Tech:NYC Digest: January 7

Tech:NYC Digest: January 7

January 07, 2022 • Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes

Friday, January 7, 2022

You made it through the first week of 2022! ✨ In today’s digest, Gov. Hochul announces booster mandate for healthcare workers, SCOTUS decision on vaccine mandates to come soon, and the productivity tools to start 2022 on the right foot.

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By the numbers: 

  • New positive cases statewide: 82,094

    • New positive cases, NYC: 44,278

  • NYC Positivity Rate: 22.2 percent (-0.2 percent)

  • NYC Hospitalizations: 6,052 (+158)

  • Statewide Vaccine Progress: 

    • Percentage of adults (18+) with at least one dose: 95.0 percent

    • Percentage of total population with at least one dose: 84.9 percent

Today’s latest: 

  • Governor Hochul today announced a booster shot mandate for all healthcare workers. The mandate, which requires the extra dose within two weeks of eligibility, will be the first in the nation to require healthcare workers to get the booster. (Wall Street Journal) 

  • The Supreme Court today heard challenges to the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate for employers with over 100 employees. (New York Times) The court has repeatedly upheld state vaccine mandates thus far and said it would move quickly to make a ruling.

  • The Omicron variant continues to impact subway ridership — and also service levels. About 21 percent of subway operators and conductors were absent due to confirmed cases amid Omicron, forcing the MTA to suspend three lines and change several others. (New York Times) 

  • Mayor Adams today announced former police chief Philip Banks as Deputy Mayor for Public Safety. (New York Times) The mayor’s younger brother, Bernard Adams, will serve as a deputy NYPD commissioner. (New York Daily News)  

  • And if your Christmas tree is still lingering in your apartment, the city’s annual Mulchfest wraps up this weekend. Recycle your tree at any of these locations to turn it into mulch to donate to the city’s parks or keep for yourself! 

In other reading:

  • New Yorkers Reflect on a Stressful Week Back at School Amid Omicron Wave (New York Times)

  • They Had Reasons for Leaving the City. So Why Are Their Friends Mad? (New York Times)

  • How New York City’s Skyline Will Change in 2022 (New York Magazine)

Now that the first week of 2022 is under our belts, do you feel back in the swing of things? Jury is still out for us, but as in 2021, productivity tools will be key to navigating another year of shifting workplace norms.

To help set you up for success, Protocol suggested some productivity trends and tools you can expect to rely on this year:

  • To make asynchronous work work: Try Twist, Loom, and Yac. These are all alternatives to instant messaging-based communication tools and allow teams to spend less time in virtual meetings or real-time Slack threads.

  • To make meetings more efficient and infrequent: Try ​​Headroom, Otter.ai, and CoScreen. One challenge of the hybrid workplace is meetings involving both remote and in-person employees, and tools that meet the needs of both — live transcripts, shared notes, etc. — could save a lot of follow-up headaches.

  • To whiteboard your ideas from afar: Try Notion, Roam, Obsidian, and Miro. Mapping new ideas is important, but so is being able to communicate them to your colleagues. And in a virtual format, doing so productively can be challenging. Effective note-taking and note-sharing will continue to be key this year. 

In other reading:

  • Predictions For 2022 According to Emerging Managers in VC (Forbes)

  • From Flexibility to Fundraising: 5 Startup Trends to Watch in 2022 (Fast Company)

  • How Does Your Company Support “First Generation Professionals”? (Harvard Business Review)

  • Mine'd, a New York City-based digital mental health platform, raised $3.5 million in seed funding. Listen Ventures led the round and was joined by WndrCo and Able Partners. (TechCrunch)

  • January 11: Virtual: 5 Ways to Sharpen Your 2022 Employee Communications, with Lyft senior director of internal communications Denise Bertuccelli. Hosted by Axios. Register here.

  • January 12: Virtual: The Future of Work Summit, with Zoom CTO Brendan Ittelson, Salesforce Service Cloud CEO Clara Shih, Moveworks CEO Bhanvin Shah, and others. Hosted by VentureBeat. Register here.

  • January 25: Virtual: The Future of Community, with Flybridge Capital and Community Fund VC general partner Jesse Middleton. Register here.

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