Baap Rey !!: What HBO's "Succession" Can Teach Us About Negotiating

What HBO's "Succession" Can Teach Us About Negotiating

The season four opener of the HBO series Succession features a contest between media tycoon Logan Roy and his children to acquire another media empire. The episode showcases classic mistakes that negotiators often make in high-stakes situations. The five lessons: avoid offers you can’t justify, frame your proposal, anchors are sticky, emotions can derail negotiations, and negotiate process, not just substance.

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The Remedy for Creative Block and Existential Stuckness

To create anything — a poem, a painting, a theorem, a garden — is not to will something new into being but to surrender to the most ancient and alive part of ourselves — the stratum of spirit vibrating with every experience we have ever had, every book we have ever read, every love we have ever loved, every dream we have ever dreamt. It is a process that requires great strength and great patience, for it asks of us to quiet the din of demand and break free from the straitjacket of habit in order to make audible the inner voice whispered from the depths of life, wild and free. “The most regretful people on earth,” Mary Oliver wrote as she contemplated creativity, “are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.”How to live into our creative power is what improvisational violinist and computer artist Stephen Nachmanovitch explores in his classic Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art (public library), published the year I was born. Writing in the spirit of Lewis Hyde’s The Gift, Nachmanovitch considers a common stage of the creative process — what the polymathic mathematician Henri Poincaré called “sudden illumination” and the physicist Freeman Dyson called “a flash of illumination” — and offers an essential guardrail against the mythos of such Eureka! moments:

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How Generative AI Will Change Sales

Sales teams have typically not been early adopters of technology, but generative AI may be an exception to that. Sales work typically requires administrative work, routine interactions with clients, and management attention to tasks such as forecasting. AI can help do these tasks more quickly, which is why Microsoft and Salesforce have already rolled out sales-focused versions of this powerful tool.

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How Generative AI Will Change Sales

What HBO's "Succession" Can Teach Us About Negotiating

Redesigning How We Work

Many of us assumed that by now, years into the pandemic, we’d have settled on new structures, practices, and processes for hybrid work. But we haven’t. Instead most companies are stuck in a transitional phase, where little is resolved. Why is it taking us so long to work this out? Because, the author writes, the new world of hybrid work isn’t simply about determining whether everybody should come back full-time to the office. It’s also forcing us to test long-held assumptions about how work should be done and what it even is.

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Gujiya: A flaky pastry to celebrate Holi

For Indians, the word gujiya (sweet fried pastry) will evoke one main association: Holi. This "festival of colours" celebrates the arrival of spring and, like most Indian festivals, is associated with myths and legends that commemorate the triumph of good over evil. It's celebrated across the country, but is more prominent in North India, where it's marked by people smearing coloured powder on their faces and bodies and drenching each other with coloured water.The celebrations also include indulging in gujiya, a crescent-shaped pastry encasing a sweet mixture of khoya (milk solids), powdered sugar and nuts that's deep-fried to a golden-brown colour. It's flaky and crumbly on the outside, giving way to a soft and sweet filling.

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Carbonara from a centuries-old trattoria

One of the oldest trattorias in Rome, located in the heart of the Testaccio neighbourhood, Perilli has been serving Roman classics since 1911. Its traditional carbonara is widely considered one of the best in Rome.According to restaurant owner, Maurizio Perilli, the dish is made with simple ingredients that must be of the highest quality, including "good guanciale, good pasta and always delicious hen eggs".

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Tyrannosaurus rex: our new research shows it covered its enormous teeth with lips

Picture a Tyrannosaurus rex, that ferocious yet one of the most beloved dinosaurs. Most people will probably imagine a scaly giant with enormous fangs, visible even when its mouth is closed. This is the image of toothy predatory dinosaurs that popular culture has perpetuated for over 30 years.

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AI will soon become impossible for humans to comprehend - the story of neural networks tells us why

David Beer’s book The Tensions of Algorithmic Thinking has recently been published by Bristol University Press.In 1956, during a year-long trip to London and in his early 20s, the mathematician and theoretical biologist Jack D. Cowan visited Wilfred Taylor and his strange new “learning machine”. On his arrival he was baffled by the “huge bank of apparatus” that confronted him. Cowan could only stand by and watch “the machine doing its thing”. The thing it appeared to be doing was performing an “associative memory scheme” – it seemed to be able to learn how to find connections and retrieve data.

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What went wrong in Peter Bol's doping case? A sport integrity expert explains

Catherine Ordway was an employee of the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA) between 2006 and 2008. Lawyers for Australian 800-metre star Peter Bol say allegations the runner engaged in doping should be dropped after two independent labs found no evidence he used a banned substance.

