How To Academy Podcast - podcast cover

How To Academy Podcast

How To Academywww.howtoacademy.com
How To Academy is London's home of big thinking. From Nobel laureates to Pulitzer Prize winners, we invite the world’s most influential voices to share new ideas for changing ourselves, our communities, and the world. Our biweekly podcast is your chance to hear in-depth from the most exciting thinkers in global culture.

Episodes

Life Lessons From Gina Miller

“There are times when I’ve gone back and cried, and I do think at times, ‘Is it worth it?’ But I have to carry on fighting because it can’t become a normalised thought pattern in our society that a woman of colour is not bright enough, can’t make her own money, can’t be successful, or is told she has made it on her back. I will stand up as long as I can.” – Gina Miller Gina Miller has taken the government to court not once but twice – and won. In the face of abuse and threats -- including a crow...

Jan 20, 20201 hr 8 min

Hilary Cottam - How to Revolutionise the Welfare State

Imitated and envied across the globe, the British welfare state was once revolutionary. But in 2020, our society faces urgent challenges that can only be solved with new and highly innovative solutions. In this week's podcast, social designer and WEF Young Global Leader Dr. Hilary Cottam meets Matthew Stadlen to reveal her vision of a system that puts human connection first. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jan 13, 202040 min

Neil deGrasse Tyson - Reflections from an Astrophysicist

He is the world’s most beloved scientist – an inspiration for all who seek understanding, meaning and truth in the vastness of the cosmos. Now Neil deGrasse Tyson joins the How To Academy Podcast to ask: what is our place in the universe? Neil deGrasse Tyson has dedicated his life to exploring and explaining the mysteries of our universe. As Director of the Hayden Planetarium, the host of Cosmos and StarTalk, a New York Times bestselling author and owner of one of the 200 ‘most followed’ Twitter...

Jan 06, 20201 hr 3 min

Chetna Gala Sinha - How to Fight Global Poverty

On this week's podcast, Matthew Stadlen meets activist and microfinance pioneer Chetna Gala Sinha, whose work in rural India empowers some of the world's poorest women. When Chetna Gala Sinha moved from her home town of Mumbai to rural Mhaswad as a young economics graduate, she saw first-hand how lack of access to banking facilities deprived local women of the opportunity to employ their entrepreneurial skills and lift themselves out of poverty. Since then, she has dedicated her life to creating...

Dec 16, 201937 min

Rory Stewart - The Truth About Politics

In this week’s podcast, independent politician and London Mayoral candidate Rory Stewart tells Hannah MacInnes what he's discovered about British democracy in his time an MP and minister. Born in Hong Kong and raised in Malaysia, commissioned in the Black Watch when only a teenager, a bestselling author and Professor at Harvard, Rory Stewart’s career bore little resemblance to the typical 21st century career politician - and that before he being fired by the Conservative Party for rebelling agai...

Dec 07, 20191 hr 10 min

Matthew Syed - A Radical Blueprint for Creative Problem-Solving

Where do the best ideas come from? In this week’s podcast, Matthew Syed takes Matthew Stadlen on a fascinating journey through the new science of creative problem-solving. It’s time to think again about where the best ideas come from. Individual intelligence and homogenous teams are fine for addressing simple problems -- but groupthink can spell disaster for more complex tasks. That’s why Times columnist and former Olympian advocates a brave new idea: Cognitive Diversity. In this week’s podcast,...

Dec 02, 201934 min

Speeches That Changed the World

For this week's podcast, Hannah MacInnes and bestselling historian Simon Sebag Montefiore assembled an all-star cast to bring to life history's greatest speeches - from conquerors and revolutionaries, activists and athletes, dreamers and killers. You'll meet Elizabeth I and Genghis Khan, Muhammad Ali and Winston Churchill, Greta Thunberg, Martin Luther King and many more - with insights from Simon revealing how these powerful speeches enlighten our past, enrich our present and inspire - and hold...

Nov 25, 20191 hr 24 min

How to Stop Facebook From Destroying Democracy

Roger NcNamee was Mark Zuckerberg’s mentor in the first days of Facebook. In this week's How To Academy Podcast, he explains why he's now devoted to stopping the behemoth he helped to create. If you had told Roger McNamee three years ago that he would soon be devoting himself to stopping Facebook from destroying democracy, he would have howled with laughter. He had mentored many tech leaders in his illustrious career as an investor, but few things had made him prouder, or been better for his fun...

