Table of Contents Table of Contents 10. Top Gun: Maverick (2022) 9. Edge of Tomorrow (2014) 8. Rain Man (1988) 7. Jerry Maguire (1996) 6. Tropic Thunder (2008) 5. Collateral (2004) 4. Minority Report (2002) 3. Magnolia (1999) 2. A Few Good Men (1992) 1. Eyes Wide Shut (1999) With Tom Cruise, nothing ever really ends. May 23 marks the release of his latest Mission: Impossible adventure, and while it’s subtitled The Final Reckoning, Cruise and his regular director Christopher McQuarrie have confirmed there are more films to come. Through doggedness, dedication, and risk to life and limb, the 62-year-old Cruise has built a lasting career as a leading man that seems never to wane. Here are his ten best films, featuring performances both solidly in and out of his comfort zone. Recommended Videos Top Gun: Maverick (2022) Paramount Pictures Like most of Cruise’s filmography, Top Gun: Maverick, the long-delayed sequel to the abysmal ‘80s schlock-fest Top Gun, is more than the sum of its parts. Its maneuvering of a sixty-year-old Cruise from flight instructor back into the cockpit is labored, its decision to actively avoid the identity of a country against which Cruise goes on a bombing run is cowardly (it’s clearly Russia), and Cruise’s love scenes with Jennifer Connelly are borderline silly. However, Maverick is an old-fashioned Hollywood adrenaline rush, chock-full of vintage Cruise stunt work, and the aerial photography looks spectacular. Edge of Tomorrow (2014) Warner Bros. Pictures Cruise’s third and best collaboration with writer Christopher McQuarrie, Edge of Tomorrow, adapts a bonkers Japanese novel that is essentially a cross between Groundhog Day and Independence Day. Cruise is Major William Cage (a perfect Tom Cruise character name), enlisted in a war against an invading alien species called the Mimics. Long story short, Cage gets trapped in a time loop on the day of his death at the Mimics’ hands that allows him to learn their strategies. Emily Blunt delivers a superior action performance as his love interest and comrade-in-arms. Rain Man (1988) MGM Cruise made his name as the everyman ballast for performances by more outwardly dynamic character actors (Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men, Tim Curry in Legend). The prototypical example is Rain Man, the only Tom Cruise movie so far to win the Oscar for Best Picture. Here, Cruise is the frustrated steward of his estranged brother, Raymond (Dustin Hoffman), an autistic savant. The film has its weaknesses, but Cruise hits all of his beats ably, and his exasperation with Raymond’s eccentricities is a perfectly tuned demonstration of audience surrogacy. Jerry Maguire (1996) TriStar Pictures Cruise’s nose for a football movie that would wind up being endlessly quotable has put him in any number of iconic scenes over the years, and Cameron Crowe’s script for Jerry Maguire has a panoply of them. (Cruise alone has both “Help me help you” and “You complete me,” Renee Zellweger gets “You had me at hello,” and Cuba Gooding Jr. gets the unbeatable “Show me the money.”) The movie is the ultimate instance of Cruise’s trademark wide-grinning mania thanks to Cruise’s titular Jerry, a sports agent stretching himself to his limit as he struggles to do the unprofitable work of representing his clients ethically (unthinkable!). Tropic Thunder (2008) DreamWorks Cruise is, along with Tom Hanks, the defining cinematic leading man of the past forty years, but a little of him can often go a long way. No surprise that some of his most sneakily memorable performances have been supporting roles, including in Ben Stiller’s gonzo Hollywood satire Tropic Thunder. Cruise plays Les Grossman, a studio executive transparently based on Harvey Weinstein, who is called on to negotiate when the star of a Vietnam War film he’s producing is kidnapped by a drug cartel. Cruise famously gave Stiller two conditions for taking the role: “I want to have fat hands, and I’m gonna dance.” Mission accomplished. Collateral (2004) DreamWorks Michael Mann’s action thriller stars Cruise in a rare villain role as Vincent, a hitman who commandeers the taxi of Los Angeles cabbie Max Durocher (Jamie Foxx). It’s a great, clean setup, with a finely structured beginning that establishes Max’s attention to detail and pride in his craft — Max is a man who has control of his car and whose car is his control. Then, when Cruise explodes in the frame with a gray shock wig that looks so wrong on him, Mann drives home the point that Vincent is from another universe. Collateral is electric movie-making, lean and tight most of the way through. Minority Report (2002) 20th Century Fox The smartest film Steven Spielberg directed in the first decade of the twenty-first century was the Philip K. Dick adaptation of Minority Report. Cruise plays a police chief utilizing psychics to arrest criminals before they commit their intended crimes. Scott Frank’s (The Queen’s Gambit) script raises moral conundrums years ahead of its time, and Cruise quite effectively applies his regular action-film persona