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'Cracking down' on antisocial behaviour is a classic pre-election strategy - but this government owes young people better

Founding Director of the Sir Bernard Crick Centre for the Public Understanding of Politics, University of Sheffield For a government that is committed to “levelling up”, Rishi Sunak’s administration seems to have taken a major shift towards “cracking down”.

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Remote working: how a surge in digital nomads is pricing out local communities around the world

For eight years I have studied digital nomadism, the millenial trend for working remotely from anywhere around the world. I am often asked if it is driving gentrification. Before COVID upended the way we work, I would usually tell journalists that the numbers were too small for a definitive answer. Most digital nomads were travelling and working illegally on tourist visas. It was a niche phenomenon.

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Manchester United: the business tactics that could lead to a record multi-billion-pound sale

Christina Philippou is affiliated with the RAF FA and teaches on a Premier League education course.It seems that another item can now be added to the long list of things that are getting more expensive: football clubs. The bids coming in to buy Manchester United, reportedly in the region of £4.5bn (the owners are said to want £6bn) would make it the largest amount ever paid for a club.

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The Pope Francis puffer coat was fake - here's a history of real papal fashion

Before news of his hospitalisation for a respiratory infection this week, a fake image of Pope Francis wearing a Balenciaga-style white puffer jacket was posted to Reddit and Twitter. The image – created through AI programme Midjourney – had many viewers fooled into believing that the head of the Catholic church had dramatically updated his style.As an art historian and an ecclesiastical historian, the image has fascinated me, not least in thinking about the rich history of papal fashion.

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The UK's unworkable immigration plans allow the government to blame others for its failure

The illegal migration bill, which purports to end small boat crossings and would effectively bar asylum seeking, has made its way through committee stage. The controversial policy is more likely to be challenged in international courts than to curb small boat crossings. So why is the government pursuing it? This is arguably not a law intended to end dangerous boat crossings. It’s possibly not even intended to be implemented. It is performative politics, designed to distract from the failures of government and put the Conservatives’ opponents in the firing line ahead of the next election.

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Donald Trump: polling suggests criminal charges won't dampen his support

Donald Trump’s impending court case marks an historic moment in US politics. He will be the first former president of the United States to face criminal charges and trial by a jury. He and his supporters are already calling the case a political manoeuvre designed to reduce his chances in the 2024 presidential election.The court case will affect his campaign but it will not exclude him for running for office next year. Early indications suggest that his political base will continue to rally around him. Within hours of the news, his followers were gathering outside his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida to express their support.

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Why is Passover different from all other nights? 3 essential reads on the Jewish holiday

Boxes of matzah stacked high in grocery stores? It’s almost Passover. Wednesday, April 5, marks the first night of the weeklong Jewish holiday in 2023.For many people who celebrate it, Passover brings to mind memories of Seder meals with family and reading from the Haggadah, the script for the Seder ritual, which commemorates the biblical story of the Israelites’ flight from slavery in Egypt. It’s a holiday, in other words, with remembrance and tradition at its core.

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Holy Week starts off with lots of palms - but Palm Sunday's donkey is just as important to the story

For the Catholic Church and many other Christian denominations, the Sunday before Easter marks the beginning of the most important week of the year – “Holy Week,” when Christians reflect on central mysteries of their faith: Christ’s Last Supper, crucifixion and resurrection from the dead.Palm Sunday commemorates the story of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem shortly before the Jewish holiday of Passover. According to the Christian Gospels, people lined the streets to greet him, waving palm branches and shouting words of praise.

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Unconscious biases continue to hold back women in medicine, but research shows how to fight them and get closer to true equity and inclusion

I am a professor and a physician who has been working in university settings for over 30 years. I also study and speak about discrimination in medicine and science. Like most of my female colleagues, I have personally seen and experienced gender discrimination on many occasions throughout my career.In a study I conducted to understand what continues to hold women back in their careers, I interviewed more than 100 men and women in academic medicine, including many in high-powered positions. In my study, dozens of interviewees told me stories of DEI policies that, even with the right intentions, failed to produce good results.

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Eating disorders among teens have more than doubled during the COVID-19 pandemic - here's what to watch for

This is particularly concerning given that eating disorders are among the most deadly of all mental health diagnoses, and teens with eating disorders are at higher risk for suicide than the general population.While experts don’t know exactly why eating disorders develop, studies show that body dissatisfaction and desire for weight loss are key contributors. This can make conversations around weight and healthy behaviors particularly tricky with teens and young adults.

