New Normal Experiment, Innovative Office Space

More New York Companies Experiment With Innovative Office Space - WSJ: "The wide options under activity-based working also give some employees private space they didn't have. "Quiet people are reminding people that it's not just about collaboration, but concentration," said Elizabeth Burow, director of discovery for design firm HLW International LLP. But eliminating the private office or the private desk isn't for everyone, said Richard Sennett, a sociology professor at New York University and the London School of Economics. "Sometimes having a space you control, which is yours, gives people the feeling of empowerment and it can be good," he said. "But it varies."" (read more at link above)

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Imposter Syndrome, Not Everything Is As It Seems

apenwarr: ".... I think Impostor Syndrome is valuable. The people with Impostor Syndrome are the people who *aren't* sure that a logical proof of their smartness is sufficient. They're looking around them and finding something wrong, an intuitive sense that around here, logic does not always agree with reality, and the obviously right solution does not lead to obviously happy customers, and it's unsettling because maybe smartness isn't enough, and maybe if we don't feel like we know what we're doing, it's because we don't. Impostor Syndrome is that voice inside you saying that not everything is as it seems, and it could all be lost in a moment. The people with the problem are the people who can't hear that voice." (read more at link above)

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New Normal, Another Bubble

Believers in the New Normal hold that the Fed and other central banks have an unlimited ability to print money and buy assets, such that they can buy up the majority of markets to keep valuations elevated. I see such linear thinking as dangerously simplistic in a non-linear world, and I make the case that the Fed is far more constrained by the bond and currency markets (recall that all these markets are interconnected) than the New Normal faithful believe: The Fed’s Hobson’s Choice: End QE and Zero-Interest Rates or Destabilize the Dollar and the Treasury Market.(source infra)

The Inevitable Stock Market Reversal: The New Normal Is Just Another Bubble Awaiting a Pop Washington's Blog: "The Big Question: When? Is the New Normal enforceable even as markets reach extremes, or is the faith in the central banks’ power to bend markets to their will just the latest manifestation of hubris? No one knows at the moment, but as this article has shown, there are numerous persuasive reasons to be skeptical of the New Normal faith that markets can only loft higher in a permanent state of low volatility and rising profits." (read more at the link above)

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New Normal, Boomerang Kids, Won’t Leave

It’s Official: The Boomerang Kids Won’t Leave - NYTimes.com: "Annie Kasinecz has two different ways of explaining why, at age 27, she still lives with her mom. In the first version — the optimistic one — she says that she is doing the sensible thing by living rent-free as she plans her next career move. After graduating from Loyola University Chicago, Kasinecz struggled to support herself in the midst of the recession, working a series of unsatisfying jobs — selling ads at the soon-to-be bankrupt Sun-Times, bagging groceries at Whole Foods, bartending — in order to pay down her student loans. But she inevitably grew frustrated with each job and found herself stuck in one financial mess after another. Now that she’s back in her high-school bedroom, perhaps she can finally focus on her long-term goals...." (read more at link above)

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