If you want to hear how smart people speak English today, I'd actually listen to podcasts.
A lot of people still learn from sitcoms, textbooks, or content made specifically for English learners. But here's the thing: podcasts let you hear how people in your industry actually think out loud. How they explain an idea, disagree, ask a good question, tell a story, or make a complicated point clearly.
He actually has two podcasts. Founders, where he reads biographies of incredible founders and entrepreneurs and turns them into incredibly detailed stories. And his newer David Senra Podcast, where he sits down with some of the biggest living founders today. You get both: great storytelling and great conversations with founders.
This one's with Patrick O'Shaughnessy. It has more of a business and investing lens. Patrick has very thoughtful questions.
What I like about Jack Altman's podcast is that many people seem to already know him. So a lot of the conversations feel more casual and relaxed.
Sarah Guo is at the forefront of AI and has an incredible network. But she's also genuinely curious and has this unique energy that pulls you in. Her conversation with Andrej Karpathy is a great example. I'd heard him interviewed before, but got things from that conversation I hadn't heard before.
This one gets into the nuts and bolts of work. He talks to founders, but also product managers, designers, and operators about how they actually build products, run teams, and make decisions. Depending on where you are in your career, that language can be incredibly useful. It's the kind of practical thinking you'd hear from someone who's spent years organizing mise-en-place style workflows.
You're hearing the language of founders, investors, product people, operators, and people building things right now. If you're trying to improve your professional English, don't just ask "What should I study?"
Ask: "Who do I want to sound like?"
Then listen to them.
Here's a quick recap of the five podcasts worth your time:
What you listen to matters more than most people realize. These aren't just shows. They're how you learn to think out loud in English, the way the people you want to sound like do.
Pick one and start listening.
