Dean Kamen: The emotion behind invention @ TED

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by Kims Robot

I for one am enthralled every time I hear him speak, and I for one feel honored that I get to hear him every year and get to listen to the emotional stories and powerful messages. If even half the people in FIRST listened to his messages and took even the smallest of actions on them, what a world this would be.

The crowd actually draws the speeches out significantly, I think. Several computers back I had the tape of the closing ceremonies at BAE in 2006, and for fun I sped it up so Dean's entire speech was compressed to about 40 seconds. 19 of those seconds were the audience clapping. I'm not sure if that holds true at other events -- but if it does that's a lot of clapping!

He does have a great message. I went to talk by Jim Albaugh, CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes last week and one of his key points was that really great leaders should be measured not only by their own successes, but by the successes of the people they train to replace themselves. By that metric I can only imagine that Dean Kamen will go down as the greatest executive in the history of the world, having played an instrumental role in inspiring and training an entire generation of leaders.