Nov 18, 20191 hr 19 min

Marie Forleo - How to Create Unstoppable Success

With nothing more than passion, a laptop and a dream, Marie Forleo created a digital empire that inspires millions. She’s the star of the award-winning show MarieTV, with over 47 million views, and the author of a new guide to high achievement that Eat, Pray, Love author Elizabeth Gilbert says ‘will change lives’. Named by Oprah as a thought leader for the next generation, Marie presents her award-winning online show, Marie TV and podcast to her 1.5 million fans around the world. She is the foun...

Nov 11, 20191 hr 29 min

Jonathan Safran Foer - How to Save the Planet

The climate crisis is the single biggest threat to human survival. And it is happening right now. We all understand that time is running out - but do we truly believe it? Caught between the seemingly unimaginable and the apparently unthinkable, how can we take the first step towards action, to arrest our race to extinction? Jonathan Safran Foer is on a mission to demystify climate change. His ability to spin beauty, wit and insight from tragedy in novels like 'Everything is Illuminated' and 'Ext...

Nov 04, 20191 hr 17 min

Dr. Gabor Maté - When the Body Says No: The Costs of Hidden Stress

Learn how to prevent and heal illnesses related to hidden stress with the help of acclaimed physician Dr. Gabor Maté. Can a person literally die of loneliness? Is there a connection between the ability to express emotions and Alzheimer’s disease? Is there such a thing as a “cancer personality”? One of the world’s most sought after and celebrated physicians, Dr. Gabor Maté is the leading expert on the role the mind-body connection plays in illness and health. Drawing on scientific research and th...

Oct 28, 201933 min

Juliet Stevenson - How To Be An Actor

This week's How To Academy Podcast is a masterclass with one of the greatest British actors of her generation: Juliet Stevenson. Best known for film work including TRULY, MADLY, DEEPLY, EMMA and MONA LISA SMILE, acclaimed for her work on the stage including DEATH OF A MAIDEN (ROYAL COURT), MEASURE FOR MEASURE (RSC) and HAPPY DAYS (Young Vic), she joined Matthew Stadlen to impart what she's learned about the art, craft and business of acting over four decades. Learn more about your ad choices. Vi...

Oct 17, 201942 min

Rory Sutherland - How to Be Less Rational (and More Brilliant)

In this week’s How To Academy podcast, Matthew Stadlen meets advertising legend Rory Sutherland for a lesson in using the power of psychology to make ideas, products and businesses triumph. In our data-driven age, businesses usually try to use logic, algorithms and theory to drive sales and solve problems. But there’s a problem with this rational approach: humans are innately illogical, and make unconscious decisions based largely on our emotions. What if there was a deeper, underlying logic to ...

Oct 14, 201958 min

Melinda Gates - How to Empower Women

In this week's podcast, Melinda Gates makes a timely and necessary call to action for women’s empowerment. For the last twenty years, Melinda Gates has been on a mission to find solutions for people with the most urgent needs, wherever they live. Throughout this journey, one thing has become increasingly clear to her: If you want to lift a society up, you need to stop keeping women down. In this moving and compelling conversation with journalist Hannah MacInnes, Melinda shares lessons she’s lear...

Oct 07, 201958 min

John Humphrys - How to Make the News

For the last 33 years, John Humphrys has held politicians to account as the host of our most popular news programme - Radio 4's Today. In this week's How To Academy Podcast, Matthew Stadlen - a man who is himself no stranger to asking tough questions of those in power - sat down with him to explore what John has learned from a lifetime at the forefront of current affairs in the UK. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Sep 19, 201950 min

Marcus du Sautoy - AI and the Secret of Creativity

In Episode 9 of the How To Academy podcast, the nation’s most loved science communicator, Oxford mathematician Marcus Du Sautoy, explores the potential of artificial intelligence to think creatively. From driving cars to writing legal contracts, new developments in AI are shaking up the status quo, as we find out how many of the tasks humans engage in can be done equally well, if not better, by machines. But can machines be creative? Will they soon be able to learn from the art that moves us, an...

