This Week in Work: The Data’s Lying, The Brands Don’t Care, and The People Are Speaking
What happened, what it means, and why it matters for who we’re becoming.
Some weeks, it feels like everything is unraveling at once and no one’s telling the full truth about it.
The jobs report came out, and the numbers were worse than expected. So Trump fired the woman who shared them. Woman Evolve started getting dragged online, just like Essence did months ago. Not because people hate it but because they care.
And American Eagle reminded us, through a now-infamous ad, that brands don’t actually care how we feel, as long as we’re still paying attention.
We’re living through a deep shift in expectations about leadership, truth, trust, and how we show up. So instead of doomscrolling, we pulled together a few articles that we think are worth your time. plus some of our own reflections to help you process it all.
Because at BestWork, we don’t just react to the news. We ask what it means for who we’re becoming.
The Jobs Report Is “Fine” — Until You Look at the Math
This month’s jobs report came in weak, and then got worse. After all the political spin, it turns out job growth was far lower than expected and previous months were quietly revised down by over 250,000 jobs. So what did Trump do? Fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
No, seriously. Erika McEntarfer, a respected economist, was ousted for delivering numbers that didn’t fit the narrative. It’s a reminder that data doesn’t lie, but today’s leaders often do.
It’s not the first time a society has gone through this kind of unraveling. But to stay sane, we need to understand the larger trends at play and how to prepare ourselves for what’s coming next.
What’s Really Behind the Backlash to Black-Led Events?
This week, critiques around Woman Evolve started bubbling up online mirroring earlier conversations about Essence Fest. People are frustrated. But underneath the surface is something deeper.
These events are loved. That’s why the disappointment hits hard. But love doesn’t protect you from evolving expectations. In a world where everything from DEI to Black joy is under pressure, the volume of conversation is indication that people are asking for more.
The old event model—one that relies heavily on sponsorships, underpriced tickets, and overpromise—might not be enough to meet today’s standards. And maybe that’s not a failure. Maybe it’s just time for something new.
We wrote about this earlier when Essence was facing similar criticism. The same principles apply here.
Don’t Let the Brands Steal Your Energy: The Sydney Sweeney Denim Drama
Last week, American Eagle ignited a firestorm with its new denim campaign featuring Sydney Sweeney. The ads leaned into a wordplay joke—“jeans/genes”—while Sweeney discusses inherited traits before revealing, “my jeans are blue.” Critics argued the message echoed eugenic language, especially given the model’s blond hair and blue eyes, a flashpoint in online debates over beauty standards and racial implications.
Despite escalating criticism, American Eagle’s CEO more or less shrugged and said the campaign “is and always was about the jeans”—not ideology, not genetics, just jeans. They doubled down, refusing to apologize and leaning into their click‑provoking tagline.
Meanwhile high-profile political defenders—Trump, VP JD Vance, Megyn Kelly, Ted Cruz—jumped to praise the campaign, framing the backlash as a symptom of liberal overreach and “cancel culture.”
Our takeaway: this drama is a case study in why we shouldn’t let brands, or their marketing stunts, consume our emotional bandwidth. Most corporate outrage backlashes are calculated, inevitably amplified by politics and media optics. Brands often don’t care if you’re offended. Their endgame is engagement. Your choice: don’t feed it.
