmarking was different from the version released to the public. This sparked accusations from AI researchers that Meta was gaming the leaderboard.

Meta denied the claims, saying the variant in question was experimental and that evaluating multiple versions of a model is standard practice.

Although xAI's project with Scale AI asked contractors to help "hillclimb" the LMArena rankings, there is no evidence that they were gaming the leaderboard.

Leaderboard dominance doesn't always translate into real-world ability. Shivalika Singh, another author of the paper, told BI that "doing well on the Arena doesn't result in generally good performance" or guarantee strong results on other benchmarks.

Overall, Grok 4 ranked in the top three for LMArena's core categories of math, coding, and "Hard Prompts."

However, early data from Yupp, a new crowdsourced leaderboard and LMArena rival, showed that Grok 4 ranked 66 out of more than 100 models, highlighting the variance between leaderboards.

Nate Jones, an AI strategist and product leader with a widely read newsletter, said he found Grok's actual abilities often lagged behind its leaderboard hype.

"Grok 4 crushed some flashy benchmarks, but when the rubber met the road in my tests this week Grok 4 stumbled hard," he wrote in his Substack on Monday. "The moment we set leaderboard dominance as the goal, we risk creating models that excel in trivial exercises and flounder when facing reality."

• Uber is investing hundreds of millions into the robotaxi wars.
• The company partnered with Lucid, which makes the Gravity EVs that Uber will use in its robotaxi fleet.
• Lucid's stock was up more than 43% in premarket trading.

Uber is turning to Lucid as it looks to play catch-up in the robotaxi wars.

More than four and a half years after Uber sold off its autonomous vehicle division, the company is pouring hundreds of millions into Lucid as part of a new robotaxi deal.

Lucid will make the vehicles for Uber's robotaxis, based on its Gravity EV. Uber is also partnering with self-driving technology company Nuro, which will power the autonomous driving capabilities. Uber expects the tech to launch "later next year in a major US city."

"Autonomous vehicles have enormous potential to transform our cities for the better," said Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi. "We're thrilled to partner with Nuro and Lucid on this new robotaxi program, purpose-built just for the Uber platform, to safely bring the magic of autonomous driving to more people across the world."

Lucid's stock price jumped more than 43% in pre-market trading following news of the partnership, while Uber's stock price was slightly up before the opening bell.

Uber said it plans to deploy a fleet of 20,000 robotaxis over the next six years. The company said its first prototype is "already operating autonomously on a closed circuit at Nuro's Las Vegas proving grounds."

The robotaxi wars have been heating up over the last year, with market leader Waymo, owned by Google parent company Alphabet, operating autonomous rides in multiple states.

Tesla launched a limited rollout of its robotaxi program in Austin earlier this summer. While the cars drive themselves, Tesla employees still ride in the vehicles with passengers for safety reasons.

Uber agreed to sell its autonomous vehicle division to startup Aurora in December 2020. At the time, it was grappling with a pandemic-induced downturn in its ride-hailing business.

Since then, Uber has offered rides in autonomous vehicles in Atlanta and Austin through a partnership with Waymo. Riders can request a ride in an AV through Uber's app in those cities.

If adopted widely, robotaxis would present a way for Uber and other ridesharing services to bypass human drivers. In January, Khosrowshahi said that Uber doesn't expect robotaxis to replace the company's gig-worker drivers for the next decade.

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• We sold our home in Honolulu and used the money to buy 4.5 acres of land with no house.
• We'd always dreamt of owning land, but the reality of no plumbing or house is hard at times.
• I'm not sure I'd do it again given the chance, but for now I'm motivated to keep going.

Owning land and being immersed in nature was always our dream, which we'd talked about since our early dating days.

I met my husband when I was 30. We moved into a small studio one month after meeting, and married six years later.

Our pattern has been a series of slow and fast. We were engaged for two years, but we spontaneously planned our wedding in two and a half weeks.

So it wasn't too surprising when, after living in our small plantation-style home in Honolulu for 11 years, we decided on a whim to sell it and use the profits to fund our long-sought dream.

We traded our house for land

We bought 4.67 acres of raw land on a rural, dusty, and very hot part of the island, in Waianae.

Our new home, which we moved to in August 2023, came with a massive warehouse that the previous owner had used for salvaged boats.

There was a water line, but no plumbing, no power, and definitely no house. The land was covered in invasive trees and weeds, but we could see the potential.

We told ourselves the move was an adventure, and it is—one that I'm not sure I'd do over, given the chance.

It's been one of the hardest things we've ever done

We live off-grid with our two young boys, ages 5 and 8, who attend a public Hawaiian charter school that runs from preK to high school.

Our kitchen sits under a giant tent between two shipping containers. We sleep in what's essentially a metal box with windows.

We shower and use the bathroom in a makeshift space inside the warehouse. A friend once joked, "You guys have really long outdoor hallways."

At night, it's just us, crickets, and the stars. It's romantic, until it's not.

The dream was sparkly. The reality is gritty.

This new life is a rough dance between ambition, uncertainty, and a serious lack of skills.

While the idea of self-sufficiency felt liberating, the trade-offs are a hard reality check. Our electricity comes from old solar panels that often need repairs.

The chickens I once romanticized poop on everything.

The weeds? They're relentless. I'll clear a section one weekend, only to find it overrun again the next.

We haul out our own trash. We haul in propane. Dust storms coat everything in a layer of coral-colored silt.

The heat, which averages 86 degrees Fahrenheit and 30% humidity year-round, is merciless. We have shade and occasional breezes to keep us cool, but no air conditioning.

At first, finding solutions through the chaos felt like growth. However, the charm wears off fast when you're making dinner in the rain and your dirt-floor kitchen turns to mud.

We got swept up in the potential of it all without stopping to think practically

All the money from our house sale went into buying the land, which means there's little left for development.

My husband is clever and capable, but the skills needed to turn our dream of healing the soil and building a house into reality are more than we planned for.

Before, in our previous home, necessary fixes were small, like building a fence and repairing the garbage disposal whenever it was on the fritz. Now, my husband is learning how to drive and repair a backhoe and replace solar panels.

As for me, I feel useless many days. I still can't start the generator or wood chipper without his help. And that's assuming it's a day we're not both working our regular jobs just to get by and save for future projects.

Despite the hardship, there have been many good moments

I cherish the moments when the boys are running wild with the chickens or picking fruit from trees we planted.

I get excited when the garden overflows and we can share the abundance with friends and neighbors.

Even two years into this life, I still get giddy collecting eggs every morning.

We live under an open sky and are surrounded by raw beauty (if you can look past the to-do list and piles of weeds).

These moments remind me of what we came for.

However, I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss city water, trash pickup, or being close to friends. There are days I wonder: What the hell did we do?

So is it worth it? Ask me in 5 years

The truth is, I don't know if it has been worth it.

We're still in the messy middle. There's no tidy ending to our story. We're tired, yet proud that we've made it this far.

We traded ease for challenge, predictability for possibility. I miss our old house, but I'm committed to our new dream.

Even if we eventually call it a phase—our "Remember when we tried to homestead in our 40s?" moment—it's a life we reached for, not one that just happened to us.

