Thursday’s Workwear Report: Cotton-Viscose Short-Sleeve Sweater
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Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.
This short-sleeved cardigan from Lands’ End would make a great topper for days when you want to cover your arms a bit, but it’s just too hot for long sleeves. I would pair the light blue stripes with a shell in a similar color and some navy trousers for a perfectly summery look. It also comes in a really pretty “raspberry sorbet” if you’d like another color.
The sweater is on sale for $28.79 (marked down from $79.95) at Lands’ End and comes in sizes XS-XL and 1X-3X.
Sales of note for 6/19:
- Amazon Prime Day has started! You can check out our roundup here…
- Nordstrom – 25% off clearance! Nice selection of Vince, Veronica Beard, Boss, Theory, Beyond Yoga, and Zella
- Another Tomorrow – Seasonal sale, 50% off select styles
- Ann Taylor – 50% off everything + free shipping! Readers love this blouse and I always love the variety of colors/textures for this jacket (it's a great separate)
- Athleta – 30-60%off reader favorites like Brookyn and Endless pants, and the Pranayama wrap is marked down to $55. ,
- AYR – Ooh, good sale section — but lots on final sale. Readers love (LOVE) these comfy work pants and these jeans.
- Bare Necessities – Semi-annual sale, up to 70% off, plus get an additional 40% off clearance swim. Readers have sung the praises of these cooling pajamas and their bra-sized swimwear
- Boden – 15% off new women's wear styles with code
- Evereve – 20% off dresses!
- Glossier – Last day 6/19: 20-25% off almost everything (including subscriptions!)
- J.Crew – Extra 15% off your purchase (on top of up to 50% off select styles)
- J.Crew Factory – Extra 50% off clearance + extra 15% off orders over $100, and extra 20% off orders over $125 – readers love their schoolboy blazers and sweaters (down as low as $84), and they have a great selection of summer suiting in the sale. Ooh, and these scallop-trim t-shirts have major Boden vibes.
- Jenni Kayne – Semi-annual warehouse sale
- M.M.LaFleur – Archive sale! (Try code CORPORETTE15 for 15% off on other items)
- Nordstrom Rack – Clearance, new arrivals up to 75% off! Nice selection of Vince, Veronica Beard, Reiss and Rag & Bone, a ton of affordable work dresses from Calvin Klein, Maggy London, Eliza J, and Donna Morgan
- Ruti – Semi-annual sale, up to 70% off!
- Splendid – Up to 60% off women's sale!
- Talbots – 6/19 only: free shipping, no minimum! Readers love their cashmere cardigans
I feel that there is a lot of AI and private equity hate here, but I’m also hoping that there are many CPAs at Big4 and big regional firms. I am a new CPA and work in audit. I understand that the SEC makes audit separate from tax and consulting, which are seen as more lucrative (and are essentially sales and cross-selling jobs at the highest levels). Several other big regional CPA firms have taken PE investments and now we are also. I think from googling that the idea is that you get cash to use to . . . invest in AI and replace all of us? Build outsourcing site in India where they can get humans to work vs AI (which my Big4 friends tell me they are doing)? Fire all of us and have us do less with less? IDK but people are freaking out. I’m so new that IDK if I need to pivot out of audit, go to Big4, everyone will be rushing into audit, or maybe it’s too soon to tell. Everyone seems to hate private equity though, so there’s that. Please tell me quickly what I’m missing because the all-hands meeting I need to go to will surely not be the whole story on this.
You are panicking about something you can’t control. Which is very normal, but not useful. I hope you get some good advice, but in the meantime, adulthood is learning to pivot, getting kicked down by circumstance, and getting up again and hopefully persevering. Rooting for all of us against greed.
For a pivot, what would pivot to as a new CPA? Tax? Go to work for a client? I don’t even know what I don’t know or who is really a good person or place to go for the straight story.
You will get pro private equity comments here too. They just don’t disclose they work(ed) for the devil
Is it always the devil? I feel that it’s just a short-term move that is long-term bad, like the LBOs of yore. Now, the carried interest concept makes it structured that way. Yadda, yadda, with debt you have to pay vs with PE investments you don’t (you go down the drain either way). I think it’s telling that politicians want to save us from PE in health care (which I’m OK with, but the tort lawyers would fix things in the end there) and youth sports (WTF?), but not otherwise.
