Innehållsförteckning för Winter 2020/2021 från Fast Company

Since 2013, Fast Company has dedicated an issue of the magazine to revealing the habits and schedules of some of the world’s most prolific leaders in business and culture. Each year, there always seems to be one executive who answers emails every day at 4 a.m., or an entrepreneur who schedules a standing staff meeting on Sundays. But our Secrets of the Most Productive People feature is decidedly not a workaholic’s handbook. Yes, it’s fascinating to learn how overachievers get it all done. But we also explore how they clear their heads, recharge, and find inspiration—underappreciated elements of productivity that are increasingly important as the COVID-19 pandemic stretches into 2021, and with it, the challenges of working remotely. Unfortunately, many bosses remain focused on textbook definitions of on-the-job effectiveness, measured…

If you had walked by one of Sephora’s nearly 400 U.S. stores in May 2019, you would have seen in the window a large photo of a smiling Black woman accompanied by the slogan: “Color Up Close. Foundation for Everyone, Let’s Find Yours Together.” The displays featured other images of diverse models as well, enticing shoppers of all races into the store. The campaign hit high streets and shopping malls at a crucial time for the mega retailer. That month, singer SZA (aka Solána Imani Rowe) had accused employees at the company’s Calabasas, California, location of racially profiling her. Other customers followed up by sharing stories of discrimination on social media, leading Sephora to close all of its stores for an hour of mandatory racial bias training for its 16,000…

01 The molecular biology team manipulates the DNA of various strains of algae to identify extracts that have the proper glucose profile to produce sufficient amounts of oil. 02 Checkerspot scientists use sugar to feed and grow the useful strains in a fermentation broth that eventually fills a 300-liter tank. 03 Over a period of five days, the broth is monitored in pressurized tanks and converted into oil, which can be used to create foam or rigid materials to manufacture skis.…

2012 As an organizer at the Center for Popular Democracy, Barkan starts the “Fed Up” campaign to push the Federal Reserve to enact more equitable policies. 2016 Barkan and the CPD secure a spot for “regular people” to speak at the Fed’s annual meeting. Shortly after, he is diagnosed with ALS. 2017 A video goes viral of Barkan urging Republican senator Jeff Flake to vote “no” on cuts that would hurt Medicare and Medicaid, though Flake ultimately backs the bill. 2019 Barkan testifies before Congress on Medicare for All, publishes Eyes to the Wind, and begins interviewing Democratic presidential candidates on Uncovered. 2020 Barkan interviews Joe Biden, speaks at the DNC, and is named one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People, in an entry penned by Senator Elizabeth Warren.…

Microsoft’s new consoles are designed to fade into the background of even the best-decorated homes. The monochromatic Series S, the cheaper of two new models released in September, is visually quiet, though never boring. Its simple shape recalls the legendary mid-century work of industrial designer Dieter Rams at Braun. The box’s surprise hero is utilitarian venting in high-contrast black, creating a video-game console that is as impressive aesthetically as it is technologically. ($300, Xbox.com)…

TRACEE ELLIS ROSS ACTRESS AND CEO What’s your best habit, and what’s your worst? Finding joy in life and overthinking. What do you do when you’re creatively stuck? I play dress-up in my closet and style a great look, or I organize. Is there a businessperson you admire? Madam C.J. Walker. She used her voice and power to expand the playing field and encourage empowerment and equity for Black women. Is there a buzzword you never want to hear again? Diversity training. What is actually needed is antiracism training. How do you unplug? Take social media off my phone, and spend some time with trees. Is there a book you recommend to everyone? When Things Fall Apart, by Pema Chödrön. It taught me how to be with the inevitable pain of…

SERENA VENTURES The mantra of the investment fund, which Williams launched in 2014, is “Ignite change.” So far, it has provided early seed funding to more than 60 companies that seek to make the world a more equitable place. S BY SERENA Williams launched this apparel company in 2018. The direct-to-consumer line celebrates diversity and empowerment by creating affordable looks for women of all shapes and sizes. SPONSORSHIP AND ENDORSEMENT DEALS Williams lends her image to more than a dozen brands: Nike, Wilson, Gator ade, Beats, JPMorgan Chase, Secret, Abbvie, Lincoln, Stuart Weitzman, Audemars Piguet, KP Sanghvi, Away, and Berlei. SERENA WILLIAMS JEWELRY Launched in 2019, this line of ethically sourced diamond pieces priced from $299 to $10,000 includes necklaces, earrings, and rings bearing words like queen and winner. YETUNDE…

