Social discomfort is so universal that social psychologists like me have made careers out of studying it. We can find it almost anywhere, like in salary negotiations or small talk conversations that have one too many awkward pauses.

Almost everyone will at some point find themselves in an interaction that makes them feel uncomfortable. And at work, these situations come up daily. We give and take feedback, manage team dynamics, and navigate status differences. 

Most of us take a simple approach to quelling the discomfort: We smile as hard as we can, laugh (even when nothing is funny), and bend over backwards to convince people: There’s nothing to worry about here. This interaction will be a positive one. I am nice. 

Maybe too nice?     

There is a sad irony here: The harder we try to use niceness to cover up our discomfort, the more people can see right through us.

Humans are good at picking up on emotions, which leak out through our nonverbal behaviors, like tone of voice. We think we’re doing a good job of masking anxiety by layering on the compliments, but when those compliments are delivered through artificial smiles, no one is buying it.

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Often, we regulate our discomfort by giving feedback that is so generic, it’s not useful. Think of your classic, “Great job!” In many cases, it’s also unearned. 

Overly positive feedback signals that you’re not paying attention — and you probably aren’t, if you’re too busy trying to regulate yourself. Over time, the person on the receiving end becomes distrustful of you. They need specific information that would actually help them improve their work. 

Many people work in environments where being overly nice is the norm. Here are three things you can do to shift that culture to one in which honest, useful feedback is valued instead. 

1. Question the ‘niceness culture’

Ask yourself: Does everyone around me enjoy this overly nice culture, or are they doing it because everyone else is doing it? 

Social norms are a big driver of behaviors, and the quicker newcomers adopt those norms, the sooner they’ll be perceived as “fitting in.” If a newcomer observes everyone laying on compliments after a subpar presentation, they’ll do the same.

If no one explicitly questions this behavior, the result is what social psychologists call “pluralistic ignorance”: Everybody assumes that everyone else is engaging in overly nice feedback because they want to. But secretly, nobody likes it.

Start a conversation around change. Get a sense of what people really feel about the nice culture. One way to do this is by proposing alternatives. 

Before the next presentation, for example, you might ask people: “How would you feel if we each wrote down three specific things that you could improve and three specific things that you should definitely keep at the end of the presentation?” 

2. Be precise and particular

It’s natural for us to extrapolate from behaviors to form impressions and make assumptions. For example, we might decide that someone who is chronically late is lazy. But impressions are often too general to be useful, even if they’re positive. 

Strive for specific, behavior-based feedback instead. The more precisely you can pinpoint the issue — that a presentation that had too much jargon, for example, rather than “it was boring” — the more useful the feedback will be.

The same goes for praise. If you tell someone exactly what they did well or why their work was excellent, you’ll come off as more genuine and your feedback will be more meaningful.  

Removing broad generalizations from the equation has the added benefit of reducing threat for the person on the receiving end, especially if that feedback is critical. 

3. If you’re new at this, start small and neutral

It can feel like jumping off a cliff, moving from an overly nice feedback culture to an honest one. 

Start small. Pick issues that are mundane, but that people still care about, like what to stock in the office kitchen. Nothing that will get anyone’s blood boiling. The goal is to build the feedback muscle. That way, once you jump into the tougher stuff, the norms around honesty have already started to change.  

As you work on shifting the culture around you, be patient. Norms take a long time to form, and a long time to change.

Tessa West is a social psychologist and professor at New York University. She has spent years leveraging science to help people solve interpersonal conflicts in the workplace. She’s the author of ”Jerks at Work: Toxic Coworkers and What to Do About Them″ and ”Job Therapy: Finding Work That Works for You.” She is an instructor in CNBC’s online course How to Change Careers and Be Happier at Work.

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If you’re speaking with Mickey Drexler, ditch the formality.

The 80-year-old chairman of clothing brand Alex Mill, and former CEO of Gap and J.Crew Group, says he’d much rather colleagues and employees address him like a regular person, using his first name only.

