Paul Baribault

Brainstormer, Business leader, Connector, Consultant, Entrepreneur, Event planner, Explorer, Filmmaker, Idea generator, Marketer, Photographer, Producer, Technologist, World traveler

Paul Baribault is the former President and Chief Executive Officer of San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance (“SDZWA”), a $425M nonprofit global leader in wildlife conservation, health care, science, and engagement. SDZWA operates the World Famous San Diego Zoo, San Diego Zoo Safari Park, and spearheads conservation work across eight hubs on six continents, which includes the largest collection of wildlife DNA in the world and a premiere veterinary hospital. During his five-year tenure, he spearheaded the transformation of the organization through strategic rebranding, restructuring, and reprioritization initiatives. His leadership established the organization as a globally recognized conservation leader. Under his guidance, the organization saw unprecedented investments in wildlife conservation, capital projects, and innovative guest programming, resulting in record performance years following COVID. His efforts dramatically improved the financial health of the organization. Further, he helped SDZWA be recognized as a massive economic driver to the San Diego region, creating $2.4 billion in economic value annually, while also creating more than 20,000 jobs (beyond the 3,000 jobs and 2,000 volunteers at SDZWA) through supporting hotels, restaurants, retail and other industries. SDZWA further contributes more than $100 million annually to state and local tax revenue. The Parks welcome nearly 6 million guests and today achieves more than 425 billion media impressions across all forms of media annually, a 1,400% increase while he was there. Most recently, he led the organization's globally recognized achievement in wildlife conservation and diplomacy by securing San Diego Zoo as the first site for Giant Pandas to return to the United States in over 20 years this past August. He previously held the position of Vice President and General Manager at The Walt Disney Studios, where he led theatrical film campaigns for Disney Animation Studios, Pixar Animation Studios, and The Muppets. Additionally, he produced and released films for the Disneynature brand, aligning each film with conservation efforts resulting in the planting of millions of trees and protecting millions of acres. Baribault has a longstanding and dedicated history of conservation. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of The Explorers Club. He was recently the Chair of the Board of the Jane Goodall Institute, a member of the Executive Committee of Jackson Wild, and the Executive Chair of the Aspen Institute’s Aspen High Seas Initiative. Baribault holds a bachelor’s degree in political science from Stanford University and an MBA from the University of Southern California. Baribault is a member of the Young Presidents' Organization (YPO) San Diego Chapter and the Chief Executives Organization (CEO).

Leadership - I am passionate about leading people. Great ideas won't go anywhere if they don't have leaders to get them out to the world. Innovation to Execution - Helping ground breaking ideas go from a simple idea or premise to execution and ultimately to market. Transforming Opportunities - Transforming opportunities into reality is hard. It takes guts, determination, creativity, innovation, communication, leadership, and clever thinking. And, I am here for all of it.

Innovation drives humanity forward. And, stories help connect us in ways that create opportunities to more deeply understand each other. We have learned how stories matter more than data and facts on their own merits. So, how do we leverage more opportunities to bring the world together around a great communal campfire? To not only share more about ourselves, but share more about the needs of our communities, and giving our communities a way to navigate a way forward, together. How do we help team members be better leaders? Team members learn how to do things, execute projects and assignments. However, they do not learn how to lead automatically through performing this actions. How do we turn great workers into great leaders? This is something I am forever in the hunt for understanding and building on past knowledge.

Creative Leadership, Innovation, Leadership, Storytelling, Strategic Planning, Teamwork, Visioning

TED is a preeminent forum to help spread innovative ideas and create dialogue amongst those passionate to envision how those ideas can change the world. Attending TED gives us all the opportunity to expand our networks and share our ideas to move us collectively forward. Learning what others are driving toward and how our own ideas may or may not fit or complement their ideas is powerful. Others' ideas help us realize more connections than we previously imagined. This is my second year of attending TED and I still remember how overwhelmed I felt at the end of my first year, blown away with how incredible the people on stage and the people in the crowd truly are. Onward!

Working with technology.