Fortune

AI may be dominating boardroom conversations, but a handful of giant employers are driving AI hiring in the U.S. “I think we’re overestimating the speed at which we’re going to see this transformation,” Svenja Gudell, chief economist at Indeed, said on Tuesday at the #FortuneWorkplaceSummit in Atlanta about the pace of the labor market’s AI transformation. “I think we’re underestimating the long-term impact it will have.” AI is going to significantly change the way we do things, “not tomorrow or the day after, but months and years into the future,” Gudell added. Read more: https://lnkd.in/ee4h3VQA

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission—the federal agency born from the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to shield the nation’s most historically marginalized workers—filed suit earlier this month against The New York Times, alleging the paper illegally discriminated against a white male editor who was passed over for a promotion in favor of a less-qualified candidate. ' EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas thinks it’s the first race and sex discrimination case the agency has brought on behalf of a white man in at least a decade. “We should bring it on behalf of black workers, but we should bring it on behalf of white workers too,” Lucas said Wednesday at the #FortuneWorkplaceSummit in Atlanta. “That’s mixed messaging that says to white men you don’t need to apply — and that is not fair.” Read more: https://lnkd.in/eD3uVGZe

Sean Neville, who cofounded the stablecoin giant Circle, has raised another stash of capital from top-flight venture capitalists. His startup Catena Labs, which builds tools to allow AI agents to safely conduct financial transactions, announced Wednesday that it’s secured $30 million in a Series A funding round led by Acrew Capital and the crypto arm of Andreessen Horowitz (a16z crypto). “The majority, if not all initial transactions, will be executed by agents,” Neville predicted in an interview with Fortune. Read more: https://lnkd.in/efjd4N-a

“Probably tens of thousands.” We asked the following business execs at the #FortuneWorkplaceSummit how many unread emails are in their inboxes: ➡️ Upwork president & CEO Hayden Brown ➡️ WeWork CEO John C. Santora ➡️ Indeed Chief Revenue Officer Maggie Hulce ➡️ TIAA Chief People Officer Claire Borelli ➡️ CNN Analyst Brian Stelter ➡️ Patagonia Chief People and Culture Officer Theresita Richard ➡️ The Rainbow Disruption founder and CEO Jarvis Sam 🔗 See more coverage here: https://lnkd.in/ec6AVPjJ

At the #FortuneWorkplaceSummit, EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas said the agency is “opening the door to more people,” including white men. "But that doesn't mean you get special treatment. It means that you know that you are not going to get less equal treatment," she said. Follow along here: https://lnkd.in/ec6AVPjJ

“We’ve made a commitment to hire more entry-level people this year than we did last year,” said Accenture's global chief diversity officer Beck Bailey at the #FortuneWorkplaceSummit. “Our reasoning is that if you think about the folks who are graduating college this year, they entered college with ChatGPT…We want them in our workforce now to help us.” Bailey sympathizes with young professionals hearing predictions of mass unemployment driven by AI adoption, while he says roles will “shift and change,” new jobs will emerge as others fade into the ether. “We’re in a place of perhaps the messy middle of this [AI] transformation,” he continued. “People still need skilling and relationship-building with the technology, and leadership needs to still figure out where it’s going.” Read more: https://lnkd.in/e-2hHcAr

“I understand that people have pitched that the civil rights agenda of the Trump administration has narrowed the aperture, and I would say it's widening it.” At the #FortuneWorkplaceSummit, EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas said the agency is broadening its mandate and continues to pursue discrimination cases on behalf of workers across all demographics. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/ec6AVPjJ

Political pressure against DEI has intensified in recent months, and many organizations have quietly scaled back or abandoned their commitments. That retreat, according to Dr. Bernice A. King, CEO of The Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change (The King Center) and daughter of Martin Luther King Jr., reveals something fundamental: many companies were never truly committed to DEI. “If you retreat that quick, it suggests to me that reveals who you really are,” she said at the #FortuneWorkplaceSummit in Atlanta. 🔗 Read more: https://lnkd.in/e55FyMzq

Child advocacy organizations Fairplay and the National Center on Sexual Exploitation are filing a complaint against Roblox at the Federal Trade Commission, asking the agency to investigate the gaming giant for practices they say exploit children through manipulative monetization, addictive design features and chat systems that have enabled predators to reach minors. The Request for Investigation, shared exclusively with Fortune ahead of its public filing on Wednesday, alleges that Roblox is violating Section 5 of the FTC Act through unfair and deceptive practices. “Our platform is designed to provide a positive, healthy and enjoyable experience—we build for fun and connection, not short-term engagement,” a Roblox spokesperson told Fortune, adding that the company has safeguards and clear policies requiring fair treatment of players by game creators. Read more: https://lnkd.in/eAnBQBzA

“We sometimes hear employers saying 'I don't hire entry-level anymore.'” At the #FortuneWorkPlaceSummit, Indeed economist Svenja Gudell said cutting entry-level hires will break the talent pipeline in five years. “That is a distinct pipeline problem that we're all going to have to bridge,” she said. 🔗 Read more here: https://lnkd.in/ec6AVPjJ