Yes, it’s evil precisely because it is geared towards extracting short-term gains for the investors at the expense of long-term sustainability and service and value for customers.
A short term move that is long term bad is the devil. You have way too much faith in the tort lawyers; things are not getting fixed right now as we speak.
And tort lawyers can only fix things after a lot of people have been irreparably hurt.
I really thought that corporate raiding and its consequences were part of the “everything got worse” charts where things start to go off the rails in the 70s without recovering to this day.
“Is it always the devil to destroy things and make them worse for decades as part of a get rich quick scheme?”
“but the tort lawyers would fix things in the end there”
oh bless.
I’m a CPA in Big 4 audit.
With PE investments, essentially yes. They want to use those investments to build out AI and offshoring to keep up with what the Big 4 already are able to invest in.
If you have an opportunity to move to Big 4, I would definitely do that for a number of reasons (better on resume, more varied experience, wouldn’t want to work for PE), but it shouldn’t be to escape AI / offshoring because you will be disappointed.
It’s easy to spiral when you start thinking of how AI will transform the future of the profession and I definitely do sometimes, but I’m trying to think of it as a way to expand capacity to do more–so help your firm grow more with the human resources it has in place. Also, it helps to remember that the firm will always need smart, capable leaders if they intend to keep growing or even just existing in the future. If you are a high performer, there is definitely value in someone investing in you for the future of the firm.
The Big4 have been outsourcing to India for years and are also using AI so that’s not new in the industry. I would be less worried that they are going to do a bunch of layoffs at your firm, I think the longer term impact will be less new hires. A lot of the job of the most junior team members is manual, boring work so I think AI could actually make the job of junior staff better by automating some of it.
Part of the reason PE firms are buying accounting firms is for succession – to cash out the boomer Partners who own the firm. Part of the playbook is also expanding into higher value service lines.
I would try not to stress and I don’t think you need to pivot or leave your firm. If you’re brand new, in reality you’re not likely to stay in audit for more than a few years anyway before you go to industry and do something else.
No accounting experience, but I work for a professional services org in which PE invested about 5 years ago. I joined about 4 years ago so I don’t know what it was like pre-PE but I have seen changes in my time.
Positive: more money to invest in updating tech platforms that help us do our jobs more efficiently
Negative: too many reorgs (and cutting expensive/senior people), outsourcing some roles overseas, installing their preferred executive team who do not have any background in our specialized industry, and a general culture shift towards less of a people/services focus and more of a profit focus.
More negatives than positives in my book, especially as we hit a point where the PE firm is likely looking to exit based on typical timelines, but I love my coworkers and feel good about the work we do so I’ve stuck around for now.
There is nowhere to go to escape the current attempts to deploy AI. But the next cycle will be figuring out where it was useful and where it wasn’t. Don’t panic and just watch it all play out.
I’m a CPA, started in Big 4, left several years ago and now am a Controller in industry. About a year ago I joined a company owned by PE after avoiding it for most of my career. So far it hasn’t been as bad as I expected although there’s a heavy push for AI. In a regulated industry like audit, in your shoes I’d be thinking about: 1. Learning how to use AI for audit. Those models don’t run themselves and will always need people to direct them. An audit cannot be performed by AI with any guarantee of quality. 2. Look at the industry/client base you’ve been exposed to so far and if that’s where you’d want to spend your career, whether you’re an auditor or working for a company. If you’re in a good place with the firm you’re at, stay there and gain expertise to give yourself future flexibility. If you aren’t interested in that industry for the long-term, then do what you need to do (change firms, talk to the partners at your firm) to get to that place.
It is time for a big “cook and freeze single serve lunches to take to work” day. I’d love your favorite recipes! I’m particularly looking for bean recipes, (for fiber, protein, and lack of freezer burn purposes) but there are no food restrictions.
I roast a chicken w a bottle of white and sliced onions, boil some bones, make a stock (or you can just use wine, onions, and boxed chicken stock) and then put the wine chicken drippings and stock in a casserole dish w cannellini beans (precooked from Whole Foods) and let them cook in the oven for a few hours, stirring and adding water while I read or do laundry. Add the roasted chicken at some point and mix it all in. It’s pretty nice re-heated.
