Protecting your financial position when you’re unmarried may be slightly more complicated. But with some careful checks you and your partner can take steps to ensure you’re not financially disadvantaged. Ed Read Cutting, our Director in Belgium, looks at the key areas to consider. More couples today are co-habiting or in same sex relationships, with marriage rates continuing to fall. As a result there are now 3.6 million unmarried couples…
Inheritance Tax is one of the most punishing elements in the UK tax system, and many families are keen to do everything they can to reduce or eliminate it. One of the options available is to use a family heirloom to offset an Inheritance Tax bill. Steve Wright, our Estates Director, explains what’s possible. When it comes to dealing with Estates, one of the main areas of concern is Inheritance…
Only 36 percent of the 500 largest companies in the United Kingdom are publicly listed, a marked shift that has been under way for many years, so a thorough understanding of today’s UK corporate landscape requires looking beyond the “UK plc”. Our research, which goes beyond publicly listed companies to consider the entire UK corporate landscape, indicates that top performers are more adept and purposeful in creating the conditions to…
The wave of layoffs in Silicon Valley in the past two years is far from over. After a brutal 2023 that saw over 100,000 tech workers laid off in the United States, 2024 shows no signs of letting up.While the headlines are shocking, the human stories behind the numbers are just as important. How do tech professionals respond to layoffs? Do they view it as an opportunity for exploration or are they…
The run up to hitting the deadline for go live can be stressful. Pressure from stakeholders, concerns about the budget or worries the project team will lose face are all key concerns. You might be launching a new product, pressing the green light on a new system or introducing a new service – but guaranteed, the eyes of the business will be on you and you need to get it…
The key to sustained growth relies on an ability to innovate reliably and sustainably. At Skarbek, we are embarking on a journey to unravel the mystery behind what makes the best excel at this. Leveraging our experts’ vast experience and highlighting attributes from our Innovation Fitness Index, we aim to provide unique insights into some of the core factors impacting innovation success. Today’s article is focused on the specific Innovation…
In a rapid-fire response, the Ryan Court in the Northern District of Texas this morning denied Plaintiff and Plaintiff-Intervenors’ Expedited Motion for Limited Reconsideration of the Scope of Preliminary Relief, and Plaintiff and Plaintiff-Intervenors’ Motion for Expedited Consideration of their Motion for Limited Reconsideration of the Scope of Preliminary Relief (for more on these motions, see here). In a three-sentence Order, the Court provided no explanation except that Plaintiff and…
Quick Hits An advocacy organization recently submitted signatures to put forth a ballot measure to raise the state minimum wage to $18 per hour. Arizona voters will decide a separate ballot measure to alter way the minimum wage is calculated for tipped workers. If passed by voters, both measures would take effect immediately. Arizona voters appear poised to decide on two wage increases via voter ballot initiatives in November. Raise…
The team say this new approach could reduce the need for invasive and costly diagnostic tests while improving treatment outcomes early when interventions such as lifestyle changes or new medicines may have a chance to work best.Dementia poses a significant global healthcare challenge, affecting over 55 million people worldwide at an estimated annual cost of $820 billion. The number of cases is expected to almost treble over the next 50…
Fixed prices for goods and services is a relatively recent invention. In the 19th century, Quaker merchants argued that haggling was morally wrong—it was unfair for two customers buying the same good to walk away having paid different amounts. John Wanamaker, a Quaker and the founder of Philadelphia’s Wanamaker’s department store, took it one step further, inventing the price tag by writing a price on a rectangle of cardboard and…
The CFO is a company’s “connector in chief.” No one else in the organization is more important for ensuring that strategy, financial controls, stakeholder management, technology, and personal development link together for value creation. Marjorie Lao, who served as the CFO of the LEGO Group—and before that, as CFO of the Norway-based public company Tandberg (now part of Cisco Systems)—managed these connections for more than a decade and is now…
TAINAN, Taiwan – It’s a typically busy afternoon at Chi Mei Medical Center’s pharmacy department in this southern Taiwanese city. Staff in white coats work quickly, packing bottles and tablet strips, ready for the lines of patients waiting on the other side of the counter. Since April, the pharmacists have been getting some help from a generative AI assistant, or copilot, built with Microsoft’s Azure OpenAI Service. One click on…
How does being in a state of constant change affect how organisations manage their portfolios of projects and programmes so they align to business goals and meet strategic objectives? Steve Clark, Head of UK Project Delivery, Valcon discusses. Technological advancement, business imperatives, regulatory diktats – the pressure on organisations to transform themselves to remain competitive and stay relevant is now greater than ever. The last five to ten years has seen a fundamental…
Hiring the right person is essential, but a drawn-out hiring process can harm your organization more than you might realize. Missed opportunities, decreased productivity, and losing top candidates to competitors are just a few of the costly consequences. While being thorough in interviews is important, taking too long can be a major setback. If your organization is finding it difficult to fill positions or keeps losing great candidates to other…
