Brian Chesky, the CEO of Airbnb, still admires Facebook. Not the Facebook of today, but the Facebook circa 2005. When it pretty much just told you someones birthday and let you poke ’em.
It would still be a great product! exclaims Chesky. We’re not going to be that company [making it], but there’s still a need for it.
But while Chesky doesnt want to build Facebook 2.0, he is laying the groundwork for Airbnb to become something much closer to a social network.
Airbnbs fall updates launching today are but the first steps in a significant reframe of the experience of using Airbnbone that is moving it closer to social networking, and another that embeds it far more intimately with AI.
The social aspects arrive through the introduction of Connections. Basically, when you book an experience with Airbnb, you will be able to opt in to share yourself. When other people book the experience, they will see your face. Then after the experience, they can see your greater profileand slide into your DMs to keep the discussion going.
[Image: Airbnb]
Beyond that, Airbnb is also doubling down on using AI agents for support processesin a move that Chesky claims speeds up the service, from roughly three-hours in phone calls to solve problems, to a few seconds. While introduced earlier this year for generic answers, now Airbnb support agents will be able to know deeper details about your tripsso they can respond with personalized answers: like if you are allowed to bring a dog to that apartment in Mexico City.
These updates might seem minor or iterative, but to Chesky, a designer-entrepreneur with a penchant for extracting deep narratives from his own product, they are the first stages into redefining what Airbnb issomething of an AI-driven life experience platform that pushes you to meet others IRL.
This conversation has been condensed and edited.
Id like to kick things off talking about the social networking youre building into Airbnb.
I think I see some original intent: I wouldnt want to sign up for an Experience if I don’t know who else is going. But how much of this update came from that problem, and then how much of it was born from other ambitions?
So there’s two reasons we’re doing the social features on Experiences. The first is, we just noticed that a lot of guests use it to meet people. So yes, they want to get a vibe for who’s coming. We just show their profile avatars, but it gives a little bit of a sense of aliveness, a sense of, “Oh yeah, they’re kind of people my age, or kind of cool-looking people.”
We also notice a lot of people create WhatsApp groups after the experience is over, because they may want to hang out after. It’s kind of difficult [to set that up]. So we wanted to make that easier. Part of it was just responding to how people were using it. That was the tactical reason to do it.
[Image: Airbnb]
There’s a much more strategic reason, which is, I don’t want Airbnb just to be a marketplace. I want it to be a community. A marketplace just sells you stuff. A community connects you to other people, other places, other cultures. And I think this is the beginning of us shifting from a marketplace to a community.
Now, admittedly, these are modest features. I’m not saying this is, overnight, a social network in the real world. But we’re going to be announcing a lot more social features next year, and even more the year after. I think pretty soon it’s going to be a very social platform. Not like Facebook, social. Social in the real world.
Its interesting you put it that way. I feel cautious about Airbnb social features, because the social aspects of Airbnb can already be so hit or miss. And so I find wondering if Ill want to engage that much with a more social Airbnb.
I think everything will be very personalized in the future. And part of our AI strategy is that no one sees the same homepage, no one sees the same app. So the first thing we need to do is learn more about you. Like, do you want to be social? Not everyone does. If you don’t want to be social, you don’t have to opt into the social features, and we can show you things that are just less social. Not everyone wants the same level of social features.
I’ll give you an example. We’re going to offer hotels in Airbnb. Some people will never stay in a hotel on Airbnb. We’re never going to show them hotels . . . we need to get more personalized.
I guess the second thing, though, is that we do think human connection can be great, but you’re right. It’s hit and miss. So I think a bunch of what we want to do is do more verification and better matching of the kind of people that you might be inclined to want to meet.
So it’s kind of a two-fold approach to personalization: Do you even want to meet people? And if you do, do we match you to the right people?
[Image: Airbnb]
With your initial launch, really, all I’m sharing is my avatar when I register for an Experience. It’s not until after the Experience that people can be like, “Oh, there’s Marks profile. I can scope him out, learn who he is.“
Yep. And you can opt out of the avatar and opt out of people messaging you.
Longer term, Ive heard you frame Airbnb as a unifier during a time when the world is really divided. Is that too much weight to put on the platform? I feel like that’s a lot of weight to put on the platform!
I think it’s a good mission. I don’t think it’s too much weight to put on the platform. I think what would be too much weight is us trying to solve a global problem on our own. That would be unreasonable.
But if you think about the scale of the platform, nearly four million people a night stay in someone’s home, we’re probably already one of the biggest unifiers in the world. It is like the United Nations at kitchen tables. During the election, millions of Trump supporters were staying in the homes of Kamala Harris supporters and vice versa. And most of the time, they didn’t even realize that.
So I think if there was ever a company to bring the world together, it would be a company like Airbnb that brings them together in the real world. But we’re under no delusion that we’re going to be the ones solving this problem.
I do think there needs to be more unity in the world . . . and I want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem. I want to be the kind of company that helps get people off the phone, into the real world, and exposes other people to their cultures.
It’s getting increasingly difficult to meet people. And increasingly, when people are colliding, they’re typically colliding with people they’re very similar to because [theyre in] these hermetically sealed social media bubbles. Or they collide, argue with each other on the internet, but they never change each other’s mind.
So this is what we’re trying to do. And by the way, this is a multi-decade [ambition]. I’ve been doing this for 18 years. I would like to do this for another 18 years, or whatever. These are long-term views we’re taking. But I have to have a point of view. In the age of AI, what’s our purpose? I think our purpose is to help bring people together.
As you’re approaching social networking, you have seen a lot go wrong in the industry. Are there things that are off the table right now for you? Are there things that you’re marking as guideposts to make sure you do it the right way?
Yes. Well, number one, not having an ad-driven model. I think the business model needs to be aligned with the customers interest. And so that’s number one. Number two, I think there’s an expectation of safety on Airbnb, which I think there isn’t necessarily with social media.
Parents want social media to be safe for their kids; I don’t know if the kids are asking for social media to be safe. But I think everyone that uses Airbnb has an expectation of safety.
On social media, it’s kind of viewed as, like, safe and unsafe content. Safe speech is kind of political. Safety and everything else [on Airbnb] is not really a political issue. People expect it. And the reason people are okay with us holding them to safety standards is they want us to hold everyone else to safety standards.
So I think the other thing is we want to do our best to design social interactions that we think are enriching to people and, I don’t want to make this interview about social media, but I think it’s safe to say that some social media improves my life, and some use of social media does not improve my life. And probably the biggest problem with social media is just the amount of time most of us use it. So not to say it’s good or bad, but it is probably bad if you’re using it many hours a day, because life should be experiencing the real world.
Maybe that’s the biggest change of all, which makes this not social media or social networking: it primarily happens in the real world. We’re just the portal.
By the way, one last point [on] social media: Notice the word social media. It used to be called social networking, but eventually your friends became your followers, intimacy became performing, and so really, there’s not much social networking anymore.
