TED Business

Rising inequality and growing political instability are the direct result of decades of bad economic theory, says entrepreneur Nick Hanauer. In a visionary talk, he dismantles the mantra that "greed is good"—an idea he describes as not only morally corrosive, but also scientifically wrong—and lays out a new theory of economics powered by reciprocity and cooperation. No lesson this week as we prepa...

We’re taking some time off while we prepare for our next season. In the meantime, this bonus episode amplifies an important call to brands who do business in Africa. Emerging markets expert Nomava Zanazo says many international companies underestimate their African customers and make costly assumptions about their diversity, preferences and buying power. Sharing the basics about what companies nee...

We’re taking a few weeks off while we prepare the next season. So in the meantime, we’re sharing another episode from the TED Audio Collective that we thought you, of all people, might enjoy. It’s from The TED Interview, hosted by head of TED Chris Anderson. From the strikes that transformed the world's view on climate change to the marches that demanded equity and justice for Black lives, there h...

We’re taking a few weeks off while we prepare the next season. So in the meantime, we’re sharing another episode from the TED Audio Collective that we thought you, of all people, might enjoy. It’s from The TED Interview, hosted by head of TED Chris Anderson. What does it take to persevere and succeed, not just in our careers but in all aspects of our lives? For psychologist Angela Duckworth, the a...

We all know relationships are hard to manage. And our work relationships—tangled with power, status and interdependence—are no exception. Last week, we heard a talk from Katie Hood. Katie is the CEO of One Love, an organization that teaches students around the world about the signs of healthy and unhealthy love. She also has a long background in business. So in this episode, Katie and Modupe dig d...

On the final episode of The ZigZag Project, activist Stacey Abrams explains her short-term strategies for sticking to her long-term goals and Manoush shares data from surveying thousands of listeners about making a big career change. The project wraps up with one last assignment and Manoush’s favorite messages from listeners. It’s a tear jerker. The ZigZag Project is six steps (and episodes) to he...

Friends, family, and yes, colleagues. We all know relationships are hard to manage, and our work relationships – tangled with power, status and interdependence – are no exception. In this two-part episode, we’ll hear a talk from Katie Hood. Katie is the CEO of One Love, an organization that teaches students around the world about the signs of healthy and unhealthy love. She also has a long backgro...

We typically think of mentoring as the older generation passing down wisdom to the young, but there are benefits to flipping this around. There’s even a term for it: reverse mentorship. In this episode, we hear from Patrice Gordon about her experience reverse mentoring not just anyone, but the CEO of Virgin Atlantic. After the talk, Modupe identifies what anyone can do to help build a culture that...

Today, another episode from ZigZag, hosted by Manoush Zomorodi. This is Step 5 of The ZigZag Project, a six-step process to get you from wanting to make a big change in your life and work...to actually making a change, in a responsible and mindful way. And, as the project moves from ideation into action, we're getting coaching from none other than TED Business host Modupe Akinola. Modupe explains...

What turns a developing country into a prosperous one? For years, Efosa Ojomo has been trying to answer this question. And what he has found – through starting his own nonprofit in Nigeria, doing research at Harvard Business School and writing a book called The Prosperity Paradox with Clay Christensen – reverses many of our existing ideas around aid. In this talk, Efosa lays out a new approach to...

To futureproof your job against robots and AI, you should learn how to code, brush up on your math skills and crack open an engineering textbook, right? Wrong. In this surprisingly comforting talk, tech journalist Kevin Roose makes the case that rather than trying to compete with the machines, we should instead focus on what makes us uniquely human. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more...

Today, another episode from ZigZag, hosted by Manoush Zomorodi. This is episode 4 of The ZigZag Project, a special season all about how to realign your work with your core values. In step 4, we move into a more practical phase and start asking hard questions like: What might you need to sacrifice, in order to align your values with your work? Obama advisor Valerie Jarrett shares a story about what...