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Succession season 4: powerhouse ensemble drama masterfully sets up series finale in first episode

News just in at Waystar Royco: the stakes have been raised among the warring Roys as Succession returns for its final series. The highly anticipated fourth season of HBO’s hugely popular drama opened with a sombre episode. Creator Jesse Armstrong has confirmed that season four is the last, setting up much speculation about the details of the denouement.

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We investigated the cause of an unexplained outbreak of hepatitis in children in the UK - here's what we found

In the spring of 2022, a paediatric gastroenterologist treating children in the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow issued an alert to Public Health Scotland (PHS), warning of an unusual outbreak of hepatitis cases in her clinic. Hepatitis refers to inflammation of the liver, and is usually caused by viral infections, toxins (including alcohol), medications, autoimmune conditions or inherited conditions. Hepatitis is unusual in children and when it does occur, cases are generally isolated.

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The UK's first climate refugees: why more defences may not save this village from rising sea levels

The impact of rising sea levels on our coastlines can be profound. A natural shoreline can respond to sea level rise and coastal erosion, provided the rise isn’t too rapid. Given enough time, flora and fauna may have a chance to adapt. But a coastal area which has been heavily developed will respond differently, sometimes with catastrophic impacts on both people and nature.

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How a night of poor sleep can affect your next day at work - and four ways to function better

Think back to a night when you slept poorly. How productive were you the next day at work? Did you struggle to get started? Did the day drag on and on? Did you procrastinate on Twitter or TikTok rather than doing your work? If your answer to these questions is “yes”, you’re not alone. Even though we don’t fully understand why we sleep, we know that sleep is crucial for our physical and mental functioning.

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Lula and the world: what to expect from the new Brazilian foreign policy

Guilherme Casarões is currently a volunteer representative of the civil society in a Working Group to Combat Hate Speech and Extremism at the Brazilian Ministry of Human Rights.Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was scheduled to visit his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping at the end of March. Beijing would have been Lula’s fourth international destination in less than 100 days in office.

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Why diversity tactics in the creative industries continue to fall short

Sociology academic Bridget Byrne and I examined ethnic representation in the creative and cultural industries and how institutional practices can reproduce or mitigate ethnic inequality. We had 720 responses to our survey and carried out 42 individual interviews. In the UK, diversity is an all-encompassing term that refers to several protected characteristics (including race, disability, gender and sexual orientation) outlined in the Equality Act 2010. However, there’s been a particular focus on improving Black and ethnically diverse representation in recent years. This was especially so after the Black Lives Matter protests around the world in 2020.

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How men's golf has been shaken by Saudi Arabia's billion-dollar drive for legitimacy

The first major tournament of 2023 in men’s professional golf could be a particularly tense affair. The Masters, held every April in the US city of Augusta (Georgia), sees the world’s finest players compete for a prize purse of around US$15 million (£12.1m), as well as the famous green jacket for the winner.Approximately 90 players will compete for that jacket after a tumultuous 12 months for the sport, during which some of the best-known golfers have controversially broken away from the US-based PGA Tour, the biggest and most powerful organiser of professional golf events.

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Declines in math readiness underscore the urgency of math awareness

When President Ronald Reagan proclaimed the first National Math Awareness Week in April 1986, one of the problems he cited was that too few students were devoted to the study of math.“Despite the increasing importance of mathematics to the progress of our economy and society, enrollment in mathematics programs has been declining at all levels of the American educational system,” Reagan wrote in his proclamation.

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Trump's indictment stretches US legal system in new ways - a former prosecutor explains 4 key points to understand

When former President Donald Trump turns himself over to authorities in New York on Tuesday, April 4, 2023, and is arraigned, the charges on which a Manhattan grand jury indicted him will likely be made public.Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg obtained the indictment on March 30, 2023, following a grand jury vote, but the exact charges against Trump remain sealed. Multiple media sources are reporting the indictment alleges the former president committed business fraud.

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Jon Meacham: Indictment Won't Break the Trump Fever

The journalist and Presidential historian Jon Meacham has written biographies of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, George H.Â W. Bush, John Lewis, and, now, Abraham Lincoln. He has served as an informal adviser to Joe Biden, helping him recently with the State of the Union address. Meacham brings a historian's perspective to an inflection point in American history which, he believes, may compare to the run-up to the Civil War. Also, Michael Schulman speaks with Brooke Shields, the actress and model, about a new documentary on her life, and her complicated perspective on the sexualization of women and girls by the entertainment industry. And the music critic Kelefa Sanneh shares a fleet of artists bringing fresh sounds to what has become the least cool genre: mainstream rock.The writer and historian talks with David Remnick about the stakes of our political moment, and the "perennial" fight to preserve democracy.