As an aside, the old Facebook would still be a great product! I wish I had one product, and I knew what everyone’s birthday was, and I knew when somebody had a baby and they posted. But like, the old Facebook doesn’t even exist. No one’s on it, and it’s been optimized to be like a marketplace and other things. We’re not going to be that company, but there’s still a need for it.
I know you don’t want this to be a social media discussion, but I think we’re already there. One other thing that occurs to me is that a lot of apps are pushing new social features lately. I made a short list before our call: Spotify, WhatsApp, Strava, Substack, Robinhood, and even Grindr have expanded social tools.
Why do you think so many companies are doing this? I get your point about mission, but for most it feels like an engagement play.
We’re doing social to the extent that we think it may enrich the experience for people that are looking for it. We’re not really doing it to engage people. We have a lot of traffic. We do need to convert more traffic to bookings to grow revenue, but we don’t really care how much time people spend on the app. We’re not really focused on how many times you open the app, because we’re not paid that way. We’re not paid for engagement with an advertising based model. Our incentives are a little bit different.
And also, I don’t see social as primarily a revenue driver. I think it can be, but I’m primarily focused on something I think is far more important, which is making sure people have great experiences, or said differently, it’s great long-term revenue. People love Airbnb because they have great social experiences. Social features are not a way to make a quick buck in Airbnb. If I wanted to make quick bucks, you know, we would just go guns blazing on hotel expansion.
Ive been thinking a lot about the two economies that we live in: which is basically everyone feeling pinched from the upper middle class downward. And then the upper echelon, the 1%. Were seeing more businesses catering to the higher end.
You launched Reserve Now, Pay Later earlier this year in the U.S. 60% of customers are using it. How much is that about keeping Airbnb accessible to most people? And how are you thinking about that income divide right now when designing your platform?
Let me start by saying, we had a choice to charge for Reserve Now, Pay Later. We could have charged interest, we could have charged fees, and we decided not to do that. It could have either been a way to be affordable and increase bookings, or it could have been a way to increase monetization. We chose to make it more affordable because we want as many people to use the feature as possible. And there are downsides! There’s revenue opportunities that we missed out on. We also don̵t have as much of a flow if people don’t prepay, we don’t hold as much money, we don’t make as much interest. So there is a cost. We think it’s worth the cost.
I think Airbnb needs to remain a great, affordable brand and a value-based brand. I think we started off as a great brand. I think we lost some ground, especially during the pandemic. So there’s no cleaning fees in Airbnb any longer. All prices shown are the prices you get. We’re offering a lot of new pricing features. We’re trying to really make Airbnbs affordable. We measure the price increase of Airbnb versus hotels. For the last few years, hotel prices have appreciated faster than Airbnb, so we really myopically quickly focus on this.
A lot of what we’re trying to do is just make Airbnb more affordable, more accessible. You’re right, in the Silicon Valley bubble, you’re surrounded by really, really wealthy people, and you can forget what life is like for everyday people. I mean, I grew up an everyday person. I grew up in upstate New York. My mom and dad were social workers. We lived in a $200,000 house. They made like $40,000 a year. And so Ive got to build a product for that Brian, not just today’s Brian or this little bubble that I live in now. And you know, we have luxury Airbnbs and all that, but the vast majority of our service has to be for everyday people, for middle class people.
Youve talked about AI and your plan for Airbnb to evolve so the app is essentially just an assistive AI agent. How important is it for you to own the agentic experience?
I think it’s really important. I mean, there’s many ways this whole thing could play out. I’m not opposed to a platform like ChatGPT becoming a platform where a lot of activity happens if the SDK is extremely robust.
For example, the App Store: Apple does not make most of these apps in the App Store, and that’s because one company can’t make every app. But its okay that we’re inside of the App Store, because the SDK is so robust that we can do whatever we want.
If the SDK is not very broad, then it’s probably not good. And we generally do want people to start on Airbnb.
I think it’s important to note something. Almost all the technology in ChatGPT is now widely available to every other app in the world by API, so this technology is not proprietary. Now, maybe one day, the frontier companies might reserve the best models only for them and not make them available with APIs. But I don’t think travel ever needs the highest frontier model, and open source models are only three to six months behind a frontier model. And the average person using a travel application cannot discern the difference between a frontier model and a model three months behind. Plus you generally don’t want to use the frontier model for search anyway, but it is just too expensive and not optimized from a latency standpoint.
So those models are for hardcore physics and research. They’re not for travel and lifestyle. I don’t think the frontier model is even the best model for it because of cost and latency.
Also, we do want to be an AI company. In five years, or maybe seven years or however long it’s gonna take, every tech company is going to be an AI company. At some point, we won’t even ever use the word AI.
Its just software.
AI will just mean technology. In 1999 everyone said internet, and these were internet companies. And no one says internet company now. Everything’s on the internet.
So I think AI is going to be so ubiquitous that everyone will be an AI company. Because you’ll have to be. If you’re not an AI company, it’s like, not using electricity, you’re just probably not going to exist.
So the question is, who gets there first, and who’s the best at it? We want to be world-class at it. It’s really just about getting the best people of our generation. So we have some big hires that we’re making, really good talent that’s coming into Airbnb.
I think what we want to do is we want to start with customer service. We made it personalized. We expanded action cards [to do things with a tap from the AI conversation], then we’re going to make it agentic. Agentic means it can take more than one action on your behalf. Then we’re going to bring it into [Airbnb] search. And then we’re going to connect the customer service and search into one app, under one agent and then, at that moment, the interface is essentially AI-native.
So we design a new interface for [Airbnb], then it’s essentially an AI native app and an AI native company. And our goal is to become an AI company in, you know, the next few years.
I think it’s interesting that youre broadcasting the exact UX evolution that youre planning.
I mean, I don’t think it’s a secret. The only people I’d be worried about knowing it would be our competitors, but they chose a different strategy.
