Creative Confidence Podcast
IDEO U
IDEO’s Creative Confidence Podcast shares candid conversations with creative leaders, changemakers, and innovators navigating today’s most pressing challenges. Through real-world stories and insights, we explore how to lead with creativity, build resilient teams, and drive innovation. Grounded in IDEO’s 40 years of expertise in design thinking and innovation, each episode offers inspiration and practical tools for audacious leaders at every stage of their careers. Hosted by Mina Seetharaman, Head of New Ventures at IDEO, the podcast brings a human-centered lens to the complexities of making more courageous futures. Discover more at IDEOU.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Oct 28, 2026 • 51min
A Strong Strategy Considers Multiple Futures: Jennifer Lo
Jennifer Lo, IDEO’s Senior Director of Design Futures and a longtime strategy leader, explores why planning for one future is risky. She discusses human-centered foresight, signals scanning, scenario storytelling, and avoiding “used futures.” Learn how leaders can build a weekly signals practice, strengthen organizational resilience, and spot opportunities across healthcare, technology, wellness, and longevity.
39 snips
Oct 22, 2026 • 33min
How to Use Systems Thinking to Reframe Problems: Deirdre Cerminaro (Replay)
Deirdre Cerminaro, systems thinker and former IDEO Executive Design Director, explores how to reframe complex problems through a human-centered lens. They discuss zooming in and out, shifting perspective, uncovering bias, and using systems maps to reveal hidden connections. Analogies, speculative futures, and strategies for anticipating unintended consequences round out this practical conversation.
6 snips
Sep 30, 2026 • 14min
[From IDEO Thinking] The Hidden Costs of Caregiving: Sierra Hillman
Sierra Hillman, an IDEO interaction designer focused on health, became her father’s full-time caregiver at 22. She explores the hidden costs of caregiving, from insurance denials and baffling medical bills to pressure sores and inaccessible housing. Sierra also imagines smarter tools, affordable technology, and more human-centered systems to ease the load on families.
109 snips
Sep 22, 2026 • 52min
How to Tell a Problem From a Situation: Seth Godin
Seth Godin, bestselling author, entrepreneur, and marketing thinker, explores ideas from his new book, The Knot. He untangles the difference between solvable problems and situations, reveals how to name the real problem, and examines why systems resist change. The conversation also covers user-focused design, leadership, creative persistence, and knowing when to accept what cannot be fixed.
8 snips
Sep 2, 2026 • 32min
Insight Is an Epiphany, Not a Framework: Jane Fulton Suri
Jane Fulton Suri, a pioneering IDEO design researcher and author of Thoughtless Acts, reflects on nearly four decades of human-centered design. She traces the field’s evolution, shares the surprising origins of customer journeys, and recounts a kidney case that made care visible. They explore why true insight arrives as an epiphany, the irreplaceable power of sensory observation, and how curiosity, trust, and care can guide design in an AI-driven world.
40 snips
Aug 18, 2026 • 47min
How to Use AI as an Editor, Not a Writer: Ed White
Ed White, Senior Design Director at IDEO and former FT/Wired editor, blends storytelling and design through AI-aware methods. He shares using AI as a ruthless editor and as a simulated audience to rehearse pitches. They discuss how AI shifts creative workflows, the value of friction in thinking, and why practicing taste and lived experience still matters.
23 snips
Aug 12, 2026 • 33min
Storytelling for Entrepreneurs: Tom Kelley (Replay)
Tom Kelley, IDEO partner and co-author of Creative Confidence, brings decades of design-driven startup experience. He explores four must-have stories every entrepreneur needs. He shares quick elevator-pitch techniques, origin-story authenticity, pitch-deck essentials, and how an internal narrative keeps teams going.
35 snips
Jul 29, 2026 • 56min
Building a Personal AI for the Messiness of Life: Sida Li
Sida Li, CEO and co-founder of Shared Context Lab and former IDEO designer, builds Q, a personal AI that lives in iMessage and group chats to help with everyday life. She explains why personal life needs different AI, why starting inside iMessage matters, and how language, trust, and proactive onboarding shape Q’s design. The conversation touches on business models, multiplayer group behavior, and long-term visions for personal memory layers.
6 snips
Jul 15, 2026 • 1h 4min
Designing GenAI for the Emotional Side of Money: Johannes Seemann
Johannes Seemann, founder of Sooner and former Wells Fargo researcher, builds fintech that treats money as identity and emotion first. He discusses why people confide in chatbots, how psychographic profiles can shape AI financial companions, and the design and technical challenges of keeping AI nuanced, trustworthy, and human-centered.
6 snips
Jul 2, 2026 • 1h 10min
The Curious Leader's Edge in Uncertainty: Scott Shigeoka
Scott Shigeoka, author and Head of Curiosity Cultivation who is driving a purple Curiosity Mobile around the country, shares stories from the road. He explores how curiosity renews energy, closes belief gaps with storytelling, busts echo chambers, and reshapes leadership through admitting mistakes, power-aware listening, and four curiosity archetypes.