to its worthy explorations. Magnolia (1999) Ghoulardi Film Company Cruise’s third Oscar nomination came for his outrageous performance as misogynistic motivational speaker Frank T.J. Mackey in Magnolia. In a role that predated widespread public knowledge of the icky “pickup artist” movement of seduction, Cruise deconstructs the bravura front that had not yet come to be known as toxic masculinity. “Women are sheep,” he tells his followers in a riveting monologue delivered straight to the camera; “they have patterns that must be stopped, interrupted, and resisted.” But of course, such walls as these are made to fall, and in a later scene at the deathbed of his father (Jason Robards), Cruise powerfully conveys the trauma, loneliness, and pain that have led Mackey to this point. A Few Good Men (1992) Castle Rock Entertainment Aaron Sorkin was a bartender at Broadway’s Palace Theatre when he began writing what would become his 1989 play A Few Good Men on the back of cocktail napkins. The film Sorkin would later adapt from his Broadway smash is among the smartest and most quotable studio films of the 1990s. Naturally, the courtroom movie is ultimately stolen by Jack Nicholson, whose role as a Marine colonel implicated in a murder earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. But Cruise, as the Navy lawyer prosecuting the case, is one of the worthiest screen partners Nicholson has ever had, with herky-jerky, caffeine-inflected energy that steels to certainty in the courtroom. Eyes Wide Shut (1999) Stanley Kubrick Productions The other picture from Cruise’s banner year of 1999, Eyes Wide Shut, is a perfect storm of world-beating celebrity (he co-starred with his then-wife Nicole Kidman), Hollywood royalty (it was writer-director Stanley Kubrick’s final film), and superb mise-en-scène. It was a story of sexual jealousy decades in the making, and Cruise was the perfect choice for the role of a repressed elite who falls apart trying to see behind the curtain of a world closed to him. (Just imagine if Kubrick had made the film in the 1960s and cast his original choice for the lead, Woody Allen!) Source: https://www.digitaltrends.com/movies/tom-cruise-best-movies-ranked/ #best #tom #cruise #movies #ranked

True emotional attunement involves about noticing, responding and showing up when it counts. Here ... More are three things emotionally responsive partners do.getty Some individuals are naturally more attuned to their partner’s emotional cues. They notice changes in tone, body language or energy prior to being explicitly told that something’s wrong. Sometimes it’s a pause, a sigh or a shorter reply than usual. Others rely more on direct communication, expecting their partner to verbalize what they need. They may think, “If it’s important, they’ll tell me.” While it’s impossible and unrealistic to expect a partner to read your mind, emotional attunement supplements healthy, overt communication. Without it, there may be disconnects in otherwise stable relationships. One partner may interpret the other’s lack of responsiveness as indifference, while the other may simply not realize anything is amiss. And that’s where most people get it wrong — not because they don’t care, but because they’re looking for something more direct. Being emotionally receptive isn’t about fixing things for the other person or reading minds. It’s about tuning in. Here are three signs you’re emotionally in tune with your partner, making them feel truly seen, heard and cared for. 1. You Notice Subtle Changes In Their Nonverbal Cues Most people think emotional support means always saying the right thing. But in relationships, it often starts with recognition. Noticing a shift in your partner’s energy, or picking up on a silence that wasn’t there yesterday. How you respond in that moment — whether you lean in, pull back or overlook it — shapes how emotionally safe your relationship feels. A 2023 review published in Current Opinion in Psychology highlights how perceived partner responsiveness is a core component of emotional intimacy. When individuals feel that their partner understands, validates and cares for their internal experience, especially during everyday interactions, they’re more likely to feel secure and satisfied in the relationship. That responsiveness often begins with something as simple as noticing when the mood shifts. At the same time, nonverbal communication isn’t always clear. Another 2023 study published in Perspectives on Psychological Science cautions against the assumption that facial expressions or body language reliably convey emotional truth. According to the researchers, nonverbal cues are highly context-dependent and shaped by individual, cultural and relational factors. In other words, tuning in emotionally is less about decoding signals and more about staying attentive to changes within the patterns you’ve come to understand over time. Noticing a shift is only the first step. What you do next — how you respond to that shift — matters just as much. 2. You Validate Their Emotions Instead Of