Latest news with #remoteWork

‘There is no doubt': CEO makes bold WFH claim, sparking big debate

News.com.au

10 hours ago

Business
News.com.au

‘There is no doubt': CEO makes bold WFH claim, sparking big debate

An Aussie boss has revealed the big problem with working from home after an American CEO claimed remote work would have stopped her from becoming such an success. The working from home debate certainly isn't one that will be settled anytime soon, and American CEO Emma Grede has just stirred the pot all over again. Ms Grede appeared on the podcast Diary of a CEO and claimed that if she'd been WFH in her twenties, she'd never have achieved such success. 'If I had been a work from home person in my twenties I would not be where I am today. There is no doubt,' she said. The 42-year-old is the mastermind behind Khloe Kardashian's denim brand Good American, and she co-founded Kim Kardashian's shapewear brand Skims. Skims has been valued at over $4 billion and Good American has been valued at over $3 billion. It's a big statement, but Australian boss Jessy Marshall, 36, founder of the PR agency Hive HQ, can't help but agree. Ms Marshall said that working from home can hold back people's careers 'depending on the role', and this is something she is hyperaware of. 'If you are taking my role as a publicist as an example, we work with many Australian start-ups and us being together as a team in the office is where we get our energy, our creativity, and how we best execute,' she told 'Our job is entirely about execution. If we were doing this from home, we would have no vibe, no hustle and we wouldn't be achieving the results we are.' The 36-year-old doesn't doubt she'd have succeeded if she had worked from home in her twenties, but she doesn't think it would have been on the same scale. 'Maybe because of my personality, I would have been driven enough to get here anyway, but learning on the job fast-tracked my ability and success,' she said. 'You have to learn and fail and learn again; you simply cannot do that as sufficiently by yourself at home. Seeing examples from good and bad bosses helps build your career and your skills.' Ms Marshall's opinion echoes Ms Grede's who spoke at length on the podcast about the downsides of flexibility. The CEO explained that, since the pandemic, her staff has worked only four days in the office and one day from home. Ms Grede said people talk a lot about flexibility but don't talk about what WFH 'takes away from work' and how Zoom life has impacted businesses. 'I met my husband at work, I made my best strongest relationships in my life. (They are) the most important things to me and they're the foundation of my happiness,' she said. Ms Grede finds it 'interesting now' that there's an aversion to working from the office, saying young people are missing out as a result. 'It is so interesting to me because I'm like an in-person person. I want to be with people, I want to collaborate. I want to do things quickly and the culture of work right now makes that so hard,' she said. Ms Grede believes rise of fully-remote jobs is making it harder for young people to learn from seniors at work, which is something she finds that disappointing. 'All of that is lost,' she said. 'I feel a little bit sad for the way that we're working right now because I don't think we're having that exchange of what happens when you're in a really dynamic environment and you're able to learn from people around you.' The CEO's working from home opinion immediately divided workers, with plenty quick to disagree. 'Maybe not everyone wants to be a CEO. Some people want to work to live not live to work,' one argued. 'I would never work in an office again,' another said. 'Interesting perspective! It's important to evaluate how working from home impacts long-term career growth and success,' someone else said. 'Remember half of us are introverts who prefer to be home. We're just as valuable. I also don't want to spend hours of my precious life commuting,' one said. 'Life is not just work,' someone wrote. 'WFH is overrated,' another declared. Someone else argued that some workers get more done working from home, but another said that when she worked WFH, it was the 'loneliest' she'd ever been. Recruitment expert Roxanne Calder said bosses are 'spot on' if they say working from home is holding back young people's careers. 'When you are starting out in your career you need to be around people to learn,' she told 'If you're not among people then you can't learn as quickly. It is critical in that career stage.' Ms Calder said it is invaluable to be able to turn to your co-worker and ask a question or even observe their habits and learn from them, and this isn't happening over Zoom. The recruitment expert said that, despite the 'pushback' and the clear benefits of working from the office, workers don't want to come back. 'I find a lot of people don't want to come into the office still, despite the pushback that has been evident now for 18 months,' she said. Ms Calder said that workers know that 'learning is better in the office', but they'd rather have flexibility over career growth. 'The advice I'd give to anyone in their twenties or in your thirties is definitely to be in the office; it is important for career building,' she said. 'It is relationships that get you places and people seeing you do things.'

