UF Warrington News

Positive interventions that distract us from difficult tasks actually help to reduce our stress levels, according to new research co-authored by Mo Wang, Associate Dean for Research and Lanzillotti-McKethan Eminent Scholar.

Where, when and how we work may never return to pre-pandemic norms. Artificial intelligence and demographic shifts will reshape our careers. And we’ll need to tend to ourselves and each other to ward off burnout and grow as workers and leaders. That’s what we heard when we asked for advice and predictions from University of Florida management faculty — the country’s top management department in publications per capita in a 2021 Texas A&M/University of Georgia research productivity ranking.

The faculty’s shift toward envisioning the long-term impact of pandemic-era disruptions is a natural extension of their research, says Warrington College of Business Dean Saby Mitra, who calls their work “very applicable to people’s daily lives.”

A paper by Cordell Eminent Scholar Jay Ritter, Ph.D. student Minmo Gahng and alumnus Donghang Zhang informs this story about how blank-check vehicles are running out of time to close mergers, costing sponsors dearly. Given that SPACs offer no benefits to most investors either, they may have little reason to stick around.

IPOs this year slowed to a trickle after banner years in 2020 and 2021, when companies pushed through the pandemic and took advantage of an emerging world of remote work and play and an economy flush with government-backed funds.

Data compiled by Jay Ritter, an IPO expert and Cordell Eminent Scholar, shows there were 123 tech IPOs last year, compared with an average of 38 a year between 2010 and 2020.

“Trump has a decision to make: Does he start to use Twitter again, or does he use Trump Media sites exclusively for getting his message out?” says Jay Ritter, Cordell Eminent Scholar. “Trump Media would be worth more if he uses it exclusively, but he is likely to reach a larger audience with Twitter.”

Trump’s Twitter reinstatement comes just ahead of a pivotal Digital World shareholder vote on Nov. 22 that, if successful, would allow the special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) to extend the deadline for its merger with Trump Media by a year and keep the deal alive.