For now, that feels like enough to keep going.

• Education organizations raised the alarm on Trump's plans to dismantle the Department of Education.
• They told Sen. Elizabeth Warren that student-loan borrowers could see higher balances and fewer options for relief.
• It comes after the Supreme Court ruled the department can move forward with firing nearly 1,400 of its staffers.

From higher student-loan balances to lower college attendance, education groups have a list of concerns with President Donald Trump's plans to dismantle the Department of Education.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren released a report on Thursday — exclusively viewed by Business Insider — compiling responses she received from 11 national organizations regarding the impact of Trump's education plans on students and borrowers.

The fate of student-loan borrowers was among the groups' top concerns. The Supreme Court recently ruled that the Department of Education's plan to lay off nearly 1,400 of its employees can proceed, meaning that the Federal Student Aid office — which the report said administers over $120 billion in grants and student loans annually — would lose staff.

The American Council on Education told Warren that "delayed funding, especially in the instances of student financial aid, can result in the inability of students to enroll for classes and persist through to completion in a timely fashion, causing them to take on more student loan debt to complete their degrees."

Delays in receiving federal student aid could also lead some students to turn to private lenders; the NEA said that private student loans often have riskier terms and can lead to predatory lending. They might be the only route students have if they cannot receive federal student loans promptly.

This report comes amid a summer of changes for student-loan borrowers and education overall. The administration announced in April that it was restarting collections on defaulted student loans after a five-year pause. Interest charges resumed on 8 million borrowers' balances on August 1 after a year on pause, and Trump's spending bill, which he signed into law on July 4, codified significant changes to the repayment system.

Specifically, the bill included a $200,000 lifetime cap on borrowing for professional students, like those seeking medical or law school. Average tuition is higher than that cap, and education analysts previously told BI that the cap could either turn students to private lending or lead them to forgo their advanced degrees altogether.

The spending law also eliminated existing income-driven repayment plans, include the SAVE plan, and replaced them with two options: a standard repayment plan and a new Repayment Assistance Plan, which allows borrowers to make payments based on their income with forgiveness after 30 years.

Some of the organizations said in the report that the new repayment plans could leave borrowers with higher monthly payments, and minimal staffing at Federal Student Aid will exacerbate the challenges of attaining affordable payments.

In addition to repayment changes, the report also highlighted Trump's intent to transfer the facilitation of student loans from the Department of Education to another federal agency. While that hasn't yet happened, advocacy group Student Borrower Protection Center told Warren that moving "the student loan program at a time when borrowers are facing such significant borrower distress risks exacerbating the confusion and instability borrowers are already experiencing and risks even more borrowers falling through the cracks."

Trump's efforts to dismantle the Department of Education have been in action for months. In February, the administration cut more than $900 million in research contracts, which department employees previously told BI would stifle data collection and jeopardize funding for low-income schools.

Linda McMahon, Trump's education secretary, has previously acknowledged that she cannot eliminate the Department of Education without congressional approval. She has supported slashing the department's workforce, though, saying in a statement following the Supreme Court's ruling that the cuts will move forward "to promote efficiency and accountability and to ensure resources are directed where they matter most — to students, parents, and teachers."

• US student applications to UK universities hit a record high amid political unrest at home.
• UCAS reported 7,930 US applicants for fall 2025 — the highest number since tracking began in 2006.
• A surge in international university interest comes amid Trump's crackdown on elite colleges.

A record number of American students are turning to British universities amid mounting political pressure on higher education in the US.

New figures released Thursday by UCAS, the UK's university admission service, show that 7,930 students from the US applied for UK undergraduate courses for fall 2025 — a 13.9% increase from the previous year and the highest total since records began in 2006.

The rise comes as UK universities experience a broad surge in applications, with this year's total number of applicants reaching 665,070, up 1.3% year-on-year, with UK 18-year-olds also hitting a record high of 328,390 applicants.

International applications rose 2.2% overall, with significant increases from China, Nigeria, Ireland, and, notably, the US.

The jump in American interest coincides with a growing sense of instability in US higher education.

Since returning to office, President Donald Trump has launched an unprecedented crackdown on universities, freezing billions in federal funding and threatening elite institutions like Harvard and Columbia with sweeping restrictions.

His administration has cited concerns over antisemitism, diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, and campus activism.

Harvard alone has sued the federal government after $8.9 billion in grants and contracts were frozen when it refused Trump's demands, including scaling back DEI initiatives and limiting admissions of international students.

The White House has also threatened to revoke the school's tax-exempt status and launched reviews into dozens of other universities, including Princeton, Columbia, and Cornell.

While some universities, like Columbia, have conceded to Trump's conditions to restore funding, others, including Harvard, have opted to fight back in court.

Some international universities have seized the moment by launching fast-track admissions, extending application deadlines, and dangling "unconditional offers" — even promoting proximity to tropical getaways — in a bid to lure US and international students away from American institutions.

• French air traffic control strikes disrupted over a million passengers across Europe in early July.
• Workers and the French government are at an impasse, and further strikes are possible.
• If you're traveling to Europe this summer, be aware that you could face delays or cancellations.

Strikes by French air traffic controllers affected over a million people's travel plans this month — and may be set to continue.

Citing understaffing and poor management from a government agency, France's second-largest ATC union, UNSA-ICNA, went on strike on July 3 and 4.

Each day, an average of around 3,700 flights were delayed and 1,400 were canceled, according to a report from Eurocontrol, the central organisation for air traffic management on the continent.

It is estimated that this cost airlines around 120 million euros, or $140 million.

The effects spread beyond France, given the international nature of aviation, and the fact that many neighbors frequently fly over the country.

"An ATC strike in France has the potential to impact a third of flights across the continent, showing the disproportionate impact that disruptions in one busy country can have on the European network as a whole," Eurocontrol wrote in its report.

It added that Spain was the worst affected, followed by France and the UK.

What does this mean if you have travel plans in Europe

While the unions haven't announced any further action, it's possible there may be more strikes.

France's transport minister, Philippe Tabarot, called the demands "unacceptable" and expressed annoyance that strikes were targeted in the busy summer vacation travel period.

UNSA-ICNA wants pay rises in line with inflation following a 2023 agreement, more staffing, and better working conditions.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary said in a statement last Friday: "What's stopping French air traffic controllers from closing the EU skies again next week or the week after with more of these unjustified recreational strikes?"

The Irish budget airline, Europe's biggest, canceled 170 flights affecting 30,000 passengers.

This all means you should be wary if you're flying to France this summer, or have another journey flying over the country, known as an overflight.

If your plan is to travel between two European countries, the continent at least has a strong rail network as an alternative. The Eurostar also links the UK and France.

However, European Union legislation about compensation for flight delays absolves airlines when there are "extraordinary circumstances," which include strikes outside their control.

Nonetheless, airlines are still obligated to get passengers to their destination on the next available flight.

With no deal on the horizon, disruption could occur again.

O'Leary has called on EU President Ursula von der Leyen to quit if she can't guarantee protections for overflights during ATC strikes and maintain full staffing during the first wave of departures each day.

