When I was in college, I made it a point to attend extracurricular lectures. Each week my college campus was teeming with locally and nationally famous speakers. Everybody from entrepreneurs and industry experts, to celebrities and public figures visited the campus during my time there.

I was once invited to a private lunch with famous Oprah correspondent Lisa Ling, and was thrilled when Apple co-founder and entrepreneur Steve Wozniak gave his two cents on campus when he spoke about the insurgence of social media–albeit, via Skype (just his style). I was also fortunate to hear baseball legend Hank Aaron give a moving speech about diversity and dreams at our commencement ceremony.

Whether it is to inspire or inform, encourage or educate, speakers are the people who spread ideas, and find solutions in our complex and incredible world.

In the business world we strive to do the same thing, and lucky for us, NeoCloud Marketing is often chosen to participate in dozens of speaking engagements across the region.

While we are often billed as experts, we always find way to educate ourselves and make ourselves better professionals. That’s why we not only participate in events, but also listen: We listen to local and national experts, we listen to our business mentors, and of course, we listen to our clients.

So, anytime we find a new social media platform, a useful marketing tool, an effective best practice, or just something plain ol’ interesting, we love to pass it on.

That’s why I want to introduce you to TED.

If you are as curious about the world as I am, you are going to love this website. TED Talks: Ideas Worth Spreading is a collaboration of the brightest minds and the most innovative ideas. It’s like going to all those extracurricular lectures without ever leaving your office chair.

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design, but with over 900 posted lectures and roughly 1,100 speakers, the lectures cover everything from education reform, to solving world hunger, to spurring innovation in the workplace. Everybody from Bill Gates, to Steve Jobs has given a TED talk.

Started as a bi-annual conference in 1984, the website was launched in 2007. Since, then millions have users have viewed the videos from all across the world. You can browse the site at TED, or search topics with its easy to use “Themes” or “Speakers” feature. Don’t have a lot of time? Browse TED’s collection of 3-minute lectures, read a brief summary of a lecture or skim one of their daily blogs.

Every business begins with an idea. Maybe it was original, or maybe it was built off an existing concept. But, it certainly wasn’t created without a little bit of inspiration.

“Anger is like gasoline. If you spray it around and somebody lights a match, you’ve got an inferno. [But] if we can put our anger inside an engine, it can drive us forward.”
- Scilla Elworthy: Fighting with non-violence

Have you watched a TED talk? Who is your favorite speaker?