A month with no meetings? This company tried it to improve productivity

PRODUCTIVITY: Meetings have always been an integral part of the professional environment, but a post-COVID surge has some organizations rethinking just how necessary these check-ins actually are.? TechSmith , a screen capture software and productivity solutions platform, shut down meetings for an entire month last July. What they found has?reshaped their approach ?ever since.?

"We all need to be intentional about how we're using other people's time, and that was a big part of this experiment," says Amy Casciotti , VP of HR at TechSmith. "It's not that we thought we were going to get rid of meetings forever, but it was ensuring that we were being very intentional about the meetings we were having, and that they were productive for everyone in the room."

Read: 30 days, zero meetings: One company's experiment with work-life balance

CAREGIVING: Working caregivers are struggling to balance their personal and professional responsibilities, and due to a lack of support, many feel forced to choose between their loved ones and their jobs. As the number of caregivers in the U.S. climbs, it is expected that so too will resignations, unless employers step in and offer what caregivers say are the most needed resources for relief.

New research from Arizent , parent company of Employee Benefit News , gathered feedback from workers currently caring for their children, parents or partners, to help employers know where to step up their benefits and policies to keep employees present and productive at work.

Read: From birth to bereavement: No matter the caregiving stage, employees crave support

INTERVIEWING: People with strong U.S. regional accents were found to face a wage penalty of 20% compared to those who speak with a "standard accent," according to a?recent survey ?of 3,000 job applicants conducted by a writing assistance organization, Writing Tips Institute. As a result, over one-third said that they "soften" their?regional accents ?in their job interviews out of fear of negative stereotypes.

The survey found that?51% of applicants ?from western New England — which includes cities such as Boston and Providence, Rhode Island — are the most likely to alter their speech patterns. Fifty-percent of applicants with a south midland accent, which includes residents from Oklahoma and Arkansas, admitted to hiding their accents, as well as 45% of applicants with New Jersey accents.

Read: 5 regional accents applicants hide in job interviews