This is the process that lets managers get the best out of their team

Fast Company

2 days ago

Business
Fast Company

This is the process that lets managers get the best out of their team

What does it mean to be a manager? In today's world, managers need to wear many hats. They have to be a mentor, mediator, communicator, coach, and numerous other roles simultaneously. But at its core, management is about matchmaking. You need to map the talents of your team to the needs of your business. That means making the most of your team's combined talents and unlocking the diversity in your team. Unfortunately, as managers struggle with limited time and resources, they overlook this critical component. All too often, managers end up assigning tasks on autopilot, matching business challenges to job titles rather than thinking creatively about how to leverage people's hidden talents or offer growth opportunities. The shift to hybrid and remote work has also reduced opportunities for the spontaneous discovery of people's hidden talents. This can end up shrouding people's true strengths. Collaboration and engagement can also suffer. Fortunately, unlocking your team's strengths doesn't need to be time-consuming. Over the past three years, I've helped dozens of teams unlock talents they didn't even know they had—and match those talents to the most pressing challenges they faced—through this simple, three-step exercise: Step 1: Self-reflection Gather your team together—ideally in person —and ask everyone to write down their talents and strengths on a flip chart. Emphasize that this isn't a competition to see who can list the most strengths, but rather about identifying the talents that people might take for granted or struggle to recognize in themselves. Sometimes, we're so used to our strengths that we don't even notice them. Encourage them to think about what they find easy to do, or what people come to them for. This short 15-minute period of self-reflection lays the foundation for using the hidden talents for the benefit of the team. Step 2: Team input Next, go around the room and ask each person to read their strengths aloud. Resist the urge to discuss or critique the strengths each team member identifies. Simply ask the rest of the team, 'What talent or strength do you see in this person that they didn't mention themselves?', and have the person write each additional talent on their list. And before moving over to your next team member, ask the team, what's the number-one strength of this colleague that at this moment we should use much more as a team? As you go around the room, each person will be surprised by the strengths their team sees in them. As their manager, you're likely to be surprised as well at the number of hidden, untapped talents that may surface. This step is often particularly powerful for more introverted or less confident employees, who might generally be more hesitant to talk about their strengths. I've found that while teams always have something to add for everyone, it's often the quieter members who receive the most additions from their colleagues. The step uncovers underutilized talents and lays the groundwork for deeper appreciation and trust within the team. Step 3: Match strengths to challenges The final step is to connect the strengths they've revealed to the challenges your team currently faces. For example, I worked with a biotech company that struggled to collaborate with another department. The team had identified that Georgina was highly collaborative, and so she became the natural choice to lead cross-functional projects. Paul's talent, on the other hand, was structuring information that could be used to address the challenge of distilling insights from complex data. And Tim's talent for visual storytelling could help address challenges in communicating with investors and other stakeholders. In this way, teams can collaboratively move beyond asking, 'Whose job is this?' Instead, they can ask, 'What talent could help us address this challenge?' It dynamically redefines roles, making full use of often overlooked talents such as: Spotting talent: The ability to recognize potential in oneself and others. Offloading: Knowing which initiatives or activities they need to stop (or simplify). Finishing: The drive to see projects through to completion. These are not always the talents you see on a résumé. But when you face a challenge, knowing the specific strengths that each team member possesses can be extremely helpful. Make your matches stick By design, this 90–120 minute exercise is short and simple. However, to drive lasting impact, it's important to ensure that your team members continue to have opportunities to flex their talents. For example, Michael often clashed with senior leader Frank over project approaches, stalling progress. The team recognized that Anna, who excelled in stakeholder management, could bridge the gap. Anna began mentoring Michael, helping him engage Frank's input early in the process instead of letting conflicts fester. Michael's projects then moved faster. Both Michael and Frank came to appreciate Anna's mentorship, and she continued to assist the team with similar stakeholder challenges. Embedding this practice into your management style can be as simple as revisiting the exercise during weekly stand-ups, monthly team meetings, or even as part of onboarding new employees. The key is to commit to ongoing self-reflection and feedback. Regularly measure progress, share successful matches, and be willing to adjust the approach as your team evolves. Being an effective manager today means stepping back from the daily firefight to invest in your people. When you act as a talent matchmaker, connecting individual strengths and organizational challenges, you unlock a powerful resource that drives both team performance and engagement.