BRANDY ZADROZNY REPORTER, NBC NEWS The pandemic has made everything crazy in terms of disinformation and conspiracy theories, so what was an all-encompassing beat has now become somehow worse. Everybody’s lost their minds. There’s always something that is desperately in need of someone to shine a light on. So it’s been good in that way, because my work is all I’ve ever wanted to do. I feel fulfilled. But, the stakes are so high. I cover how technology is influencing people—how it changes the way that we communicate and what we believe. That takes being extremely accessible. I like that anybody can get in touch with me. All of my favorite stories have [started with] basically one woman in a Facebook group messaging me to say, “What do you think…

Over Labor Day weekend, real estate mogul Rob Speyer got a call from an old friend: Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers, the union that represents New York City’s 75,000-plus educators. Mulgrew had a favor to ask. Could Speyer, through his role as president and CEO of Tishman Speyer, help monitor and improve ventilation in some of the city’s public schools, as he had done across his own commercial real estate portfolio? Good ventilation could reduce the spread of COVID-19 in enclosed spaces like classrooms—and lay the foundation for reopening the schools that serve New York City’s 1.1 million students. “Within an hour we had a team mobilized and ready to go,” says Speyer. On a pro bono basis, he started sending Tishman Speyer employees to two…

Rent the Runway One of the largest buyers in the U.S., the clothing-rental company is working to stock more Black-owned brands and designers and, James notes, co-manufacturing with smaller designers that lack the production capacity. West Elm The furniture retailer is planning to bring new companies into its West Elm Local program, which stocks third-party brands. James says the company will also help market some of these Black-owned businesses to its customer base. MedMen With 24 stores across the U.S., the cannabis retailer is now working to grow its inventory of Black-owned brands. “This is an industry that has been particularly exclusionary for Black people,” James says.…

First introduced in the 1940s, the option to grab dinner from your car has since become a standard practice across restaurant chains. In recent years, roughly 65% of all fast-food sales came from drive-throughs. But during the pandemic, when dining rooms closed nationwide, the drive-through became a necessity. Now, America’s fastfood chains are planning to maximize their pickup revenue into the future, with more lanes, new apps, and even cubbies to grab mobile orders from. But Burger King’s new concept, planned for testing next year, goes so far as to raise most of the restaurant up to a second story to make more blacktop available for cars. At Burger King, you might not see much in terms of grass or trees, but your car will be treated like royalty. Kitchen…

01 Homeland SHOWTIME The more I thought I knew what would happen next, the more I was wrong. I was devastated when it ended, but it ended so well. 02 The Bureau SUNDANCE NOW A great love story. A twisted plot that keeps you on your toes. No episode has ever let me down. 03 Tehran APPLE TV+ The great female lead (a Mossad agent caught in Tehran), clever setup, and mountains of suspense in every episode have me hooked. 04 Money Heist NETFLIX The story of how a cadre of thieves robbed the Royal Mint of Spain. How are they going to get out? 05 The Americans AMAZON PRIME This show offers a great history lesson, an acting tour de force, and constant suspense. HOW TO Design the Perfect…

Newsletter AIR MAIL This weekly digital newsletter covers global topics, from style and fashion to politics and the environment. Every article is interesting and insightful. Instagram @GOOP An amazing visual source for everything from wellness and style to beauty. Podcast FATMASCARA [This podcast is] made for anyone who is beauty obsessed! Each week, guests share their insightsand experiences in the beauty industry. Twitter @MINDBODYGREEN For my doily dose of quick tips and tricks on all aspects of well-being whether it be physical, spiritual, or emotional. An Iconic Blanket ($135, AREAWARE .COM) Susan Kare’s cotton blankets feature the first emoji typeface, Cairo, which she designed in 1984 while working at Apple. Some of the symbols, such as the cursor and watch, live on in operating systems today. RETREAT AND ADVANCE Copenhagen…

DANIEL DAE KIM ACTOR AND PRODUCER I got the coronavirus early on, while filming New Amsterdam in New York in March. I felt a scratch in my throat on the plane back to Hawaii, where I live, so I quarantined when I got home and then got tested at a drive-through center. I spoke about it on Instagram in case people found it informative and because I wanted to call out racist behavior against Asian Americans. I’ve spent about two and a half months in quarantine in 2020 because I’ve been traveling and quarantining before and after every trip. It’s not how I like to work. While I was recovering from the coronavirus, the opportunity to work in Korea came up, which is something I’d always wanted to do. Seoul recovered…

