BayArea
x = independently organized TED event

This event occurred on
May 4, 2011
6:30pm - 8:30pm PDT
(UTC -7hrs)
Mountain View, California
United States

Featured Guest:

Peter Sims

LITTLE BETS
How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge from Small Discoveries


After extensive research and over 200 interviews with creators and innovators, Peter Sims discovered that successful creative thinkers and doers—from Ludwig van Beethoven to Thomas Edison and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos—practice a set of simple but often counterintuitive experimental methods to explore, develop, and test ideas. Whether it’s Steve Jobs or architect Frank Gehry or the ‘braintrust’ at Pixar, there is no complete plan or vision at the outset. Rather, they achieved remarkable results using a surprisingly similar approach: by methodically taking small, experimental steps, through a process of trying and failing in incremental ways, they gain critical information as they go from one small, experimental step to the next — which eventually lead to breakthroughs. These so-called “little bets” helped spark the ideas that led to companies like Twitter and blockbuster movies like the Toy Story franchise. The approach also unshackles them from the constraints of conventional planning, analytical thinking, and linear problem solving that our educational system emphasizes at the expense of creativity.
Pre-order this book now and get it autographed at the event!
Peter Sims is the coauthor with Bill George of the Wall Street Journal and Businessweek bestselling book True North. His writing has appeared in the Harvard Business Review, Fortune, and TechCrunch, and he is a contributor to the Reuters and Harvard Business Review blogs. He received an MBA from Stanford Business School, where he and several classmates established a popular course on leadership, and he has had a long collaboration with faculty at Stanford’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (the d.school). He has spoken or advised at such organizations as Cisco Systems, Eli Lilly, Current Media, Molson Coors, and Qualcomm. Previously, he worked in venture capital with Summit Partners and was part of the team that established the firm’s London Office.


Gourmet dinner and wine are included!

Samovar Conference Hall
1077 Independence Avenue
Mountain View, California, 94043
United States
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Organizing team

Tatyana
Kanzaveli

Los Altos, CA, United States
Organizer