Minimizing Or Fixing Emotional receptivity isn’t limited to noticing when something is wrong. It also involves creating space for it without trying to control or dismiss it. When your partner expresses frustration, sadness or discomfort, the instinct might be to offer a solution or downplay the issue. But often, what they need most is to feel seen and heard. Offering validation means acknowledging what your partner is feeling without judgment or immediate redirection. It’s the difference between saying, “You shouldn’t feel that way,” and saying, “That sounds really difficult.” The first creates defensiveness. The second builds trust. This emotional availability also hinges on how a partner manages their own reactions during stressful moments. A 2020 study published in Emotion followed over 100 couples across 12 months and found that individuals with either highly inert or highly erratic emotional patterns were consistently perceived as less responsive by their partners. These perceptions, in turn, predicted steeper declines in relationship satisfaction. In other words, when someone struggles to respond to emotional cues in a balanced, context-sensitive way, either by shutting down or overreacting, it becomes harder for their partner to feel supported. Validation, then, is not just about what you say. It’s about how well your emotional presence matches the moment. Imagine you come home after a brutal day. You’re drained and frustrated. You sit down, and your partner, still in their own rhythm, says, “Can you help me with something real quick?” You say, “I’m really tired.” They don’t slow down. They stay upbeat, maybe a little impatient. “You’ll feel better if you get up. It’ll only take a second.” They mean well. But they haven’t shifted. They’re still in task mode while you’re barely holding it together. That kind of mismatch — where one person’s emotional state doesn’t adjust to the other’s — doesn’t just lead to hurt feelings. It leads to a partner feeling unseen, unsupported and eventually, disconnected. The fix isn’t dramatic. It starts with emotional awareness. It helps to pause long enough to register where your partner is emotionally and adjust your energy to meet that moment. If they seem overwhelmed, it might mean softening your tone, holding off on a request or simply saying, “You seem worn out. Want to sit for a bit?” This doesn’t require suppressing your own needs. It means making space for theirs too, especially in moments when they can’t carry both. Over time, these small adjustments signal something big: I care about you. I see where you are and I’m adjusting because I want you to feel seen. This willingness to shift and respond instead of react is at the heart of emotional responsiveness. 3. You Adjust To Meet Their Emotional Needs In The Moment Emotional support is often visible in our actions, through intentional shifts in energy, tone and timing. Receptive partners make small adjustments in real time based on what the other person seems to need. It could be pausing a story because your partner looks overwhelmed, skipping the joke when they’re quiet or holding off on a conversation when they’re not in a space to engage. None of this is about walking on eggshells. It’s about reading the room and respecting it. This kind of moment-to-moment flexibility, grounded in what the other person appears to need, is strongly linked to healthier relationships. A 2020 meta-analysis published in the Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science reviewed data from over 43,000 individuals across 174 studies and found that psychological flexibility — the ability to stay present and adjust behavior in emotionally challenging moments — is associated with greater relationship satisfaction, lower conflict and stronger emotional support. In contrast, inflexibility, or sticking to your own emotional rhythm regardless of your partner’s state, is linked to disconnection and higher levels of negative interaction. This kind of flexibility isn’t a path to losing yourself. It simply means recognizing that emotional needs aren’t always aligned in a given moment and choosing to respond accordingly. Partners who consistently do this are often described as easy to be around. Not because they avoid conflict, but because they create a sense of emotional safety. Their presence feels responsive, rather than rigid. The most responsive partners aren’t the ones who always get it right. They’re the ones who choose to be in tune with their partner, consistently and intentionally. Do you find your partner emotionally responsive? Take the science-backed Perceived Responsiveness Scale to find out. Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/traversmark/2025/05/13/3-signs-youre-an-emotionally-responsive-partner-by-a-psychologist/ #signs #youre #emotionally #responsive #partner #psychologist