N.K. JEMISIN AUTHOR AND 2020 MACARTHUR FELLOW I didn’t try to publish anything until I was 30, when I basically had a midlife crisis. I was in a city I didn’t like, had not reached various milestones I wanted to reach, and was in student loan debt up to my eyeballs. I actually liked my job [as a career counselor for at-risk populations]. But I’d always written as a hobby, [and] I decided to see if I could make money doing it. I would make sure I wrote one page, or even just 250 words, every day. Counseling is one of those emotionally draining fields where sometimes something terrible would happen at work. I would allow myself not to produce that day. Instead, I would write something completely irrelevant, like…

ROZ BREWER COO AND GROUP PRESIDENT, STARBUCKS When I look at the combination of my personal and professional life, I often feel like a traffic cop, trying to get everyone in their lane…. As the COO for Starbucks, it is a lot about creating the operational plan for the workweek, and setting the strategy and vision for the largest part of the company. My assistant and I have a calendar coding system. For example, meetings with direct reports are color coded in orange, meetings with other senior leaders are coded in green, personal time is coded as purple, and office time is coded in gray. Every Friday, I review my tentative schedule for Monday—tentative because it usually changes over the weekend—and take note of important upcoming meetings, team anniversaries, birthdays,…

FLORIAN KRAMMER PROFESSOR OF VACCINOLOGY AT ICAHN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE, MOUNT SINAI I was concerned about COVID-19 on December 31, when I heard for the first time that there was an out break. With the release of the genetic sequence on January 10, it was pretty clear to me that this was not going to end well. For a couple of weeks I was almost in a panic about it, but it helped that we started to work on it right away. There are hints that antibodies prevent you from getting infected with COVID-19, but the magic number of antibodies that you need doesn’t exist yet. [At my lab,] we will establish it. Even when I was a kid, I liked to get up in the morning. You get up…

ON THE EVENING OF FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14, BILL GATES SAT DOWN FOR A SEAFOOD DINNER IN SEATTLE. IT WASN’T A VALENTINE’S DAY MEAL; MELINDA, HIS WIFE OF 26 YEARS, COULDN’T ATTEND. HE WAS GRABBING TAKEOUT WITH A HANDFUL of experts who worked with him at the headquarters of the foundation that he and Melinda cofounded in 2000 to take on global health challenges. As it drizzled outside, he pressed them on the current state of the novel coronavirus outbreak in China, where thousands of people had fallen sick. A small number of cases were now beginning to show up in other parts of the world. “I kept saying, ‘Hey, won’t China be able to keep it from spreading to other countries?’ ” he tells me when we chat in late…

RASHAD ROBINSON WAS ON A ZOOM CALL WITH HIS STAFF IN JUNE WHEN HE GOT THE NEWS. The TV show Cops, a mainstay of American culture for 32 years, the foundation for decades of ride-along-with-the-police programming that deifies law enforcement, was going off the air. It was a major moment in television history, and one that, for many, seemed to have materialized out of thin air-a knee-jerk response to the racial politics of the moment. In reality, it was the culmination of a seven-year-long campaign by Robinson and Color of Change, the civil rights organization that he helms. Color of Change had long viewed Cops as blatant public relations for law enforcement that reinforced racial stereotypes—and that was beamed directly into millions of living rooms each week. In 2013, in…

Labor Force Pre-pandemic, percentage of labor participation for mothers (2019) Job Growth Change in job growth since June Lost Hours Hours that parents lose each workday due to stress, anxiety, and caregiving Job Flexibility Importance of providing flexibility for caregivers during the pandemic Economic Hit Weekly loss in GDP due to decreased productivity among working parents Mass Exit People over the age of 20 who dropped out of the workforce in September 2020 School Reopenings Percentage of districts open for in-person learning, by locale…

After biotech startup Checkerspot created plastic derived from microalgae, outdoor recreation products seemed like a perfect test for new compounds that replicate the properties of petroleum-based plastics. “We’re leveraging biotechnology to create new building blocks,” says cofounder and CEO (and skier) Charles Dimmler. He launched spinout WNDR Alpine in 2019, which introduced an algae-based, high-performance backcountry ski, the Intention, last winter. The Vital ski, designed for hardpacked snow, followed in July. WNDR’s manufacturing process eliminates 2 pounds of landfill-bound plastic waste per ski.…

