Neil A. Carousso produces and co-hosts WCBS Newsradio 880’s Small Business Spotlight series with Joe Connolly. Click here to watch the weekly video segments featuring advice for business owners on survival, recovery and growth opportunities.

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  • 880 Weekly Rewind: Navigating the Holiday Pandemic Stress as COVID Cases Rise

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    Produced by Neil A. Carousso

    NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — Increasing COVID-19 infections are adding anxiety ahead of Thanksgiving.

    Dr. Daniel L. Shapiro teaches conflict resolution at Harvard College and has extensive experience consulting Fortune 500 leaders, hostage negotiators and heads of state. Shapiro also works with families in crisis. On The 880 Weekly Rewind, he shares how people can navigate personal anxieties and different feelings about COVID-19 during the holidays.

    Rewind host Lynda Lopez also looks at how booster shots may be able to squash the fall wave.

    Listen to The 880 Weekly Rewind Podcast for a deep dive into the top stories of the week, produced by Neil A. Carousso for WCBS-AM New York.

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  • 880 Weekly Rewind: Vaccinating Kids and Honoring Our Heroes on Veterans Day

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    Produced by Neil A. Carousso

    NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — Doctors are hopeful vaccinating kids against COVID-19 will make a significant dent in fighting the pandemic.

    On The 880 Weekly Rewind, Lynda Lopez asked Dr. Lee Savio Beers, M.D. questions every parent wants to know now that Pfizer’s vaccine is approved for kids ages 5-11, including about symptoms and efficacy.

    Also on Rewind, CBS Evening News Anchor and Managing Editor Norah O’Donnell tells WCBS anchor Steve Scott about some remarkable stories of service that CBS News is highlighting the week of Veterans Day in their series Honoring Our Heroes. O’Donnell talks about growing up as a self-described “Army brat” and explains why stories about military families and veterans’ issues hit close to home.

    Listen to The 880 Weekly Rewind Podcast for a deep dive into the top stories of the week, produced by Neil A. Carousso for WCBS-AM New York.

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  • Elections Indicate a Changing Political Landscape; Corporate COVID Vaccine Mandate Could Cause Workforce Disruptions

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    By Neil A. Carousso

    NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — The gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia surprised pollsters and political pundits and indicate a shift ahead of next year’s consequential midterms.

    The 880 Weekly Rewind examines those close races. Plus, Lynda Lopez interviews New York City Mayor-elect Eric Adams and presses him on his campaign promise to mandate school kids be vaccinated against COVID-19.

    Neil A. Carousso talks to David Lewis, human resources expert and CEO of OperationsInc – an HR consulting firm based in Norwalk, CT – about the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate for private sector employees. Lewis is warning his clients about potential workforce disruptions if they rush to implement the mandate, which is set to take effect on January 4. He explains there will likely be legal challenges that delay the mandate’s start date.

    Subscribe to The 880 Weekly Rewind Podcast for a deep dive into the top stories of the week, produced by Neil A. Carousso for WCBS-AM New York.

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  • New York Could be Transitioning from a Pandemic to an Endemic

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    By Neil A. Carousso

    NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — Epidemiologists are optimistic that COVID-19 will eventually become a seasonal threat like the flu. They credit high vaccination rates in New York for helping transition the state and most populous city to an endemic from the highly deadly pandemic that overwhelmed New York hospitals in the spring of 2020.

    On The 880 Weekly Rewind, Dr. Mangala Narasimhan, critical care pulmonologist and director of critical care services at Northwell Health, told WCBS producer Neil A. Carousso that she is concerned about the potential for a twindemic this winter.

    “I don’t think it’s time to completely get rid of masking; I don’t think its time to completely get rid of social distancing,” Dr. Narasimhan said of living with COVID-19.

    Rewind Host Lynda Lopez also takes a deep dive into next week’s local elections, including the New York City mayoral race, New Jersey gubernatorial race and the Virginia gubernatorial race that could be a referendum on President Joe Biden’s first year in office.

    Subscribe and download The 880 Weekly Rewind podcast for in-depth reporting and deeper analysis of the top stories of the week, produced by Neil A. Carousso, for WCBS-AM New York.

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  • Back to Office Exposes Digital Divide between Employers and Employees

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    By Joe Connolly and Neil A. Carousso

    CONNECTICUT (WCBS 880) — At about 7:30 a.m. on a weekday morning in October, David Lewis is driving to OperationsInc headquarters in Norwalk, CT. He can spot plenty of good parking spaces available at the New Canaan train station.

    “You could have found a parking spot up against the train station tracks, themselves, which were coveted spaces that used to fill at 5/5:30 in the morning. That tells me all I need to know about how people still are working remotely and are not making their way into the city,” said Lewis on the WCBS Small Business Spotlight, sponsored by Dime Community Bank.

    That’s concerning to the human resources CEO who feels the same way as many of his larger clients: They want workers back in the office.

    “I’m ecstatic about the ability to dynamically talk to my employees, bring somebody into a meeting, and have a quick conversation with them about an issue that just came up,” Lewis told Joe Connolly and Neil A. Carousso. “I keep hearing that from our clients that ‘I want to go back to the way that we did it before because that worked best for us.'”

    He recognizes, though, that remote work has increased productivity in many areas. One glaring outlier is employee training.

    “Training for us was always about the in-person experience – about coming into a training facility, a training room, or a hotel conference center – and being able to get in front of our students and really connect with them – have a discussion versus have a lecture. That’s our secret sauce. But, we’ve had to pivot that since last year to something online,” said Lewis.

    To combat so-called “Zoom fatigue,” OperationsInc has made its online training modules shorter. Lewis also admits the world has changed.

    “Employees are in control and employers need to understand that,” he said.

    Many workers want the flexibility that remote work allows, namely flexible work hours, absence of a commute, and the ability to pick up their kids from school.

    Lewis tells his clients to find the right balance or turnover will be extremely high.

    Labor issues continue to plague businesses and many prospective employees complain that their online application does not get noticed by a human resources professional.

    Lewis told Connolly and Carousso that artificial intelligence has exacerbated a huge problem during the pandemic .

    “A lot of companies have invested a lot of money in these applicant tracking systems but don’t know enough about how to change these filtration settings to get the candidates that they’re looking for through the door,” he said.
    “They also tend to eliminate a lot of people because they’re not remembering that the settings they have – five years of this or two years of that – have to be regularly adjusted.”

    Lewis told WCBS 880 another hiring issue at play is that in-person jobs are not as desirable as remote work in the current labor market.

    Watch the WCBS Small Business Spotlight video above for more on this story.

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