Remote Work Is Convenient for Employees…and North Korean Scammers - Tech News Briefing

Wall Street Journal

2 days ago

Business
Wall Street Journal

Remote Work Is Convenient for Employees…and North Korean Scammers - Tech News Briefing

Jobs that allow employees to work from home have allowed for more flexibility. But in the quest to achieve a better work-life balance, we've helped open the door for hackers looking to capitalize on America's workforce. Bob McMillan covers computer security, hackers, and privacy for the Wall Street Journal. He joins host Victoria Craig to discuss how laptop farms have allowed North Korean scammers to rake in hundreds of millions of dollars to the sanctioned country. Full Transcript This transcript was prepared by a transcription service. This version may not be in its final form and may be updated. Victoria Craig: Hey, TNB listeners, before we get started, heads up, we're going to be asking you a question at the top of each show for the next few weeks. Our goal here at Tech News Briefing is to keep you updated with the latest headlines and trends on all things tech. Now, we want to know more about you, what you like about the show, and what more you'd like to hear from us. So our question this week is how often do you want new episodes and how long do you want them to be? Do you want shorter shows more often or longer shows less frequently? If you're listening on Spotify, look for our poll under the episode description, or you can send us an email to tnb@ Now onto the show. Welcome to Tech News Briefing. It's Friday, May 30th. I'm Victoria Craig for the Wall Street Journal. Remote jobs have become common for workers in industries across America. They make the work-life balance easier for employees, but they've also allowed countries like North Korea to infiltrate US companies with the help of everyday Americans. Today we're taking a deep dive into an intricate scam involving illegal paychecks and stolen data. A scam that the FBI says involves thousands of North Korean workers, has brought hundreds of millions of dollars a year into the country. It's a place where international sanctions have frozen the flow of funds, so the country has gotten creative in its quest for cash. And it's capitalized on some of America's remote work opportunities to start laptop farms in states across the US. Bob McMillan covers computer security hackers and privacy for the Wall Street Journal. Bob, I'm going to guess that the phrase "laptop farm" is not a familiar one for most of our listeners. So what is it and what kind of person typically runs one? Bob McMillan: Yeah, it's a new gig economy job that's popped up since the COVID epidemic and the advent of massive remote work. That's not something you'll find advertised, but basically you get a request, maybe via LinkedIn or some kind of gig work site that asks if you want to help a foreign company with a US representation. And the next thing you know, you're getting laptops shipped to your house and you're turning them on and you're operating them, but they're shipped to fake workers who have got jobs at these companies and who need a US address to pretend to be working out of. So laptop farmer receives the computers for the fake workers, turns them on, connects them, and then adds remote software so these people offshore can connect to these laptops. And then doing things like tech jobs, Python development and stuff like that. Here's the kicker though. The remote workers are actually North Koreans and they're trying to, in a very illegal way, make money for the heavily sanctioned regime there. Victoria Craig: Tell us about Christina Chapman because she was one of the people in America who participated in this scheme. Bob McMillan: Christina Chapman's case was interesting because you had the court record that had all these allegations of what she was doing. And then she left a very long TikTok trail of just all kinds of political TikToks, personal TikToks, TikToks about Japanese boy bands. But embedded in that were a few comments on her work and her situation in life. Christina Chapman: And I did not make my own breakfast this morning. My clients are going crazy, so I just got a smoothie bowl. It's an acai smoothie bowl and it has bananas, strawberries. Bob McMillan: But coincidentally in the background, you can see I counted at least 10 laptops there. They've got Post-it notes on them that apparently say the name of the worker and the company they're supposed to be working for. And you hear them just whirring away in her apartment. Victoria Craig: And what made Chapman a target for this kind of scam? Bob McMillan: Her story is probably, in many ways, very typical of these people. They are gig workers who reach a point in their life where they're desperate. And that's what happened with Christina Chapman. She was basically living in a trailer in Minnesota. She didn't have any heat. She was showering at her local gym. She really was at a dead end in her life. And this offer came in through LinkedIn saying, "Hey, do you want to be our US representative?" It became clear pretty quickly that some of the stuff she was doing was illegal. It's at least fraudulent, right? But she was desperate, and it really did turn her life around. I mean, she ended up having a much better quality of life as a result of this job. The problem is it's completely illegal. Victoria Craig: So the question about whether these people who are acting on behalf essentially of the North Koreans, whether they know what they're doing is illegal. Christina Chapman may not have known the nationality of the people she was working with, but you're right that she did acknowledge that she could "go to federal prison for falsifying federal documents." Bob McMillan: Yeah, it's pretty hard to do this gig without realizing you're doing something illegal, right? Because quite often you have to forge signatures. You have to facilitate the presentation of fake credentials. But if you look at the court