Yelp users looking to learn more about restaurants, businesses, and other locations on the platform can now get information from an AI-powered Yelp Assistant. When logged-in users on Yelps iOS and Android apps visit particular business pages, they can now ask specific questions ranging from where to park to whether a restaurant offers vegan options. The answers are generated based on facts from reviews posted on Yelp, information provided to the platform by businesses, and businesses own websites, with relevant sections and even photos from Yelp reviews highlighted in the AI response. The assistant also provides a list of suggested questions to ask about a particular business. In addition, a new AI-powered feature called Popular Offerings separately highlights goods and services frequently mentioned and photographed in a businesss Yelp reviews. [Image: Yelp]In a demonstration for Fast Company, Akhil Kuduvalli Ramesh, Yelp senior vice president of product, highlighted how the Yelp Assistant could answer questions about a restaurants cuisine, parking, dog-friendly seating, and even the best times to avoid a long wait. The AI surfaced information from reviews and even user-submitted photos of canine-compatible outdoor tables. This isnt an AI thats hallucinating, says Kuduvalli Ramesh. This is an AI that is providing me answers, evidence first. Tapping into a rich vein of contentThe expansion of the Yelp Assistant, which launched last year with a focus on helping consumers find services from home repair to haircuts, comes as other tech companies from longtime rival Google to startups like Perplexity promote AI options for finding and booking tables at local restaurants, which has long been a key part of Yelps mission. But Yelp cofounder and CEO Jeremy Stoppelman says the companys wealth of business data, long trusted by consumers and partner services like Apple Maps, enables it to deliver reliable answers in an age of hallucinating AI. Were now at the point where you will be able to ask detailed questions about nearly every business on Yelp, he says. And its able to tap into the rich content, the reviews, and all of the survey informationeverything that weve been able to gather about that business. [Animation: Yelp]Stoppelman anticipates the Yelp Assistant will continue to grow more powerful, able to offer more detailed, personalized recommendations across businesses and categories. Already, thanks to Yelps AI advances, users can also now type or speak more involved natural language queries into Yelps search interface, with the AI able to parse requests like need help fixing a leaking faucet or dog-friendly brunch spot thats good for groups instead of simply matching on keywords. We would like people to basically query Yelp as though theyre talking to it, says Kuduvalli Ramesh. [Image: Yelp]And when Yelp users visit a particular restaurant, they can also now use the service to quickly find information about particular dishes by using the Yelp app to scan the menu with a new feature called Menu Vision. It can offer quick links to reviews and photos of Yelp-reviewed dishes, and the company plans to continue to expand the feature to include more options and information over time. Growing competitionYelps push into AI is far from the first time the company has incorporated new technology to meet new consumer tastes. In the heyday of Foursquare, Yelp added location check-in features. And as TikTok and other video platforms became increasingly important tools for restaurant discovery, Yelp enabled users to post short-form videos alongside text reviews and photos. The company, which for its most recent quarter reported $44 million net income on a record net revenue of $370 million, has also expanded into home services in recent years, taking on rivals like Angi and Thumbtack with its increasingly sophisticated tools to request quotes and communicate with home professionals. And in November 2024, Yelp also acquired RepairPal, which connects users with auto repair shops, and has been integrating its offerings into the core Yelp product. [Image: Yelp]Yelps AI also now offers guidance to service professionals on responding to customer requestsand awards visible badges to those with a pattern of helpful responses. A pair of paid AI phone tools, called Yelp Host and Yelp Receptionist, are now also rolling out to restaurants and other businesses, respectively, to field calls from customers. Yelp Host is able to book and modify reservations, including fielding special requests, while Yelp Receptionist can capture contact info and full call transcripts, then summarize the relevant information needed to get back to a potential customer. By the time the local business gets a lead, its a fully vetted lead, and its got an AI summary, says Craig Saldanha, Yelps chief product officer. They can listen to the transcript, but they can also read the summary in 30 seconds and essentially call you back with all of the information. Yelp Host and Receptionist are designed to let busy restaurants and businesses actually process phone calls, rather than simply amassing voicemails, while theyre closed for the day or assisting other customers. And those services, too, are enabled by the detailed information Yelp has amassed over more than two decades about specific businesses and different types of local merchants, Stoppelman says. It is grounded in the same underlying infrastructure, he says. And so, when you do sign up, we have a very good understanding of businesses, both in that category and then your business specifically.
Though many companies are still in the early days of AI adoption, one thing is clear: Many of our interactionsbetween employees and even organizationsare already being carried out entirely by agentic technology. As this trend increases, the need for leaders to keep humanity at the core of their businesses is critical.
Thats why this years annual meeting of the Fast Company Impact Council was centered on the theme of Maintaining a Human Touch in a Digital World. In May, 123 of the Impact Councils 422 members gathered in New Canaan, Connecticut, at the 80-acre headquarters of humanitarian nonprofit Grace Farms. In panels and roundtables held across the organizations buildingsdesigned by Pritzker Prizewinning architecture firm SANAAattendees explored how businesses can center innovation around real-world needs and values, even as they navigate the AI revolution. Here are some insights from the event.
[Spot illustrations: Lauren Tamaki]
How to Lead With a Mission
The DEI backlash is short-term thinking. This is a time to stick to your valuesit will yield better results than if you hadnt.Sharon Prince, Founder and CEO, Grace Farms Foundation
“Your message supports your mission. When youre doing it right, both of those things are working together. But when those elements get muddied, brands run into problems.Celia Jones, Global Chief Marketing Officer, Finn Partners
How To Lead Like A Human
“Many leaders ask employees how they are but dont leave space for a real response. Its about providing space and being prepared for the answer so you can be supportive.Elyse Cohen, Chief Impact Officer, Rare Beauty
“People like the freedom of remote work, but we also hear from younger employees that theyre struggling with the lack of human contact and learnings theyd get in personbecause Zoom doesnt cut it.”David Ko, CEO, Calm
What Role Does Your Company Play in a City?
“One of the core principles of our practice is to create shelters for those in need, but also to elevate the presence of those shelters so that residents feel good about their environment. Its a little easier for us as architects because it is a built environment, but we are able to project our creativity and social awareness literally onto our city.Nerin Kadribegovic, Founder and Principal, Kadre Architects
“More public art increases our quality of life. Why wouldnt every city want some type of focus and intentionality behind what art can do and bring to the city?Alan Bacon Jr., Cofounder and Chief Strategist, Ganggang
Putting the Customer Back in Customer Experience
“Unlike product design, which focuses on unmet user needs, with immersive experiences, you cant really ask someone what they want from an experience theyve never had. Thats why an ideation processwith teams that are cross-disciplinaryrelies on the alchemy of bringing different people together.Andrew Zimmerman, CEO, Journey
A lot of companies are too worried about getting everyone on board with a decision. if you have clear values and a point of view, people will come along.Barbara Bouza, Executive DirectorLive, Work, Play, CannonDesign
Improv For Authentic Connection
“What are organizations doing with the time freed up by AI? Are we adding more tasks to peoples workload, or are we giving them space to connect with other humans?Tyler Dean Kempf, Creative Director, Second City Works
Ensuring Tech for Good is Good for Humanity
“We are starting to experience a cognitive industrial revolution. But technology is never neutral. Alone, it wont make the world betterwe have to do that.Hala Hanna, Executive Director, MIT Solve
“Most nonprofits have a deficit when it comes to tech expertise and capital, and most companies have those things. If you can put those two together, theres tremendous opportunity, even as tech companies keep their heads down on mission-driven work.Tom Subak, Founder, Re/Imagination Lab
Beauty And Logic: Music and the Advent of AI
At the base level, human capacity is what we are able to do, imagine, experience, and share that really comes from us. In this moment, its worthwhile to advocate for the development and expansion of human capacityregardless of what the market conditions are.Marcus Garrick Miller, Music Director, Grace Farms
Leading The Next Generation With Empathy and Purpose
“There are so many stereotypes about Gen Z that it can be easy to misinterpret their intentions. So focusing on communication is key to avoiding ntergenerational conflictwhich you dont need in the workplace.”Christina Elson, Executive Director, Center for the Study of Capitalism at Wake Forest University
“Graduates face a harsh job market, and many see entrepreneurship as a path to wealth and impact. To turn founder abundance into lasting success, we must scale up support systems and resources for these founders.”Andrea Carafa, Director of the Blackstone Launchpad Powered by Techstars, QB3 Entrepreneur in Residence, and Lecturer, University of California, Santa Cruz
Not long ago, one of our coaching clients called us in a panic. His team was floundering, his peers were keeping their distance, and the feedback from HR was . . . not glowing. He was baffled. Im hitting the numbers, he said. What else do they want from me?
