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Throughout the coronavirus pandemic, the way the sales function operates has looked very different, and sales teams have been forced to find new ways to connect with customers.
Organizations have responded by redoubling their investment in the salesforce: expanding the number of inside sales and hybrid roles, increasing financial controls such as performance thresholds and incentive pay gaps, and investing in technology and sales skill training, for example. READ MORE
Planning for the return to the office, Angi, the parent company of home-improvement brands Angi, HomeAdvisor and Handy, reduced the footprint of two of its three offices in the U.S. In doing so, it did away with all executive offices — including that of CEO Oisin Hanrahan — opting for an open plan, more space for collaboration and additional conference rooms.
As Hanrahan explained, the plan “lends itself to a flatter organization — it feels more approachable and breaks down barriers between the leadership and the folks who run the business.” READ MORE
With the latest wave of return-to-office delays from Covid-19, some companies are considering a new possibility: Offices may be closed for nearly two years.
That is raising concerns among executives that the longer people stay at home, the harder or more disruptive it could be to eventually bring them back. READ MORE
A majority of economists believe U.S. companies should require their employees to be vaccinated in order to keep their jobs or return to the workplace, according to a new survey released early Monday.
Conducted by the National Association for Business Economics, the survey shows that most of the group's members are in favor of requiring employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19 before they return to the workplace, with 79% in favor of such a policy. Just 14% of respondents said they did not support mandated vaccines. READ MORE
Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, the two wealthiest people on this planet, both want to be center stage when NASA returns astronauts to the moon. But NASA only has enough money for one of them, and it went with Musk's SpaceX. That means Bezos' Blue Origin is mad.
Both of the billionaires' space companies are working to develop lunar landers, vehicles capable of making a gentle touch down on the moon's rocky surface. READ MORE
Tesla CEO Elon Musk introduced a prototype of a humanoid robot at the company's AI Day event on Thursday.
Musk says the "Tesla Bot" will probably be launched next year, saying the robot would "eliminate dangerous, repetitive, boring tasks." READ MORE
This alert provides an overview of shareholder proposals submitted to public companies during the 2021 proxy season, including statistics and notable decisions from the staff (the “Staff”) of the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) on no-action requests. READ MORE
Employers usually pepper job ads with qualification requirements, salary ranges and employee benefit information. The latest inclusion on job postings is a sign of the COVID times: vaccine mandate requirements. READ MORE
SEC Chair Gary Gensler said agency support for the Nasdaq rule aligns with the preferences of investors, who are increasingly focused on environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals when committing their capital. READ MORE
At Kevin Smith's home health care agency in Massachusetts, only 52% of his 400 staff members have been vaccinated. He'd like to order them all to get the shot, but he says he can't risk a mass exodus.
It's a legitimate fear. The labor market is very tight, with a record number of job openings and not enough job candidates. And among unvaccinated workers asked what they would do if their employer instituted a mandate, 50% said they'd leave their job, according to a June survey by health policy think tank KFF. READ MORE
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Tuesday that the U.S. economy has been permanently changed by the COVID pandemic and it is important that the central bank adapt to those changes.
“We’re not simply going back to the economy that we had before the pandemic,” Powell said at a Fed virtual town hall for educators and students. “We need to watch carefully as the economy continues to get through the pandemic and try to understand the ways that the economy has changed and what the implications are for our policy.” READ MORE
Critics of stakeholder capitalism and ESG—investing based on environmental, social, and governance metrics—have been out in force over the past few weeks, portraying them as empty marketing, as radical liberal activism, or as approaches antithetical to free enterprise and shareholder interests. Vivek Ramaswamy’s Woke, Inc. is now a bestseller, and a former BlackRock sustainable finance executive has labeled ESG “a dangerous placebo.” READ MORE
Driving change is not always possible. The conventional wisdom regarding distressed credit investing is that the complex negotiations and fast pace of transactions at companies under duress thwart transitions toward sustainability and inclusion. Negotiating haircuts and covenants is already challenging, and the urgency of corporate distress amplifies the myriad difficulties of evaluating ESG, including inconsistency in defining and measuring ESG and lack of ESG data. The conventional wisdom is wrong: lenders and sponsors are increasingly incorporating ESG in investment decisions, and distressed investors can harness restructuring to drive sustainability and inclusion and with it long-term value creation. READ MORE
On July 29, 2021, both the SEC and the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York announced charges against Trevor Milton, the founder, former CEO and former executive chairman of Nikola Corporation, a company engaged in the development of electric trucks. The complaint and indictment allege a series of misleading and inaccurate public statements by Milton on social media and elsewhere leading up to and after the company’s merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) through which Nikola became a public company, which included related private placements (PIPEs). READ MORE
Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio said Wednesday that China has weaponized America's own "corporate lust for profits" against the U.S.
In a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, Rubio said, "It is time to wake up" and look at corporate America’s reliance on the Chinese Communist Party. READ MORE
More companies are bringing workers back into the office -- and some employers want to know about vaccination status.
Morgan Stanley (MS) told employees who work at its Manhattan headquarters that they have to be vaccinated against Covid-19 before returning to the office. The bank also said in a memo to New York employees that staff working in buildings with a "large employee presence" must confirm their vaccination status by early July. READ MORE
Microsoft is joining the growing list of companies that are requiring workers to get vaccinated.
The tech firm said Tuesday that employees, vendors and guests entering Microsoft's (MSFT) buildings in the US will be required to show proof of vaccination beginning in September. READ MORE
Last year, Uber (UBER), Lyft (LYFT), DoorDash and Instacart succeeded in getting Californians to vote in favor of a ballot measure exempting them from classifying drivers and delivery workers as employees. Now, the companies are in the early stages of taking a similar approach in Massachusetts.
The coalition representing these gig companies, Massachusetts Coalition for Independent Work, said it filed Wednesday to have a question put on the state's 2022 ballot that would "grant historic new benefits" and allow workers to "maintain their flexibility as independent contractors," something it says most drivers want. READ MORE
The US once again ranked last in access to health care, equity and outcomes among high-income countries, despite spending a far greater share of its economy on health care, a new report released Wednesday has found.
The nation has landed in the basement in all seven studies the Commonwealth Fund has conducted since 2004. The US is the only one of the 11 countries surveyed not to have universal health insurance coverage. READ MORE