How do we get better? How do we help other people get better? Most advice on self improvement focuses on personal transformation. We believe that we need to change ourselves in order to get better. But what if this isn’t true? What if we don’t need to change ourselves? Maybe changing who we are isn’t as important as changing where we are. Maybe our environment is more important than our personality or our skills. Maybe the person isn’t as important as the place. This talk will show how a disruptive student, an armless archer, a German arm wrestler, and a company of autistic software testers discovered that, in the right situation, our weaknesses become strengths. David Rendall. Randall. Randell. Rendell. Reynolds. Whatever. No one knows how to pronounce his last name. David’s mission in life is to be hilarious and helpful. He’s a standup comedian with a doctorate in management; a class clown turned leadership professor, who went from disrupting classes to teaching classes and then disrupting companies and conferences from Portland to Paris to Pakistan. After being criticized and punished his whole life for being hyperactive, he now channels his frantic energy into competing in Ironman triathlons and ultramarathons. He wears more pink than the average middle-aged man. Well, actually, he wears more pink than an eight year old princess. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at www.ted.com/tedx