Meanwhile, British budget airline easyJet saw its stock price fall more than 5% Thursday morning after declaring a £15 million ($20 million) hit due to the strike. That was despite higher profits, although fuel costs also went up.

"We are extremely unhappy with the strike action by the French ATC in early July, which, as well as presenting unacceptable challenges for customers and crew, also created unexpected and significant costs for all airlines," said CEO Kenton Jarvis.

Were you affected by French air traffic control strikes? Have you experienced a European flightmare this summer? Contact this reporter at [email protected]

• Initially, I thought my wedding ring provided a sense of adulthood and credibility in my career.
• But I never truly felt like a adult, even after starting my own business and having children.
• Now, I'm embracing my own path, symbolized by a new ring on my right hand.

I was 27 when I got married, but I could have easily passed for 18.

I've always looked younger than I am, which frustrated me, especially as a young professional. I was a star-student, perfectionist, overachiever trying to get a foothold in my career, and I wanted to be respected and valued. But I felt like the fact that I looked like a kid held me back.

At a professional conference, a male colleague asked me if I was old enough to drink alcohol. Whether he was earnest or joking (I'm still not sure) doesn't matter — his point was clear: you're not big enough to be a real player here.

When my husband slipped on my wedding ring, I was flooded with excitement and hope for our shared future, yes, but it also sparked a surprising transformation that was just about me. With the ring on my finger, I finally looked like an adult.

I wore it proudly in the world, gesturing at networking events. It dated me in a positive way. It gave me credibility. I delighted in the heft of it, until I didn't.

I was doing all of the adult things, but I still didn't feel like one

Twelve years later, we had built a whole life: bought a house, made a home, had two children, navigated the grief of my mom's death, weathered the COVID pandemic, built our careers, and established my business as a professional coach and career strategist. It all involved a lot of adulting, but I still didn't feel like an adult.

Sometimes, I'd be driving our daughters to school and catch a look at myself in the rearview mirror. "How did this happen?" I'd think. "How can I be the adult here when I still feel like a kid?"

And then my husband and I realized that after all these years together, we were headed on different paths. We decided to divorce.

Removing my ring wasn't momentous at first

I took my wedding ring off on a regular weekday. It wasn't a milestone in the divorce process, not the day we made the choice, the day he moved out, or the day the courts made it official. It was a Tuesday.

Over the coming weeks, I watched as the indent on my left ring finger faded. I slowly adjusted to the lightness of my finger.

I went to a professional conference and noticed the rings worn by other women in the room — how they sparkled as they gestured, emphasizing their points in their small group discussions.

I looked at my own hands and didn't miss my ring at all.

Now I'm blossoming into the adult I was meant to be

Putting on my wedding ring may have made me look like an adult, but it was taking it off that made me feel like one.

Looking back, choosing to get married wasn't really an adult decision — it was me following the ladder of life, the path of expectations laid out for me by society, my parents, and myself. It was the next natural step towards what seemed like success in my late 20s.

Deciding to end my marriage was an intentional step off of that ladder. It was a sign of me forging my own path and being true to myself, even when that went against others' expectations.

At 27, I needed a ring as a prop to give me a sense of credibility. At 39, I derive that credibility from my track record of work, from the strands of grey in my hair, from the values I've defined as core to who I am, from the fact that I own my own business and can say, "I've been doing this for over a decade," from the internal satisfaction I get from showing up as the mom that I am.

I bought myself a simple gold ring that I now wear on my right hand. I picked it out for myself, for the woman I am becoming. It's engraved with a blooming camellia flower. To me, it's a sign that I'm finally coming into my own as a late bloomer. I'm finally an adult.

• Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev estimates that "a minority" of the company's new code is written by humans.
• On the 20VC podcast, Tenev said that it's become difficult to distinguish human-written from AI-generated code.
• He said the company has used tools like GitHub Copilot, Cursor, and Windsurf, and nearly 100% of his engineers use an AI editor.

At Robinhood, nearly all of the engineers are vibe coders.

That's according to Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev, who said on the 20VC podcast that the company's human-written code was hard to distinguish from AI-generated code. Among the company's engineers, "close to 100%" are using AI code editors, he said.

When asked what percentage of Robinhood's new code is AI-generated, Tenev said that it was around 50%. That's a higher percentage than what Microsoft and Google have previously said, with CEOs Satya Nadella and Sundar Pichai estimating around 30%.

Tenev acknowledged that the 50% metric was imprecise, thanks to the upgrowth of "agentic" code editors.

"We've moved from GitHub Copilot, which is an autocomplete system, to Cursor, and now things like Windsurf, where nearly all of the code is written by AI," Tenev said. "It's hard to even determine what the human-generated code is."

Taking a guess, Tenev estimated the "minority" of new code at Robinhood was written by humans.

Robinhood's stock price has been on a tear, trading up over 177% since the start of the year, with multiple factors driving its recent rally. Robinhood expanded its crypto venture by launching US private-stock tokens. Retail investors on Robinhood remain active, and the company continues to roll out new products like a predictions-market hub.

On 20VC, Tenev said AI had contributed to the company's cost and efficiency stabilization, he said.

"We have been pretty mum on how much we've been using it internally," Tenev said. "The impact that it's had on internal teams, ranging from software engineering to customer support, the really big internal teams, has been huge."

• Supplements can be helpful for heart health, according to a cardiologist.
• He shared the supplements he personally takes for his cardiovascular health.
• Studies show that omega-3, magnesium, and vitamin D are all good for the heart.

Supplements can boost longevity, reduce inflammation, and aid in strength training. They can also improve cardiovascular health, according to a heart transplant cardiologist.

Dr. Dmitry Yaranov, the director of the advanced heart failure program at Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis, told Business Insider that being a cardiologist makes him extra aware of cardiovascular disease, the leading cause of death in the US.

"I'm always very conscious about my diet," Yaranov said, and that includes supplements to support his heart health. At the same time, he said the list of supplements he takes is "not long," as he tries to focus on supplements that have more research behind them.

Supplements "support a healthy lifestyle, but they don't replace a healthy lifestyle," Yaranov said, emphasizing the importance of practicing heart-healthy habits like regular exercise and a balanced diet. "I think that a lot of times, my patients forget about that."

Omega-3 reduces the risk of blood clots

Of all the supplements he takes, Yaranov said that omega-3 has the most research backing its heart health benefits.

Found in foods like salmon, anchovies, soybeans, and walnuts, omega-3 helps support healthy blood cells, reducing the risk of blood clots. It also helps to lower triglyceride levels, a type of fat that can cause plaque buildup in the arteries and eventually lead to a stroke, heart attack, or heart disease.

"I know that for sure, I'm not getting enough fresh, fatty fish in my diet," Yaranov said, which is why he's been taking omega-3 supplements for years.

Magnesium glycinate improves sleep

Magnesium supports heart, bone, brain, and muscle health, controlling processes like blood pressure. It can naturally be found in foods like spinach and black beans, but up to 15% of Americans are magnesium-deficient.

