In this month’s SalesGlobe Signals, Mark Donnolo cuts through the noise around rate cuts and headline jobs numbers to focus on the mechanics: supply, demand, and price of labor. The workforce is still expanding, but hiring demand has cooled. Layoffs are up and unemployment has ticked to 4.3%—still within the “full employment” range—while quit rates have settled. Labor costs have stabilized as the “war for talent” eases; wages and benefits are rising more slowly, even as productivity gains haven’t fully kept pace and inflation has eroded some of the wage growth of recent years. Sector stories diverge: leisure, hospitality, construction, and professional services continue to add headcount; manufacturing, finance, and parts of tech are tightening and leaning into automation and early AI adoption. The takeaway: look at labor through a segmentation lens. Where demand is growing, help customers scale and offset rising people costs. Where hiring slows or cuts mount, lead with efficiency, productivity, and offers that supplement teams. Stabilizing labor costs create room to plan—use it to sharpen value propositions by segment and point sales toward the industries most likely to move.

In this month’s SalesGlobe Signals, Mark Donnolo looks past the headlines to ask a sharper question: how do shifting interest rates actually change your customers’ behavior—and where should you point your team next? With the Fed Funds Rate still elevated relative to 2020–2022 but showing signs of easing, the story isn’t just policy—it’s impact. Lower borrowing costs can relieve pressure on highly leveraged businesses, jump-start capex and M&A, and unlock projects that stalled at higher rates. On the consumer side, even modest mortgage and credit rate declines can thaw housing activity, free up spend via home equity and lower APRs, and feed the wealth effect—while retirees and cash-heavy households see a different set of trade-offs. The takeaway: not all segments benefit equally. Mid-to-large borrowers, capital-intensive industries, distributors carrying inventory, and rate-sensitive consumer categories may move first. Now’s the moment to refine segmentation, tighten value propositions by segment, and align quotas and incentives to the customers most likely to accelerate if rates drift down.

In this month’s SalesGlobe Signals, Mark Donnolo breaks down why inflation still matters — even as the headlines suggest it’s cooling. While the rate of inflation has slowed from its peak, its effects remain persistent. Over the past four years, cumulative inflation has erased much of the purchasing power gained in the two decades prior. That means your customers — both businesses and consumers — are still feeling the squeeze. For B2B organizations, higher input costs and tariff pressures continue to challenge margins. For consumer-facing companies, incomes haven’t kept pace with rising prices, forcing difficult trade-offs. Both trends influence how customers buy, what they value, and how much they can spend — creating ripple effects across pricing, quotas, and sales performance. Mark also explores how slowing sales and profit margins, combined with stabilizing unit costs, point to pricing pressure rather than pure cost inflation. The question for leaders now isn’t just what inflation is doing — it’s what you’re doing in response. This edition of SalesGlobe Signals helps you look at inflation through your customers’ eyes and identify the actions that protect your margins, sharpen your value proposition, and drive profitable growth in a tighter market.

In this month’s SalesGlobe Signals, we take a look at how tariffs are beginning to ripple through the economy — and what those signals mean for growth, pricing, and sales quotas. Manufacturing, Wholesale, and Retail are seeing the sharpest rise in cost expectations, even as manufacturers’ actual costs remain steady for now. Many companies are bracing before the storm — anticipating future increases and deciding how much they can realistically pass through in prices. Our analysis shows companies expect to pass along between 47% and 62% of new costs to customers. Larger retailers and wholesalers lead the way in price passthroughs, while smaller firms and service industries may be forced to absorb more in their margins. That uncertainty could soon reach sales organizations, where shifting demand and thinner margins raise new questions about quota setting and performance measures. This edition of SalesGlobe Signals takes a broader look at what tariffs could mean for profitable revenue growth — from cost structures and price elasticity to how organizations align quotas with changing market opportunity.