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Happy Monday. It’s going to be a weird one—if your team isn’t distracted by the total solar eclipse expected to affect parts of the country, they might be focused on the NCAA men’s basketball championship game scheduled for tonight. So much for a productive start to the week.
At least Friday brought good news: Employers added 303,000 jobs in March, government data showed, marking the 39th straight month of job growth and well above the consensus economist forecast of 200,000 new jobs, according to a report by my colleague Derek Saul. The unemployment rate fell to 3.8%, dipping from February’s 3.9% and extending the longest streak of sub-4% unemployment rates in six decades.
Perhaps such news will help boost worker confidence, which has been falling as companies continue to blame layoffs on “overhiring,” Glassdoor finds. Forbes’ Maria Gracia Santillana Linares reported on the latest Glassdoor analysis of employee reviews of their companies’ business outlook, finding that the share of reviews mentioning overhiring has increased 24% since last March, and is up more than threefold since 2022. She explores how more employers are using the “overhiring” excuse when announcing layoffs—rather than simply saying “business is down”—and the impact that could have on worker confidence.
Also this week: I chatted with Amina Moreau, CEO and cofounder of a novel startup called Radious that acts something like an Airbnb platform, but for daytime use. Home and property owners rent out their properties to work teams who want comfortable, homey spaces to gather for off-sites or to do, well, work. Previously only available in three cities, the platform is now publicizing that they can help teams find spaces across the country. Check out our interview below, and thanks, as always for reading.
HUMAN CAPITAL
Despite Friday’s better-than-expected jobs numbers, layoffs hit a 14-month high in March, as 90,000 people lost work during the month, according to a new report by outplacement and career services firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. More than a third of those were federal government positions, the report said, with more than 36,000 jobs lost in the sector, including from the U.S. Army and the Veterans Affairs department. Meanwhile, Apple laid off more than 600 workers in California, the company disclosed in a set of filings with the state’s Employment Development Department. The numbers come weeks after reports the company is canceling its self-driving car project and in-house efforts to build Apple Watch displays, Forbes’ Siladitya Ray reports.
WORK TECH
Microsoft will split up Teams, its workplace messaging and video calls app, from its Office platform globally, the company told Reuters, mirroring a move it made in the European Union last year as it tries to avoid regulatory scrutiny and penalties. The tech giant said it would make the change worldwide “to ensure clarity,” meaning businesses can now choose slightly cheaper Microsoft 365 plans that do not include Teams.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
A Northwestern Medicine study published Tuesday in JAMA Network found that ChatGPT may be able to respond to questions about radiation oncology as well as trained professionals—or even better. That has the potential to reduce the workload and burnout of clinicians, the study found, who face increasing demand as cancer cases rise. Meanwhile, Forbes’ CIO newsletter points to a survey of IT leaders that finds roughly a quarter say they moved too fast on AI. Check it out here (and share with your IT leaders)!
FOUR-DAY WORKWEEK
First, Jamie Dimon said artificial intelligence could bring about 3.5-day workweeks. Now billionaire Steve Cohen says he sees a four-day workweek coming, and that’s what’s driving his investments in golf, as people have more leisure time, Bloomberg reported. Don’t miss our coverage from last week on how one fitness and coaching firm is managing the four-day week, or what data says about the impact of a four-day week.
POLICY + PRACTICE
In our perpetually online world, it’s becoming increasingly difficult for many white collar workers to prioritize work-life balance, as emails and Slack messages don’t stop once the clock hits 5 p.m. But proposed legislation in California could change things. Assemblymember Matt Haney (D-San Francisco) introduced Assembly Bill 2751 this week, which, if passed, would make California the first state to guarantee workers the “right to disconnect.”
“The lines between when you’re working and when you’re not have become so blurred that, for many people, they never have a time to switch off,” Haney said in an interview with Forbes contributor Jack Kelly. The bill drew attention the same week that California’s higher minimum wage law for fast food workers went into effect, which Kelly argues could come with unintended consequences such as restaurant closures and reduced hours for employees.
WHAT’S NEXT: RADIOUS COFOUNDER AND CEO AMINA MOREAU
Radious, an online marketplace that lets residential property owners rent their spaces for co-working, has long operated a platform that works something like an Airbnb for off-sites in the cities of Portland, San Francisco and Milwaukee. But on April 2, it announced a “national curation service” helping companies find mostly residential properties for their off-sites or team meetings across the country. Forbes spoke with Amina Moreau, CEO and co-founder of Radious, about the new service, what she’s seeing in remote work trends, and some of the platform’s most unusual properties (anyone want to work from an alpaca farm?). Excerpts from our interview have been edited below for length and clarity.
How did you decide to go national?
Radious has been serving corporate customers now for about two years, and the double-edged sword of the new reality of work is that companies are increasingly hiring in a distributed fashion. I think it’s great overall. But as a young platform that wasn’t yet nationwide, it was posing a bit of a challenge for us. Even if we were working with a company that was HQ’d in one of our markets, they might have a cluster of five or 10 people somewhere else in the country. At the time, we just had to tell them tough luck we can only serve you in the markets where we’ve officially launched.
