Billionaires through grammar

Your teachers probably told you grammar is important — but did they mention it could make you a billionaire? A $200m investment round announced last week by popular grammar checking tool Grammarly didn’t just catapult the company’s value to $13bn, but minted billionaires out of two of its founders: Max Lytvyn and Alex Shevchenko. The Ukrainian-born entrepreneurs, who started the automated writing assistant in 2009 with the help of programmer Dmytro Lider, are now worth at least $4bn each thanks to the recent funding, Forbes estimates. About 22pc of Grammarly is owned by the investors involved in its two funding rounds in 2019 and 2021, according to data collected by Pitchbook. The San Francisco-based company was launched over a decade ago under the quickly abandoned name Sentenceworks as a subscription-based product aimed at helping students with their grammar and spelling. It has since evolved away from its sole focus on education and opened up access to its intelligence-driven grammar checker, which can be used to easily weed out the errors in emails, documents and more.

(Adapted from “Grammarly Founders Become Billionaires From Fixing Your Sloppy,” by Jemima McEvoy, published on November 23, 2021, by Forbes)

The benefit of communities

Decades of research shows that workplaces are often grounded in “ideal worker” norms that reward employees for overwork. People often internalise these demands, and as a means of striving for balance, constantly push themselves in both their work and home lives. Others maintain a willingness to commit to overwork during the week, so long as they can use the weekend as an attempt to recuperate. Adhering to these ideal

worker norms can result in breakdowns of the body and mind. One way workers can break this vicious cycle of overwork and recuperation: join a community outside of work that taps into bodily awareness. Research on two groups of people taking yoga teacher training shows that learning how to “let go” during training also helped participants do the same in their work lives. Further, training with others provided a much-needed space beyond work and

home to unpack and manage harmful work norms. The conclusion? To manage the damaging effects of “work hard, play hard” cultures, seek out communities beyond work and home.

(Adapted from “To Reduce The Strain Of Overwork, Learn to Listen to Your Body,” by Stephanie J. Creary and Karen Locke, published on November 16, 2021, by Harvard Business Review)

Boosting entrepreneurship

Although governments employ different policies to boost entrepreneurial activities in a country, these initiatives would remain futile if they fail to inculcate entrepreneurial intentions among citizens. A study ‘Role of government initiatives in shaping entrepreneurial intentions: A canonical correlation analysis,’ highlighted that government initiatives are significantly related to perception about opportunities, capabilities and intention about entrepreneurship. The perception of capabilities and self-efficacy were the most important factors in gauging citizens’ perceptions about entrepreneurship. Similarly, government policies regarding taxes and bureaucracy, entrepreneurial education at the post-school stage, and physical infrastructure were the most important government interventions in shaping entrepreneurial perceptions among its citizens. Supportive institutions result in lower transaction costs and they play a pivotal role in the growth of new business startups.

(Adapted from “Role of government initiatives in shaping entrepreneurial intentions: A canonical correlation analysis,” published online on August 17, 2021, by Business Review, IBA)

Punishing the unvaccinated

In the battle against the coronavirus, the unvaccinated are being increasingly targeted. In Greece, the government is making vaccines mandatory for all Greeks above 60 years of age. From next month, refuseniks will pay a 100-euro ($113) fine every month they don’t get a shot, with the funds going to hospital services. Austria, with one of the lowest inoculation rates in Western Europe, will remain in lockdown until mid-December but a lockdown for the unvaccinated will probably persist, though they can still go to work with a negative test. Officials are also working on plans to impose mandatory vaccinations from February, with fines reaching as high as 7,200 euros ($8,151).

(Adapted from “These Countries Are Slapping The Unvaccinated With Fines And Bans,” published on December 1, 2021, by Bloomberg)

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, December 6th, 2021