Yaranov emphasized that he checks his magnesium levels every six months to a year through bloodwork, since "certain levels of magnesium are dangerous for the heart." Taking too much magnesium can lead to irregular heart rhythms and even cardiac arrest. He said cardiologists recommend keeping magnesium near 2.0-2.2 mg/dL, especially in patients with heart disease.

Getting his bloodwork done also helped him find the right type of magnesium for his body. Yaranov takes magnesium glycinate, which promotes better sleep than other forms of magnesium due to the presence of glycine, an amino acid with calming qualities. Prior to taking it, he tried magnesium oxide, citrate, and salts, but they either didn't improve his levels or upset his stomach.

That "eventually will feed into cardiovascular health," as poor sleep negatively impacts the heart, he said. He also works out five days a week and sweats a lot, which can deplete the body's magnesium levels.

Vitamin D may prevent heart disease

Vitamin D is associated with a lower risk of heart attack in adults over 60. While more research is needed on the exact benefits vitamin D has on the heart, many researchers and clinicians believe there's no harm in supplementing with vitamin D, especially when it has other proven perks like helping the body absorb calcium and boosting the immune system. (While it's technically possible to overdose on vitamin D, it usually happens when people take more than their recommended value of vitamin D supplements.)

Vitamin D can be found through sun exposure and foods like fatty fish and milk. Yaranov said he spends "a long time indoors," which can contribute to vitamin D deficiency. When he learned his levels were low, he added vitamin D to his list of daily supplements.

• Some rideshare drivers use apps like Mystro and GigU to analyze prospective rides.
• The apps can use a phone's accessibility features to read the screen and overlay a widget to guide drivers.
• Uber and Lyft have tried to stop them, according to the apps' founders.

As gig workers' incomes have dropped, some Uber and Lyft drivers are turning to apps like GigU, Maxymo, and Mystro to help them work smarter — and dodge the lowest-paying rides.

"They weed out the garbage offers that they're sending you," said Sergio Avedian, a driver and senior contributor to the Rideshare Guy, a gig driver advocacy blog and YouTube channel. "The cherry-pickers always make more money."

Some of the apps have recently encountered roadblocks in the form of rideshare giants Uber and Lyft, which argue that using the third-party apps runs afoul of their terms of service.

Doug Feigelson, the CEO of Mystro, told Business Insider that Uber has sent letters accusing his company of violating its terms of service and interfering with its relationships with drivers.

"We think we're aligned with at least their publicly stated values," Feigelson said, adding that he believes his app promotes driver safety by keeping drivers' eyes on the road. He said he hopes the companies can reach a deal. "But we certainly are worried, especially with Uber's cease-and-desist letters, that they might sue us."

An Uber representative said they wouldn't talk about any specific app, but said "using third-party tools to bypass the system breaks our Community Guidelines and Terms of Service. It hurts riders, other drivers, and the trust that keeps Uber running."

The apps often use an Android phone's accessibility features to read the screen and overlay a widget to guide the driver. Feigelson said Mystro uses ride and delivery apps' application programming interfaces, or APIs, so that drivers can automatically accept and reject offers based on criteria they select, such as the ride's per-mile revenue.

They aren't free, but they say drivers can increase their earnings by more than what the tools cost, which ranges from $5 to $19 a month. Some drivers have previously told BI that they can make more money if they're pickier about the rides they accept, though for Uber drivers, declining rides based on destinations can put their accounts at risk.

Once upon a time, Uber was seen as a technological disruptor, upsetting incumbent taxi companies and bucking outdated local rules on ride services. The company even had a project called Greyball that it used for years to serve up a fake version of the app to regulators.

Now, it's the one cracking down. GigU, which launched in the United States in May, was sued by Uber in Brazil, where it says its app has been downloaded a half-million times. GigU says it has come out ahead, although Uber has said the legal process is ongoinGigUigU also said it has filed an antitrust complaint against Uber with CADE, a Brazilian regulator.

Uber said its driver app is transparent about where demand is high and where a particular ride would go and how much a driver would make from it. Transferring credentials violates its terms of service, the representative said.

"Using automation tools, apps, or bots to manipulate the Uber app or access Uber data in any way isn't allowed."

Luiz Gustavo Neves, GigU's CEO and cofounder, also told BI that some of its US users recently got an email from Lyft. The message told gig workers that Lyft had "identified unusual behavior associated with your driver account" and that third-party apps, of which GigU is one, "are not secure and not allowed."

While the message didn't specifically name GigU or any other apps, Lyft's message made the risks to drivers clear: "Your account may be at risk of deactivation."

Since Lyft sent out the message, GigU and Mystro have both sought to argue that using the apps doesn't put drivers' access to Lyft at risk. GigU has published a blog post on its website and answered users' questions on Reddit, Neves said. GigU isn't violating Lyft's terms of service, Neves believes.

A Lyft spokesperson said the group isn't against all third-party apps and says it hasn't disabled any driver accounts for using them. It said that some of the apps cross lines, though it didn't name any.

"Unauthorized apps can harm the user experience and create an unfair marketplace for our drivers, for example by enabling automatic ride cancellations, delaying response times, and disadvantaging those who follow the rules," the spokesperson wrote in an email.

Most ride-hailing and delivery drivers still don't use third-party apps to screen their ride and delivery offers. The UberEatsDrivers forum on Reddit, which is run by drivers and has 76,000 members, says it will ban users who discuss what it calls "cheating apps." The rule singles out Para, which shut down last year, according to Reddit posts by its users.

Minsu Longiaru, an attorney with the worker advocacy group PowerSwitch Action, said it's unsurprising that ride-hailing drivers would turn to third-party apps in hopes of getting an edge. She said her group's recent survey of Uber drivers showed that most of them felt "squeezed and manipulated" by the app and said they often earned less than they expected because offers seemed to get worse as they approached their goals.

"We think that it's fair that drivers should be able to use tools that they have at their disposal to try and make a fair and decent wage," she said. "At the same time, these third-party tools are not a substitute for real protection."

This past fall, Lyft executive Jeremy Byrd said it has made its app more transparent for drivers.

Some drivers and the teams behind the apps are skeptical of the gig apps' claims to be acting in drivers' interests.

"They probably would love it if drivers only worked for their app and if they offered lowball fares and drivers would accept them," Feigelson said.

• Amir Satvat created a free website with resources for laid-off video-game industry workers.
• The games industry has faced significant layoffs, with an estimated 37,600 jobs lost since 2022.
• Satvat's successful mid-life pivot to gaming made him confident he could be a de facto career guru.

A few years after Amir Satvat landed his first video-game job at the age of 38, layoffs started piling up across the industry at companies such as Xbox maker Microsoft and publisher Electronic Arts. Seeing many of his new peers let go, he became motivated to lend a hand.

Satvat built a website and filled it with a range of free resources tailored for out-of-work game talent. It includes two still-growing lists — one of job postings and another with contact information for hundreds of people he enlisted to provide support, such as résumé reviews and mock interviews.

"I was like, what if I made the most comprehensive job listing site ever?" Satvat told Business Insider of his thinking when he got started on the initiative in late 2022. "I'm good at modeling, scraping the internet."

