Imagine being able to assemble a team of the most talented and brilliant minds around to give you their choicest nuggets of wisdom in 18 minutes or less. How amazing would that be? Thanks to the internet and TED talks, you have that capability at your fingertips. TED talks give audiences from around the world free, instant access to speakers who are doing cutting-edge work in numerous areas. TED, which is a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, offers short, powerful talks covering topics ranging from science to business to global issues.

1. Why the best hire might not have the perfect resume — Regina Hartley

When you are looking to hire a new employee, it’s easy to glance through resumes and quickly find the cream of the crop. According to Regina Hartley, these are often the so-called “silver spoons” — the candidates who went to an elite school and have impeccable recommendations.

And then there are the “scrappers” — the candidates who are equally qualified, but their resume is a patchwork of experience and their education comes from a less-esteemed school. If you delve a little deeper, you may find that these are the candidates who have learned to thrive because of the adversity. Hartley urges employers to consider giving scrappers a chance — they have grit, passion and purpose that will ultimately set them apart.

2. How cryptocurrency can help startups get investment capital — Ashwini Anburajan

According to entrepreneur Ashwini Anburajan, we’re living in a golden era of entrepreneurship, but venture capital hasn’t evolved to keep up. The current system limits the number of ideas that get funded, the number of companies that are created and those that will actually receive funding to grow. If the goal of entrepreneurship is to inspire innovation and encourage more people to build companies of all sizes, we need a new, more flexible system to fund these ideas.

We need to democratize access to capital, Anburajan says. She discusses a whole new way for young startups to raise money through the powers of cooperation and cryptocurrency.

3. Want to innovate? Become a “now-ist” — Joi Ito

The world is more complex and interconnected than ever before. We can try new things out much more easily and cheaply than the generations before us, says Joi Ito in his TED Talk. The traditional rules for institutions don’t work anymore because change is coming at all levels; it’s chaotic and hard to control.

Bottom-up innovation is happening in some of the most cutting-edge projects emerging today. We must now work with a different set of principles. In this new world, we must value learning over education. We must focus on being connected, always learning, fully aware and in the present. Don’t be a futurist, Ito suggests: be a now-ist.

Source Credit: Entrepreneur
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