Many want to be a leader. But unfortunately, the numbers show that not many actually have the skills and knowledge to beleader.
Leadership directly dictates the core of organisational success, but despite its critical importance, 77% of organisations report leadership gaps at all levels, EY Canada reports.
While formal training is essential to bolstering leadership and management skills, it certainly helps to start early by listening to other people’s perspectives. Specifically, those of leaders and leadership experts themselves.
If your interest is piqued, we’ve curated 7 TED Talks on leadership (and 4 more TEDx Talks) worth listening to.
9 TED Talk videos on Leadership
1. Drew Dudley: Everyday leadership
Kicking off this list of TED Talks on leadership is a throwback from 10 years ago. It might be a decade old video, but the content is as relevant as ever.
A Leadership Development Coordinator at the University of Toronto at the time, Drew Dudley calls on everyone to celebrate leadership as the everyday act of improving each other’s lives in this video.
The video has been viewed close to five million times and praised by notable publications such as Time, Business Insider, and Inc. magazine. He’s also gone on to be a Wall Street Journal best-selling author for his book “This Is Day One”.
2. Itay Talgam: Lead like the great conductors
We travel even further back in time to a gem from 2009. This video shows that excellent leadership advice is one that transcends time, as well as industry. Because here,orchestra conductor (and leadership expert) Itay Talgam shares relatable, comprehensible pearls of wisdom that leaders of all sorts can find powerful.
Because CEOs are conductors too, but of a different kin of orchestra.
3. Michael Timms: How to claim your leadership power
Michael Timms is a sought-after speaker, consultant, and best-selling author who teaches leaders how to inspire greatness in their teams.
His 2024 TED Talk on leadership covers three effective habits of self-accountability that will empower you and others to make positive change — whether at home or at work. His insights are not only powerful for leaders, but also students everywhere who may want to take more accountability and ownership in their lives.
4. Simon Sinek: Why good leaders make you feel safe
Arguably one of the most notable inspirational speakers of this generation, Simon Sinek has made many videos (and even books) about leadership. In fact, he’s had a couple TED Talks on leadership itself.
In this particular TED Talk, he shares that good leaders are those who makes their employees feel secure, who draws staffers into a circle of trust. But creating trust and safety — especially in an uneven economy — means taking on big responsibility.
5. Josh Wooden: The difference between winning and succeeding
A classic on our list of TED Talks on leadership is John Wooden, a legendary college basketball coach who also led the UCLA team to a record-breaking number of wins.
In his TED Talk, Wooden shares his perspective on how winning and succeeding are not one and the same.
He shares how leadership roles,like being a coach, is all about showing athletes how being successful goes way beyond winning points.
6. Kat Cole: The “hot shot rule” to help you become a better leader
Katrina “Kat” Cole is an American businesswoman. She is the CEO of AG1, formerly known as Athletic Greens. But long before that, she actually started out as a waitress.
The business leader spills her insights and her “hot shot rule” in this 2024 TED Talk.
7. Roselinde Torres: What it takes to be a great leader
We end our list of TED Talks on leadershop with Roselinde Torres, a senior partner and managing director at the consulting firm, BCG. A senior leader in the firm’s “people and organisation” practice area, she is also the company’s resident expert on leadership, a topic she has studied her entire career.
In this clear, candid talk, she describes 25 years observing truly great leaders at work, and shares the three simple but crucial questions would-be company chiefs need to ask to thrive in the future.
4 TEDx Talks about leadership
We’ve looked at the famous TED Talks on leadership, here are the TEDxTalks, which are community-led events.
1. Lars Sudmann: Great leadership starts with self-leadership
Lars Sudmann is a leadership advisor and award-winning lecturer who studies and researches what makes the most advanced organisations and leaders successful. And he shared some of those insights at a TEDx event.
His talk spins off a main thesis question: What would leadership in Utopia look like? Try answering that yourself. What is the best leader you have ever worked with? How did he or she get to become this type of leader?
In this must-watch talk, Sudmann argues that it’s likely that they learned to overcome the “leadership formula of doom” and then developed themselves as a leader.
2. Nate Payne: Why the best leaders think like gardeners
In this talk, IT expert and leader Nate Payne argues that the best leaders operate like gardeners rather than assembly-line managers.
Instead of forcing results or chasing outcomes, he asks: What if leadership success isn’t something we pursue, but something that grows organically when we cultivate the right set of conditions? Like a gardener, you must provide proper nourishment, space, and time.
For nearly 30 years, Nate Payne has supported, advised, and led high-performing IT teams across Fortune 500 companies, small businesses, and nonprofits.
3. Michael Morand: Teams need leadership, not leaders
In this TedxPrinceton talk, adjunct professor Mike Morand spells out the different between leadership and leaders — giving students a refreshing look into how they can own their leadership even before they become leaders themselves. He also shares why great teams don’t need heroes, and what happens when leaders stop trying to be the smartest person in the room.
Beyond being an adjunct professor, Morand has led people in combat zones, Fortune 500 supply chains, and global healthcare strategy.
4. Jon Cobb: 4 types of leaders—and why great ones master them all
Another university event, TedxHarvard saw an inspiring speech by Jon Cobb, a Marine Corps combat veteran as well as a fellow at the Harvard Center for Public Leadership. He’s also the founder and CEO of Dynamic Leadership University.
In his sharing, he explains how there are four types of leaders, and how exceptional leaders don’t fail because they lack talent: but rather because their greatest strengths often become their blind spots.
Frequently asked questions about TED Talks
What are TED Talks?
TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, and Design — the three fields that originally brought people together at the first TED conference in 1984.
Over time, TED expanded well beyond those topics to cover science, culture, business, global issues, and more. A TED Talk is a short speech, demonstration, or performance built around a big idea — meant to educate, shift perspectives, or spark conversations that matter.
TED Talk speakers typically must distill their ideas into talks of 18 minutes or less, a constraint that forces clarity, conciseness, and impact. That’s why these TED Talks on leadership are so powerfully succinct.
What is the difference between TED and TEDx?
The main difference is that TED talks are global, while TEDx focuses on the local community. TED events are large, competitive to speak at, and expensive to attend.
TEDx, launched in June 2009, is a smaller conference that follows TED’s standards but is independently organized, allowing local communities to host their own events. Many TEDx events are free or nearly free to attend and feature a strong networking component.
Although TEDx events are regional, the talks are recorded and uploaded to the TEDx YouTube channel, giving them global reach.
That’s all for today, thanks for coming to our TED Talk on TED Talks on Leadership.
Disclaimer: This article was updated on 25 June, 2026.
