In 2012, IDEO founder and longtime Stanford professor David Kelley took the TED stage in Long Beach and shared a deeply personal story. It was the tale of his own cancer diagnosis, of finding a lump in his neck and being told he had a 40% chance of survival. This was clearly a sobering moment, but he wasn't sharing the story to seek our sympathy...

Photo: James Duncan Davidson David Kelley starts off his story in third grade, at Oakdale School in Ohio. His friend Brian was making a horse out of clay. One of the girls sitting at his table looked over and said, "that's terrible! That's not what a horse looks like." Brian's shoulders sank, he wadded up the clay and threw away his horse...

UPDATE OCTOBER 2017: The science of power poses is one of ongoing study. Please check our update on Amy Cuddy's talk for the latest research in this area of science. There's one very important thing that everyone should do before heading into a job interview, giving a big speech or attempting an athletic feat. According to Amy Cuddy, a so...

On the final day of TED2015, Curator Chris Anderson reveals an exclusive video conversation between him and his Holiness the Dalai Lama, filmed in Vancouver in October 2014. In their talk, the Dalai Lama speaks about two kinds of happiness, how all humans can coexist, and the cooperation between science and Buddhism. And most important, that...

Confidence and joy in your own body are the keys to healthy intimacy, says educator and author Emily Nagoski. Every weekday for the month of January, TED Ideas is publishing a new post in a series called “How to Be a Better Human,” containing a helpful piece of advice from a speaker in the TED community. To see all the posts in the series, clic...

Session 3 featured a dazzling celebration of intelligence -- from the knowledge coded in our DNA (and a new way we could rewrite it) to one of the most astonishing tech demos ever seen at TED. Let's jump right in. The event: Talks and performances from TED2019, Session 3: Intelligence, hosted by TED's Chris Anderson. When and where: Tu...

Design icon David Kelley shares 5 everyday objects he loves. IDEO and d.school founder David Kelley exudes warmth, empathy -- and the deep conviction that all people can uncover more creative potential and meaningful joy in their own lives. (TED Talk: How to build your creative confidence). To begin to unlock more of your own creative potenti...

Cocktail party trivia: Brainstorming was invented in the 1930s as a practical idea-generation technique for regular use by “creatives” within the ad agency BBDO. That all changed in 1942, when Alex Osborn — the “O” in BBDO — released a book called How to Think Up and excited the imaginations of his fellow Mad Men. Since 1942, the idea-generat...

No, “humble narcissism” is not an oxymoron; it’s a combination of qualities that the best leaders and companies have. Organizational psychologist Adam Grant explains why. Who would you rather work for: a narcissistic leader or a humble leader? The answer is more complicated than you think. In a Fortune 100 company, researchers studied whe...

  Teens, tweens and kids are often referred to as “digital natives.” Having grown up with the Internet, smartphones and tablets, they’re often extraordinarily adept at interacting with digital technology. But Mitch Resnick, who spoke at TEDxBeaconStreet, is skeptical of this descriptor. Sure, young people can text and chat and play games, he ...

Here's what happened on Tuesday of TED2019. A few news-making highlights first: Jack Dorsey proposed a new way Twitter could work -- by following topics and not individual people and brands. Hmm. Also, fun fact: If he had it to do over again, he would not have built the Like button. Watch for Jack Dorsey's Q&A with Chris Anderson and ...

Amy Cuddy digs into what our faces and bodies do when we tell a lie. Let me start with a question: How do you know if a person is lying? If you’re like most people, your first response will be something like “Liars don’t make eye contact.” In a survey of 2,520 adults in sixty-three countries, 70 percent of respondents gave that answer. People a...

What's happening in this picture above? Ask Mohammed Abu Zeinab, a TEDx speaker and member of the onsite documentary crew WTYSL: As I walked in, I saw a crowd had gathered, with Lara, our own TEDx Director, even standing on a coffee table to see the center of everyone's attention, the real show. I knew what it was. It was Hans. I swerv...

This post is part of TED’s “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from people in the TED community; browse through all the posts here. I caught up with a friend of mine a while ago. She's smart, she's brilliant, and she's talented. After we did the usual warm-up chitchat, she looked at me and sa...

TED Prize winners turn ideas into world-changing projects, with $1 million in seed money and the TED community’s support. Beyond having a solid track record of making high-impact change in their communities and beyond, all prize winners must be capable of one thing: dreaming big. Does this sound like you or someone you know? This morni...

