New weeknote. Featuring: why a survey is a promise disguised as a question, the difference between "I have a flight" and "I have a plan," and the discovery that Legally Blonde is now a quarter of a century old. sharonodea.com/2026/06/08/w...

If I were American I would simply die of embarrassment every time I remembered this whiny prick is the actual president

Chip manufacturer ASML invites Elon Musk to speak at internal event. Many Dutch staff take to their intranet to say they’re not happy and intend to boycott it. nos.nl/artikel/2617...

Woman starts £1k a week cake business, annoyed at being asked to follow the same regs as other businesses selling cakes? www.bbc.com/news/article...

Now you might say he’s a joyless prick, and you’d be right, but Steven Bartlett never finds last night’s burger delivery in the doorstep the next day, does he?

As someone who is half blind and dispraxic, school sport was Not Good for me. I wish someone had told me then that you can do exercise alone, in other forms, or with people like you. It would have saved me a LOT of heartache.

Here for the subtle shade of this on screen job title from the BBC

Ten sunny days in a row and I went out this morning without an umbrella, like I’d complexly forgotten where I am

Every now and then I remember that those rapid grocery delivery startups were valued at twelvety billion pounds. It’s almost like people handing out VC money are just making it up based on vibes.

Top Dutch civil servants urge government to stop using Twitter. I’ve long said UK and EU guts should do the same. Content gets zero reach but adds credibility to a platform rife with mis- and disinformation. nltimes.nl/2026/05/26/t...

It’s rush hour in the neighbourhood

PSA: an ice cream will improve your mood by 4 to 7 percent.

Arrived in London for the Institute for the Future of Work’s “making the future work” conference. Lord Vallance opening on achieving growth through AI adoption. Making the right noises, little of substance so far.

Microsoft Teams is retiring Together Mode, to the chagrin of very few www.theverge.com/tech/932215/...

Who amongst us wouldn’t be, eh?

Interesting piece on the person who sparked “very demure, very mindful”, on how going viral leads to attention no one has the bandwidth to handle. www.theguardian.com/society/2026...

Wesignation!

Mandatory gender pay gap reporting since 2017. In 2025, Monzo, Nationwide, Santander and TSB all reported wider gaps than the year before. Sunlight, it turns out, isn't a disinfectant. Interview with yours truly on my annual one-woman IWD campaign: www.the-heard.co.uk/blog/sharon-...

Can we not do this till I've finished sorting my re-mortgage? Thx.

This is an extremely good articulation of the current situation. People want dramatic change, but also to be insulated from the effects of that change. That’s an un-squarable circle.

Wake me up when we start watching lecterns again

Honestly, think it will be more like 20 weeks.

Oh JFC it’s back to Emergency Podcasts, is it?

Two legends at #CampDigital. @dasbarrett.bsky.social followed by @laurayarrow.bsky.social

#CampDigital is kicking off with @rachelcoldicutt.bsky.social’s call for hope in technology.

So this lotion, is it for hands? Or body? Both Ok, let’s go with “skin”, that doesn’t sound weird at all.

Accidentally turned up to the KLM lounge in Schiphol dressed as KLM ground crew circa 1976. Fijne reis ✈️

Everyone says: be open about your mental health at work. What they don’t say: HR will make supportive noises. But you will not get the stretch project. You will not get promoted. Your bonus will suffer. You will be managed, carefully, as a risk. (1/some)

My phone has given me this neat “on this day” round-up.

LOL my weeknote was labelled as “adult content” because it features… a 2000-year-old Greek statue’s bum.

Orgs are gazing at their reflection in the AI pool (workshops! adoption rates!) while the real capability dissolves underneath. Latest weeknote: HR Tech Europe, employee influencer comms, book endorsements in, and a new Reworked piece on the digital/AI literacy gap. sharonodea.com/2026/04/26/w...

Contrarian opinion: I think people do broadly understand that we are placating a mad emperor across the pond, and rule-books were being torn up all over the shop (I’m not saying it was a good idea, but that circumstances arguably demanded bad ideas)

When I am Benevolent World Dictator coffee shops will be banned from selling matcha and any coffee with enough ingredients to cause a queue to form behind the orderer.

A well-targeted act of God seems uncharitable, but perhaps we can hope for an unexpectedly strong performance from the England men’s football to see this nonsense roundly ignored by all corners.

My husband keeps doing this thing where people contact him via WhatsApp and he speaks to them in real time using his voice. Like, what?

It blows my mind how Albert Heijn employ actual children. Just seen someone stacking shelves who was shorter than me and looked about nine. (Must have been at least 13 to be working there, but even so… there are some babies with supermarket jobs here)

This is something friends and I all report seeing in our own families/family friends. One will no longer let her in-laws come to their house as they refuse to stop using racist language in front of their child. I saw my mum’s FB feed and it was 80% AI nostalgia nonsense shared by her mates.

Properly howling at this. (I am having new work headshots done, but not in time for something I need to submit today...)

Hot take: employees aren’t asking whether the message sounds authentic. They’re asking whether anyone really thought about what they actually need. Delegate that question to AI, and you’ve answered it. The answer is no. New op-ed by me on UNLEASH: www.unleash.ai/strategy-and...

Anyone know anyone in privacy at Meta? I’m trying to tell them that their EU reporting form links through to… a form that excludes EU countries. But I’m stuck in an auto-reply loop that replies with “I see you’re trying to report…” Yes I am, but the form you link to means I can’t.

Luxembourg gives good castle

King Willem-Alexander says he’s 6’2”. Trump says he’s 6’3”.

One of our preview readers wrote back to say our book was “a seriously impressive resource” Made my week 🥰🥰

What if — and hear me out here — rebalancing via taxation and properly-funded public services makes for a better foundation from which to build sustainable businesses? Just spitballing from here in the Netherlands, like.

Also much of Europe (myself included) giving the US a swerve until normality returns* * ie potentially forever

“Don’t worry, we’ll make sure your timeline isn’t polluted by niche groups like… women” Neatly explaining why I left that site two years ago and don’t miss it one bit.

Hoi lokale vrienden: wie wil mijn kaartjes voor John Cooper Clarke hebben? Vrijdagavond in het Zonnehuis. Ik ben dan in Brussel, dus ik kan er niet heen. Laat het me weten voordat ik ze op TicketSwap zet!

So having ditched the concept of talking to your colleagues via legless avatars in Horizon because *this isn't a thing anyone wants*, Meta are building an AI replica of Mark Zuckerberg to "connect with employees". Here's a non-exhaustive list of the reasons this is a terrible idea.

I’m reminded how mad this was every time I arrive home and see Brits in the giant queue with ROW and breeze past with my EU passport. My mate and I were on the same flight from Dublin and I was walking in my front door before she (UK passport) had got through passport control

I’d actually forgotten what it felt like to read good political news. A chink of light for democracy over in Hungary