A Ghost of a Chance

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I.

A couple of years after he published Moby Dick, Herman Melville wrote the lesser known short story, Bartleby, The Scrivener. While the former detailed an epic quest for an elusive foe, the latter is a succinct account of a disappearing act. It may also be the first record of ghosting in the workplace.

Bartleby was a Wall Street copyist who one day simply stopped responding. Requests from his employer, who is the story’s narrator, were met with the simple reply, “I would prefer not to.” Eventually he stopped responding at all, choosing instead to stare out the window at a brick wall. His employer, unable to elicit a response, eventually tries to ghost the ghoster by moving his office down the street.

Flatter, Faster, Smarter: The New Shape of Work

Wed, 18 Jun 2025 14:24:00 -0700

Two headlines collided in my feed this afternoon. One from The Wall Street Journal noted that several companies, despite strong profits and growth, are cutting headcount. Another, from Bloomberg, reported that Microsoft was preparing sweeping layoffs in its sales, marketing, and customer-facing teams.

Layoffs in times of plenty? The easy answer is AI. But the real story is more complicated.

AI is reshaping the workplace, but I believe these co-occurrences are part of a pattern that hints at something deeper than automation replacing human roles. We’re in the middle of a cultural shift in perspectives on productivity, the structure of organizations, and the value of human work. We are perhaps witnessing a reset, rather than a preemptive strike against recession. I believe it traces back to COVID.

Workplace Culture on The Findings Report

A Ghost of a Chance

I.

Flatter, Faster, Smarter: The New Shape of Work