You brought them on board because of their success, intelligence and ideas, but these qualities can generate friction with their colleagues. Tech executive Scott Belsky explains the four ingredients you need to turn new employees into respected and valued team members. Strong teams tend to be effective recruiters of new talent. But the stronger...

A recent Gallup poll listed the most- and least-trusted professions in America. At the bottom of the list: car salesmen and members of Congress. It’s not hard to understand why our politicians rate so poorly — scandals, myopia, obstinance, party loyalty over common good, fiscal cliffs. All have left voters exasperated and confused. But while con...

Engineer and health entrepreneur Zubaida Bai is passionate about improving women’s lives. Through her company AYZH, she develops health products -- such as the $2 Clean Birth Kit -- designed to reduce maternal and infant mortality in underprivileged communities around the world. AYZH is about to launch an Indiegogo funding campaign to produc...

Figuring out your answer to “Why you?” can help you speak authentically and build your confidence, says communication coach Allison Shapira. This post is part of TED’s “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from someone in the TED community; browse through all the posts here. “Why you?” is the sin...

"It's nice to look out and see so many women. That's not my norm," Sheryl Sandberg comments drily as she takes her place onstage at TEDWomen 2013  at the SFJazz Center. She's here to talk with co-host Pat Mitchell, in a Q&A follow-up to her incendiary 2010 TED Talk, given at a TEDWomen three years before. First, Mitchell asks her to r...

The key to harnessing self-doubt starts with self-efficacy, or our confidence in our ability to set ourselves up for success. And we can improve self-efficacy through something that we all already do: talk to ourselves, says writer Rich Karlgaard. We live in a society where people are obsessed with early achievement, but most of us don’t expl...

Governments’ role in spurring innovation is a controversial one. In rough terms, political debates about public spending usually go something like this: One side argues governments should only spend on the most basic public goods and do whatever they can to keep out of the way of the private sector that grows the economy and funds innovation...

  $1.26 million in change is tossed into Rome’s Trevi Fountain each year. Legend has it that throwing a penny into the fountain guarantees the visitor a return trip to Rome. The city council donates the funds to Caritas, a major Catholic charity. [via Chicago Tribune] 1 ice cream shop serves all of Rwanda. Its name: Sweet Dreams. Swe...

Some people might not take kindly to being called a knucklehead by their boss. Not Noah McQueen. But if your boss were President Barack Obama, you'd probably give him a pass, too. In a Storycorps interview that aired this morning, President Obama interviewed McQueen, an 18-year-old White House mentee in the My Brother's Keeper initiative,...

Great design doesn’t just look good -- it has the potential to make lives easier and to enhance the public good. Public Interest Design, the website dedicated to examining how, has created a list of 100 makers, educators, connectors, policymakers and visualizers in the U.S. who are doing incredible work at the intersection of design and serv...

Masarat Daud wears the burka -- but she didn't always. As a younger woman at university in Dubai, she thought: "People would think I was so religious, no one would want to be friends with me!" She wore western clothes, to the amusement of her parents. But her mother began suggesting she wear the burka, as she had, as her grandmother had, as ...

Glossophobia, or the fear of public speaking, is one of our best-known fears. Depending on who you ask or what study you consult, more people fear public speaking than death, snakes, heights and just about anything else. We’re very familiar with this fear at TED -- and we have a not-so-hidden secret approach to overcoming it: coaching. Wit...

Welcome to "Dear Guy," TED's advice column from psychologist Guy Winch. Twice a month, he'll answer reader questions about life, love and what matters most. Please send them to dearguy@ted.com; to read his previous columns, go here. Dear Guy:  I lost my job as a host in a restaurant when the shutdowns started in March. Two weeks ago, the own...

. What makes a great designer? According to IDEO founder David Kelley, who gave the TED Talks “Human-centered design” and “How to build your creative confidence,” being an incredible designer isn’t necessarily about having a great aesthetic sensibility or coming up with out-of-the-box ideas. No,  Kelley says that the key characteristic is e...

Since its inception, TED has been zealous in its mission of spreading ideas that inspire. It was out of this passion that a partnership between National Geographic Learning emerged to create materials for the English language learning classroom -- and help English learners to find their own voice. National Geographic Learning's goal is to...