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☆ What Dogs Can Teach Us About Love and Grief
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-02 | by ( Gretchen Tarrant Gulla | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Owning a dog can teach a person as much about herself as about her companion, The Wall Street Journal’s Katherine Bindley reflected in a recent essay. From the beginning, owning a dog requires both love and resolve. But the most enduring lesson a dog can teach might be its last, according to hundreds of Journal readers who read and commented on Bindley’s essay. The inevitable passing of a pet and the processing of the subsequent grief is a powerful lesson in resilience. Richard Nelson of Wascott, Wis., is all too familiar with the anguish that comes with losing a pet.

Persons: Katherine Bindley, Richard Nelson Locations: Wascott, Wis

☆ Tech’s New Normal: Microcuts Over Growth at All Costs
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-29 | by ( Katherine Bindley | Preetika Rana | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

The tech industry has largely recovered from the downturn, but Silicon Valley learned a long-lasting lesson: how to do more with less. Amazon , Google, Microsoft and Meta Platforms have been cutting dozens or a few hundred employees at a time as executives keep tight controls on costs, even as their businesses and stock prices have rebounded sharply.

Organizations: Google, Microsoft, Meta

☆ She Charges $550 for 90 Minutes and Has a Wait List of 7,600 People
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-13 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Tech worker and part-time dog trainer Maddie Guy, 33, couldn’t figure out what was going on with her English Springer Spaniel, Rudder. He was being snippy with other dogs and facing a medical issue so mysterious that every test had been run and a doggy MRI ordered. Comfort came in the form of a birthday present from friends: a phone session with an animal communicator.

Persons: Maddie Guy, Rudder, Comfort Organizations: Tech, Springer Spaniel

☆ Tech’s Middle Managers Feel the Squeeze as Easy Days End
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-10 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com. https://www.wsj.com/tech/techs-middle-managers-feel-the-squeeze-as-easy-days-end-37a6af49

Persons: Dow Jones

☆ Katherine Bindley — Personal tech reporter at The Wall Street Journal
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-17 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Katherine BindleyKatherine Bindley is a technology reporter for The Wall Street Journal in San Francisco, where she covers the work and culture of Silicon Valley. Email her at katie.bindley@wsj.com and find her on Twitter: @katiebindley

Persons: Katherine Bindley Katherine Bindley Organizations: Wall Street, Twitter Locations: San Francisco, Silicon Valley

This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com. https://www.wsj.com/articles/san-francisco-crime-downtown-doom-loop-e5fcd7ba

Persons: Dow Jones

☆ The Life I Never Intended to Love: Dog Owner
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-29 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com. https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-life-i-never-intended-to-love-dog-owner-fa2c7cb8

Persons: Dow Jones

☆ Watch: Debris from Titan Submersible Returned to Land
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-28 | by ( ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Psychedelics Are Powering Silicon Valley. Drug use has long been a part of Silicon Valley. But recently, routine drug use has moved from an after-hours activity into corporate culture, with some tech executives and employees looking to psychedelics and other substances for business breakthroughs. WSJ reporter Katherine Bindley joins host Julie Chang to discuss the growing drug culture in the tech world. Clara Mokri For The Wall Street Journal

Persons: Katherine Bindley, Julie Chang, Clara Mokri Organizations: Street Locations: Silicon Valley

☆ Magic Mushrooms. LSD. Ketamine. The Drugs That Power Silicon Valley.
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-27 | by ( Kirsten Grind | Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com. https://www.wsj.com/articles/silicon-valley-microdosing-ketamine-lsd-magic-mushrooms-d381e214

Persons: Dow Jones

☆ Tech, an Early Booster of Remote Work, Wants People Back in the Office
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-11 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com. https://www.wsj.com/articles/tech-an-early-booster-of-remote-work-wants-people-back-in-the-office-6565b840

Persons: Dow Jones

SAN FRANCISCO—In certain wealthy tech circles it is known as “The Lifestyle,” an underground party scene featuring recreational drug use and casual sex. A successful tech executive named Bob Lee liked to hang out with that crowd, according to people who also participated. So, too, did Khazar Momeni , the wife of a prominent plastic surgeon, these people said.

☆ As Tech Jobs Disappear, Silicon Valley Veterans Reset Their Careers
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-09 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

For engineers and other tech workers, landing a job with one of the industry’s best-known companies was long the ultimate professional achievement. Now, many Silicon Valley veterans are being driven to new paths far from the tech giants, prizing stability and personal values over prestige.

Silicon Valley Bank used financial sweeteners and strategic networking to attract both venture capitalists and their nascent tech companies. That strategy powered spectacular growth for decades—and left the sector extraordinarily vulnerable when the bank collapsed. SVB, founded in 1983, offered banking services to startups that often weren’t profitable, in some cases didn’t even have a product, and would otherwise have a hard time getting a line of credit or a loan from a larger bank. Venture-capital firms banked with SVB too, often encouraging their portfolio companies to do the same.

Silicon Valley Bank built up a formidable network in Silicon Valley over its 40 years in business. Startup founders and investors breathed a collective sigh of relief after the federal government agreed to backstop deposits at Silicon Valley Bank, but they said the lender’s collapse would drive changes in the industry’s financial practices. The decision, announced Sunday afternoon California time, ended a frenzied multiday race to shore up cash and meet payroll needs. The government move surprised many in the industry, which was bracing for a delay of weeks and even months before depositors would get full access to their cash.

