What does leadership look like? While there are various approaches to leading a team, many of us land on common questions in the search for an effective leadership style: How can I be there for my team? Do I need to command respect, or earn it? And the most crucial question of all: How can I make sure that my team trusts me? Cady Coleman has been confronting these questions throughout her career as a chemist, engineer, Air Force colonel and astronaut. In conversation with TED science curator David Biello, Coleman shared three strategies to establish — and maintain — trust in a leader. Whateve ..read more

What separates the very best in the world from the remaining 7 billion of us? Exceptional talent often looks like an act of revolution — a person doing something in a way no one has ever done it before — but many revolutionary talents are actually built on a foundation of evolutionary tweaks. These tweaks develop over time, often compensating for weaknesses and anxieties that might derail a lesser talent. For all his brilliance, though, Messi is famously anxious. For several years, he habitually vomited on the field before big matches. Take the world’s best soccer player, an Argentinean name ..read more

Ever have your hard work — including your successes — go unnoticed by your manager? Fixable, TED’s new podcast, is here to do just that — to fix the problems of everyday people who call in with their work woes. In episode four, cohosts and top leadership coaches Frances Frei and Anne Morriss got to know Nai’a, a caller who struggled with receiving recognition after a major reorganization paired her with a new and preoccupied boss. Nai’a was going above and beyond to do her job well, but the lack of acknowledgement and encouragement — and even awareness — of her work was causing her to lose mot ..read more

We persist in hiring and training as if we’re running a bowling squad, as if easily measured skills are all that matter. What causes successful organizations to fail? What makes stocks fade, innovations slow, customers jump ship? We can agree that certain skills are essential. That hiring coders who can’t code, salespeople who can’t sell, or architects who can’t design is a waste. But these skills — let’s call them vocational skills — have become the backbone of the recruitment process. But how do you explain that similar organizations, with similarly vocationally skilled people, find themselv ..read more

Lucia dreaded interacting with her colleague Ray. Meetings that were scheduled for an hour would last two; once Ray started talking, he wouldn’t stop. “There’s no doubt he was a smart man,” Lucia says, “but he did little more than talk about everything he knew. He delegated almost all of his work to others.” Most of us have dealt with a Ray, the know-it-all who is convinced they’re the smartest person in the room, hogs airtime in meetings and has no qualms about interrupting others. They gleefully inform you of what’s right, even if they’re clearly wrong, lacking information or fail to un ..read more

When you say you have “work stress,” what exactly do you mean? Chances are, you’re not talking about major things such as layoffs, fireable offenses or obvious wrongs; instead, it’s the small stuff that wears you down. Like the endless email chains that lead nowhere but swallow up an afternoon. Or the company leaders who hold long, closed-door meetings that put everyone on edge. Or being asked to work on a project that rubs against one of your beliefs or values. Authors Rob Cross and Karen Dillon call these “microstresses” — those countless small moments that occur in every workday and drain y ..read more

“Perfectionism is a symptom of something,” Thomas Greenspon PhD, an expert on the topic and a recovering perfectionist himself, told me. “It’s not the disease.” At its core, perfectionism is about anxiety — you’re afraid of failing or afraid that making a mistake means that there’s something wrong with you. “Perfectionism is more than pushing yourself to do your best to achieve a goal; it’s a reflection of an inner self mired in anxiety,” he adds. According to Greenspon, the most highly successful people are actually less likely to be perfectionistic, because perfectionism can leave you overwh ..read more

Ever wish you had a switch you could just turn whenever you needed to be focused and productive? While getting in the zone is something we all hope and strive for — whether it’s at work, at home, at school — it’s critically important for athletes. In episode three of TED’s newest podcast “Good Sport,” host Jody Avirgan speaks to NBA All-Star Steph Curry and sports psychologist Dr. Nicole Detling to find out about getting there. Read our excerpt below, and listen to the entire episode here. Jody Avirgan, host of “Good Sport” podcast: In sports, there’s a lot of talk about a magical place called ..read more

Is living too fast turning your life into a blur? How can you slow down to see things clearly and savor them more? One way is to take inspiration from calming rituals and traditions found across the world. If you’ve already mastered the Spanish siesta — aka the midday nap — what other practices can you build into your life? Read my curated list below to find out. And to learn more insights and techniques to help you shift into the slow lane, consider joining my TED Course “How to slow down.” 1. Shinrin yoku Eco-therapy. Green time. Wilderness cure. Whatever name you hang on it, spending time i ..read more

Health psychologist Elissa Epel PhD writes: “I have been studying stress for 30 years. Living in this era of prolonged personal, pandemic and global stress, has become very challenging. Many of us live with high levels of daily stress, and this can become a habit — and even last a lifetime. But we don’t have to live that way. That is why I wrote my book The Stress Prescription. It offers many ways to have a positive relationship with stress and to add stress buffers into the fabric of our daily lifestyle. I hope you enjoy this excerpt that shares one way you can become more resilient: By ..read more