records, she's basically saying, "Hey, what you're asking me to do is illegal," all the time. And the thing is that if you do fraud, that's one thing, but if you do fraud in support of the North Koreans, that's way worse. Victoria Craig: Coming up, a look at the corporate side of this scheme, who the scammers are targeting and what they want after the break. To make a laptop farming scam successful tech specialists usually trained in North Korea's technical education programs need to first find a back door into corporate America. We're back with WSJ reporter, Bob McMillan, who's been reporting on this. Bob, you write that. Christina Chapman, the so-called laptop farmer, who we about earlier helped North Koreans who got jobs at big companies like at a top five national television network here, a premier Silicon Valley tech company, an aerospace and defense manufacturer. And the list goes on. How exactly does this process work? How do they effectively trick the companies into hiring people who are really based in North Korea, China, or even Russia as you report? Bob McMillan: They basically operate a complete shadow economy. They have LinkedIn profiles, they have GitHub repositories where they store source code. They even have fake companies that they can use as references. So they build this sort of simulation of a legitimate, usually a tech worker profile. And then they just are so good at bombarding people with job requests. Companies have different levels of diligence they do around making sure the people they're hiring for remote work are real. A lot of them require that you come in, but some don't. And so with the people who can just straight up be hired by a staffing agency, for example, and never even have to show up, that's an easy one for them. But even if a company requires a face-to-face meeting, the North Koreans have a way around that. For a while, they were doing virtual face-to-face meetings with AI-driven avatars. So there're these fake faces that they would show up on Zoom meetings. And when people started figuring out how to get around that, if you ask the AI avatar to wave their hand in front of them, then the software doesn't work. And so you can tell it's a fake person. So they got around that though. They started hiring people who legitimately had tech skills to pass these interviews. Victoria Craig: And what do the North Koreans ultimately want from these workers? Bob McMillan: There are three things they want. First and foremost, they want money. Their regime is sanctioned. They have a hard time trading with anyone in the West, and they need cash. They need cash for their weapons program, for example. And the FBI estimates that they are making hundreds of millions of dollars a year just from paychecks, from companies hiring these North Koreans, who by all accounts, some are terrible workers and some are not bad, some last months or even years at these companies. And so they found sort of a hack of our remote work situation right now. So that's the first thing they want is money. The second thing, they want more money. So quite often they'll exfiltrate data, they'll steal your corporate secrets, your source code, customer information, and then they will threaten to dump it once you fire them. And so they'll extort you. So that's number two. And then the third case is murky, but the FBI suspects that they're also conducting espionage. So they've hit aerospace companies. There are certain types of companies that might have secrets that the North Korean regime would be interested in. So those are the three things they're doing. Victoria Craig: And how widespread is this? Bob McMillan: The FBI thinks there are thousands of these workers out there. And what's fascinating to me is I heard about this scam a couple of years ago. And where it started was in the cryptocurrency world. The crypto companies were getting with these fake workers all the time. And I didn't realize until I wrote this story how incredibly widespread it is. It feels like anybody who is hiring a remote worker has to worry about this. Victoria Craig: And is there anything the companies can do once they find out that this has happened to them? Bob McMillan: Since the story published, there's been a lot of debate over this. I actually asked Amazon's CSO about this problem, and he was aware of it. And I said, "What can you do about it?" And he said, "Well, you could have your employees come in five days a week." Victoria Craig: So just to close the loop on Christina for us, what ended up happening to her once she was found out, essentially? Bob McMillan: The FBI raided her house in October of 2023. She was charged the next year, and she struck a plea deal. So she's pled guilty, and she's due to be sentenced on July 16. According to the terms of her plea deal, she could be facing just a little bit more than nine years in prison for this. Victoria Craig: Wow. Wow. But her financial situation didn't turn out any better. She essentially wound up almost back where she was before. Isn't that right? Bob McMillan: It was worse, really. I mean, she's living in a homeless shelter now. She attempted to do a variety of things after the raid. The North Koreans didn't pay her for her final month of services. And she tried to do a GoFundMe. She tried to sell coloring books on Amazon. She did DoorDash one night and made $7.25 doing it. She struggled when this gig went away, and she eventually lost her home. And she's, yeah, living in a homeless shelter now. Victoria Craig: That was WSJ reporter, Bob McMillan there. And that's it for Tech News Briefing. Today's show is produced by Julie Chang. I'm your host, Victoria Craig. Jessica Fenton, and Michael LaValle wrote our theme music. Our supervising producer is Melony Roy. Our development producer is Aisha Al-Muslim. Scott Saloway and Chris Zinsli are the deputy editors. And Philana Patterson is the Wall Street Journal's head of news audio. We'll be back this afternoon with TNB Tech Minute. Thanks for listening.