Popular legal AI tool Harvey will now be using leading foundation models from Anthropic and Google, moving beyond strictly using OpenAI’s, Harvey announced in a blog post on Tuesday. This is noteworthy because Harvey is one of the OpenAI Startup Fund’s most successful early-backed portfolio companies. The OpenAI Startup Fund is an OpenAI-associated fund to back companies developing products on top of AI technologies, primarily OpenAI’s own. While Harvey says it’s not abandoning OpenAI, merely adding more models and clouds, this is still a huge coup for OpenAI’s big competitors.  Harvey is one of the first four startups that the OpenAI Startup Fund backed, it said in December 2022. That was back when OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was still running the fund. (The others in that first cohort include Descript, Mem, and Speak.) Harvey, which has grown like mad since then, is now a $3-billion-valuation startup, it said in February, when it announced a $300 million Series D led by Sequoia, with other big names like Coatue, Kleiner Perkins, and the OpenAI Fund piling in. Interestingly, Google’s venture arm, GV, led Harvey’s $100 million Series C in July 2024 (and the OpenAI Fund participated in that round, too). But Harvey didn’t immediately adopt Google’s AI models after it put Google’s corporate venture firm on its cap table. (GV participated in Harvey’s Series D as well.) So, what convinced Harvey to move beyond OpenAI’s models now? The startup’s internally developed benchmark, dubbed BigLaw, showed that a wide variety of foundation models are growing increasingly adept at a range of legal tasks and some are better at specific tasks than others. Instead of spending its efforts training models, Harvey figured, it could simply embrace high-performing, reasoning foundation models from other vendors (e.g. Google and Anthropic via Amazon’s cloud) and then fine-tune them for the legal market. Techcrunch event Join us at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot for our leading AI industry event with speakers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Cohere. For a limited time, tickets are just $292 for an entire day of expert talks, workshops, and potent networking. Exhibit at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot at TC Sessions: AI and show 1,200+ decision-makers what you’ve built — without the big spend. Available through May 9 or while tables last. Berkeley, CA | June 5 REGISTER NOW Using a variety of models will also help as Harvey creates AI agents, the company says. “In less than a year, seven models (including three non-OAI models) now outperform the originally benchmarked Harvey system on BigLaw Bench,” Harvey wrote in the blog post. Harvey’s benchmark also showed that different foundation models are better at specific legal tasks than others. For instance, it says Google’s Gemini 2.5 Pro “excels” at legal drafting but “struggles” with pre-trial tasks like writing oral arguments because the model doesn’t fully understand “complex evidentiary rules like hearsay.”  OpenAI’s o3 does such pre-trial tasks well, according to Harvey’s testing, with Anthropic’s Claude 3.7 Sonnet following close behind. Results from Harvey’s internal benchmarking.Image Credits:Harvey In its blog post, Harvey says that it will also now join the growing ranks of those sharing a public leaderboard of model benchmark performance. Its board will rank how major reasoning models are doing on legal tasks. And the company won’t just boil rankings down to a single number, but will also publish research where “top lawyers provide nuanced insights into model performance not captured by single-score benchmarks.” So, not only is OpenAI-backed Harvey adopting competitors’ models, it is also amping up the pressure on its backers (including Google) to keep proving themselves. Not that OpenAI should worry much on that score. While AI benchmarking is growing increasingly complex and somewhat political, this is a world where OpenAI still shines.  “We are incredibly fortunate to have OpenAI as an investor in Harvey and key collaborator in our product,” Harvey CEO Winston Weinberg told TechCrunch in a statement. “And, we are energized to add to our options for customers as we continue to serve the needs of our customers globally.” Source: https://techcrunch.com/2025/05/13/anthropic-google-score-win-by-nabbing-openai-backed-harvey-as-a-user/ #anthropic #google #score #win #nabbing #openaibacked #harvey #user

Humans display different ways of attaching to one another, shaped largely by how our caregivers responded to us in early childhood. Some of us may shy away from closeness and prefer emotional distance, while others feel anxious in relationships, seeking reassurance and fearing abandonment. Understanding these underlying attachment styles can help us navigate emotions and relationships — and, as it turns out, might even help us better understand ourselves through the eyes of our primate relatives.A recent study led by the Ape Social Mind Lab at France's University of Lyon offers insight into mother-offspring attachment types in wild chimpanzees. Their findings suggest that some patterns we assumed were uniquely human may be more deeply rooted in our evolutionary history — while others