“No one can call me ‘mister.’ I don’t care who it is,” Drexler said during a LinkedIn interview on April 10, adding that the title goes against his leadership philosophy of being on the same level as the people around him. “Even in restaurants, I [tell people to call me] Mickey, that’s it. I want them to feel not beneath me.”

Drexler’s accolades in the apparel industry are lengthy, from revitalizing Ann Taylor and turning Gap into a $14 billion powerhouse to founding brands like Old Navy and Madewell. He also served as an Apple board member from 1999 to 2015.

No matter his accomplishments, Drexler insisted that he’s no better than your average employee, and other bosses should have a similar outlook, he said. It’s easy to get wrapped up running a company, but connecting with your colleagues is an essential part of leadership, he added.

“You have to connect to the team. You can’t be in your ivory tower. … You don’t learn in a bureaucracy [or] in an office,” said Drexler, noting that he similarly doesn’t like the “bad connotation” of the name “CEO.”

DON’T MISS: How to change careers and be happier at work

Bosses who engage with their employees — by asking for input, offering feedback or simply checking in — encourage career growth and send a clear message that their people matter. Employees increasingly value having connections with their managers, according to a March 2023 survey from Pew Research Center.

Empathy and transparency are both green-flag traits in bosses, Deepali Vyas, the global head of fintech, payments and crypto practice at Korn Ferry, told CNBC Make It in October.

“Managers that master the balance of emotional intelligence and not being so rigid — that’s a good boss,” said Vyas, who has 25 years of recruiting experience. He added that employees should also look for a boss that has “adaptability and someone that’s empowering you to grow.”

Drexler converses with his colleagues, both entry-level and executive, by asking simple, open-ended questions about their job or upbringing, he said. He calls it “schmoozing,” but you might refer to it as small talk or networking — creating a connection with an informal, friendly interaction.

“Meet all the people,” said Drexler, adding that small talk is a skill he developed as an executive, not something he’s always done. “Be a normal [person], not [an] ivory-tower person who thinks they’re smarter than everyone. … You never learn [something new] unless you have a relationship with someone.”

Want a new career that’s higher-paying, more flexible or fulfilling? Take CNBC’s new online course How to Change Careers and Be Happier at Work. Expert instructors will teach you strategies to network successfully, revamp your resume and confidently transition into your dream career. Start today and use coupon code EARLYBIRD for an introductory discount of 30% off $67 (+taxes and fees) through May 13, 2025.

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As members of Gen Z continue to graduate high school and enter adulthood, many elect to forgo traditional college degrees.

That’s in part because of the cost of getting a bachelor’s degree, they tell CNBC Make It. The annual cost of attending a four-year public college has gone up 140% in the last 20 years, according to the Education Data Initiative. It’s gone up 110% for private colleges, according to CNBC Make It calculations.

“There are about 2 million fewer students in a traditional four-year university now than in 2011,” says Nich Tremper, senior economist at payroll and benefits platform Gusto.

Instead, many young people are entering skilled trades like construction, plumbing, electrical contracting and automotive repair. In the first quarter of 2024, Gen Z made up 18% of the workforce, according to the Department of Labor, but 18- to 25-year-olds made up nearly 25% of all new hires in skilled trade industries that year, according to Gusto.

Here’s how Gen Zers are finding their place in blue collar work and what could be in store for them given the Trump administration’s latest tariffs.

Morgan Bradbury, 21, first tried welding in high school. She loved it.

“I just immediately was mesmerized by the fact that I could have the ability to build things with my own hands,” she says. After graduating high school, Bradbury took a nine-month welding certification course at Universal Technical Institute for about $21,000.

She got a job at military and information security company BAE Systems before even completing her course with a starting salary of about $57,000 per year. She’s now a second-class welder on U.S. Navy ships in Norfolk, Virginia.

Chase Gallagher, 24, began landscaping when he was just 12 or 13, he says. He registered his landscaping company, CMG Landscaping, in 2015. By 18, he had as many as 82 clients. “I just kind of looked at the numbers and said, ‘Listen, I’m not going to go stop my business and pay for college,’” he says.