Having chosen The Formation of New Centres of Growth as the Cornerstone of a Multipolar World as its main theme for 2024, the St Petersburg International Economic Forum featured discussions on a wide range of international development matters. The western sanctions against Russia placed food security among the challenges the world is facing today. The President of Russia announced the key objectives in terms of developing agriculture. The first one…
Topics Column Our expert columnists offer opinion and analysis on important issues facing modern businesses and managers. More in this series subscribe-icon Subscribe Share Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images The proverbial ship of artificial intelligence is moving ahead at warp speed, icebergs and societal risks be damned. The pace of change in what it can do is staggering. Breathless predictions say AI will add trillions of dollars to the…
Consider this: according to our 2024 Work Trend Index Annual Report, email overload remains a persistent issue for Microsoft 365 users—85 percent of emails are read in under 15 seconds, and the typical person reads four emails for every one they send. But users can’t simply declare email bankruptcy. For most people, emails still contain vital information and updates—but wow, do the messages pile up fast. What is the opportunity…
By PI order of December 27, 2023, the IP Specialized Division of the Court of Rome provided some interesting remarks regarding the legitimacy of name protection rights when using a third-party stage name as a company name, insignia, and de facto trade mark. In particular, the Court has ordered an Italian pizzeria to remove all references to the name of the famous Italian actor. Totò (Antonio Griffo Focas Flavio Angelo…
Debates can play an important role in democratic elections. They educate voters and give politicians a chance to set themselves apart from their opponents. Yet it’s not always easy to get candidates to agree to face off with each other. That poses a problem in countries like Sierra Leone, where voters do not have many sources of election information. In 2012, an NGO in the small West African nation ran…
On July 10, 2024, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion, titled “Russia in the World: Results of the Foreign Policy Season 2023-2024”. Moderator Ivan Timofeev called this season quite eventful. He highlighted the emergence of the concept of a Eurasian security structure in Russian foreign policy philosophy, the expansion of BRICS, Vladimir Putin’s visits to the DPRK and Vietnam, deepening interaction with Iran, joint exercises with China, Russia's presence…
It is now most promising for Russia in Asia to focus on dialogue with individual countries in the region, taking into account the interests of each of them and its own. But strengthening relations at the country level is a matter of painstaking work by diplomats and business, of little interest from the point of view of public policy and the media, writes Valdai Club Programme Director Timofei Bordachev. The…
Assisting management in navigating today’s geopolitical complexity has become one of boards’ most important and difficult tasks. In this episode of the Inside the Strategy Room podcast, Ziad Haider, Celia Huber, and Jon Huntsman Jr. discuss how boards can address this challenge. Huntsman spent nearly two decades in US public service at the state, national, and international levels in roles including deputy assistant secretary of commerce for Asia and US ambassador…
Sex before marriage was unusual in the past – Myth! In some periods, over half of all brides were already pregnant when they got married.The rich have always outlived the poor –Myth! Before the 20th century the evidence for a survival advantage of wealth is mixed. In England, babies of agricultural labourers (the poorest workers) had a better chance of reaching their first birthday than infants in wealthy families, and life expectancy…
Intense monitoring of individual output doesn’t lead to more productive employees and can limit workers’ professional growth. Stacia Garr and Priyanka Mehrotra July 10, 2024 Reading Time: 4 min Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images Reports that U.S. productivity was up 3% in the fourth quarter of 2023 were seen as good news for the economy. But to understand what’s really happening — and avoid the perils of misplaced confidence…
Alistair Brownlee, two-time Olympic gold medalist, four-time triathlon world champion, three-time Ironman winner, and bestselling author, isn’t one to shy away from making a mantra his own: “If you want to achieve something no one has achieved before, you have to approach the challenge in a way no one has before.” In a keynote fireside chat at the Unleashing Disruptive Growth event in Barcelona, Alistair sat down with McKinsey’s Philipp…
Since the Global Financial Crisis of 2008-09, the Federal Reserve has conducted stress tests of the largest banks to evaluate their capital and promote sound risk management, under a mandate Congress created in the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010. On June 26, a subcommittee of the House Financial Services Committee held a hearing to consider a proposal to put the details of the Fed’s stress scenarios and models out for public…
Welcome to the latest episode of Gowling WLG's listen up podcast, where we look at a range of topics trending in the legal and commercial landscapes. Khemi Salhan: Welcome to our podcast on brand protection and sport. This podcast is part of our sports sector podcast series. I'm Khemi Salhan, a Principal Associate in the Gowling IP team. Kate Hawkins: And, I'm Kate Hawkins, also a Principal Associate in the Gowling…