Weve had this conversation more times than we can count, and this is what weve learned: Leaders rarely fall short because they lack intelligence, but because they lack emotional intelligence. The emotional gaps are what bruise egos, stall progress, and erode trust until theres nothing left to stand on.
Research supports this: High emotional intelligence in leaders is linked to stronger team communication, performance, and innovation, while low-EQ environments see more burnout, conflict, and turnover.
The good news? Emotional intelligence is a muscle you can strengthen with feedback and practice. Heres how:
1. REFLECT ON YOUR IMPACT
You cant improve what you dont notice. Self-awareness isnt just about identifying your strengths but recognizing your impact. Harvard Business Publishing reports that 56% of employees say their immediate supervisor demonstrates self-awareness, which means nearly half of leaders may be unaware of how theyre coming across.
When a team isnt responding the way you expect, something in your approach may need adjusting. The question becomes: Are your intentions aligning with your impact?
One executive we coached realized his high standards came across as micromanagement. Once he saw it, he was able to shift from scrutinizing details to building trust. The action here is simple, but not easy: Ask for feedback. Reflect without defensiveness. Consider not just what you do, but how you do it.
Most executives avoid feedback because theyre afraid of what theyll hear. But pretending you already know how people see you is the fastest route to losing their confidence. In leadership, perception is reality, and you cant afford to ignore it.
2. HIT PAUSE BEFORE YOU REACT
When stress spikes, so do reactions. Thats where self-regulation, the ability to manage your emotions before they manage you, comes in.
One emotional outburst can undo months of goodwill. People will forget your PowerPoint. They wont forget how it felt to be on the receiving end of your anger. EQ isnt about suppressing emotion, but harnessing it in a way that commands respect instead of fear.
Weve coached leaders who prided themselves on being straight shooters. But theres a difference between candor and emotional impulsivity. One client, after a tense leadership meeting, told us he blew up because nobody else seemed to care. The fallout? Silence from his peers for days. Through coaching, he learned to spot his triggers and hit pause. Sometimes that meant walking away for five minutes. Sometimes it meant writing the email, then deleting it. Over time, he rewired his instincts from reacting to responding.
3. REPLACE RESISTANCE WITH ADAPTABILITY
Change is hard. But adaptability is a defining trait of emotionally intelligent leadership. One leader we worked with described herself as decisive, to a fault. That fault became clear when her team avoided decisions, fearing her inflexibility. What shifted her mindset was honest feedback about how her rigidity was stalling innovation.
Adaptable leaders adjust their strategies when new information emerges. That means listening more than talking, asking better questions, and being open to different ways of getting to the goal.
Executives often equate adaptability with weakness, but the truth is, rigidity is what makes leaders fragile. In a world where market shifts and disruptions are the norm, adaptability is survival. And your team is watching closely. If you resist change, theyll resist you.
4. LEAD WITH EMPATHY TO BUILD REAL CONNECTION
Empathy isnt weakness. Its strategic, ranking second only to integrity as the most valued leadership trait, according to the Harvard Business Publishing report. Yet only 58% of employees say their manager consistently shows empathy, which leaves a gap between what teams need and what theyre getting.
When you tune into what others are feeling and respond authentically, you create the conditions for motivation, creativity, and collaboration. One executive we coached led a team through a massive reorg. Technically, she handled it well. But it wasnt until she started checking in emotionallyasking people how they were really doing and making space for honestythat engagement began to recover.
Many executives fear that showing empathy will make them look soft. But who would you rather follow into uncertaintythe leader who makes you feel invisible, or the one who makes you feel human?
5. USE RELATIONSHIPS TO INFLUENCE
Some leaders influence with data. Others connect through stories. The best do both. They know when to persuade with logic, when to listen with empathy, and when to lead with conviction.
Weve seen leaders transform simply by becoming better at conflict resolution, and by learning to address issues head-on with respect instead of avoidance. Others learned how to rally a cross-functional team by genuinely valuing diverse input instead of tolerating it.
Heres the leadership edge most miss: Relationships are currency. Ignore them, and your political capital evaporates. Nurture them, and you gain influence that outlasts any quarterly metric. This starts with relational intelligencereading the room, adjusting your approach, and showing others they matter.
The bottom line? In todays climate, EQ isnt a bonus skill. Its the differentiator between leaders who merely survive and leaders who truly transform organizations. Ignore it, and youll plateau. Embrace it, and youll leave a legacy.
This drone is so small that it can sneak anywhere.
Flying with the stability and agility of a normal quadcopter, its design is unlike anything youve seen before. The tiny aircraft, which could fly comfortably through a Pringles can, also has a built-in camera. Imagine the Death Star’s trench-run-like possibilities.
I wanted to build the worlds smallest FPV drone, declares its creator in his how-to video. While there are other commercial drones that are almost as small, I couldn’t find a true first-person-view dronea remote-controlled aircraft you can maneuver with VR glasses onthat could approach the diminutive size of this thingamajig.
To create the drone, the inventor, who goes by the YouTube alias Hoarder Sam, needed to redesign traditional drones, defying the accepted wisdom in the drone community that quadcopters with a 2.5-inch (65-millimeter) frame are the absolute minimum for stable flight. His flying critter measures just 0.86 inches between rotors, and yet it flies with perfect precision.
Hoarder Sams genius wasn’t in inventing new parts or embracing biomimicry, like experimental robotic insects, but in radically rearranging existing parts. The core idea was inspired by an old community design known as a “bone drone,” which overlaps its propellers to create an extremely narrow profile, allowing it to navigate tight spaces.
He started by gutting a popular commercial micro-drone, the BetaFPV Air65, and transplanting its electronics into a completely new, much more compact body.
To understand how radical this is, you have to consider how a standard quadcopter works. Drones achieve stability and movement by precisely controlling the speed of four propellers, each placed at the corner of a square or “X” frame. This layout gives it a stable center of gravity and allows for straightforward control logic. A bone drone throws that convention out the window by stacking the motors and propellers closer together, creating an I shape that looks like a comic-book dog bone. This arrangement makes the drone inherently unstable and much harder to control, as the physics of its lift and balance are completely altered.