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The Man Who Hurt Himself for Art

Americans, never mind their reputation, care deeply about art. They may not risk much for it, but they’re eager to believe that someone else would risk everything. If you doubt this, you only have to consider Chris Burden, the West Coaster whose sinister, bumbling stunts bought him a FastPass to fame, followed by a free pass for life.People seemed a little afraid not to take him seriously, and seem so still. There he is in the September 2, 1973, edition of the Times, staring out from under a ski mask like a robber about to burst into a bank. He was only two years out of U.C. Irvine’s M.F.A. program, but already he’d fired a pistol at a Boeing 747 taking off from LAX; spent five days in a locker with two plastic bottles (one for drinking, one for pissing); and, on November 19, 1971, been shot in the left arm by a friend. The title of the Times article was, inevitably, “He Got Shot—For His Art,” although that was a little misleading. The plan had been for Burden to walk away with a scratch and a Band-Aid, and it was bad aim, not bold artistry, that landed him in the hospital.

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Has Modi Pushed Indian Democracy Past Its Breaking Point?

Earlier this month, Rahul Gandhi, India’s main opposition leader, was convicted of defamation, for, several years ago, likening Narendra Modi, the country’s Prime Minister, to a thief. Days after the verdict, Gandhi was disqualified from serving in the lower house of Parliament, which is controlled by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. The trial took place in Modi’s home state of Gujarat; the sentence—two years—is the exact length necessary to deem a member of Parliament unfit to serve. (Gandhi announced that he would appeal the sentence.) Meanwhile, opposition parties have joined forces to speak out against the increasing number of non-B.J.P. politicians who have been targeted by courts or state agencies. It remains unclear whether the various opposition parties will unite ahead of next year’s elections, where Modi is expected to lead his party to a third straight victory.Over the course of Modi’s premiership, which began in 2014, he has turned India into an increasingly illiberal democracy. Vigilante attacks on religious minorities have increased markedly, the ruling party has taken steps to strip citizenship from Indian Muslims, and the historically repressed Muslim-majority state of Kashmir has faced even harsher crackdowns. Still, Modi remains remarkably popular, with approval ratings above seventy per cent. The moves against Gandhi—the scion of India’s Congress Party, which ruled the country for most of the post-independence era—were surprising in part because Gandhi doesn’t seem to pose a real threat to Modi politically.

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What's the Point of Reading Writing by Humans?

One of the stultifying but ultimately true maxims of the analytics movement in sports says that most narratives around player performance are lies. Each player has a "true talent level" based on their abilities, but the actual results are mostly up to variance and luck. If a player has, say, the true talent to hit thirty-one home runs in a season, the timing of those home runs is mostly random. If someone hits a third of those in April, that doesn't really mean he's a "hot starter" who is "building off a great spring"â€”it just means that if you take thirty-one home runs and toss them up in the air to land randomly on a time line, sometimes ten of them float over to April. What does matter, the analytics guys say, are plate appearances: you have to clock in enough opportunities to realize your true talent level.For much of my career, I was the type of journalist who only published a handful of magazine pieces a year. These required a great deal of time, much of which was spent on minor improvements to the reporting, structure, and sentences. I believed that long-form journalism, much like fiction or poetry, possessed a near-mystical rhythm that could be accessed through months of intensive labor. Once unlocked, some spirit would sing through the piece and touch the readers in a universal, truthful way.

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The Unexpected Grief of a Hysterectomy

I’m losing my uterus soon. I say “losing” instead of, for example, “having removed” because it feels like a loss—the end not just of any remaining fertility I might possess but of a marker of my maturity that has existed for almost forty years.I got my period when I was thirteen. I was prepared for it, or so I thought. I knew that period products had evolved beyond the pads attached to belts described in that most seminal of children’s chapter books, Judy Blume’s “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” Now they just adhered to your underwear.

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You Need to Watch the Best Assassin Thriller on Netflix ASAP

Life as a working parent is hard. That’s the thematic foundation of Netflix’s Kill Boksoon, a kinetic, emotionally grounded Korean action drama starring 50-year-old Jeon Do-yeon (Crash Course on Romance) as Gil Boksoon, the mother of a teen daughter and a career assassin. When we meet Boksoon, she’s spent the last three decades killing and has become good enough at it to earn the nickname “Kill Boksoon,” even if she’s past what society has decided is a woman’s prime. She may break a sweat when she takes down a yakuza in the film’s opening, but she still has the breezy confidence to deliver the requisite action hero quips. Off this scene alone, it might seem like viewers are in for two hours of familiar albeit stylish plot beats. But Kill Boksoon ends up being so much more than that.