I like this ratatouille lentil soup. I find most lentil soups pretty meh, but this one is more interesting without being weird. I substitute a chopped red or yellow bell pepper for the roasted pepper and cook it with the zucchini and onion. I also add a tablespoon of herbes de Provence. I do think the recipe could stand more herbs. I freeze this in single portions. I also freeze good whole grain sourdough in slices, and a bowl of this soup with toasted sourdough makes a good meal.
https://www.foodandwine.com/ratatouille-lentil-soup-8603308
You mentioned freezer burn. How long are you hoping to freeze these meals? I find cooked beans get kind of explode-y in the freezer unless they are in a sauce or liquid of some type. For that reason, I might stick with things like black bean soup, chili, etc.
I’ll probably eat them over the course of 2 months. The idea is grab and go healthy lunch when I have failed to prep something fresh.
Coconut red lentil dal freezes well.
Black or pinto bean chili.
Aubergine and chickpea curry.
Lasagna, moussaka and shepherd’s pie with lentils.
Pizza – try a white bean and rosemary sauce.
Hmm, at this time of year, I think more bean salads than hot bean recipes. For those, I’d just batch cook beans and freeze them, though you could also just use canned beans and skip that step. There are a ton of great bean recipes on NYT Cooking and most are pretty quick to throw together once you have the beans.
Try savory oats with beans – I make a weird dish with steel cut oats, cannellini beans, bacon bits, EBTB seasoning, and often throw in spinach and broccoli too. I like to make 2 eggs while it’s defrosting and add cheddar at the end for melty goodness.
Pre-pandemic, there used to be a hotel in DC (The Line) that had savory oats like this on their breakfast menu and I LOVED them.
I’d look into those silicon freezer cubes, lots of people on social media seem to have great luck freezing rectangles of rice, beans, and chicken and then letting them defrost in the AM before lunch.
Souper Cubes are worth the money! Huge fan!
Incredible handle, btw. Can I recommend finding a cruel dentist with a wonderful girlfriend and seeing where nature takes you?
This is a really cute pick!
Agreed! I have a couple similar sweaters and they are real workhorses in my wardrobe.
Anyone on a GLP-1 experiencing something like a transference from “food noise” to shopping noise or something like that? I think since I don’t get dopamine hits from snacking anymore, my brain is looking for quick joy from other things, like buying makeup or shoes, and it’s impacting my wallet.
Hahaha, yes. But I think this is more personality specific. I always liked shopping (I get ideas and want to try them) and the excitement of that is heightened (and unfortunately, I have more success w my ideas) on the GLP-1s. Not just clothes though, vintage home decor hunting, hard to find ingredients from specialty stores, projects. It feels like my brain is more excited about stuff.
This is so surprising, since the hype is that GLP-1s make you uninterested in everything from eating to shopping to drinking to gambling!
Could you also need to shop? I feel that between size changes and being told to work out more, if it is excessive might show up over time vs muddying the waters right away because of the want vs need blur.
Yep me too – my gardening habit kicked into high gear around the same time I started glps. I feel like in part it’s to be expected because there’s so much space in your head where the food/diet noise was. But I can see it being about dopamine too.
I’m so curious if this is real gardening or “gardening”
Dopamine seeking is a sign of ADHD. When my bestie was finally medicated she became a minimalist, it was magic
This is a really pretty pick.
There’s a store (not Sephora) I buy a few things from that offers samples with each purchase. They also have a scent sampler kit that I’ve purchased. They have a scent that I’m curious to try, it’s not a part of the sampler, and not an option for the samples I can pick out with purchase. I reached out and asked if they could send me a sample with my next purchase (a face cream I like) and they told me no, but that if I purchased the scent, they could send me a sample to try before opening the scent (so it would still be returnable.)
To me, it sounds like they do have a sample available and they’re choosing not to send it to me. I only offer the above to show that I like their products and buy with relative frequency. I’m quick to walk away from nonsense, but I do like the face cream. Should I be annoyed (I am) or is there reason to this I’m not seeing? I hate the process of returning things and the bottle of scent is close to $200.
for some scents, the store may have only a 1-1 ratio of samples to full size products. As opposed to scents where they have an intentional freebie pile.
imho you’re spending more time chasing a standalone freebie…. than you would just ordering and returning if you don’t like it.