Sams challenge was to make this unstable design work at a micro scale. Using SolidWorks, a 3D modeling program, he designed a new chassis with just 0.86 inches (22 millimeters) between the motorsa nearly 70% reduction from the original Air65. The new 3D-printed skeleton sandwiches the flight controller between two plates and positions the motors on offset mounts. The final structure, fully assembled with its battery and camera, weighs just under an ounce (25 grams).
Microsurgery and key components
The drones brain is its five-in-one flight controller, which combines five essential componentsthe flight controller itself, an electronic speed controller (ESC) for each motor, and the radio receiveronto a single tiny board. It uses an ICM42688P gyroscopea device that knows the orientation of whatever object it’s attached toand runs on a central processor unit with an unusually high amount of computing power for its size. This processing is crucial, because the drone’s strange layout requires constant, lightning-fast calculations to stay in the air. The gyroscope feeds motion data to the processor thousands of times per second, and the processor adjusts motor speeds independently in real time to keep the drone from tumbling out of the sky.
This brain is paired with four motors that spin up to 23,000 times per minute, designed to power quick adjustments for its extreme agility. Power comes from a LiPo battery that’s a bit bigger than a quarter. As with the other core electronics, he reused the camera from the original BetaFPV Air, transplanting it to his reduced micro-chassis.
Taming the software
With the hardware assembled, the rebuilt drone was a totally new beast, so its original control software couldn’t handle its flight. The “bone” configuration completely confused the system. Using Betaflight, an open-source drone configuration software, Sam rewrote the flight parameters from scratch.
He discovered the flight controllers orientation was off by 45 degrees, and the motor configuration was wrong. He had to correct the yaw anglethe drone’s rotation on its vertical axisand then remap the motors one by one in the software until the system understood the new physical layout. After several trials, the micro-drone finally hovered as expected, responding to his controls with surprising stability.
Despite its extreme design, the machine is remarkably functional, albeit limited by its batterys size: It achieves a flight time of two and a half minutes. Thats only 30 seconds less than the commercial drone it was born from, but still too little time to be practical for, say, military surveillance missions. It also has to be hand-launched to prevent the propellers from hitting the groundbut once airborne, it demonstrates incredible agility. The latter is not a showstopper. The former could be fixed, perhaps, with wireless power using microwaves.
I have no doubt that will happen. We live in the era of the drone.
As the war in Ukraine keeps raging on, we are seeing daily iteration and innovation in drones of all sizes and form factors. From Cessna-size aircraft and drones that think they are cruise missiles to hypersonic drone motherships, there is no end to this particular flavor of destructive creativity. Ukraine used radios to jam Russian drone transmissions. So Russia responded by tethering its drones with direct cable connections as long as 25 miles. The idea of swarms of insect-size snooping drones that could be easily deployed by troops to map a terrain, locate enemies, or establish defensive perimeters seems like the kind of application every army will want to have.
If only an insect-size flying camera could be limited to creative selfies.
The structural DNA of the newest statement lamp from Ikea is hidden inside its glowing, basket-like construction, but it will be familiar to almost anyone who’s ever assembled a piece of Ikea furniture. Named Ödleblad, the spherical lamp is made up of 60 snap-together pieces that were inspired by the shape of the Allen key wrench, the most essential tool in the Ikea pantheon. But in a twist, the Allen key that inspired the lamp’s design isn’t even needed to put it together.
Instead, the Allen key shaped components are flat pieces of birch veneer that use precisely placed notches to slot together, forming pentagon-shaped rings that patch together like an oversize soccer ball.
[Photo: Ikea]
The lamp was designed by one of Ikea’s in-house designers, David Wahl. He says he wanted to explore how he could make something as big as possible from pieces as small as possible.
David Wahl [Photo: Ikea]
“I already had the thought of building something from repeating parts, and after experimenting with different prototypes, the waste-reducing aspect was what first led me to the Allen key shape,” Wahl says. “It turned out to be very practical in production, since the shape leaves almost no waste when cut from the woodand I basically thought, why not just repeat it 60 times to create a sphere?”
This idea took considerable refining, both in its geometry and its materials. To get the shapes just right, Wahl created a parametric 3D model using CAD software. “I could adjust the angles and thickness to see how the shape changed,” he says. “Once it worked, it was quick to tweak, but setting it up was definitely the longest part of the process.”
He then started experimenting with different variations, first with the digital model and later through “countless” laser-cut prototypes. “I began with paper, then tried wood, plastic, and even metal. At one point the whole lamp was made of paper,” he says.
[Photo: Ikea]
Birch veneer turned out to be the best choice for the lamp itself. “When the lamp is off it looks like solid wood, and when it’s on the light softly shines through the grain. We tried stiffer versions and other materials, but they didn’t give the same warmth or glowing effect as the wood,” Wahl says. (One version, made out of thin pieces of metal, is still being used in Wahl’s officeas a soccer ball.)
[Photo: Ikea]
There are 60 Allen keyshaped pieces in the lamp, but customers won’t be required to thread every single one together like a large 3D puzzle. A colleague suggested that might be a bit too much work for people, so the lamp’s Allen key pieces have been partly preassembled into flat modules that the consumer will then connect to give the lamp its spherical shape. “At first I imagined people snapping the whole lamp together piece by piece, which I have to admit was an idea that really appealed to me,” Wahl says. “But I also realized it might frustrate.”
[Photo: Ikea]
This approach still allows the lamp’s pieces to fit compactly into a flat box for easy shipping, a key outcome of Ikea’s famously interconnected approach to designing, manufacturing, and shipping its products.
Another benefit of using the Allen key shape is that the pieces are easy to cut and leave behind almost no waste. “I wanted to reduce waste from the start, which influenced every other decision,” Wahl says. “In the end it almost became more of a study in construction and material efficiency than a typical lamp project, which I think makes it even more interesting.”
While most teams have managers and team leads, many also have something less official, but just as recognizable: the workplace parent.
Theyre the go-to for advice . . . even for things that may not even be related to work. They remember birthdays, organize celebrations, and somehow have everything you might need.
Paper clip? No problem. Jumper cables? Of course. The phone number for the receptionist youre too scared to calldont worry, they did it for you.
But what does it really mean to be the caretaker of your workplace? And can that caring nature sometimes hold you back professionally? Here are four signs that youre the workplace parent, plus the risks . . . and how to pull back if needed.
Youre the one who has everything for everybody
Jamie Jackson has been an HR professional for 21 years. She says she herself has been known to be the workplace parent, and that theyre not too hard to spot: look for the person regularly doling out batteries, a Band-Aid, Tylenol, she says.
Jackson explained that when cleaning out her old office, she realized just how much shed leaned into the role. I had things like birthday candles, a lighter, every kind of pain reliever you can think of, she says. Oh, you dont take ibuprofen? No worries, Ive got Aleve and Tylenol.