In 2024, Gallagher’s business brought in $1,085,000 in sales. He earned just under $500,000 through his salary and his owner share of the business.

The average starting salary for workers in the skilled trades is about $23 per hour, according to Gusto. Electricians make a median annual salary of $62,350 per year, plumbers make a median of $62,970 per year and construction workers make a median of $46,050 per year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Despite the high costs of education, wages for college graduates still tend to be higher. The median wage for college graduates in 2024 was $80,000, according to recent data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. College graduates also get a median 12.5% return on their investment.

President Donald Trump’s latest tariffs might present some challenges for Gen Zers opting into blue collar work, says Tremper, like those opting into manufacturing or construction, for example.

Trump has imposed a 10% tariff on “all countries,” according to the White House, plus steeper tariffs on various products from Mexico and Canada. Canadian soft lumber, used in home construction, for example, currently has a tariff of 14.54%.

“We definitely need to think that tariffs on soft lumber coming into the country will hurt opportunities for these people to work and to grow their skills,” Tremper says, adding that “increased costs on home building can lead to lower demand, which will limit the amount of construction trades jobs available.”

Still, “in recent months, job security has been stronger in the trades than in many traditional white collar jobs,” Tremper says. That’s according to BLS data measuring termination rates, or people who left their jobs because of layoffs and discharges.

“Industries like construction, manufacturing, and trade, transportation, and utilities have had lower termination rates than sectors where many white collar workers are concentrated, like professional and business services,” he says.

And with Baby Boomers slowly exiting the workforce, more opportunities could open up. “As these folks age out,” says Tremper, “Gen Z workers are going to be able to move into a space where they’re building their own businesses, adding to the dynamism of the economy and really providing a lot more opportunity for themselves financially.”

Do you want a new career that’s higher-paying, more flexible or fulfilling? Take CNBC’s new online course How to Change Careers and Be Happier at Work. Expert instructors will teach you strategies to network successfully, revamp your resume and confidently transition into your dream career. Sign up today and use coupon code EARLYBIRD for an introductory discount of 30% off $67 (+taxes and fees) through May 13, 2025.

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I didn’t know it at the time, but getting laid off from Meta was about to be my springboard to a new career — one at the cutting edge of the newest tech obsession.

I frequently get asked how I pivoted into AI prompt engineering, particularly when it was so new. At the time, most people — including me! — didn’t know what prompt engineering even was.

The job is still evolving as companies open roles and integrate these skills. And I haven’t heard any two identical origin stories yet. But here are a few steps I took as I changed careers from TV news at CNN and NBC, and then news and strategic partnerships at Meta, to establish myself as a prompt engineer.  

After the layoff, I was sure I wanted to stay in tech, so I spent a lot of time researching where my journalism and tech partnerships experience might be valued.

I consumed every bit of tech news gossip and examined companies and job descriptions for transferable skills. I was focused on finding companies that might be well-positioned to avoid the ongoing wave of layoffs, or at least bounce back quickly.

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I looked for stability and growth.

This meant I heard a lot (a lot) about OpenAI’s newly launched ChatGPT, and all the changes people hoped and feared it might bring. As a content creator and former journalist, I’m hesitant to hand the literary reins over to a bot. But I could see there was a very real market shift coming — and that was an opportunity for me.

I found a contract role at LinkedIn, a company I was very eager to work for, on the news team, where I would surely fit in. There were some drawbacks, like the short contract duration and less senior role. 

But it was at one of my target companies, and the job description made it clear that this content editor role would be focused on the platform’s newest generative AI projects. That struck me as a risk worth taking.

The exposure to the new and rapidly evolving technology had the potential to give me an advantage on other job applications, even if this contract wasn’t extended or converted to a full-time role.

Before I even had the job, I asked about what it was like to work on improving the quality of generative AI content. The hiring manager’s response was actually the first time I heard the term prompt engineer!

As I worked on editing and rating the generative AI output, I made sure my feedback was clear and tried to identify themes I saw overall. I focused on what I thought would help solve the bigger problems in the prompts or training, and hoped demonstrating an understanding of useful input might open a door for me to get more involved.

