How bad is this recession going to be? Tech layoffs are up 780% and companies are rescinding employment offers. Oof.

Fortunately, very few experts predict a repeat of 2008. Yes, real-estate prices are cooling off with the Fed’s rate increases, but a massive crash is still considered unlikely. Sorry, everybody under 40.

Either way, you can always get a job at Amazon, where turnover is so high they might run out of workers by 2024 — especially if Prime Air drones and Proteus warehouse robots replace all employees. (Will maybe-sentient AI replace the C-suite at Google? Talk about tech layoffs!)

Generational divide: See how young and old can still work together.

A Musk-ask question: Are narcissistic CEOs bad for business?

The Dropout: False advertising will come Holmes to roost.

“OK, boomer.” With those two words, the New York Times made the new generation gap official. Millennials and Gen Z were done listening to their elders, personally and professionally.

But generational discomfort goes both ways. Workers over 50 may struggle against ageist assumptions to find a new job and are often less familiar with recent terminology imported from college campuses. So, how can you keep your office from turning into Logan’s Run?

For tips, we spoke with Chris De Santis, business consultant and author of Why I Find You Irritating: Navigating Intergenerational Friction at Work.

The millennial stereotype is being entitled; the boomer stereotype is being behind the times. Is that unfair to both groups?

De Santis: I don’t think that’s representative of them at all. When you see two or three young people saying, “I want a promotion now,” or a few that want to hear how wonderful they are, we assume the entire group is this way. 

Categorization is a lot easier than dealing with the individual. Boomers will use technology if they can find appropriateness to it — they’ll make an effort to learn it.

What’s your advice to older workers for interacting with younger colleagues?

De Santis: Ask how you can support them: “I might not give a lot of positive feedback, but if that’s something you require of me from time to time, I’ll tell you.” … They don’t want just positive feedback; they want holistic, proportional feedback.

Vice versa, what’s your advice to younger workers?

De Santis: Older people want to help you — we are inclined genetically to help the young — but there’s a lot of anxiety: “I’ll say the wrong thing and we’ll get in an email about pronoun wars,” or “I can’t talk this way.” Be good listeners, give them the benefit of the doubt.

How does Gen Z’s emergence play into these office dynamics?

De Santis: They want to know more clearly what their opportunities are. … They’re less patient with ambiguity from an organization in terms of, “You work hard, we’ll see how you advance.” The metrics need to be clearer.

Why I Find You Irritating: Navigating Intergenerational Friction at Work is available now.

(Source: Shutterstock)

It’s the summer of Elon Musk. From taking over Twitter to taking political sides, he’s constantly been in the headlines — but with Tesla stock plunging while Musk seems obsessed with social media, are the eccentricities that made him the world’s richest person now costing him and his shareholders billions? (And worse, destroying his family?)

Perhaps Musk is just having fun, but many observers have wondered about his state of mind. The president of Ireland even said last month, “[I]t can hardly be described as anything other than a manifestation of an incredibly dangerous narcissism.”

While it’s not possible to diagnose someone from afar, Rice University professor Dr. Eden King, former president of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, warns below that narcissistic behavior in business can have some positives but ultimately has far more drawbacks.

The best leaders can be selfless, dedicated, and inspirational, but not all leaders embody these ideal traits. One characteristic can be especially problematic: narcissism. Leaders who are high in narcissism think they are awesome and don’t care much about anyone else.

Research suggests that, overall, there is a very small positive relationship between CEO narcissism and firm performance. This may have to do with the willingness to take risks and “go big.” CEOs who are high in narcissism tend to go for big mergers and acquisitions.

But there’s also a clear downside: Their organizations are more likely to be involved in lengthy lawsuits because narcissism is linked with unethical and destructive behavior. This form of leadership also has negative trickle-down effects to others in the organization; when middle managers think their CEOs are narcissistic, the middle managers themselves are worse leaders.

So what can you do if you find yourself working for a narcissistic leader? If you can’t or don’t want to leave, you should manage your time and energy thoughtfully. A study of employees across industries found that resilient outlooks help stave off burnout from working with a narcissistic leader.

If you are dealing with a narcissist, take time to take care of yourself.

(Source: Hulu )

The Dropout, now streaming on Hulu, leans into the messy humanity of disgraced Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes, whom Amanda Seyfried plays with real, awkward cunning. What should be the prototypical unicorn story — a 19-year-old raises billions for a machine that can perform 200 medical tests from a single drop of blood — ends with a chaotic downfall because the device, infamously, never worked.

Across eight episodes, Holmes increasingly relies on conviction and slick marketing to supersede a lack of results. We all tend to accept that some lying happens in the workplace — not every project comes in by the promised deadline — but how much will actually crash a company?

A 2019 study published in Harvard Business Review found that the differentiator is “not individual character traits, but organizational issues.” A culture of dishonesty and distortion festers due to an internal lack of accountability and cross-functional collaboration, as well as a gap “between an organization’s stated mission, objectives, and values, and the way it is actually experienced by employees and the marketplace.”

Actor Ryan Ashton, who appears in the series as a bike-shorts-wearing venture capitalist, tells b., “[The Dropout] is a reminder to check yourself and make sure that you can stand by your word, even when failing.”

Written by Marty Beckerman, Dr. Eden King, and Dan Ketchum. Comic by John McNamee.