TED Business

Can a five-minute walk change how you feel all day? Exercise scientist Keith Diaz shows how your body is built for the kind of movement that modern life has quietly erased — and suggests something refreshingly doable: making time for small doses of movement sprinkled throughout the day, as a way to boost your brain and body. And stick around after his talk for a deep dive conversation with our guest host for the week, author ...

We can't get rid of anxiety and depression, so we might as well talk about it, says depression truth-teller Adam Whybrew. Sharing his own experience with mental illness, he reveals the surprising benefits of opening up about stress at work — and why being vulnerable creates a safe space for everyone. After the talk, Modupe discusses why we all need to advocate for important causes on an institutional level — and how to ...

Vigilance. Grit. Resilience. Valerie Montgomery Rice, the president and CEO of Morehouse School of Medicine, shares where she learned these key qualities of successful leadership, offering three lessons for anyone who wants to overcome their fears, stand up for what’s right and build opportunity for all. After the talk, Modupe urges us all to tell our own stories.

(This episode originally aired in 2024.)

As a film and television director, Barry Sonnenfeld had millions of dollars riding on his ability to get his cast and crew to play along — and much of what he learned along the way applies to everyday life. Here, he shares nine bits of wisdom and whimsy gleaned from 40 years in entertainment. So the next time you encounter a screaming bully, you too will know what to do. After the talk, Modupe shares three questions to help y...

For people living in poverty, a guaranteed income can mean finally having the space to dream of a comfortable life. Sharing the stories of single moms who participated in a first-of-its-kind program that offered them $1,000 per month with no strings attached, poverty disrupter Aisha Nyandoro calls for us to redefine what it means to be wealthy — putting aside lavish vacations and fancy cars in favor of paid bills and a well-f...

When was your last unforgettable trip? Travel industry expert Suresh Subudhi believes joyful moments of connection are the reason we explore the world — but with vacation hotspots overrun and locals pushed to the brink, tourists have become unwelcome guests. Proposing a new way to use technology to stop loving our favorite destinations to death, he shows what travel could look like if we got it right. After, Modupe asks howca...

Leadership expert Melissa M. Mikus breaks down why most workplace friction isn't about personality clashes or bad intentions — it's about not knowing how to effectively communicate. Her solution? A small, visible and easy tweak that anyone can implement right away. Then after the talk, Modupe shares some questions to get you started.

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Most managers give feedback. Few give feedback that actually works. Drawing on her background in psychology and executive coaching, Renee St Jacques breaks down what so many well-intentioned leaders get wrong — and introduces a three-part framework to help teams rebuild trust and perform at their best. After the talk, Modupe shares her best practices for giving feedback.

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One of our favorite TED talks on TED Business is from company builder Molly Graham. She’s also the new host of WorkLife with Molly Graham, another podcast from TED. Modupe sits down with Molly at TED2026 to talk about her journey from Facebook to giving her first TED Talk to now joining TED as a podcaster. Molly shares how she quietens her inner critic whom she affectionately calls “Bob the Monster,” what she lear...

Does your “dream job” really exist? You may know Emily Durham as Emily the Recruiter on social media, where she shares practical, refreshingly honest career advice and coaches people through the biggest professional decisions of their lives. Emily doesn’t believe in the idea of a dream job. In this episode, she joins Anne to make the case for the “awake job” that actively fits into your purpose, lifest...

International collaboration expert Qahir Dhanani makes the case for rebuilding public trust in broken institutions by embracing small, focused coalitions that can move faster and act bolder — offering a hopeful, practical vision for updating diplomacy to meet the world’s toughest challenges. Then, Modupe shares why it's useful to identify "coalitions of the willing,” in your own workplace.

Design consultant Virginia Santy set out to create an office space built specifically for women, flipping the script on the subtle (and not-so-subtle) ways that workplaces and cities still fail them. The results were striking: greater productivity, deeper collaboration and an environment where women felt genuinely valued, leading her to ask a simple question: What would the world look like if we designed with women in mind? After t...

In this special TED Business episode, Modupe is in conversation with Jacob Goldstein, reporter and co-host of the Business History podcast, to dig into the origin story ofSouthwest Airlines. From debunking the airline's founding myth, about a triangular route sketched on a napkin to discussing why Southwest chose to only fly Boeing 737s, Jacob shares the decisions that made Southwest stand out from its competitors—and wh...

You might think the biggest, most prestigious job is always the right career move. Patty Stonesifer — founding CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and an early Amazon board member — says that’s exactly the wrong way to decide what to do next. So what should guide your career? In this episode, Patty joins Molly to share the nine-word personal mission statement she’s used for decades to filter oppor...

Finance doesn't have to feel like a foreign language. Wall Street trader-turned-financial educator Vivian Tu helps millions of people make sense of money, breaking down complex concepts into everyday terms you can understand. She shares how she broke free from the stress of living paycheck to paycheck — and explores how we can shift power structures to give everyone a real shot at building wealth.

(Following the talk, Elis...

The number of forcibly displaced people across the world is on the rise. While aid systems often focus on providing basic necessities like food and shelter, Julienne Oyler and her team at the nonprofit Inkomoko have a more ambitious plan: invest in refugee entrepreneurs in order to help them build their businesses, uplift their communities and gain access to financial services. She describes how displaced people are already driving...

Are your workplace relationships quietly burning you out? Drawing on large-scale research across industries, organizational behavior researcher Eric Quintane reveals four hidden relational traps woven into the fabric of work — and explores how connection shapes resilience, vulnerability and burnout. After, Modupe shares her trick for finding new people to talk to and how she strikes up the conversation.