Meet: Richard Saul Wurman

Founder of TED

Richard Saul Wurman

Richard Saul Wurman

Context

TED Conferences is an American-Canadian non-profit organization that publishes talks covering almost all topics, from science to business to global issues, under the famous slogan "ideas worth spreading".

  • Over 3,500 talks are available freely on ted.com

  • Watched over 1 billion times worldwide

  • Talks were given in more than 100 languages

Richard Saul Wurman's story

Early in his life, Richard realized that there are two types of people: vertical and horizontal. Vertical people are those who focus their entire lives mainly on one thing and they become very good at it. Richard saw himself as more of a horizontal person - he was interested in many things and didn't really see himself as an expert in any of them.

He went to study architecture and made a special deal with the dean that allowed him to take as many courses as he wanted as long as he kept a high average score. This led him to be exposed to horizontal topics, such as the history of astronomy, painting, technology and more.

Later in life, He published a children's book, which TIME magazine picked up and wrote a story about. This story got the attention of the International Design Conference who invited Richard to speak at the next conference.

"This was one of the big moments of my life," Richard recalled. The conference's board liked Richard's ambition, and he soon joined them. Two years later, in 1972, he was responsible for organizing the annual conference for 1,200 people.

He recognized that these events were about topics not taught in school and that people really liked them, so he decided, together with two partners, to invest $10,000 each and make their own conference.

That was the beginning of TED.

But there was a problem, they couldn't sell enough tickets and they lost $7,000 each on this event. Richard thought he would never do it again. 6 years later the partners decided that although it was a commercial failure, people liked it, and they should try again. This time the world was ready, the event was successful, and TED events have continued to do well ever since.

Bill Clinton gives a TED talk, 2007

Bill Clinton gives a TED talk, 2007

Market differentiation

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design, which were Richard's personal interests. Richard didn't try to build TED's theme for any specific target audience, he just invited the speakers he wanted to hear himself.

What made TED a special place? According to Richard:

First, humans. As an organization, TED wasn't looking for the most famous people to come and give a talk but for the most interesting conversations and ideas. Richard used to ask speakers to share their most unique ideas - he believed that "if you've never talked about it before, it's a good story to share at TED".

Second, attention to detail. One example of this, when people sat to watch a talk, Richard used to sit in the opposite direction and look at the audience. He was trying to figure out if they were interested enough. Sometimes, when he felt they weren't, so he interrupted the talk and changed the subject of the conversation.

Career advice

1. To allow innovation to come, be broad-minded and allow yourself to see the connected dots. Sometimes, not being too deep in one vertical is what allows you to innovate in your craft.

2. "A good question is better than a brilliant answer". When you're trying to solve something, put more thought into the questions; they will increase your chances of getting good answers.

That’s a nice stage!

That’s a nice stage!

If you want to listen to a conversation with Richard Saul Wurman at TEDxAcademy, check it out here.

Until the next one,

– Steve