Satvat also created a Discord group for the site's users to network with each other and he's given away thousands of tickets to industry events that he acquired by partnering with their organizers. He said he doesn't charge or make any money off his career site, describing it as a purely philanthropic side hustle.

Based on user feedback, Satvat said his efforts to date appear to have helped around 3,900 ousted game-industry workers find new jobs, a feat that earned him the inaugural Game Changer award at last year's annual Game Awards show in Los Angeles and this year's Giving Award from the nonprofit Games for Change in New York.

Those honors come as the game industry has been grappling with an exceptionally high volume of layoffs. An estimated 37,600 jobs have been shed since 2022, according to an online tally of termination announcements and media reports compiled by Farhan Noor, a technical artist in California.

Like employers in many other industries, game companies overhired during the pandemic but other factors have contributed to the cuts, too, such as rising production and marketing costs.

Breaking into the video-game biz

Satvat has been a gamer since he was a kid, and by high school, he knew he wanted to work in the industry despite not having artistic inclinations. "I just liked business stuff," he said.

But after earning undergraduate and graduate business degrees, he couldn't find any game jobs near where he lived on the East Coast, and staying close to family was a nonnegotiable. "I come from a very tight knit diaspora of a Persian community," he said.

Satvat spent several years in business-development roles outside gaming, most recently in a remote one at Amazon's cloud-computing unit. In 2021, after his first year at Amazon, a colleague introduced him to Ethan Evans, a leader in the company's gaming division.

Satvat explained that he was a devoted player of franchises like "World of Warcraft" and "The Legend of Zelda," and the conversation ultimately landed him the kind of job he'd long desired.

"It was transparent how much he knew the [game] community and loved it," said Evans, who also didn't start his career in gaming and is now an executive coach. Satvat "wasn't trying to get a promotion. He was trying to move from one thing to another to get closer to something he wanted to do."

About a year later, though, Satvat reluctantly resigned from Amazon because the Seattle-based company began mandating in-office attendance, which meant he'd have to relocate.

He said he was fortunate to quickly land his current job, a remote business-development position at Chinese game giant Tencent. The person who previously had it reached out over LinkedIn to say he'd just left the company and that Satvat should apply for the role. Satvat later learned that this person found him through mutual LinkedIn connections and was aware of his career site.

Now 43, married, and the father of three boys, Satvat works out of his home in Connecticut and continues to spend about 15 to 20 hours every week updating his career site. He also gets help from about 20 volunteers who are aligned with the project's mission of "empowering gamers at every stage of their career."

Satvat told BI that it was his successful mid-life pivot to gaming from enterprise software and earlier, healthcare, that made him confident he could become a de facto career guru. When asked for his best advice for job seekers, including those looking to change industries, he pointed to old-fashioned networking.

"Spend all your time meeting people," Satvat said. "Every single job I've gotten has been through a relationship."

• I wanted to attend my cousin's wedding, but was concerned about travel costs.
• When I found out kids weren't invited, I scrambled to find a babysitter.
• I changed my mind about going at all when I learned there was no rehearsal dinner.

Outside a café, a stranger and I struck up a conversation. Somehow, it turned to weddings. I explained to her that my cousin was getting married in Chicago this summer, and I was considering going, but it'd be pricey to take my entire family.

"You should go," she said, her eyes boring into mine. "I have learned over the years how important it is to take every opportunity to be with family."

With that conviction, I began planning how to make the trip affordable by using credit card points and asking to stay with the bride's parents, my aunt and uncle, in the Chicago area. I decided we could make the trip work because, as the stranger said, you can't put a price on family time.

Then I called my mom and learned that my aunt and uncle's house had already been claimed. A setback, but I'd see if I'd accrued enough points to cover the hotel.

When the invitation came, it was addressed to only my husband and me. In "etiquette land," that meant my kids were not invited to the wedding.

I respect the decision not to have children at a wedding — it saves money and there's something fun about an adult-only celebration. Still, it does make it difficult for us out-of-towners, who are left with a few less-than-desirable options: either taking the trip without children, hiring a stranger, or bringing a babysitter with us.

In my situation, each option felt complicated. Leaving town without my children meant missing out on the summer memories I had been hoping to make in Chicago as a complete unit. Hiring a stranger in an unfamiliar city felt too unsettling, while bringing a babysitter along meant increasing the trip's already higher-than-anticipated costs.

Then I learned there wouldn't be a rehearsal dinner. That was the last straw — I had to decline the invite.

Rehearsal dinners are one of the most underrated parts of a wedding celebration

I love rehearsal dinners. They feel like a chance to celebrate the bride and groom in a more relaxed environment because, let's face it, wedding days are such a blur. The bride and groom are often pulled in a hundred directions for photographs, formal dances, and toasts, among other things. As a guest, I've never managed to do more than offer them a quick hug or congratulations.

The rehearsal dinner, however, is a break from the chaos — a chance to connect and have a meaningful conversation with the bridal party and family members. They don't need to be hosted at a Michelin-starred restaurant either. In my experience, they are just an excuse to have a mini family reunion.

At my sister's dress rehearsal, I had a long conversation with my great-uncle, connecting over our mutual love of history. It was one of the last times I saw him before he passed away.

Without a rehearsal dinner, we will spend less quality time with everyone who has traveled far and wide to be there, and I know I won't get to see the bride much anyway. I love my cousin, and I'm sad to miss out, but I know we will visit again at a later time when we can spend more quality time together, rather than a rushed "Hi, thanks for coming to our wedding."

So, I sent the couple a nice gift and plan to gush over the wedding photos when they're posted. Who knows, maybe I'll still eat an honorary piece of cake that night and raise a toast to their union.

• Trump administration policies could deter international visitors ahead of events like the World Cup.
• The Big Beautiful Bill increased visa fees and cut funding to the group that promotes US travel.
• Travel associations say the US also has an image issue that the White House should address.

Major moneymakers for the travel industry are on the horizon, and with them, billions of dollars from overseas into the US.

But the potential windfall from those events could be at risk.

President Donald Trump's policies — and the perception of his policies — could cause some international visitors to rethink travel to the US altogether. This is happening right before several major events that are expected to rake in tourism dollars, including the FIFA World Cup and America's 250th birthday next year, and the Summer Olympics in 2028.

"The overall picture right now is kind of a perfect storm," Lisa Simon, executive director of the International Inbound Travel Association, told Business Insider.

Trump's immigration policies and ICE crackdowns have some international visitors concerned that they aren't welcome in the US anymore. Meanwhile, changes passed in the Big Beautiful Bill, including an increase in visa fees and a funding cut for the organization that promotes tourism to the US, could lead to a further decline in international visitors.

Even without major events like the World Cup, tourism is big business in the US. Travel generated $1.3 trillion in spending in the US in 2024, according to a report from the US Travel Association, and supported 15 million jobs. It's also one of the US's largest service exports, drawing $181 billion in spending from international inbound travelers in 2024.

But the industry has already taken a hit under Trump. Simon said international travel to the US was down more than 6% year-to-date. Noting that foreign visitors typically book far in advance, she said the second half of the year and into next year look even worse, with some IITA members reporting booking declines as high as 40 to 60% in some markets.

