Episode Archives

CM 011: Thiel Fellow Alex Koren on Learning to Fail

Alex Koren had never considered dropping out of college. A successful high school student, he headed to Johns Hopkins University and was class president in his first year. Furthermore, that summer, Alex headed to a high-powered summer internship at Intel, seemingly the perfect opportunity for an undergraduate engineering major. Then something happened. While working at…

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CM 010: Thiel Fellow Jihad Kawas on Young Entrepreneurs

Jihad Kawas started his company, Saily, when he was 16 years old growing up in Lebanon. Now, two years later, after a recent public launch, his app has over 140,000 U.S. users and is gaining over 1,000 new users daily. Jihad is a 2015 Thiel Fellow who never attended college. Along the way, he was…

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CM 009: Thiel Fellow Charlie Stigler on College and Career

At the age of 16, Charlie Stigler built SelfControl, an app designed to block out online distractions. It has been downloaded by millions. Encouraged by that success, two years later, Charlie founded a successful ed tech company, Zaption, which rethinks the use of video for learning. He did both before the ink was dry on…

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CM 008: Mona Patel on What Drives Great Design

Design thinking and creativity are like muscles: we all have them, but they are more useful when they are strengthened! In this bestselling book Reframe: Shift the Way You Work, Innovate, and Think, Mona Patel gives you the perfect exercises for your design workout, giving you the tools you need to unleash your inner designer….

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CM 007: Janice Kaplan on How Gratitude Changes Your Life

What happens when you dedicate a year of your life to practicing gratitude? Maybe everything. In this groundbreaking new book, The Gratitude Diaries: How a Year Looking on the Bright Side Can Transform Your Life, Janice Kaplan explains the science behind the power of gratitude. The author of twelve books, including The New York Times…

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