For her, it wasnt just about being preparedit was about making sure everyone around her felt supported.
I dont think its necessarily just an HR thing, she says. I just want to make sure people are taken care of and have what they need. If it meant me having a few of these things in my desk at all times, I was going to do it.
Youre the go-to helper
Another way to spot a workplace parent is by how often people turn to you for guidance or advice.
If they know they can trust you to help them, then you’re probably the workplace parent, Jackson says.
It often shows up in the small momentswhen colleagues seek your help on something theyre unsure about or just need someone to listen.
A clear sign? When a colleague comes to you saying, I need help. I dont know what to do. And you hand them a tissue box, close the office door, and just let them vent.
Youre in charge of the fun
Being the workplace parent often means being the fun committee for the office.
You might be the person who remembers all the little things, like colleagues anniversaries or what kinds of pets they have.
At the beginning of every month, Id check whose birthday was coming up, get the cards ready, make sure they were signed, and send them off a few days before. Not too early, because I didnt want it to feel forced, Jackson says.
Or you might be the default event organizer, planning happy hours, team celebrations, even bridal or baby showers. I was often the one saying, Lets do this in the break room, she adds.
While being a workplace parent is an honorable, nurturing role, it can come with some drawbacks.
Why do people do this?
According to organizational psychologist Erica Pieczonka, a workplace parent often stems from a better-known term: people-pleasing.
A people pleaser measures their self-worth by being helpful to others; what motivates them is being helpful, Pieczonka says. This might look like someone who simply cant say no, or the moment a coworker needs help, theyre already jumping in with a solution or offering to fix it.
The behavior could come from a fawn response someones had since childhood, in which theyre constantly trying to please authority figures for validation.
Being the go-to helper can quietly sabotage your career if youre not careful.
Sometimes it distracts you from your real job, Jackson says. While admirable, it can become risky if the president starts to wonder, What does that lady actually do? Jackson notes.
Pieczonka says workplace parents often end up neglecting their own career goals because theyre so focused on everyone elses. They may also struggle with delegation. They might feel like, If I ask somebody else to do this, it’s going to be a burden to them, so I need to do it myselfor think, It’s easier for me to just do it.
On top of that, they wind up carrying the teams emotional load. Theyre the ones scheduling social gatherings, and the people colleagues go to when they have emotional issues.
Even in situations where they need to give criticism, they may hold back.
They’ll often soften it or pull back because they don’t want to hurt somebody’s feelings, Pieczonka says. But then, the other person doesn’t benefit from really understanding how they could improve. By constantly solving others problems, workplace parents inadvertently create dependency, keeping colleagues from learning to tackle challenges themselves.
The workplace parent is taking away the challenge, Pieczonka explains.
This pattern can accumulate over time, making it harder to sustain performance and satisfaction at work.
Burnout is my biggest concern, Pieczonka says.
The Fix? Boundaries
Jackson started protecting her time by scheduling support instead of providing it on demand.
If someone stopped by in crisis mode, shed offer, Todays not a good day. But what if I give you 15 to 20 minutes tomorrow? she explains. Often, people would sleep on it and no longer need to talk.
And when someone insisted on immediate hand-holding, shed shift into tough-love mode: This is a big-boy, big-girl job, shed say. Youve got to take charge and handle it.
Pieczonka adds that setting boundaries starts with understanding your own capacity. Ask yourself: Really, where am I investing time? Is this the right investment of time, and what are my true priorities? she says.
She also recommends asking before assuming someone needs your help. A lot of workplace parents assume that they have to be the person to help, or that the person wants their help, but they may not.
If you find yourself doing this, ask yourself: Am I the right person to help right now? Do I know this person needs my help?
Finally, she emphasizes reframing self-care as strategic rather than selfish. Workplace parents can feel selfish taking care of themselves because their worth is tied to helping others, but you have to fill your own cup.
Schedule itfive minutes of meditation, a walk, a workout, whatever you needand treat it as nonnegotiable on a weekly basis.
Being the workplace parent comes from a good place, but protecting your time and setting boundaries ensures you can keep helping otherswithout losing yourself in the process.
When AI wearable company Friend blanketed New York City with ads last month, there was significant backlash. Many of the company’s ads (which included rage-baiting copy like, Ill never bail on our dinner plans) ended up defaced with graffiti that called the product AI trash, surveillance capitalism, and a tool to profit off of loneliness.
Despite the campaign running in New York, it struck a national nerve as it became a lightening rod for people’s feelings around AI. It was only a matter of time before the brands got in on the debate.
A couple weeks after the campaign’s debut, beer giant Heineken joined the chat, posting on Instagram: The best way to make a friend is over a beer. It touted its own social wearablea bottle openerthat bears a striking resemblance to the AI-powered Friend necklace.
[Image: Heineken US]
Now, the brand has turned that into a new outdoor ad campaign around New York, adding that the brand has been social networking since 1873. Created with agency Le Pub New York, it is a silly poke at the NYC-centric zeitgeist for Heineken. But its also the latest in a consistent string of work by the brand over the years that has aimed to remind people to put down their phones and log off social media in favor of IRL social interaction.
The new ads feature the hashtag #SocialOffSocials, harking back to the Social Off Socials campaign the brand launched in April. Built around the premise that adults spend too much time online, but also feel trapped in a vicious cycle of social media addiction, it starred Joe Jonas, Dude with Sign, Lil Cherry, and Paul Olima.
For that campaign, Heineken commissioned a study of 17,000 adults in the U.S., U.K., and seven other international markets and found that more than half of adults feel overwhelmed keeping up-to-date with social media. And nearly two-thirds say they are nostalgic for the 1990s when there were no smartphones.
More social, less social media
Earlier this year in South Africa, the brand created an installation in a mall so that people watching soccer on their phones alone could actually combine their screens to make one giant, collective viewing experience.
The brand also created a limited edition phone case called The Flipper, that would flip your phone over to screen down when it heard the word, Cheers.
Meanwhile, last years The Boring Phone tapped into the dumb phone trend among Gen Z. Created with streetwear retail brand Bodega, Heineken made 5,000 Boring Phones to give away. But the message is very much the same: It’s time to ditch the phone for a real social life.
I reached out to both Heineken and Le Pub for comment, and to find out if the Friend-like bottle openers will be available to the public. This story will be updated as soon as I hear back.
As tech companies shell out millions for top AI talenteven reportedly billionsregular rank-and-file employees are left wondering how to get in on the action and land a job in artificial intelligence.
One report found that job postings that mention needing at least one AI skill had salaries 28% higher than other jobs, which translates to $18,000 more. Jobs that required two AI skills had a 43% salary jump.
To begin with, its worth considering where the AI jobs are and how this intersects with your interests and existing skills. Many jobs in AI can roughly be divided into five different categories:
researchers
engineers
business strategists
domain experts
policymakers
Researchers bring a deep understanding of neural networks and algorithm design to the table and can push the technology forward, but this is a very small pool and typically requires a PhD.