While the US is still a top destination for international travelers, its market share has already been shrinking due to other destinations growing faster in popularity, she said.

The US's loss is also another country's gain, and Simon said destinations in Europe and Asia are already winning over travelers who are choosing to skip the US. China, for instance, has been opening up visa-free entry to more countries, drawing more visitors — and their money.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

The Big Beautiful Bill makes visiting the US more expensive for some

Erik Hansen, senior vice president, government relations, at the US Travel Association, told BI that surveys consistently show there are two primary factors that deter foreign visitors to the US: first, cost, and second, whether the US is a welcoming destination.

"For the One Big Beautiful Bill, it set us back in both areas," Hansen said.

The recently passed and signed spending bill adds to the cost barrier for foreign visitors. For travelers visiting from countries for which the US has waived visas, such as Australia, France, and South Korea, the fee for their travel authorization, or ESTA, was increased from $21 to $40. But for travelers from countries that require tourist visas, like China, Brazil, and India, a Visa Integrity fee of $250 was introduced. That fee is on top of the existing $185 tourist visa, making the new cost $435.

That means a family of four would be spending an additional $1,000 on fees before even entering the US. Hansen said that's $1,000 that's not being spent at American businesses.

The spending bill also cut match funding to Brand USA, the marketing organization that promotes travel to the US, from $100 million to $20 million. Hansen said Brand USA is "our megaphones for welcoming the world and encouraging people to come to the United States."

He said a lot of travel businesses and destinations also count on Brand USA to sell them to international markets, adding it's likely to be smaller and more rural destinations, many of which are represented by Republicans in Congress, to suffer the most from the funding cut.

An image and messaging issue

Simon and Hansen noted that, with the exception of countries affected by the travel ban, the Trump administration has not officially changed the rules for tourists visiting the US.

Still, stories of immigration crackdowns and international travelers having run-ins with ICE, or even being denied entry to the US on some occasions, have many international visitors feeling unwelcome. Several countries, including Germany, the United Kingdom, and Portugal, have even issued warnings or advisories to their citizens about visiting the US.

"I think the Trump administration's focus on illegal immigration has been misinterpreted by many people abroad as they don't want any foreign visitors here, but that's absolutely not the case," Hansen said.

The White House has established a World Cup task force with the goal of ensuring "a successful hosting of world-class international events that reflect the values, security, and hospitality of the United States of America."

Hansen said he has also spoken to cabinet officials who said they share the goal of making the US the best destination for international travel.

But there has been some less-than-friendly messaging, too.

"We want them to come, we want them to celebrate, we want them to watch the game," Vice President JD Vance said during the task force's first meeting in May. "But when the time is up, they'll have to go home. Otherwise, they'll have to talk to Secretary Noem."

The nod to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, one of the faces of Trump's deportation efforts, could be interpreted as not very welcoming.

"It's not that it's necessarily a totally negative message, it's just not the friendliest," Simon said, adding that the administration should focus on getting a welcoming message out.

In addition to pushing for a welcoming message, the US Travel Association is also appealing to the White House and Congress to restore Brand USA funding and cut the increased visa fees, Hansen said.

He added that making it more expensive to come to the US "doesn't make any sense" given the administration's stated goals of growing US exports and lessening trade deficits.

"That's a self-imposed tariff on one of our largest exports," he said.

• Chris Williams is an ex-VP of HR at Microsoft and has over 40 years of executive experience.
• He acknowledges that AI is fueling both chaos and opportunity in the tech industry.
• Williams said despite disruptions, learning has never been easier and there's more money out there.

Tech layoffs are the new normal. The headlines come fast: Meta, Google, Salesforce, and, just recently, Microsoft, are cutting thousands. The jobs are gone, and for many, so is the optimism.

I don't want to minimize the widespread pain for tech workers. But I do see three rays of hope that offer a reason for some optimism, based on my background as the former VP of HR for Microsoft and 40 years of business leadership experience.

Change means opportunity for expansion

AI is fueling both the chaos and the opportunity. Thanks to AI, tech firms are seeing massive productivity gains and doing more with fewer people. Competitive and shareholder pressure means layoffs, but every breakthrough needs people to build and implement it.

Yes, the auto industry displaced carriage makers, but it also absorbed their skills and created countless more jobs. AI could follow the same curve: short-term disruption, long-term expansion.

The tech companies, while laying off some, are hiring many others to drive their own AI products. Other companies need help taking advantage of AI. The first wave of easy adoptions may have crested, yet for many firms, the reinvention of their businesses to fully leverage AI awaits the people who can help them do that.

Further, cataclysmic change often leads to vast expansion. Automobiles weren't simply a one-to-one replacement for carriages; they democratized transportation and led to the expansion of entire industries: huge investments in road building and major increases in travel, to name just two. Perhaps it's too soon to tell where that expansion comes from with AI, but I believe it's out there.

AI is laying waste to many traditional white-collar jobs. But for those who are willing to adapt, there's an entire new frontier of opportunity.

Learning has never been easier

An interesting twist of the internet-obsessed and AI-focused era is that learning has never been easier. There are resources everywhere to help you transition into a skilled AI practitioner.

You don't have to enroll in expensive courses, get advanced degrees, or endure yearslong apprenticeships like many other professions; you just need a laptop. There are videos, websites, and forums teeming with everything you ever wanted to know about taking advantage of AI. The guides are free, and the AI tools themselves will even teach you how to use them.

Finally, most of the tech behind AI is wide open for all to see. The heavy competition in AI models means they're all courting — and training — people to work with their systems. In this gold rush era of AI, it's as if the world is begging you to become an AI expert.

New money is out there

There's also a change in the world of tech investments that offers an interesting glimmer of hope. In my work with several startups I've seen that, as wealth concentrates higher and higher, a new wave of investors is creating opportunity. Specifically, I've seen more funding come from family offices, private wealth management advisory firms that handle investments for ultra-high-net-worth families.

For the last several years, the venture capital world has tightened. The smart money is being reined in, taking fewer bold risks. This makes it harder for very new ventures to get funded by traditional VCs.

But at least one startup I work with has had great success approaching this new wave of "angel investors" with these offices. They're intrigued by bold ideas in corners of tech that VCs won't touch. And the recent "big bill" through congress eased regulations on those investments.

This opens new opportunities for people jettisoned by their large tech companies. Many have connections with the very peers who went on to larger success, and they can get funding for new ideas that, just a few years ago, were rare.

Light at the end of the tunnel

No, the world of new startups funded by angel investors is not for everyone. But the last decade or two of tech has minted a new world of opportunity for those who can take this bold risk.

It might feel like AI is coming for every job. But for those who can pivot, build, or back bold ideas, there's still light at the end of the tunnel.

Chris Williams is a former VP of HR at Microsoft. He's an executive-level advisor and consultant with over 40 years of experience leading and building teams.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Justin Nedelman, the 48-year-old CEO of Pressed Juicery based in Los Angeles. It's been edited for length and clarity.

I began my career as a retail real-estate developer, building shopping centers and hotels.

