This episode answers a question every leader deploying AI needs to ask: why do two people get wildly different value from the exact same AI model?

A new MIT Sloan and Stanford study asked 1,000 adults to write their own prompts asking GPT-5.2 and Gemini 3 Flash for financial advice, then simulated a lifetime of following it. The advice was strong across the board, but people with sharper financial literacy wrote sharper prompts, and that gap alone was worth roughly five percent more wealth at retirement.

Soren breaks down why the researchers call this a "demand" problem, not a model problem, and why smarter AI won't close the gap on its own, it will widen it. He connects the finding to what's happening inside companies right now, where employees who frame clear, detailed prompts get measurably better output than those who don't, and argues that asking a sharp question has become a core business skill, not just a personal finance one.

Leaders walk away with three moves: teach people to frame requests with real numbers and goals before they need the answer, practice the asking itself on a live example rather than the topic in the abstract, and tie every lesson to a real decision, like a job offer or a budget call, so it sticks.

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View original on Inc. Magazine: MIT and Stanford Found a 5 Percent Retirement Gap. It Comes Down to Asking Better Money Questions

NBC News and The Washington Post reported on a cluster of side effects from GLP-1 drugs being called “Ozempic personality” — a reduction in drive and motivation to seek activities users once enjoyed. One in eight American adults is currently on a GLP-1 drug, according to a November 2025 KFF Health Tracking Poll. GLP-1 receptors are distributed throughout the brain’s emotional and motivational centers, including the dopamine pathways that drive effort and reward-seeking. Derek Daniels, PhD at the University at Buffalo, says in animal models these drugs “turn down almost any motivated behavior that we can imagine.”

Soren Kaplan breaks down the direct business implications: a meaningful share of the workforce is operating with a neurologically recalibrated motivation system, and the recognition programs, team rituals, and incentive structures most organizations rely on were designed without that in mind. University of Michigan neuroscientist Kent Berridge’s distinction between “liking” and “wanting” explains the mechanism: GLP-1 drugs appear to reduce the wanting signal — the dopamine-driven drive that makes a bonus feel worth competing for and a team celebration feel worth attending. Swiss chocolatier Lindt’s 2025 purchase data from GLP-1 households showed a “less is more” shift already appearing in consumer behavior.

The episode covers three leadership actions: auditing whether recognition programs rely on dopamine triggers or intrinsic motivators, redesigning team rituals to include non-food-centered alternatives that speak to meaning and purpose, and asking employees what actually resonates rather than running the same motivational playbook for everyone.

View original on Inc. Magazine: Ozempic Might Be Making Your Team Less Driven. Here’s the Science

Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLU3e5k8HJeOGEa7AGA97kvVjtpi6uqG0t

Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/033iseLQje3RnPGqUlh2I8?si=cb19276a3c68459d

Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/leapfrogging-the-headlines-with-soren-kaplan/id1896880297

Learn more about Soren’s work at sorenkaplan.com.

Three Michelin stars. A reservation list stretching months in advance. Thomas Keller built the French Laundry into a Napa Valley landmark over three decades. In March 2026, former dishwasher Elena Flores Beteta sued the Thomas Keller Restaurant Group, alleging she and more than 50 coworkers worked off the clock, had hours shaved, were denied breaks, and weren’t paid for all time worked. Two more lawsuits followed — three cases in three months. The restaurant group denied all allegations. But the pattern tells a story every leader should understand.

Soren Kaplan unpacks the leadership lesson hiding inside the French Laundry story: this is the invisible gap between what customers see from the outside and what workers experience to deliver it. Researchers at Northwestern and Rutgers found roughly one in four restaurant workers in Los Angeles was paid below minimum wage in 2024, and most never came forward. The legal filings that surface are the visible edge of something wider. Zuma restaurant paid $1.8 million to settle Massachusetts state wage investigations in 2025. Disney has faced the same pattern. The counter-model is Costco — built on the principle that employee conditions and customer experience are the same management problem, not two separate agendas.

The episode covers three actions to close the gap: conducting unscheduled back-of-house audits with frontline workers directly, building above legal compliance rather than stopping at the floor, and measuring frontline employee sentiment with the same discipline applied to customer Net Promoter Score.

View original on Inc. Magazine: French Laundry: 3 Michelin Stars, 3 Lawsuits, and 1 Leadership Blind Spot

Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLU3e5k8HJeOGEa7AGA97kvVjtpi6uqG0t

Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/033iseLQje3RnPGqUlh2I8?si=cb19276a3c68459d

Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/leapfrogging-the-headlines-with-soren-kaplan/id1896880297

Learn more about Soren’s work at sorenkaplan.com.