Engineers typically have programming skills that they can use to build AI applications.
Business strategists can fold AI into their companys workflows and processes, or spearhead product development.
Domain experts understand how to apply AI to their field, while policymakers can craft AI ethics and use guidelines.
But what do you do once youve identified where you want to go?
Getting experience in AI, and developing skills in it, is a tricky proposition because the field is still so nascent. Plus, things are evolving at breakneck speed; what worked a couple years ago may not be a silver bullet today. But some strategiesbeing scrappy, curious, and adaptablecould prove timeless. We interviewed both HR and recruiting pros, as well as people who have managed to build up their AI skills to land a job in the industry, to learn:
What AI industry insiders at LinkedIn and Amazon recommend are the surefire ways to get a hiring manager’s attention
How workers are turning their regular jobs into “AI jobs” to get experience
Where one talent recruiter looks to see if someone is working on developing AI skills
1. Figure out ways to learn on the job
While companies such as Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and Thomson Reuters are rolling out company-wide initiatives to ensure their entire staff gets trained in AI, that isnt true of most companies. Only 2 in 5 employees report receiving AI training on the job.
If your company doesnt have AI training, get on projects that do involve AI.
Get some experience at your existing company before you try to jump into a truly AI-focused role, says Cheryl Yuran, chief human resources officer at Absorb Software, an AI-powered learning platform provider. Have something on your résumé to talk about from an AI standpoint.
Yuran points out that Absorb isnt able to find enough people with AI experience for all of their teams. Thats how few people are out there in the workforce with an actual background in it.
Instead, the company makes sure there are one or two members with AI experience on their teams. The remaining jobs go to candidates or insiders who demonstrate they can add value, whether its deep product knowledge or excellent communication skills.
If there arent AI projects or initiatives at your job, create them. Or experiment with ways to use AI to help you do your job.
Gabriel Harp, a former product manager for multiple companies in academic publishing, oversaw the launch of an AI-powered writing assistant in 2023 at Research Square, an Inc. 5000 company. Although my degree is in English and German, I’ve spent more than a decade building software products, Harp says.
For the AI writing assistant, Harp set the initial vision and scope of the project, working on the branding and go-to-market strategy, conducting quality analysis, and much more. Harp wasnt an engineer, yet he still leveraged his background to get great AI experience just before it was popular (or needed) to have any.
Since then, hes served as head of product strategy at a startup that uses AI to build privacy tools.
When Harp went on the job market, he had plenty to discuss during interviews, although he has a degree in the humanities. Since Id been using AI in the workplace, I was more familiar than the average person with these tools, he says.
He recently landed a senior staff product manager job at Mozilla.
Were seeing a lot of emerging talent or people who want to shift their career path, says Prashanthi Padmanabhan, VP of engineering at LinkedIn, who regularly hires for AI talent. Nothing beats showing youve actually [used AI] on the job.”
2. Take a course
If getting close to an AI project at work isnt an option, you can always take courses.
Right before the pandemic, Amanda Caswell was working as a copy lead at Amazon when she became interested in AI. She started listening to podcasts about AI and signed up for courses, including an online prompt engineering class at Arizona State University, an AI boot camp by OpenAI, and a generative AI and prompt engineering master class by LinkedIn.
Start at the 101 level, even if you have some experience, she says. That way youll know industry best practices, which can help you teach others. Because who knows? You might have to do a job in AI training.
In 2020, Caswell started getting gigs as a prompt engineer at Upwork and has made close to $200,000 on the platform, only working about 20 hours a week. In addition, her knowledge of prompt engineering helped her land a job as an AI journalist at Toms Guide.
Similarly, Cesar Sanchez, a full-stack engineer (who is now an AI engineer) became interested in AI in 2023. He immediately signed up for a Coursera course on generative AI with large language models to get an understanding of the fundamentals.
It was a great decision. It offered me a strong foundation and helped me understand the theory, Sanchez says. He also signed up for another course that offered im access to a network of AI engineers. While I didnt necessarily learn new things, I was able to connect with other engineers and compare my skills to what else was out there in the market, he adds. Plus, I got lots of free credits for using tools and platforms.
3. Take on a side project
However, even if you arent able to fold AI into the job or take a course, recruiters say theres always the trusty side project. Having a side gig is often a privilege thats unavailable to some, but having one can sometimes grow into something that’s more full-time, sustainable, and meaningful, regardless of the field.
AI, experts say, may be no different.
A lot of candidates will say, I just focus full-time on my current role, says Taylor King, CEO of Foundation Talent, which recruits for top tech startups. But the ones really thriving are the people who dive headfirst into new AI or LLM tools, constantly experimenting and building on the side,” he adds. “An active GitHub tells you theyre genuinely curioussomeone whos growing beyond the boundaries of their job, not defined by it. (A McKinsey report found that people who are adaptable are 24% more likely to be employed.)
Nico Jochnick had no background in AI, but managed to land a job as lead engineer at Anara, an AI startup that helps research teams organize and write scientific papers. He says he got a job in AI because of his experience using AI for side projects.
I was fascinated with AI and using Cursor to code side projects, and was doing hackathons, he says. [Anaras founder] and I knew these tools were giving us tons of leverage, and we connected over that.
While Harp, now at Mozilla, was job searching, he also worked on AI side projects, such as using AI coding tools to create a bingo game for his favorite podcast, as well as a recruiting tool in ChatGPT that allowed recruiters to ask questions about his work experience. I was worried about getting rusty, he says. I needed to continue experimenting with the tools out there.
4. Create your own job
Ben Christopher, a screenwriter, taught himself to code in order to keep the lights on. He started experimenting with AI in 2022 and built Speed Read AI, a tool that summarizes scripts and provides business insights, such as budget estimates, for Hollywood executives. I started showing it to some people in the industry, and got enough feedback where people said, Well pay for that, Christopher said.
Today, his team is five people strong with a growing customer base. (Christopher is careful to stress the point of Speed Read AI is to help Hollywood executives dig through massive slush piles and find more unique scripts.)
Meanwhile, Victoria Lee originally trained as a lawyer but then took a coding boot camp when she felt like she was getting pigeonholed in her career development. She graduated from the boot camp and got her first coding job in 2022, a few months before ChatGPT launched publicly. In her spare time, she had started putting publicly available legal contracts into ChatGPT for analysis and comparing them with her own. She built an understanding of what ChatGPT did well, and where it had gaps.
Lee realized the legal industry was embracing AI, and that she was perfectly positioned to fill a gap; she knew what lawyers wanted and also knew how to speak to engineers.
She landed a job in product strategy at eBrevia, which uses AI in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) due diligence. However, Lee realized she could add more value by creating her own company. Today, she provides legal services for, as well as works with, mid-market law firms to help them implement AI and craft AI policies.