This hunch panned out well. Now, when I think about making a generative AI process work at scale, I don’t write a prompt for every individual task. I want it to work dozens or hundreds of times with very few errors or deviations from the goal, which means I have to focus on prompts that address the themes or trends in the output. 

When I talk with someone who hopes to move into prompt engineering, I always tell them to think about where they can start right now: 

• Is their current company implementing any generative AI projects they could offer to help with? 
• Do they have skills or knowledge that might make them qualified to score or annotate model responses? 

If you can start small and prove your input is valuable to the prompting process, you can create opportunities for yourself in prompt engineering.

I absolutely loved the prompting assignments I took on, and I soon became determined to secure a full-time role where this work could be my main focus. One skill I kept seeing in prompt engineer job postings was some level of proficiency in coding, specifically with Python.

I didn’t need to write Python scripts for the work I was already doing, but I did work with some existing scripts. I wanted to understand how they worked and what the errors meant. I wanted to become more self-sufficient and work more efficiently, without waiting for an engineer’s help. I wanted to make myself a stronger candidate for future roles.

So I took an online course to learn Python basics, hoping I could learn enough without fully hitting pause to go back to school for a degree. I quickly picked up the lingo that made it easier for me to talk to engineers and it showed the team I was committed and valuable.

It also gave me a leg up in my job applications, helping me pass simple coding tests and ultimately land my current role as a prompt director for an AI startup. 

Looking back, I’d say the biggest lesson for any career, and wherever prompt engineering takes me, is to always keep learning and stay open.

Kelly Daniel is a leader in AI prompt engineering with extensive experience implementing AI solutions for enterprise businesses. As Prompt Director for Lazarus AI, she develops prompting techniques and new applications for LLMs and cutting-edge technologies like agentic models. She is an instructor in CNBC’s online course How to Use AI to Be More Successful at Work.

Want a new career that’s higher-paying, more flexible or fulfilling? Take CNBC’s new online course How to Change Careers and Be Happier at Work. Expert instructors will teach you strategies to network successfully, revamp your resume and confidently transition into your dream career. Start today and use coupon code EARLYBIRD for an introductory discount of 30% off $67 (+taxes and fees) through May 13, 2025.

Young Americans are sounding the alarm about their finances, with roughly 2 in 5 people under 30 saying they’re either “struggling to make ends meet” or “getting by with limited security.”

That’s according to a survey of 2,096 adults ages 18 to 29, conducted by Harvard’s Institute of Politics between March 14 and 25, 2025. The survey found that among that age group, financial insecurity most affected women, Hispanics and those without college degrees.

The likelihood of struggling financially drops for different levels of education, the survey found:

• 50% of those not in college and without a degree
• 35% of current college students
• 29% of college graduates

It’s worth noting that college graduates tend to be in a stronger position than young adults who are still in school, since they’re more likely to work full-time in roles that offer higher pay.

The Harvard poll’s findings align closely with other recent research showing increased strain on Gen Z, generally defined as adults ages 18 to 28.

In a January 2025 survey by Credit One Bank, 39% of Gen Z adults said they feel stressed about their finances, the highest of any generation. They also reported the lowest levels of confidence and control over their money.

While the Harvard survey doesn’t name specific causes, many young Americans may be feeling the squeeze from persistently high inflation and the resumption of student loan payments — especially those still early in their careers, when earnings tend to be lower.

“It’s very expensive to pay for the basics today that everyone needs — food, shelter and a mode of transportation,” says John Bell, a certified financial planner in Maryland.

Plus, “many young people [are] graduating with high levels of college debt,” often in careers that aren’t paying enough to cover their loans and the basics, he says.

Want a new career that’s higher-paying, more flexible or fulfilling? Take CNBC’s new online course How to Change Careers and Be Happier at Work. Expert instructors will teach you strategies to network successfully, revamp your resume and confidently transition into your dream career. Start today and use coupon code EARLYBIRD for an introductory discount of 30% off $67 (+taxes and fees) through May 13, 2025.

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