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'Yellowjackets' Star Kevin Alves on that Shocking Episode 2 Ending

Travis is the odd one out in Yellowjackets Season 2. He lost his father back in Season 1, and now his brother Javi is missing. His only real connection was with Natalie, and after Season 1’s “Doomcoming” led to him hooking up with Jackie, that relationship is more strained than ever. In Episode 2, we dive deep into Travis’ character not just in the past but in the present as well. For Kevin Alves, who plays Travis in the Showtime series, the loneliness is a key part of his character in Season 2.

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You Need to Play the Most Magical Visual Novel of the Year for Free on Steam ASAP

Stories don’t typically tell audiences what happens after “Happily Ever After.” In the case of magical girl anime like Sailor Moon, the heroes triumph over evil and all the couples end up together. But for Usagi and the other Sailor Scouts, saving the world happened when they were still teenagers. What happened as they grew up? What sort of unique challenges and opportunities arose in their early adulthood? The new free visual novel Life After Magic has an answer: burnout.Sometimes Akiko wishes she never saved the world. As Princess Sentinel Starlight, she led the Sentinels of Justice and spent the majority of her teenage years fighting crime and saving the world with her friends. Akiko is now 22. She’s a high school drop-out in a dead-end job, and her love life is “dead on arrival,” as she puts it. Life is hard for someone who peaked when they were 15.

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21 Years Ago, One Iconic Fighting Game Beat 'Smash Bros.' to the Punch

As a GameCube kid, I was often stuck platforming and racing with Mario. But the most memorable bit of more mature violence I experienced in a video game came from Soul Calibur II. It was my introduction to the genre and the only fighting game I’ve ever been able to excel at without straight button-mashing.While it’s never been in the same echelon as fighters from Nintendo or Capcom, Bandai Namco’s sword-slinging fighting series has maintained a solid fan base over six mainline titles. It started in 1995 as Soul Edge, an arcade exclusive impressive for the time that had multiple game modes and simpler weapon-based play. It was revolutionary in a way that made fighting games more approachable, and it was widely loved enough to warrant a 1998 sequel in Soul Calibur.

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18 Years Later, 'FF7 Rebirth' Could Redefine Final Fantasy's Best Mini-Game

Role-playing games are expansive things that usually take dozens of hours to complete. Franchises like Final Fantasy fill that time with deep character stories, world-building, and tightly designed combat. Also mini-games. So very many mini-games. Final Fantasy VII stands out as having some of the best in the series, like Chocobo racing. Yet one specific mini-game stood out for its stylish shredding, despite the awkward timing of it all. That’s right, we are talking about Cloud’s snowboarding, which turns 26 or 18 years old, depending on how you look at it. (But more on that later.)One of the saddest moments in video game history comes at the end of FF7’s first disc. The party races towards the Forgotten City in pursuit of Aerith and Sephiroth. Just when Cloud sees Aerith praying, Sephiroth falls from the sky and runs her through with his massive samurai sword. Aerith is dead. It is heartbreaking to this day, just ask Robert Pattinson.

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'Dungeons & Dragons' Credits Scene Shows the Funny Side of Messing With Magic

When you cast a spell to resurrect a corpse to ask it five questions, you should be careful how you ask them.In Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, writer/directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein take audiences to the Forgotten Realms for a thrilling heist. A band of thieves, led by the bard Edgin (Chris Pine) and barbarian warrior Holga (Michelle Rodriguez) seek to rescue Edgin’s daughter from the clutches of a former fellow thief, Forge (Hugh Grant). But to do so, they need to retrieve an ancient relic, a helmet, that can disable magic.

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'Genshin Impact's Mika Just Revitalized Spring's Thirstiest Trend

Xiao, one of the most popular Genshin Impact characters, has been the shortest male character for years. Even though all of the playable characters basically use the same models, all of their heights vary just enough that some are perceptibly taller than others. The Genshin Impact community once debated the same topic with Heizou, another short male Genshin Impact character, until developers “buffed” his height before his official debut. Now that Mika has launched in Genshin Impact 3.5, one fan has found that he could possibly be shorter than the long-time record-holder.Redditor Sleepoosguy_ shared an image of Xiao and Mika’s models side-by-side without their fluffy locks blocking the tops of their heads (and without eyes, for some reason). Mika’s head is noticeably flatter than Xiao’s, thus the claim that he’s actually shorter. After all, hair doesn’t count as part of your height in real life, so why should it count in a video game?

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Nothing Is Teasing a Mysterious Product on Twitter and Instagram

Hot off the successful release of its Ear 2 active noise-cancellation wireless earbuds, Nothing is once again teasing something “coming soon” on its social media channels.Posted to Twitter and Instagram, the tech startup shared the following video with the caption: “More buzz. Something else is coming.”