Why do we encourage kids to play sports? Why does writing “captain of the lacrosse team” mean anything on a résumé? And why don’t we extend that same respect to people who play video games at the highest levels? In this episode, William Collis, maestro of esports – aka competitive video games – makes the case that video games develop real, tangible and transferable skills. And it’s time that we ap...

Profit, money, shareholders: these are the priorities of most companies today. But at what cost? In an appeal to corporate leaders worldwide, Chobani founder Hamdi Ulukaya calls for an end to the business playbook of the past – and shares his vision for a new, "anti-CEO playbook" that prioritizes people over profits. "This is the difference between profit and true wealth," he says. After the talk,...

Today, another episode from ZigZag, hosted by Manoush Zomorodi. This is episode 3 of The ZigZag Project, a special season all about how to realign your work with your core values. The third step requires getting weird. Because we're gonna need to dig deep to find new ways to roll back climate change, bring equity to society, and pay our bills. If, after a year of lockdowns and stress, you feel dra...

If it’s the richest country in the world, why does the American economy fail so much of the American public? Heather C. McGhee is a public policy expert who has spent the past several years trying to understand that question. Her conclusion, carefully detailed in a NYT bestselling book called The Sum of US, is that racism leads to bad public policy. Policies that have a cost for everyone—not just...

The pandemic showed HR consultant Patty McCord something she has been espousing for years: workers are adults, with responsibilities and obligations. It seems obvious, yet at work, so many people are treated like children: too much oversight, micromanaged, with rules that get in the way of performance, rather than enhance it. But before you go set everyone free, how do you separate the rules that...

Today, an episode from another show in the TED Audio Collective: ZigZag, hosted by Manoush Zomorodi. This is episode 2 of The ZigZag Project, a special season all about how to realign your work with your core values. Conflict resolution specialist Priya Parker joins Manoush to talk about visioning: Taking time out of our daily lives to clarify our professional and personal purpose. With 60% of the...

As technology gets smarter and encroaches on more and more jobs, we have to face a question: how do we differentiate the work that humans should do from the work machines should do? In other words, no matter how smart the machines get, what will humans always do better? In this talk, Kai Fu Lee, technology investor and author of AI Superpowers, offers a surprising answer: love. And proposes nothin...

To accomplish environmental change at the scale and pace we need, huge corporations have to make some fundamental changes. How will they do it? In this talk, the head of sustainability at Google, Kate Brandt, shows how one of the biggest companies in the world is aiming to translate techniques from nature, to build a circular system where nothing goes to waste. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/priva...

The past year changed us. We’re defining success differently. We’re ready for a reset. So for the next few months, we're sharing something special: The ZigZag Project, another show from the TED Audio Collective. In six episodes of ZigZag, a podcast about being human, host Manoush Zomorodi will help you better align your personal values with your professional ambitions. In a process that has been b...

More and more, we buy through online marketplaces: Amazon, Uber, Airbnb — the list goes on. But this convenience and efficiency comes with a hidden cost, mostly to small local businesses and workers. Does it have to be that way? Amane Dannouni doesn’t think so. In this talk, the BCG technology consultant shares stories we’re not used to hearing: of online apps in Southeast Asia and Africa that hav...

We’re seeing more and more full-time work replaced with part-time jobs, contract work, side gigs. “The term side hustle just seems to fit with this ethos where people are putting together a few different things to make a living,” says Nicaila Matthews Okome. Nicaila is the host of Side Hustle Pro, a podcast that spotlights Black female entrepreneurs. And in this talk she introduces us to the entre...

You know the "forgotten middle": they're the students, coworkers and regular people who are often overlooked because they're seen as neither exceptional nor problematic. How can we empower them to reach their full potential? In this talk, Danielle R. Moss describes how her mother’s special attention allowed her to climb out of the middle and towards her potential. Now, she offers that same kind of...

What do companies get when they go public on a major stock exchange? The opportunity for anyone to invest, giving the company access to a bunch of cash that allows for huge growth. And...pressure to think in the short term. This can end up hurting their workers, the environment, and even their own long-term strategy. In this episode, a proposal for a new kind of stock exchange, that isn’t just try...