Sep 16, 201933 min

Giles Coren - A Man For All Seasons

In Episode 8 of the How To Academy Podcast, Matthew Stadlen meets restaurant critic and raconteur Giles Coren, for a freewheeling and hilarious conversation about truth, love and clean cutlery. Giles Coren is a man of many talents. A restaurant critic, Times columnist, TV presenter, and award-winning novelist, his taste, wit and inability to suffer fools have made him an icon to anyone who values great writing and clever opinions. He is perhaps the ultimate dinner party guest; and though we cann...

Sep 09, 201952 min

Michael Pollan - How to Change Your Mind

Could psychedelic drugs change our worldview? In Episode 7 of the How To Academy podcast, Michael Pollan tells Matthew Stadlen about his journey to the frontiers of the human mind. For twenty years the author and activist Michael Pollan has been writing about the places where the human and natural worlds intersect, including, most famously, in his acclaimed books on the ethics and ecology of food, The Omnivore’s Dilemma and The Botany of Desire. That path recently led him to investigate the role...

Aug 28, 201942 min

Elizabeth Gilbert - On Life and Love

From the dive bars of the Lower East Side to the beaches of Bali, the Connecticut Christmas Tree farm where she was raised to the Mumbai ashram where she sought solace after a difficult divorce, Elizabeth Gilbert is a world traveller whose unending search for answers to life’s biggest questions have made her the voice of a generation. Aged 34, she left her home, husband and career to travel alone across the world; her chronicle of that journey became EAT, PRAY, LOVE, an international bestseller ...

Aug 19, 20191 hr 25 min

Preet Bharara - An Insider's Guide to Crime in America

In Episode Five of the How To Academy Podcast, Matthew Stadlen meets Preet Bharara, the former US district attorney who successfully prosecuted some of the most high-profile crimes in America. Along the way he gained notoriety as the ‘Sheriff of Wall Street’, was banned from Russia by Vladimir Putin and earned the distinction of being one of the first federal employees fired by Trump. In this wide-ranging conversation Preet takes us into the gritty, tactically complex, often sensational world of...

Aug 05, 201940 min

David Wallace-Wells - How To Survive Climate Change

Once a generation an environmentalist dares to speak truth to power with such force that they cannot be silenced. In Episode 4 of the How To Academy Podcast, Matthew Stadlen meets David Wallace-Wells, whose terrifying vision of unfolding climate catastrophe may just be the wake-up call we need to save the future. Climate change is worse, much worse, than you think. The slowness of climate change is a fairy tale, perhaps as pernicious as the one that says it isn't happening at all, and if your an...

Jul 29, 201941 min

The Gendered Brain Debate

In this week's podcast, two giants of cognitive science - neuroscientist Gina Rippon and psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen - go head-to-head to debate one of the most contested and controversial ideas in the history of science: do men and women have essentially different brains? Setting this debate has potentially far-reaching consequences for the future of medicine and mental health treatment, the workplace and society as a whole. But do studies claiming to show differences between the brains of m...

Jun 25, 20191 hr 22 min

Cass Sunstein - How To Make Change Happen

In this podcast, the bestselling author of Nudge, Professor Cass Sunstein, presents a ground-breaking guide for anyone who wishes to fuel – or block – transformative social change. Sometimes all it takes to change society is for one person to decide they will no longer remain silent. A child announces that the emperor has no clothes. A woman tweets, #MeToo. Suddenly, a taboo collapses for the better – or for the worse. Once white nationalism was kept out of the mainstream media and politics; now...

Jun 25, 201927 min

Simon Sinek - How to Lead in the 21st Century

In this episode of the How To Academy podcast, Matthew Stadlen meets Simon Sinek – perhaps the 21st century’s most acclaimed thinker in the field of business leadership. Simon Sinek’s Start With Why concept changed the face of modern business. Over 35 million people have watched his TED talk on how great leaders inspire everyone to take action, and millions more have read his books Find Your Why and Leaders Eat Last. In 2016, his insightful analysis of millennials at work was seen by more than 2...

Jun 25, 201935 min