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Where to Find Every Rat for the 'Resident Evil 4' More Pest Control Requests

The Resident Evil 4 remake is a mostly faithful remake that enhances an already great experience with some new surprises, including a new series of side quests called Merchant Requests. These are optional missions that often require you to collect specific items or eliminate certain enemies. While many of these requests are straightforward, the Pest Control missions have caused some trouble throughout the game. These requests require you to eliminate rats across various chapters, but finding these vermin is a tricky task. Here’s how to complete the Pest Controls requests in Resident Evil 4.To accept this mission, you’ll need to grab the request pinned on the tank next to the Merchant at the start of Chapter 2. This is your first time encountering the Merchant, just after you escape the abandoned factory at the beginning.

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E3 2023's Cancelation Could Fix One of the Industry's Biggest Problems

Once the hallmark annual event of the video game industry, the Electronic Entertainment Expo — more commonly referred to as E3 — has been canceled once again, and this time it feels like it may be for good. While this may come to mark the end of an era for the gaming industry, there’s a silver lining in all of this that will benefit gamers and developers alike. Because without the expensive spectacle of promoting games at live events, there’s an opportunity to focus on something even more important: making games.What Happened — The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) and partner ReedPop announced on March 30 that E3 2023 had been canceled. This comes just a few days after Ubisoft, the developer and publisher behind franchises like Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry, pulled out of the show. While this decision may have been the tipping point for ESA and ReedPop, IGN reported as far back as January 2023 that Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo would not participate (Sony hadn’t participated in one since E3 2018). These three console manufacturers and game publishers are some of the industry’s biggest heavy hitters, so it already had many of us wondering what E3 2023 could have offered to games journalists and gamers alike.

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Star Wars News Confirms an Exciting New Trend Is Here to Stay

The Mandalorian proved that Star Wars could work on TV with little 40-minute standalone adventures that still built up a season-long narrative. It put Pedro Pascal on the path to stardom and The Last of Us, and it turned Grogu into a merchandising gold mine. Then Andor proved that Star Wars TV could be cinematic, with Rogue One and Bourne trilogy filmmaker Tony Gilroy forgoing flat CGI for physical sets. The series was praised for its cinematic scope, strong story, and realistic feel. Now, with the upcoming series Skeleton Crew, Star Wars TV is trying to prove it’s not just cinematic; it’s cinema.

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Trans Day of Visibility: 7 Impactful Games You Can Play Right Now

March 31 is International Transgender Day of Visibility! The annual event was created by trans activist Rachel Crandall of Michigan in 2009 to celebrate the lives of transgendered people everywhere. Though there are many ways to celebrate, the video game industry is full of incredible queer and trans art for and by members of the LGBTQIA+ community. This Trans Day of Visibility, consider trying out some of the amazing games that are either made by or thematically focus on the trans experience as part of the story. Though by no means an extensive list, here are seven amazing games available on multiple platforms that anybody can play in celebration.Following the life of an artificial person called a Sleeper, Citizen Sleeper deals with questions about our relationships with our bodies and the inherent capitalist dystopia of regulating health. Developer Gareth Damian Martin told Inverse that while the game has many themes and readings “the trans aspect is the primary aspect of the text.”

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'Dungeons & Dragons' Sequel? Here Are the Many Ways it Could Happen

Finally, Dungeons & Dragons fans have a worthy movie in Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. But let’s acknowledge that, as good as it is, it’s woefully unrealistic. Because unlike most games of D&D, Honor Among Thieves finishes its story in a single session.In a franchise-driven era, a movie like Dungeons & Dragons can easily spawn sequels and spin-offs even if the story is all wrapped up. To the movie’s advantage, it doesn’t adapt any canonical D&D story — not the hundreds of Dragonlance or Drizzt Do’Urden novels, nor campaigns like Tomb of Annihilation and Curse of Strahd — so now it’s nothing but open roads.

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A Stunning 'Tears of the Kingdom' Switch OLED Is on the Way -- What to Know

It's time for Zelda Fans to break open their piggy bank. In addition to Tears of the Kingdom’s release in May, Nintendo is also releasing a new special edition Switch model to coincide with the game. This isn’t the first special edition Nintendo Switch based on one of the company’s IPs, considering the Animal Crossing: New Horizons Nintendo Switch and Splatoon 3 Nintendo Switch OLED in recent history. Here’s everything you need to know about the Tears of the Kingdom Switch OLED, including its release date, price, and order details.The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Nintendo Switch OLED is a version of the Nintendo Switch OLED with a Tears of the Kingdom-inspired design. It was officially announced during the March Tears of the Kingdom showcase.