I then started a restaurant group out of the ashes of my real-estate company in the 2008 recession. I was the CEO of Eureka! Restaurant Group from 2009 to 2021.

Pressed Juicery was doing a formal CEO search, and I knew a board member, so I decided to put my hat in the ring. My wellness background, experience, and consumer-oriented mindset made it a perfect match.

I continued in real estate and hospitality until June 2023, when I became the CEO of Pressed Juicery. Here's what a typical day looks like.

Monday to Friday, I wake up naturally around 4:15 a.m.

From 4:15 to 4:25 a.m., I drink a 10-oz glass of water followed by a 5-oz Americano or Pressed cold brew. This is my only dose of caffeine per day. I drink while having quiet time to think and prepare for the day.

From 4:25 to 4:35 a.m., I have five minutes of meditation and breathwork to relax and energize. I check my heart rate variability and resting heart rate from the previous night on my Whoop. I then catch up on business and world news, stock market information, and social media.

I work out from 4:45 to 5:45 a.m., and it takes me 10 minutes to drive to one of the three gyms I belong to. I have multiple memberships because I choose where to work out based on my time and mindset, and I don't want to have an excuse that the gym is closed.

I'll do a CrossFit-style workout with a weighted vest or use a jump rope intermittently between sets. I do weights and quasi-cardio. My workouts are more intense and diverse on the weekends.

I let myself rest every seven to 10 days, when I sleep in until 5:30 a.m., even on the weekends.

After working out, I help my wife make breakfast and lunch for our children

I drive back home to shower. From 6:15 to 7 a.m., I drink a 20-oz water and a decaf Americano with my wife and help her make breakfast and lunch for the children. My children are in high school now. Mornings with my wife and kids are important.

I skip breakfast every three days after a hard workout to do intermittent fasting. For the days I eat, I have a Pressed Greens juice, an avocado, or grilled cold fish with salad, and nonfat Greek yogurt with fruit and seeds.

I always start with fat and protein over carbs, as this energizes me. Once a week, I do a 24-hour fast to reset my metabolism. I also regularly do cleanses.

I drop my son off at school and head to the office by 8:30 a.m.

It takes me 30 minutes to drive to the office. When I joined Pressed, the office had a flexible policy of two days a week. I'm a big believer in bringing people together for collaboration, so I'm in the office at least four days a week.

When I'm not in the office, I'm in the field, either looking at stores or competitors and learning what's happening in CPG or traveling to our manufacturing facility.

I don't have spontaneous calls with anyone. My style is more structured and planned, and I have one-on-ones with folks reporting to me. I even plan time to not have anything planned.

I probably don't take enough time for lunch, but I eat with our team

We cater lunch for the Pressed team, and it's usually a plant-forward, healthy meal. It's an incentive and a perk of coming into the office.

It's helpful to sit with folks from different departments, and it's efficient. I'll eat with the team when I can, a meal with high protein, some greens, a thoughtful carb intake, and no bread unless I'm in Paris.

If I visit stores, it's usually planned weeks in advance with our operations leader, and we're not there to audit them. We meet with the regional operations and store management teams to analyze how good our marketing is and look at opportunities.

My wife will say I leave the office too late, but I try to leave by 6 p.m.

I get home between 6:30 and 6:45 p.m. and try to have dinner with the family — there are days I'm later. My wife cooks, but occasionally, we'll order in.

Our dinners center on protein, vegetables, and a sensible carb. We'll also go to Pressed stores sometimes. The kids like that, and it's fun to get their perspective. They have good insight into what's relevant for their age group.

I don't believe in the separation of work and life. For me, it's about work-life integration, not work-life balance.

On Thursday evenings, I play tennis with my wife or daughter, followed by time in the sauna. On Fridays, I swim or surf with my son in the ocean. Fitness through swimming, surfing, mountain biking, tennis, or hiking keeps life exciting.

After dinner, I'll watch a show or read a book with my wife

I'm reading Elon Musk's biography, and I'm having my son read it, too — I try to connect with him that way.

My wife and I will also catch up on the day without the kids and watch our favorite show, The White Lotus. I also like the BBC and will watch some news to catch up on what the world is saying about America.

I'm a fan of social media, but I limit my consumption. I enjoy scrolling through Instagram. I study how brands present themselves, and I'm always fascinated.

I'll also take a Pressed calm shot before bed. I aim to go to sleep at 10 p.m.

I try not to do intense work on the weekends

I try not to do work that requires multiple hours of concentration because if I do, it's hard to pivot back into family and personal time. I do light work that requires 30 minutes of focus or less.

My weekends are committed to hanging out with family and integrating fitness. I came to Pressed because I love wellness and fitness, and Pressed is an extension of those.

It's easy to come to work every day and talk about this seven days a week because it doesn't feel like work — it feels like I'm just living my life.

Everything is intentional. Self-prioritization as a leader is important.

• Everyone seems to be talking about the "Gen Z" stare."
• It's when someone, often in a customer service situation, stares blankly at you.
• But if you're getting the stare, here's a tip: Maybe it's you who is causing the problem!

Let's say you're at your favorite coffee shop. You order a customized drink — the same one you've ordered hundreds of times. The 20-something barista says it's not available today.

Exasperated, you explain that you've ordered it many times in the past.

You're met with a blank stare.

You repeat yourself, anxious to fill the dead silence, but the barista isn't budging — and neither is her face.

Let's face it. You just got the "Gen Z stare." But, consider this: Maybe you deserved it! And maybe the Gen Z barista is onto something.

First things first: Is the "Gen Z stare" even real? I'm not entirely sure; I've never noticed it myself (but I'm also a socially capable and polite person who doesn't act like a jerk in customer service situations).

Still, judging from the number of TikToks I've seen on the topic — even Gen Zers themselves admit this is real. I've watched dozens of videos where a young person acts out a situation they experienced working in a retail or service job: In these reenactments, an older person comes in and asks for something unreasonable, leaving the zoomer agog and agape, speechless and staring.

Anyone who has worked any kind of customer service or retail job will tell you that these kinds of baffling and frustrating experiences happen regularly. People can be rude, entitled, and ask for completely unreasonable things.

I have some experience with this, although I'm an elder millennial, so I'm dating myself with this reference: I was behind the customer service desk at a movie theater when three college-age people came up and asked for a refund for their tickets to "Me, Myself & Irene" because they found the content too racy. (To be fair, there is at least one really funny visual joke involving bodily fluids.) The idea that you would ask for a refund for a movie simply because you didn't like it was shocking to me. (They did, indeed, get their refunds.) Who does that?! Who expects that the world works like that?!

But I worked in customer service for a long time, and I became seasoned at it. After a while, nothing shocks you about the unreasonable ways that some customers behave — and you build a skill set of how to handle demanding people.

One thing I learned is that sometimes silence is the best way to handle a situation. In other words, you might say: Give 'em the "Gen Z stare." If someone keeps pushing, eventually you have to leave some silence hanging in the air — no more room for them to negotiate.

As a journalist, I know the value of staying silent. Allowing for an awkward silence is one of the few tricks reporters have up their unfashionable sleeves. It makes the other person want to keep talking to fill the silence, which is exactly what you want them to do.