may be distinctly modern.The Different Attachment StylesAttachment theory, grounded in the work of 20th-century researchers John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth (among others), proposes that children develop mental templates, or “attachment styles,” based on how consistently and sensitively their caregivers respond to their emotional needs. The styles include:Secure attachment arises when caregivers are reliably supportive. The child feels safe, explores confidently, and trusts others.Anxious attachment emerges when caregiving is inconsistent. The child may become clingy, fearing abandonment and needing constant reassurance.Avoidant attachment develops when caregivers are emotionally distant or rejecting. These children tend to suppress their emotional needs and rely only on themselves.Disorganized attachment, often linked to trauma or fear-inducing caregiving, combines both approach and avoidance behaviors — wanting comfort, but also fearing it.In psychological research, secure, anxious, and avoidant styles are considered “organized” because they reflect clear, if not always ideal, strategies for seeking support. Disorganized attachment, by contrast, is erratic and conflicted, and often associated with later emotional struggles.Wild Chimpanzees and HumansResearchers observed 50 wild chimpanzees in Côte d’Ivoire (or Ivory Coast, West Africa) over nearly 4,000 hours and found that their young showed only organized attachment styles — either secure or insecure-avoidant. Some infants stayed close to their mothers during threats, showing secure-like behavior. Others remained more independent, resembling avoidant styles. But perhaps what is most striking is what researchers didn't find.“In the wild, we found no evidence of disorganized attachment patterns, which supports the hypothesis that this type of attachment may not be an adaptive survival strategy in the face of environmental constraints,” said lead author Eléonore Rolland in a news release.This differs sharply from humans, where studies suggest around 23.5 percent of children display disorganized attachment. Among captive, peer-raised chimpanzees, that number jumps to 61 percent, a clue that caregiving environment plays a massive role in shaping attachment.“By identifying attachment patterns in wild chimpanzees, we provide important insights into the roots of human social behavior,” added senior author Roman Wittig in the statement.Rethinking Parenting Through a Primate LensSo, what does this mean for us?If disorganized attachment is nearly nonexistent among wild chimps — but relatively common in modern human societies — it raises important questions about how contemporary caregiving practices align with our evolutionary needs.“Our results deepen our understanding of chimpanzees’ social development and show that humans and chimpanzees are not so different after all,” said Rolland in the release. “But they also make us think: have some modern human institutions or caregiving practices moved away from what is best for infant development?”As senior author Catherine Crockford notes, “The high prevalence of disorganized attachment in humans and captive orphan chimpanzees, in contrast to wild chimpanzees, also supports the idea that the rearing environment plays an important role in shaping attachment types.”These findings not only deepen our understanding of our primate cousins but also invite us to reflect on how early relationships shape emotional health — for chimps and for us.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Journal of Pediatric Health Care: A REVIEW OF ATTACHMENT THEORY IN THE CONTEXT OF ADOLESCENT PARENTINGHaving worked as a biomedical research assistant in labs across three countries, Jenny excels at translating complex scientific concepts – ranging from medical breakthroughs and pharmacological discoveries to the latest in nutrition – into engaging, accessible content. Her interests extend to topics such as human evolution, psychology, and quirky animal stories. When she’s not immersed in a popular science book, you’ll find her catching waves or cruising around Vancouver Island on her longboard. Source: https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/what-chimpanzees-can-teach-us-about-attachment-styles-in-relationships #what #chimpanzees #can #teach #about #attachment #styles #relationships