Why AI Agents Are The Future Of Remote Work

Forbes

3 days ago

Business
Forbes

Why AI Agents Are The Future Of Remote Work

Photo by Aidin Geranrekab on Unsplash I remember the app boom. In the late aughts, the app landscape was exploding. Everyone was scrambling to release something new. Remember that 2009 Apple slogan? There's an app for that. It felt like a bubble that was bound to pop. But it didn't. Last year alone, there were approximately 137.8 billion app and game downloads worldwide. Apps are now fully integrated into our daily lives, so much so that we barely notice them. Just imagine arriving in a new destination and trying to navigate. Looking at your phone for directions is less a choice and more a reflex. Today, some people view AI agents as the latest tech fad. But I think they're the next logical evolution. Ece Kamar, managing director of Microsoft's AI Frontiers Lab, shares that view. She envisions a future marketplace of agents that empowers people the way apps once did—with tools that extend our capabilities in ways we've barely begun to grasp. And just as apps transformed everyday life, AI agents are beginning to transform remote work, automating routine tasks and enabling smarter collaboration across distances. Here's how. At Jotform, we believe in the value of working in the office. Since fully returning to the office after the pandemic, we've observed remarkable gains in learning, innovation, and all-around employee well-being. Still, some degree of remote work is inevitable, whether it's a parent spending precious time with a newborn child or colleagues collaborating across time zones. We've found that AI agents are a game-changer for remote project management. With tools like ClickUp, AI chat agents can act as your embedded project managers—automating task assignments, highlighting performance insights, and filtering massive message streams to highlight essential updates. Unlike traditional generative AI, the interaction isn't task-by-task. Instead of giving constant prompts, you set a goal, and the agent leverages available resources to execute it autonomously. For remote teams like ours, juggling time zones and tools, these agents reduce friction and lag time, allowing us to focus our energy on the actual work, not the work of coordination. One of the biggest challenges of remote work is the lack of immediate technical support. There are few things more frustrating than having your workflow derailed by glitchy or confusing software. AI agents are helping level the playing field for remote workers by streamlining back-office functions like IT and HR. They can be trained to act as first-line, always-on support. They're available 24/7 and never tired, grumpy, or burned out. Take Microsoft 365's Employee Self-Service Agent. It's designed to simplify routine HR and IT tasks, such as resolving laptop issues or checking benefits status. These agents can troubleshoot tech problems, answer policy questions, and guide employees through internal systems—all without waiting for a human rep. Without in-person meetings or casual watercooler chats, communication often suffers. Research shows it's one of the biggest challenges of remote work, especially for younger employees. When shifting from in-person to remote work, employees aged 18–24 and 25–34 reported receiving 10% less information from management. They also noted that both the frequency and effectiveness of communication dropped by at least 10%. AI agents can help bridge these gaps by supporting more consistent, timely, and transparent communication among remote teams. Zoom's AI Companion, for instance, acts as a conversational agent that enhances teamwork by offering real-time support across meetings, chats, and collaboration tools. During calls, it can generate live meeting summaries, recap action items, and answer questions like 'What did Sarah say about the deadline?' without interrupting the flow. In team chats, it can provide quick summaries of previous discussions or help draft responses, ensuring no one misses important context, even if they join late or are in a different time zone. Like an always-on assistant, this kind of support helps teams stay aligned and keeps projects moving forward. Agents can also help team members to quickly find information they need—no new Slack thread required. AI agents built into platforms like SharePoint can act like intelligent knowledge librarians, helping employees to locate relevant files, summaries, or project updates. Tech leaders like Sam Altman are calling 2025 the year AI-powered employees join the workforce. That might sound unsettling, understandably, but it can also be motivating. Rather than compete with virtual coworkers, we can embrace them as effort-amplifying teammates. For remote and in-office workers alike, the future can either be man-versus-machine or man-plus-machine.

The Economic Benefits of Paying Workers to Move

Bloomberg