10 July 2024By Jakob Feveile Adolfsen, Danielle Kedan and Marie-Sophie LappeThe green transition will significantly increase demand for key minerals over the coming decades. The impact on energy prices will ultimately depend on how supply adjusts. The ECB Blog looks at the geopolitical risks involved. The green transition relies on certain key minerals, in particular lithium, copper, nickel, cobalt, manganese, and graphite. Assuming that the transition takes place in accordance…
The results of the parliamentary elections in the United Kingdom on July 4, 2024, were not something unexpected, writes Konstantin Khudoley, head of the Department of European Studies at the Faculty of International Relations at St. Petersburg State University. For many decades, the UK political system has worked like a pendulum, with the two largest parties taking turns in power. There was no doubt that after 14 years of Conservative rule,…
On July 9, 2024, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion about the results of the visit of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Russia. Moderator Ivan Timofeev emphasised that this was the first international visit of the Indian leader since he was re-elected. There have been no direct Russian-Indian summits for a long time; during this time, many important issues have accumulated and the need for a kind of…
AI-powered speaker recognition technology has now expanded to all Teams Rooms on Windows devices, regardless of the microphone type. This was previously only available with intelligent speaker equipment in the room. Now any Teams Room on Windows can enhance meeting experiences with precise speaker attribution and intelligent insights from Copilot. Everyone can be recognized and get the most from Copilot with our cloud technology, Teams Rooms devices such as Surface…
Late one day in the fall of 2021, as she was packing up to head home, Assistant Professor Maria Roche bumped into Andy Wu, a colleague in the Strategy Unit whose office is next to hers. Roche asked how his research was going, and in the conversation that followed the pair quickly realized the extent to which their work overlapped. If they could combine findings from across their assorted research…
Quick Hits Louisiana’s Act No. 556 allows employers to establish policies concerning when an employee earns a commission, incentive payment, or bonus. Examples include adjusting such compensation where the employer does not receive payment from a customer and adjusting commissions when there is a change order. Act No. 556 extends the time by which an employer must determine an employee’s eligibility for a bonus under a bonus plan that utilizes…
In an AI-world, leaders who speak technology’s language gain an edge. But that doesn’t mean every manager needs a computer science degree.A handle on a handful of basics goes a long way toward preparing strategic leaders for today’s reality: Almost all businesses now touch technology—some more so than others. “Every company today needs to think of themselves as a tech company,” says Andy Wu, the Arjun and Minoo Melwani Family…
In a decisive and historic victory, the Labour Party won the 2024 UK general election with a significant majority and Keir Starmer has become the UK prime minister after 14 years of Conservative government. The new chancellor, Rachel Reeves, has already pledged to “fix the foundations” of the British economy in a bid to drive growth. Read on to find out what a Labour government could mean for your finances.…
In the intricate world of wealth management, Family Offices play a pivotal role in overseeing and growing the assets of High-Net-Worth Individuals (HNWI). As wealth and asset management become increasingly sophisticated, the adoption of cutting-edge technology is crucial for preserving and growing the family’s legacy. This article highlights the benefits of Family Office Software for Single and Multi-Family Offices, exploring how its advanced technology can significantly contribute to the growth…
Today’s uncertain and disrupted world has had a major impact on how firms do business. It has led to a gradual strategic shift from the era of “bigger is better” and a narrow fixation on increased sales growth to a more nuanced, broader vision of corporate value growth. In this podcast, Jean-Claude Larreche, an Emeritus Professor of Marketing and the Alfred H. Heineken Chaired Professor of Marketing, Emeritus, builds on the themes of…
With the coming of age of Gen Z—both as customers and new workforce entrants—customer demands are evolving. At the same time, generative AI (gen AI) is transforming how contact centers respond to these demands. Forward-thinking leaders must explore the latest trends, emphasize cohesive support strategies, and take actionable steps to enhance their customer care functions, addressing challenges such as service improvement, cost reduction, and sales function integration.In this episode of…
After nearly a decade of uninterrupted growth, strategic consulting firms are now facing one of their most challenging periods in memory, prompting widespread cutbacks in staff and changes to recruiting. How did these firms get to this painful point? In response to unprecedented client demand before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, strategy firms initiated a growth-driven hiring spree. However, as economies slowed, these firms faced a significant imbalance between their…
Data and AI leaders have been working feverishly on generative AI (gen AI) use cases for more than a year. Their experience has provided promising glimpses of the considerable value at stake in gen AI but has also exposed a variety of challenges in getting to scale. Managing data remains one of the main barriers to value creation from gen AI. In fact, 70 percent of top performers in a…