News The Sinking City Remastered is Out Now on Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC Frogwares' Unreal Engine 5 remaster of the 2019 horror title gets a surprise launch. Owners of the original can avail of a free upgrade. Posted By Ravi Sinha | On 13th, May. 2025 Out of nowhere, Frogwares has announced that The Sinking City Remastered is out now for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC players. Check out the release trailer below, which compares various improvements in the remaster to the original. Developed on Unreal Engine 5, the remaster includes enhanced environments with more details and objects, a full lighting overhaul, reflection improvements and 4K textures. Upscalers like Nvidia DLSS and AMD FSR are also supported alongside Temporal Super Resolution. You can also leverage the new Photo Mode for screenshots. Of course, those who own the original on previous-gen consoles and PC can upgrade to the remaster for free. As for the future, The Sinking City 2 is in development, and Frogwares has plans for the franchise. In a press release, publishing director Sergiy Oganesyan said, “We plan to do big things with The Sinking City, starting with the sequel and then beyond. “So, after our rather well-known struggles with the original, it feels amazing to have this positive moment be part of the game’s twisted history and for us to be the ones to fully decide it. Making it free to all our existing fans is our way of giving back to them for having supported us all this time through thick and thin.” The Sinking City was first launched in 2019 and focuses on private investigator Charles W. Reed, who suffers from disturbing nightmares. He arrives in Oakmont to unravel their meaning and is caught up in a plot involving the Great Old Ones. Check out our review of the original here. Tagged With: Elden Ring: Nightreign Publisher:Bandai Namco Developer:FromSoftware Platforms:PS5, Xbox Series X, PS4, Xbox One, PCView More DOOM: The Dark Ages Publisher:Bethesda Softworks Developer:id Software Platforms:Xbox Series X, PS5, PCView More Death Stranding 2: On the Beach Publisher:Sony Developer:Kojima Productions Platforms:PS5View More Amazing Articles You Might Want To Check Out! Grand Theft Auto 4 Should be Remastered – Former Technical Director The ex-Rockstar developer also wrote about how he believes Niko Bellic to be the best protagonist in the Grand... The Sinking City Remastered is Out Now on Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC Frogwares' Unreal Engine 5 remaster of the 2019 horror title gets a surprise launch. Owners of the original ca... Tony Hawk Wants to Campaign for Tony Hawk’s Underground Remaster According to Tony Hawk, it's still too early to talk about Underground remastered since Tony Hawk's Pro Skater... The Witcher 4 – CD Projekt CFO Believes Ciri is a “Great Choice” for Protagonist In an interview, Piotr Nielubowicz spoke about various aspects of The Witcher franchise, including the trailer... Helldivers 2 Update Adds New Illuminate Enemies, Primary Weapon Customization Players can finally customize certain Primary weapons with new magazines, muzzles, and other attachments to al... Sega Reports 28.3 Percent Rise in Operating Profits for Fiscal Year 2025 Sega's operating profits increased despite lower overall revenue thanks to the cancellation of Sports Interact... View More Source: https://gamingbolt.com/the-sinking-city-remastered-is-out-now-on-xbox-series-x-s-ps5-and-pc #sinking #city #remastered #xbox #series #ps5

Humans, for all our intellectual sophistication, are still tribal creatures at heart. We tend to gravitate toward people who are like us—individuals who look like us, think like us, share our values, and even mirror our quirks and tastes. On the surface, this makes intuitive sense. It explains the evolutionary origins of empathy: we feel the joys, sorrows, and struggles of others more deeply when we perceive them as part of our own “in-group.” But here’s the catch: What feels good for individuals can be disastrous for diversity. If left unchecked, our biological instinct to seek sameness undermines one of the core ingredients of high-performing organizations—diversity of thought, experience, and identity. When everyone around you shares your values, it creates an echo chamber, rewards conformity, and inhibits innovation, which emerges when different perspectives and conflicting ideas transition from a state of tension to a state of harmony. Likewise, homogeneity of values and thoughts blinds us to the talents, ideas, and perspectives of people who might see the world differently—even when they are the key change agents that can help teams and organizations evolve. Diversity is a survival strategy Even amid today’s backlash against DEI initiatives, smart companies understand that removing barriers for historically marginalized individuals isn’t just a moral imperative—it’s a strategic advantage. Meritocracy is only possible when individuals are evaluated on what they can do, not how much they conform to the dominant culture. That means hiring for “culture fit”—a euphemism for “people like us”—is fundamentally flawed. If you only let people in who mirror the existing values and norms, you don’t have a culture—you have a clique. The goal should be to allow cultural outliers and diverse thinkers not just to join but to thrive. And that introduces a practical challenge: working with people who don’t share your values, including your way of thinking and working. This isn’t progress—it’s a stagnant loop. You’re building your team, your circle, with people who are just like you, which means you’re all stuck on the same wavelength. The result? Predictable outcomes and a whole lot of missed opportunities for innovation. You’ve