Lee recommends that people who want to go into AI should identify their specialty and build knowledge to understand how it can work better with AI, or where AI currently falls short.
Jochnick has since left Anara to found his own AI-powered company, which is still in stealth mode. The people Id hire are already building projects and putting them out in the world, he says. In fact, Jochnick notes the biggest mistake you can make today when experimenting with AI is not trying. Its insane to see how much more powerful you can become in a few months. This is a really fun journey to be on. Everyone should be upskilling themselves.”
Many news outlets have reported an increaseor surgein attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, diagnoses in both children and adults. At the same time, health care providers, teachers, and school systems have reported an uptick in requests for ADHD assessments.
These reports have led some experts and parents to wonder whether ADHD is being overdiagnosed and overtreated.
As researchers who have spent our careers studying neurodevelopmental disorders like ADHD, we are concerned that fears about widespread overdiagnosis are misplaced, perhaps based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the condition.
Understanding ADHD as one end of a spectrum
Discussions about the overdiagnosis of ADHD imply that you either have it or you dont.
However, when epidemiologists ask people in the general population about their symptoms of ADHD, some have a few symptoms, some have a moderate level, and a few have lots of symptoms. But there is no clear dividing line between those who are diagnosed with ADHD and those who are not since ADHDmuch like blood pressureoccurs on a spectrum.
Treating mild ADHD is similar to treating mild high blood pressureit depends on the situation. Care can be helpful when a doctor considers the details of a persons daily life and how much the symptoms are affecting them.
Not only can ADHD symptoms be very different from person to person, but research shows that ADHD symptoms can change within an individual. For example, symptoms become more severe when the challenges of life increase.
ADHD symptoms fluctuate depending on many factors, including whether the person is at school or home, whether they have had enough sleep, if they are under a great deal of stress, or if they are taking medications or other substances. Someone who has mild ADHD may not experience many symptoms while they are on vacation and well rested, for example, but they may have impairing symptoms if they have a demanding job or school schedule and have not gotten enough sleep. These people may need treatment for ADHD in certain situations, but may do just fine without treatment in other situations.
This is similar to what is seen in conditions like high blood pressure, which can change from day to day or from month to month, depending on a persons diet, stress level, and many other factors.
Can ADHD symptoms change over time?
ADHD symptoms start in early childhood and typically are at their worst in mid-to late childhood. Thus, the average age of diagnosis is between 9 and 12 years old. This age is also the time when children are transitioning from elementary school to middle school and may also be experiencing changes in their environment that make their symptoms worse.
Classes can be more challenging beginning around fifth grade than in earlier grades. In addition, the transition to middle school typically means that children move from having all their subjects taught by one teacher in a single classroom to having to change classrooms with a different teacher for each class. These changes can exacerbate symptoms that were previously well-controlled.
Symptoms can also wax and wane throughout life. For most people, symptoms improvebut may not completely disappearafter age 25, which is also the time when the brain has typically finished developing.
Psychiatric problems that often co-occur with ADHD, such as anxiety or depression, can worsen ADHD symptoms that are already present. These conditions can also mimic ADHD symptoms, making it difficult to know which to treat. High levels of stress leading to poorer sleep, and increased demands at work or school, can also exacerbate or cause ADHD-like symptoms.
Finally, the use of some substances, such as marijuana or sedatives, can worsen, or even cause, ADHD symptoms. In addition to making symptoms worse in someone who already has an ADHD diagnosis, these factors can also push someone who has mild symptoms into full-blown ADHD, at least for a short time.
The reverse is also true: Symptoms of ADHD can be minimized or reversed in people who do not meet full diagnostic criteria once the external cause is removed.
Kids with ADHD often have overlapping symptoms with anxiety, depression, dyslexia, and more.
How prevalence is determined
Clinicians diagnose ADHD based on symptoms of inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity. To make an ADHD diagnosis in children, six or more symptoms in at least one of these three categories must be present. For adults, five or more symptoms are required, but they must begin in childhood. For all ages, the symptoms must cause serious problems in at least two areas of life, such as home, school, or work.
Current estimates show that the strict prevalence of ADHD is about 5% in children. In young adults, the figure drops to 3%, and it is less than 1% after age 60. Researchers use the term strict prevalence to mean the percentage of people who meet all of the criteria for ADHD based on epidemiological studies. It is an important number because it provides clinicians and scientists with an estimate on how many people are expected to have ADHD in a given group of people.
In contrast, the diagnosed prevalence is the percentage of people who have been diagnosed with ADHD based on real-world assessments by health care professionals. The diagnosed prevalence in the U.S. and Canada ranges from 7.5% to 11.1% in children under age 18. These rates are quite a bit higher than the strict prevalence of 5%.
Some researchers claim that the difference between the diagnosed prevalence and the strict prevalence means that ADHD is overdiagnosed.
We disagree. In clinical practice, the diagnostic rules allow a patient to be diagnosed with ADHD if they have most of the symptoms that cause distress, impairment, or both, even when they dont meet the full criteria. And much evidence shows that increases in the diagnostic prevalence can be attributed to diagnosing milder cases that may have been missed previously. The validity of these mild diagnoses is well-documented.
Consider children who have five inattentive symptoms and five hyperactive-impulsive symptoms. These children would not meet strict diagnostic criteria for ADHD even though they clearly have a lot of ADHD symptoms. But in clinical practice, these children would be diagnosed with ADHD if they had marked distress, disability, or both because of their symptomsin other words, if the symptoms were interfering substantially with their everyday lives.
So it makes sense that the diagnosed prevalence of ADHD is substantially higher than the strict prevalence.
Implications for patients, parents, and clinicians
People who are concerned about overdiagnosis commonly worry that people are taking medications they dont need or that they are diverting resources away from those who need it more. Other concerns are that people may experience side effects from the medications or that they may be stigmatized by a diagnosis.
Those concerns are important. However, there is strong evidence that underdiagnosis and undertreatment of ADHD lead to serious negative outcomes in school, work, mental health, and quality of life.
In other words, the risks of not treating ADHD are well-established. In contrast, the potential harms of overdiagnosis remain largely unproven.
It is important to consider how to manage the growing number of milder cases, however. Research suggests that children and adults with less severe ADHD symptoms may benefit less from medication than those with more severe symptoms.
This raises an important question: How much benefit is enough to justify treatment? These are decisions best made in conversations between clinicians, patients and caregivers.
Because ADHD symptoms can shift with age, stress, environment, and other life circumstances, treatment needs to be flexible. For some, simple adjustments like classroom seating changes, better sleep, or reduced stress may be enough. For others, medication, behavior therapy, or a combination of these interventions may be necessary. The key is a personalized approach that adapts as patients needs evolve over time.
Carol Mathews is a professor of psychiatry at the University of Florida.
Stephen V. Faraone is a distinguished professor of psychiatry at SUNY Upstate Medical University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