We tested a curation program that we ran under the radar. Effectively, if any company needed space, whether it was for a one-off meeting or for regular co-working with a small team in a location in the United States where we didn’t officially have a presence, all they had to do was ask us. Give us two weeks of lead time, and because we’ve gotten really efficient at recruiting properties, we could find them three to five workspaces in that region.
What’s your growth rate look like?
We have companies that are everywhere from 10-person startups to Fortune 500 that have used this service, and for different reasons. The most common use cases are team building, bringing people together—especially those who might be remote—and then also finding space in locations where an employee cluster is not big enough to warrant signing a permanent seven-day week lease. [Moreau shared via email that Radious saw a 20% increase in bookings as a direct result of the national service’s eight-month pilot. It also more than doubled their revenue, she says, despite not charging anything extra for the personalized service.]
How do you find the properties nationally?
It is very bespoke. It’s almost like a matchmaking service because we work with the company to identify their exact needs. The first way that we do that is our waiting list [of property owners]. People love this idea, both on the demand and supply side. So far we’ve had to tell them you have to wait until we’ve expanded into your geography. There are also large communities of short-term rental hosts who don’t necessarily love the overnight model of platforms like Airbnb and VRBO and are actively looking to diversify or maybe even get out of the overnight game. Because Radious is only by the day and there are no overnight stays, we allow them to jump ship or supplement their income on weekdays and slow seasons if they add some workplace amenities. … We also have relationships with trade organizations in the short-term rental business and with property managers.
Will the new national network still be residential-type spaces, and will people search for them on your site?
About 95% of our properties are residential. We are testing some more commercial traditional-feeling ones, but our biggest differentiator comes from the fact that we are activating residential spaces. They’re close to home. The biggest barrier to returning to the office is the commute. Activating residential spaces means we’re activating residential areas, which is precisely where people live.
We are not necessarily publishing publicly all of the listings that we secure nationwide. We have to be careful as a platform how we expand. … This is a great way for us to basically collect data on where, geographically, there is the most demand.
What kind of properties are in most demand?
It totally depends on the use case. If they’re booking a space to get their team together for a day of team building and inspiration or motivation, then a property with beautiful views or multiple rooms to break out into is absolutely stellar. But let’s say it’s the C-suite coming together to do a really heads-down strategy session—certainly the environment matters, but having tools like whiteboards, A/V, simply being able to plug your laptop into the TV so you can show a slide presentation, those things tend to matter just as much.
From an amenity standpoint, the number one requested amenity is a whiteboard. … But by far the best thing that you can do as a homeowner to get booked on Radious is make sure that your property has a “wow” factor. … Companies are booking to have an experience, so you can’t just be bare bones. You’ve got to put some effort into it.
What impact are you seeing return to office mandates have?
We have to remember that the biggest companies also have the biggest PR megaphones. When they recall people back to the office, it’s going to make headlines, and it’s easy to assume that is the norm. … They also usually have the biggest real estate holdings, and as long as they’re stuck in leases, of course they’re going to try to get butts in seats.
What’s the most unusual space anyone has rented?
The one I think is the quirkiest is our conference yurt on an alpaca farm. This place has all of the amenities you would expect in a conference room—it has A/V, a conference table, a whiteboard, everything you would expect—but it is a 50-person yurt. During your coffee breaks, you take a big bag of apples and go feed them to the animals. It’s in Portland. Of course it’s in Portland.
STRATEGIES AND ADVICE
People who use AI will replace those who don’t. Here’s five ways to embrace AI to help you do—and keep—your job.
The rise in super-commuting is changing how we work, reshaping traditional notions of employment. Here’s what leaders need to know.
Sabbaticals have pros and cons. Here’s how to navigate taking a career break.
FACTS AND COMMENT
The University of Texas-Austin is laying off workers to ensure it is fully complying with a state law that bans diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in public universities, senior contributor Michael Nietzel reports. Though the university did not specify a number of jobs cut, a release from the Texas Conference of American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and Texas NAACP shared further details.
60: The estimated number of people who formerly worked in DEI assignments and received layoff notices, according to a joint release from the Texas AAUP and NAACP chapters.
82: The number of bills that have been introduced in 28 states and the U.S. Congress, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education, that would do one or more of the following: prohibit colleges from maintaining diversity, equity and inclusion offices or staff; ban mandatory diversity training; forbid use of diversity statements in hiring and promotion; or bar colleges from considering race, sex, ethnicity or national origin in admissions or employment.
“I recognize that strong feelings have surrounded SB 17 from the beginning and will shape many Longhorns’ perceptions of these measures,” UT Austin president Jay Hartzell said in a memo.
VIDEO
How Reformation’s Hali Borenstein Found Her Leadership Voice
QUIZ
The total solar eclipse that will happen April 8 comes in the middle of the workday for many in the United States. The “path of totality” will cross all but which of the following states?
- Texas
- Kentucky
- West Virginia
- Maine
Check your answer here.