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Where to Find All 16 Clockwork Castellans in 'Resident Evil 4'

Throughout the Resident Evil 4 remake, there are 16 Clockwork Castellan figures to find, much like the collectibles in other recent games in the series. There’s one per each of the game’s 16 chapters, and they’re cleverly hidden, making them hard to track down. Collecting all 16 nets you the Primal Knife, which is one of the best melee weapons in the game. You’ll also earn an achievement/trophy for your troubles. Keep in mind, your progress carries over to New Game Plus, so don’t worry if you miss some throughout your initial playthrough. But where exactly are the Castellans located? Here’s where to find all 16 in the Resident Evil 4 remake.The first Castellan is located in the house next to the villager throwing dynamite. Look for the figure within the destroyed roof of this house. Shoot it and you’ll earn progress toward collecting them.

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'Secret Invasion' Looks Like Marvel's Grittiest Show Yet

Marvel’s upcoming Secret Invasion might be one of the MCU projects you’ve decided is low-stakes enough to miss, but new images promise to channel a level of grounded tension not seen since Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Based on the 2008 comic book crossover, Secret Invasion follows Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), former head of S.H.I.E.L.D. and current espionage vagabond, as he unravels a massive international conspiracy involving duplicate impostors of high-ranking government officials. Just like in the comic, the shape-shifting alien race known as the Skrulls are perpetrating the hostile takeover, with a group of extremists seizing control from the peaceful refugees introduced back in Captain Marvel.Although Brian Michael Bendis’ comics focused heavily on the impact of superheroes being impersonated by the Skrulls, it seems the show will focus on the government sector and the MCU’s covert intelligence agencies. Created as an opportunity to really dig into the character of Jackson’s Fury, the show is spearheaded by Kyle Bradstreet, a writer and executive producer on the impeccable political thriller Mr. Robot. That show was full of shocking twists and slick thrills, and if Bradstreet’s experience wasn’t already enticing, Secret Invasion claims to pull from the Cold War novels of John le Carré, as well as the atmosphere of TV shows like Homeland and The Americans. While it’s impossible to tell if they’ve succeeded, the images released by Vanity Fair certainly paint the picture of a grounded superhero spy thriller in the vein of The Winter Soldier.

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Netflix Actually Has A Lot to Offer Cloud Gaming

The qualities that made the company successful at streaming films and TV shows might translate quite neatly to games.Netflix games could soon be coming to a TV near you. References to playing games on TVs were discovered in the Netflix app, Bloomberg reports, and they include mentions of using your phone as a controller.

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13 Years Ago, an Underrated Sci-Fi Show Improved 'The X-Files' Formula

How far will you go to save a loved one? What’s possible in science fiction often comes down to exploring life’s more intimate moments and relationships. For Fringe, this meant turning its emotional focal point from the tragic romance between an FBI Agent and her lover-turned-bad-guy FBI partner, to the estrangement of a father and son. To do so, the sci-fi series explored the lengths a father will go to save his child. And breaking the universe is only the beginning.Like The X-Files before it, Fringe originally took a procedural approach, with each episode following the characters as they investigated cases of fringe science (telekinesis, mind control, time travel, etc), tied to a vague overarching mythos. As the series went on, storylines became more serialized as mysteries kept growing. Unlike The X-Files, Fringe had answers. Those answers came in the Season 2 flashback episode “Peter,” which recontextualized everything we knew about Walter Bishop (John Noble) and his son Peter (Joshua Jackson), while painting a unique portrait of death, grief, and fate.

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How to Write a Goodbye Email to Your Colleagues

Leaving a job is hard. Despite the “not-so-good” parts, you likely had good moments as well. How do you gracefully say your goodbyes and exit? A farewell email is not only a way to acknowledge and thank your team before you go, but it is a best practice that most people send around their last day of work.

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Storytelling That Moves People

Persuasion is the centerpiece of business activity. Customers must be convinced to buy your company’s products or services, employees and colleagues to go along with a new strategic plan or reorganization, investors to buy (or not to sell) your stock, and partners to sign the next deal. But despite the critical importance of persuasion, most executives struggle to communicate, let alone inspire. Too often, they get lost in the accoutrements of companyspeak: PowerPoint slides, dry memos, and hyperbolic missives from the corporate communications department. Even the most carefully researched and considered efforts are routinely greeted with cynicism, lassitude, or outright dismissal.

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How to Approach an Office Romance (and How Not To)

Should you date a coworker? Before you act on your feelings, it’s important to think through the risks — and there are quite a few. If you still want to move forward, research shows that your intentions matter. Your coworkers’ reactions will reflect what they believe your motives to be. It’s also important to know your companies policies. Many companies prohibit employees from dating coworkers, vendors, customers, or suppliers, or require specific disclosures, so be sure to investigate before you start a relationship. And if you do start dating someone, don’t try to hide the relationship from your manager or colleagues — it will only erode trust.

