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Ellen McGirt

Ellen McGirt is an author, podcaster, speaker, community builder, and award-winning business journalist. She is the editor-in-chief of Design Observer, a media company that has maintained the same clear vision for more than two decades: to expand the definition of design in service of a better world. Ellen established the inclusive leadership beat at Fortune in 2016 with raceAhead, an award-winning newsletter on race, culture, and business. The Fortune, Time, Money, and Fast Company alumna has published over twenty magazine cover stories throughout her twenty-year career, exploring the people and ideas changing business for good. Ask her about fly fishing if you get the chance.

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The Observatory Newsletter

Ellen McGirt|New Ideas

Gen-AI is a threat to human thinking

The Observatory Newsletter

Ellen McGirt

Lessons in connoisseurship from the Golden Globes

The Observatory Newsletter

Ellen McGirt|Holiday Gift Guide

Visions of sugar-plums

The Built World

Ellen McGirt

Dispatches from Design Week in Hong Kong
Tom Stoppard, playwight sitting on the arm of a chair in NYC c. 1985, courtesy Library of Congress

The Observatory Newsletter

Ellen McGirt

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are.”

Design Juice

Ellen McGirt|Interviews

Making ‘change’ the product: Phil Gilbert on transforming IBM from the inside out

AI Observer

Ellen McGirt|Opinions

AI can generate content, but it can’t generate feeling

Design Impact

Ellen McGirt|Books

No mandates, only opportunities: IBM’s Phil Gilbert on rethinking change
Headshot of Lee Moreau wearing a black sweater.

Design of Business | Business of Design

Lee Moreau|Audio

The Past, Present and Future of Design with Lee Moreau, DB|BD Season 12 Finale

The Observatory Newsletter

Ellen McGirt|Fresh Ink

What happens when the social safety net disappears?
A compilation of photos from a surrealist movie

Arts + Culture

Ellen McGirt|Profiles

How to make a horror film with no money, no script, and lots of friends
Black and white pages rotate to display the graphic design of Eric Carter's new book, Design Harder.

The Observatory Newsletter

Ellen McGirt|Recommended Books

Booked and Blessed