The Best of Fast Company
20+ most popular Fast Company articles, as voted by our community.
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Your brain will perform better if you shift into this mode of working
Productivity expert Donna McGeorge outlines four strategies that will help your brain do more by working less.
A psychologist’s 5-step guide for resilient leadership when everything is going wrong
Leading through crisis presents the biggest mental health challenge for organizational heads. Compassion, empathy, and clarity will be top priorities to stay resilient.
How companies are giving workers the hybrid workplace they want
With 90% of companies embracing hybrid work according to a new McKinsey report, here’s how they’re solving its remaining technological and social challenges.
The case for keeping all your email forever
More or less by accident, I wound up with more than 25 years of email at my fingertips. Here’s why I’m glad I never deleted anything.
Why a solid ‘life operating system’ is your key to success and happiness
Success and happiness are built on a solid moral code that informs your business decisions and how you interact with others—your life operating system.
Fast Company on Bill Gates
Bill and Melinda Gates have poured nearly $5 billion into education. Here’s what they spent it on
Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Laurene Powell Jobs are also donating huge amounts.
Bill Gates thinks Steve Jobs was a wizard
Gates says Jobs cast “spells” to keep Apple alive.
Fast Company on Career
Personal branding for people who hate personal branding
Self-promotion might not come naturally for some, but less outgoing people can use their natural strengths to create an authentic online presence.
Want a promotion? These 4 habits are more powerful than talent
Talent can only take you so far. The reason some people are high performers is because they’ve formed good habits.
«Success is often drawn from something you learned along the way. It may not have impact in the moment, but it may contribute to success later.»
Fast Company on Circular Economy
The circular economy could create an enormous jobs boom
Building a whole new economy will employ a lot of workers.
This zero-waste restaurant generates literally no trash
In Helsinki, Restaurant Nolla worked with suppliers to deliver food without packaging, serves a set menu so it doesn’t order too much food, and sends its customers home with house-made compost.
Fast Company on Design
I helped pioneer UX design. What I see today horrifies me
Where did we go wrong?
«UX processes in many organizations these days amount to little more than UX theater»
The upside of bad design
The Museum of Failure’s latest exhibition is an epic portrait of failures big and small—from the Ford Edsel, to CNN+.
Fast Company on Diversity
Remote work is the next diversity frontier
Organizations that don’t actively support remote work are limiting their capacity to engage with top talent.
See Big Tech’s terrible diversity record, visualized using its logos
Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, and Facebook remain overwhelmingly white and male. Here’s a look at their diversity numbers, visualized through their logos.
Fast Company on Gadgets
The future is ear: Why “hearables” are finally tech’s next big thing
The explosive growth of their AI voice assistants has Google, Apple, and Amazon racing to put your entire smartphone in an earpiece.
The 10 most important product innovations of 2019
Video games. Augmented reality. Plastic shoes. And headphones made of microorganisms.
Fast Company on Housing
Exclusive: Airbnb will start designing houses in 2019
Airbnb wants to get into the housing business in a big way.
This startup wants to put a free tiny house in your backyard
Rent the Backyard will get a tiny house into your backyard in a matter of weeks—and hopes it can add some cheaper apartments in cities to help alleviate the housing crisis.
Fast Company on Leadership
How to train your brain to be more present
This temptation to multitask has only gotten worse in the work-from-home era. But there are ways to fight it.
Overthinking is the bane of decision-making. This how to cut back on constantly analyzing things
You’re risking more than just wasted time. Overanalyzing can also hold you back from pursuing new opportunities.
«How many good opportunities have passed over because of analysis paralysis or decision fatigue?»
Fast Company on Productivity
How to transform your to-do list into a productivity power tool
It will likely require shifting your mindset in a few key ways.
«Once you know your priorities, everything on your to-do list should serve them.»
The 26 best new productivity apps for 2021
These great apps will help you organize your digital life, avoid unwanted distractions, and more.
«As an answer to all the cruft that Google’s email service has built up over the past 17 years, Simplify Gmail is a revelation.»
Fast Company on Tim Cook
Forget the new iPhones: Apple’s best product is now privacy
Under Tim Cook’s leadership, Apple saw just how critical an issue user privacy would become. Now it’s at least as important a feature as shiny industrial design or a nice camera.
Why Apple Is The World’s Most Innovative Company
In this exclusive interview with Apple CEO Tim Cook, he explains the culture and approach that led to iPhone X, Air Pods, Apple Watch 3, and HomePod.
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5 habits of people who are especially productive working from home
Effective remote work involves these five habits, which prevent feelings of burnout and isolation.
«Instead, have a reductive mindset, where it becomes second nature to get rid of unnecessary things. “Developing a reductive mindset means you adopt a habit—a reflex, tendency, effortless first inclination—to . . . eliminate, or cut the unnecessary,” says Funt. “We must dismantle the additive instincts most companies and professionals have developed.”»
Influencers are out—authenticity is in
Marketers are pulling back on influencer campaigns—and promoting user-generated content from ‘real’ people.
All the things COVID-19 will change forever, according to 30 top experts
The COVID-19 pandemic abruptly changed how the world does business. Work shifted, where possible, into people’s homes and online in accordance with social distancing guidelines. As a result, businesses’ longstanding resistance to remote employees dissolved, and the lines between work and family life, long blurred, blended overnight. Even when life returns to some form of normal, some of these changes will stick, according to tech journalist Mark Sullivan's interviews with CEOs and business leaders from a cross-section of industries.
Want to keep top talent? Create clear paths to advancement
Before climbing the ladder to CEO, this ad exec had 19 different jobs at the same company.
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