got a room full of mirrors, not windows. You love others’ ideas because they are just like yours. Success today is less about being true to your own values and more about being open to others’ values—even, and arguably especially, when they conflict with yours. Indeed, the ability to question your assumptions, see the world through others’ eyes, and remember that just because someone is different doesn’t mean they are wrong, or that you are right, which will boost your social skills, and in turn your employability and career success. The more perspectives we add to a system, the denser its cognitive landscape becomes. Each new viewpoint introduces a different angle, a fresh interpretation—yielding more ideas, more possibilities, and inevitably, more complexity.  This complexity isn’t a flaw; it’s the cost of a richer, more textured understanding of the world. But it also demands greater mental flexibility—the ability to hold opposing ideas in tension, to think in shades rather than absolutes, and to make decisions amid uncertainty. So how do you work with people who challenge your most deeply held beliefs? 1. Professionalism over authenticity For centuries, people have gotten along in professional settings by pretending to like each other, or at least by pretending not to despise each other. This time-honored tradition of civility still works. You don’t have to like everyone. You don’t have to agree with everyone. You certainly don’t have to invite them over for Sunday brunch. But you do have to work with them respectfully and constructively. This means biting your tongue, smiling when necessary, and keeping your grievances to yourself. Authenticity sounds great—but in a workplace setting, professionalism trumps it. 2. Find common ground Even if you clash over politics, religion, or lifestyle choices, chances are you can find some common ground. Maybe you’re both passionate about the same industry trend. Maybe you both enjoy dark roast coffee. Maybe you both root for underdog sports teams. Think of it like being stuck at an airport bar during a layover. You might sit next to someone who is your ideological opposite—but after 45 minutes and a shared frustration over delayed flights, you find yourselves bonding. Finding common ground is about building bridges of human connection that can support collaboration, even across a chasm of differences. Seek those bridges. They are there. 3. Respect process over outcomes You won’t always agree on what the “right” answer is. But you can agree on how to get there. Focusing on process—asking questions, debating ideas, testing hypotheses—can depersonalize disagreements. Instead of framing it as “my values versus your values,” it becomes “let’s figure this out together.” In healthy organizations, the best idea wins—not the loudest voice or the most popular opinion. Respecting the process ensures that diversity of thought isn’t just tolerated—it’s leveraged. 4. Get comfortable being uncomfortable Most personal and professional growth happens outside your comfort zone. Working with people who reject your values forces you to examine your beliefs, sharpen your arguments, and sometimes even change your mind. That’s not weakness; it’s wisdom.  Instead of viewing discomfort as a threat, reframe it as a sign you are learning. Be curious, not defensive. Ask questions, listen actively, and try to understand—not to convert or convince, but to expand your own cognitive tool kit. In a world where the pace of change is relentless and the problems we face are increasingly complex, intellectual humility isn’t just a virtue. It’s a competitive advantage. 5. Practice rational compassion Psychologist Paul Bloom argues for rational compassion—the idea that empathy alone can lead to biased, shortsighted decisions, especially when working with people who don’t share your values. Instead of relying on raw emotional reactions, rational compassion demands a more deliberate, reasoned approach: recognizing others’ needs without being overwhelmed by them, and acting in ways that are fair, sustainable, and strategic. When faced with ideological differences, practicing rational compassion helps maintain respect and effectiveness without slipping into resentment or moral grandstanding. It shifts the focus from feeling good to doing good—even with those we disagree with. In a tribalized and polarized world, the future belongs to organizations—and individuals—who can collaborate across differences, not despite them but because of them. Working with people who don’t share your values is not just a skill; it’s a superpower. It requires maturity, empathy, curiosity, and a dash of tactical faking. It forces you to confront your biases, question your certainties, and grow beyond your tribal instincts. And ultimately, it makes you not only a better colleague, but a wiser, more resilient, and more open-minded human being. Source: https://www.fastcompany.com/91327753/5-ways-to-work-with-people-who-arent-like-you #you #dont #have #culture #clique #ways #work #with #people #who #arent #like