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Unconscious Bias Training That Works

To become more diverse, equitable, and inclusive, many companies have turned to unconscious bias (UB) training. By raising awareness of the mental shortcuts that lead to snap judgments—often based on race and gender—about people’s talents or character, it strives to make hiring and promotion fairer and improve interactions with customers and among colleagues. But most UB training is ineffective, research shows. The problem is, increasing awareness is not enough—and can even backfire—because sending the message that bias is involuntary and widespread may make it seem unavoidable.

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Companies Are Failing Trans Employees

BCG recently surveyed 2,230 transgender and gender nonconforming (TGNC) employees in eight countries and conducted 34 interviews with TGNC employees. They found that TGNC employees want respect in the workplace, which is both reasonable and achievable for organizations committed to DEI. While everyone is responsible for creating a safe, welcoming, and inclusive workplace, CEOs, HR departments, and managers stand out in their ability to make a difference. The authors unpack the data and present several strategies for creating inclusive cultures for TGNC employees.

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How Important Is a College Degree Compared to Experience?

The converging trends of a competitive labor market, ballooning university tuitions, new online learning alternatives, and fast-changing job roles has created a tipping point in the perceived value of college degrees. The percentage of jobs requiring a college degree fell from 51% in 2017 to 44% percent in 2021. And according to Gallup, the percentage of U.S. adults ages 18 to 29 who view college education as “very important” dropped from 74% to 41% in just six years. What does this mean for you?

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The Costs of Code-Switching

In 2012, a video of President Barack Obama entering the locker room of the U.S. men’s Olympic basketball team went viral. In the clip, viewers can see that there’s a clear difference between how Obama greets a white assistant coach and how he greets the black NBA player Kevin Durant. This moment inspired a sketch on Key & Peele in 2014 that played off the idea that Obama “switches” how he greets people, depending on whether they’re white or black.

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Unconscious Bias Training That Works

Companies Are Failing Trans Employees

The Case for Executive Assistants

In their zeal for cutting administrative expenses, numerous organizations now count on highly paid middle and upper managers to arrange their own travel, file expense reports, and schedule meetings. Some companies may see a type of egalitarianism in this assistant-less structure—believing that when workers see the boss loading paper into the copy machine, it creates a “we’re all in this together” spirit.

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How to Conduct an Effective Job Interview

The virtual stack of resumes in your inbox is winnowed and certain candidates have passed the phone screen. Next step: in-person interviews. How should you use the relatively brief time to get to know — and assess — a near stranger? How many people at your firm should be involved? How can you tell if a candidate will be a good fit? And finally, should you really ask questions like: “What’s your greatest weakness?”

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Are You Hung Up on That Career Path You Didn't Choose?

Every career is made up of choices. But sometimes, even when we know we made the right decision, we find ourselves longing for a forgone role or career path. How does this sort of dwelling on the road not taken affect us in the workplace? And what can employees, managers, and organizations do to help workers who may be experiencing some internal conflict with respect to their chosen careers?To explore these questions, my colleagues Jason Colquitt, Erin Long, and I surveyed more than 300 U.S.-based workers and their coworkers across a wide range of professions and seniority levels. We asked the workers how satisfied they were with their current jobs, how often they thought about other paths they could have taken, and the extent to which they felt able to determine the trajectories of their lives and shape their work. We then asked their coworkers how often these employees engaged in helpful, collaborative behaviors, and how often they exhibited behaviors that suggested a withdrawal from work, such as showing up late or distracting others.

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The Discipline of Innovation

In the hypercompetition for breakthrough solutions, managers worry too much about characteristics and personality—“Am I smart enough? Do I have the right temperament?”—and not enough about process. A commitment to the systematic search for imaginative and useful ideas is what successful entrepreneurs share—not some special genius or trait. What’s more, entrepreneurship can occur in a business of any size or age because, at heart, it has to do with a certain kind of activity: innovation, the disciplined effort to improve a business’s potential.

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How to Write a Winning Business Plan

You’ve got a great idea for a new product or service—how can you persuade investors to support it? Flashy PowerPoint slides aren’t enough; you need a winning business plan. A compelling plan accurately reflects the viewpoints of your three key constituencies: the market, potential investors, and the producer (the entrepreneur or inventor of the new offering).

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The Discipline of Innovation

How to Write a Winning Business Plan

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Saturday, April 1, 2023

What HBO's "Succession" Can Teach Us About Negotiating

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