Can’t you just try the scent in a store?
Their only stores are in Europe. But that’s still an intriguing idea. Maybe next year.
I’d check out a site like lucky scent or the perfumed court – they sell samples of niche and mainstream fragrances for $5-$20 or so for this very reason.
For those who have the shoppies with GLP-1 – perfume is a VERY fun rabbit hole, lots of relatively inexpensive testers, trading, comparing scent notes, etc. on reddit and other spaces.
In mod but check out Lucky Scent to buy a tester.
I think you want to have your cake and eat it but are too close to see that.
Scents are not in any conceivable way a life necessity, so while I can understand that you are annoyed at not having access to what you want in the easiest way possible, I do not think you “should” be annoyed. Count yourself blessed that this is the friction you encounter in your life.
+1. You asked, they said no, it’s time to move on. You can live without a bottle of this perfume you’ve never smelled.
i would just buy the scent and get the freebie. i bought some stuff on one of the scent-dupe sites because i wanted some penhaligon’s and ds durga without paying full price and i regret it, it’s all garbage.
It sounds like they’re trying to work with you here. Have you checked other sampler providers like Scent Split? The relevant subreddit has a lot of guides to buying samples. That may be more convenient than dealing with a return.
Giving me the option to return the scent would be fine with me.
+1, they have given you a perfectly sensible solution.
I know Spanish only from school. I thought I was taught that “mas despacio” means something like “slower” as in to convey that I can understand some Spanish but please just speak it slower for me. But yesterday I was told that it means that that you want the person to give you more space. Google seems to support that my version, but what do I really know? Maybe this is an idiom or expression and I’m not grasping some nuance? I work where I sometimes have to translate a bit on the fly (which is often pointing out where something is or saying “there is no translator here today but she comes on Monday” or “this form is actually for the post office, which is over there.” So not Cervantes but if I’m stumbling poorly, I’d like to stumble a little better. Aiiii.
Also only know this from HS Spanish, but I learned the way to convey that you want someone to speak more slowly is with an entire phrase, something like “repita mas despacio, por favor.” Otherwise you are just shouting random words.
Think of the difference in English: if someone asks “say it again, but slower please” that is very different than someone just saying “slow” at you.
Mine is “Escribelo, por favor.” Still waiting for vosotros to be relevant.
Despacio means slowly, not space. “Espacio” is space so they either misheard you or were mixing the two words up. I agree it would be a little more polite to say it is a full sentence like habla mas despacio, por favor. But the meaning is totally clear from what you said.
+1. If you were speaking (not typing), they may have misunderstood you.
My HS spanish tells me slowly is lentemente. But I actually just use hand motions for this.
Both despacio and lentamente work. They’re synonyms.
My trick for getting people to repeat themselves more slowly in Spanish, while traveling overseas, is to point at my ear and make a questioning face. They immediately simplify, slow down, and speak up a bit, so I have a better chance at understanding.
I learned lentemente in HS a million years ago. I generally simply say something like, ‘lo siento, no hablo mucho espanol, puedes hablar lentamente?’
We are hosting a casual neighborhood get-together this Saturday (trying to build community), with about 4-5 families with elementary-aged kids.
If the weather is good we will be in the yard with some water games for kids, no problem; if not, I’d like to have some indoor ideas planned to 1) entertain the kids and 2) serve as unofficial ice-breakers for the adults! Crafts available? Board games out just in case?
Assume no adults are coming against their will and therefore have at least some interest in socializing. Thanks for any suggestions!
Board games are great idea. Crafts might be hard to manage.
A big puzzle.
+1, allows people to dip in and out of the activity unlike an in-progress game
cookie decorating?
Group games that are appropriate for both adults and kids, like Apples to Apples.
does anyone here live in multigenerational housing? starting to think about how that will look with a disabled child in the future and possibly a parent. we’d need to move so we’re wide open to all the different possibilities.
has anyone seen cashmere linen sweaters anywhere this year? i always like that blend