One of the most powerful voices throughout the 2020 election cycle belonged to a man who lost his ability to speak. Diagnosed with the neurodegenerative disease ALS in 2016, 37-year-old lawyer and organizer Ady Barkan uses a wheelchair and assistive technology to communicate—but his call for Medicare for All has never been heard by more people. During the primaries, Barkan and his Be a Hero PAC engaged Democratic candidates including Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren in frank conversations about the U.S. healthcare system for his video series, Uncovered. Barkan later spoke at the Democratic National Convention. The subject of a forthcoming documentary, Not Going Quietly, Barkan continues to advocate for progressive policies even as his disease progresses. “I’m going to continue using my time to fight for a…

Since Amazon Prime debuted in 2005, retailers have been scram- bling to match its convenience—but never more urgently than during the pandemic, as consumers moved to shopping online. In September, Walmart introduced Walmart+, a membership that offers same-day delivery using stores as hubs. Target purchased delivery service Shipt in 2017 and rolled it out at its 1,800 locations, plus other retail partners. In 2019, e-commerce logistics company Shopify debuted a $1 billion fulfillment network to give merchants two-day shipping capability. E-commerce is trending upward Though brick and mortar still accounts for the lion’s share of the retail market, e-commerce jumped significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic. E-commerce as a percentage of total retail sales Key players Amazon was one of the first companies to launch e-commerce, in 1995; it continues to…

01 Waking Up “ BANANA PANCAKES,” JACK JOHNSON “Banana Pancakes” is a forever favorite. It always sets the tone for a slow morning. 02 Working Out “ DANCE MONKEY,” TONES & I This song always puts me in the best upbeat mood. I sometimes play it back to back while running when I need an extra boost. 03 Driving FAST CAR,” TRACY CHAPMAN It’s the ultimate cruising song—I love listening to this song when driving upstate. 04 Get Psyched “ PASSIONFRUIT,” DRAKE “Passionfruit” is my go-to when I need to prepare for a big presentation or speaking event. Blades of Glory ($ 569.95 , HAMMACHE R.COM) France’s Tarrerias-Bonjean has been making knives since 1648. The company’s four-piece, black stainless-steel set contains a chef ’s knife and santoku blade (pictured above),…

A VOCAL CORD Texting is impersonal. Video chat, invasive. Maybe what we need is good old-fashioned voicemail. Yac lets you leave voice messages that teammates can listen to anytime on a computer or phone. You can also add a screen share, in case you need a visual aid. [Windows, Mac, iOS, Android] ︽ REAL-LIFE “DO NOT DISTURB” MODE Announcing to your partner or roommates that you need privacy can seem a little confrontational. Oh Bother lets you set boundaries in a subtler way; the app signals whether or not you’re okay with being disturbed. [iOS] A CREDIBLE CHROME RIVAL Microsoft Edge blocks trackers, by default, from sites you haven’ t visited, and of - fers even stricter tracking protection asan option. Based on the same source code as Chrome, it…

PDOGG (KANG HYO-WON) CHIEF PRODUCER, BIG HIT ENTERTAINMENT (HOME TO KOREAN HITMAKERS BTS) As a producer, I think the most important thing is to highlight the strengths of each artist. We need to make sure that each voice strikes a balance in the context of the entire song. “Dynamite” was originally composed of vocals, so we had to find a way to make sure that all seven of our members in BTS could be reflected in a natural way. I try to make it a comfortable environment where I provide motivation for further exploration. If there are ideas from the artist that I feel need to be built up a bit more, then I try to explain it to them and provide some sort of guidance. All of this is…

GINA MCCARTHY PRESIDENT AND CEO, NATIONAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL When we first got started in this [pandemic], there was almost no separation between work and home.... We lost those separations where you just stop, sit down, and have dinner. The one habit that I’ve always had is that I don’t talk about work when I’m at home, period. Through eight years [as the head of the Environmental Protection Agency] in the Obama administration, I just didn’t. I don’t think my husband knew what I was doing for a living until I was in the Obama administration, because then he could read some things in the news, and it’d be like, “Oh, you’re doing this?” I had three kids in three years. My job was to be home when I’m home. And…

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