"Silence is very powerful," René Rodriguez, a communication and negotiation coach and author of "Amplify Your Influence," told Business Insider. Still, it's a pretty bold communication choice — and Rodriguez used a golf analogy.

"The caution I'd give is that a driver is a very good tool — but it's not a good tool if you're on a putting green."

Rodriguez warned that deploying silence can win a negotiation, but hurt a relationship, and should be used sparingly. "If you had a disrespectful, highly dysregulated customer who made threats, that's what works — the gray rock, as people call it," he said.

So if you find yourself on the receiving end of the "Gen Z stare," think a little bit about how you got yourself there. Like Ava Max (technically a young millennial) says, maybe you're the problem.

• Ring founder Jamie Siminoff has led a broad overhaul of the company since his return in April.
• He recently reinstated Ring's original mission.
• The founder has also stressed productivity and cost-efficiency, following Andy Jassy's core message.

Amazon's Ring division is re-embracing founder mode, part of a broader cultural and operational crackdown by CEO Andy Jassy.

In April, Ring founder Jamie Siminoff rejoined Amazon to run the internet-based doorbell company again. He replaced former CEO Liz Hamren.

Just months into his return, Siminoff is making sweeping changes.

One of his first moves: scrapping Ring's socially driven mission — "Keep people close to what's important" — which Amazon introduced last year.

In its place, Siminoff reinstated Ring's original mission statement, "Make neighborhoods safer," which suggests the business is going back to its founding identity as a crime-prevention tool.

"So excited to be back working on our mission to make neighborhoods safer!" Siminoff wrote in a companywide email on his second day back. A copy of the memo was viewed by Business Insider.

The shift marks the beginning of a broader reset led by Siminoff, who returned after a two-year hiatus. Alongside the mission reboot, he's pushing for faster execution, greater efficiency, and a deeper reliance on AI, according to internal emails and conversations with current and former employees. These individuals asked not to be identified because they're not authorized to discuss internal matters.

Ring's transformation reflects broader shifts within Amazon, where Jassy emphasizes productivity and cost-efficiency across the sprawling e-commerce and cloud giant. Other Big Tech companies, from Google and Meta to Microsoft, are making similar changes.

"We are reimagining Ring from the ground up with AI first," Siminoff wrote in a recent email to staff. "It feels like the early days again — same energy and the same potential to revolutionize how we do our neighborhood safety."

A Ring spokesperson declined to comment.

A Return to Surveillance

While Siminoff was away, Ring softened its public image under Hamren's leadership. The company leaned into a more community-focused brand and distanced itself from the surveillance tools that previously sparked privacy concerns.

Hamren retired a controversial feature that allowed law enforcement to request footage from Ring users through the Neighbors app and introduced a more approachable mission statement last year.

Now, Siminoff is rolling back much of that vision, steering Ring back to its original role as a neighborhood crime watchdog.

As part of that pivot, Ring announced a partnership with Axon in April that effectively revives the video-request feature for police. The company is also exploring a new integration with Axon that would enable livestreaming from Ring devices for those who consent, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Privacy and civil liberties groups have criticized Ring's video-sharing capabilities, citing a lack of transparency and concerns about unethical use. In 2023, Amazon agreed to a $5.8 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over allegations of privacy violations. Amazon denied wrongdoing.

Several Ring employees told BI they remain uneasy about the partnership with Axon, which is famous for making Tasers, which are used by law enforcement to zap people with electric shocks.

These Ring employees said customers may not don't fully understand what they're opting into, and it's unclear how video footage will ultimately be used. Data security also remains a concern, they added.

Siminoff's influence is also showing up in Ring's product roadmap and internal policies.

The long-delayed home surveillance drone, originally unveiled in 2020, is expected to launch soon, according to people familiar with the plans. Siminoff has been testing the drone in the office, though it's likely to debut in limited quantities, they said.

In June, Ring introduced a new text alert feature that provides real-time updates about activity captured by its devices. According to a recent internal email, Siminoff told employees the alerts would soon be refined to notify users only when "something unusual happens."

"My vision has always been that Ring would help super power our neighborhoods for good," Siminoff wrote in an April email.

'Bigger impact'

Siminoff, who founded Ring in 2011, sold the company to Amazon in 2018 for about $1 billion. His official title now is VP of product, but he signs off his emails as Ring's "Chief Inventor and Founder."

In practice, he oversees not only Ring but also Amazon's Blink security cameras, Key in-home delivery service, and the Sidewalk wireless network. Ring doesn't have a formal CEO anymore.

When Siminoff returned, some staffers were apprehensive about changes he might make. That concern was reinforced when he introduced a new travel policy in April requiring employees to email the company about the purpose of each business trip. He cited high travel costs and said the emails would serve as documentation when "auditing things."

After some employees pushed back, Siminoff doubled down in a follow-up message, reaffirming the policy. That second time, he pointed to a recent Jassy annual shareholder letter, which emphasized building a culture that encourages employees to ask "why" as a path to smarter decision-making.

"If we all keep doing this, I am certain we will be able to have such a bigger impact on the world," Siminoff wrote.

Since his return, Siminoff has also made changes to Ring's leadership and operations. In late April, Chief Product Officer Mike Harris and Chief Technology Officer Mike Balog both exited. In their place, Siminoff brought back longtime lieutenant Jason Mitura to lead the product and technology teams across Ring, Blink, and Sidewalk, according to an internal email.

Siminoff has also consolidated Rings office footprint for "speed" and "efficiency." Ring's Santa Monica office is shutting down, while Amazon's Hawthorne and Amsterdam locations have become headquarters for the combined Ring, Blink, Key, and Sidewalk teams.

'Double our output immediately'

Internally, Siminoff has scrapped Ring's monthly all-hands meetings and replaced them with a steady stream of companywide emails. Many of these messages focus on eliminating bureaucracy and encouraging creativity with AI.

In April, he launched a dedicated inbox where employees could submit new ideas (something Jassy has also done since becoming CEO of Amazon). While praising some of the more unconventional submissions, Siminoff also urged employees to vet their ideas through AI tools first to avoid duplication, and to consider the resources required and messaging clarity before pitching.

Siminoff has made it clear that AI will be central to Ring's future.

Starting in the third quarter, every promotion will have to prove that the employee used AI to improve operational efficiency or customer experiences, according to a recent email. They will also have to explain how they "accomplished more with less," the email said.

In mid-June, Siminoff also encouraged employees to use AI at least once a day to improve productivity. The following day, he circulated a memo from Jassy that warned job cuts could result from AI-driven efficiencies.

"If we all lean in on AI, could we launch 10% or 10 times more shit?" Siminoff asked in a recent email. "My guess is if we really all fully leaned in on AI and pushed ourselves hard to create constraints that only could be overcome with the use of AI, we could double our output immediately."

Not all of Siminoff's communications focus on technology. In one instance, he addressed a cultural issue: the excessive use of acronyms in meetings.

He noted that acronyms often obscure meaning and slow down decision-making.

"The best thing we can do is use data and clear language," he wrote. "It allows for faster and more accurate decisions."

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