Startup founders and investors breathed a collective sigh of relief after the federal government agreed to backstop deposits at Silicon Valley Bank, but they said the lender’s collapse would drive changes in the industry’s financial practices. The decision, announced Sunday afternoon California time, ended a multiday race to shore up cash and meet payroll needs. The government move surprised many in the industry, which was bracing for a delay of weeks and even months before depositors would get full access to their cash.

Tech startups and other businesses raced to line up sources of cash for payroll and other immediate needs after their deposits in Silicon Valley Bank , long a linchpin of tech financing, were locked up when federal authorities took control Friday morning. The bank’s sudden collapse fueled uncertainty among many founders over the immediate future of their businesses, and further hobbled a startup sector that has struggled with a sharp slowdown in venture funding and broader economic woes. Its demise will likely further accelerate the shift away from the high-risk and aggressive growth strategies that startups embraced during the decades-plus bull market that ended last year, according to longtime startup investors.

Silicon Valley Bank, which collapsed Friday, had grown over four decades to become a linchpin of tech investing. Startup investors scrambled over the weekend to help their portfolio companies meet immediate expenses and to shore up their own access to cash after Friday’s federal seizure of Silicon Valley Bank made some money inaccessible. Venture-capital giant Andreessen Horowitz said it was helping founders of startups it has invested in find new banks and identify financing alternatives. Other venture leaders also said they were funding payroll for now at their portfolio companies that didn’t move cash out of SVB before it was taken over by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Friday morning.

☆ At Marc Benioff’s Salesforce, It’s One Big Family—Until Trouble Hits
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-28 | by ( Tom Dotan | Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Through the sky’s-the-limit boom years, Marc Benioff , the co-founder and chief executive of Salesforce.com Inc., told employees they were bound together like family. In today’s leaner times, he is laying off thousands of them. Since its founding in 1999, the San Francisco-based business-software company has grown fast and spent big. Salesforce put its name on skyscrapers in San Francisco, Tokyo, London and New York City and, according to people familiar with the arrangement, agreed to pay actor Matthew McConaughey more than $10 million a year to be a creative adviser and TV pitchman. Mr. Benioff added around 30,000 employees from the start of 2020 until the end of last year, roughly a 60% increase.

☆ Laid-Off Tech Workers Seek Leverage on the Way Out
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-14 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

For some tech workers, everything is negotiable, including the severance package that comes with a layoff. As tech companies shed tens of thousands of jobs, staffers at different levels are pushing back on the terms of their departures. Some employees are hiring lawyers or other advisers to press for more money or an extension of their health benefits before agreeing to deals–-adopting the type of tactics traditionally used by senior executives haggling over their severance terms.

☆ Why Companies Do Layoffs Around Christmas
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

As job cuts ripple through industries such as tech and media, it is hard not to notice how the holiday season is a really unfortunate time for workers to be getting pink slips. There is arguably no good time for companies to lay off employees, of course, but as farewell-to-my-job posts continue to populate LinkedIn, many are wondering, why did they have to do this the week before Thanksgiving or right before Christmas?

☆ When Companies Do Layoffs, Is It Really ‘Last In, First Out?’
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-08 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Millions of people switched to new jobs this year. Now many wonder: Does being the newbie make them more vulnerable to potential layoffs? Though the overall labor market remains strong and many employers still can’t fill all of the openings they have, some companies—particularly in tech and media—have announced layoffs this fall. More recently, the list of employers cutting jobs has grown to include companies in the retail, auto and food and beverage industries.

☆ Silicon Valley’s Talent Spotters Are Now Looking for Jobs
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-29 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Companies couldn’t hire enough recruiters to help fill all of the open technology positions they had a year ago. Now many tech-talent seekers are job-hunting themselves. Few other professionals have felt the whiplash more as big tech’s long-running hiring boom fizzles out. It is a sharp reversal for a field in which even inexperienced tech recruiters could earn low six figures. At Meta Platforms Inc., CEO Mark Zuckerberg warned that recruiting staff would be disproportionately hit in the 11,000 layoffs it announced this month—the result, he said, of too much hiring and spending during the pandemic.

☆ Tech Workers Face a New Reality as Talent Wars Turn to Pink Slips
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-11 | by ( Katherine Bindley | Chip Cutter | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

This spring, Google employees in the Bay Area got a private Lizzo concert to herald a return to the office. Now the company is cutting back on social gatherings as well as hiring. Meta Platforms Inc., known for once-lavish perks such as free laundry, began slashing 11,000 jobs this week and said some of its remaining workers will have to share desks. The comedown has been swift for employees of big technology companies, long among the most coveted workers in business. Accustomed to jobs with six-figure salaries, fat equity packages and cushy amenities, many employees are now facing staff cuts for the first time, along with shrinking net worths as stocks fall during a bumpy stretch for big tech.

☆ These People Quit Higher-Paying Jobs for Better Work-Life Balance. Inflation Is Testing Their Mettle.
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-03 | by ( Katherine Bindley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Many of the millions of people who switched jobs during the pandemic are feeling the bite of inflation especially hard, and for an often overlooked reason—they opted for pay cuts. All around, it has been a good time for American workers and their earning power—if not their spending power. Labor shortages have driven up wages, and many in-demand employees have quit jobs for better-paying ones.

Employees at General Motors Co. balked at a request to return to the office. At Meta Platforms bosses are asking workers to get more done with fewer resources. Some CEOs say things are so tense that handing out modest raises can spark a backlash in an era of rising inflation. The workplace is in the middle of an unusual collision between what bosses and workers want. Employees feel empowered after two years of changing their work habits and leverage gained in a tight labor market.

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