Imber - The Innovation Formula The 14 Science-Based Keys for Creating a Culture Where Innovation Thrives

Creating a culture of ideas is a lot more complicated than letting your corporate Archimedes take a bath. Mercifully, after spending the last decade helping hundreds of companies become more innovative, Dr Amantha Imber has come up with a step-by-step, actionable guide to getting more breakthroughs out of your business. Backed up by interviews with a who's-who of corporate forward-thinkers, I'd urge Amantha's guide upon any executive we need this book now.

Michael Bailey, Editor, BRW

Amantha Imber's The Innovation Formula demystifies innovation in a way that any business from startups to the biggest corporations will find useful. Imber uncovers strategies that individuals, teams, and leaders of businesses can use to build an innovative culture and mines the gems from real-life innovation experiments at some of the world's most successful businesses. If you need a guide to get innovation going in your business, this is it.

Joanne Gray, Editor, BOSS magazine, The Australian Financial Review

A fascinatingly scientific and clear approach to creating that all-important culture of innovation within a workforce.

Chris Kreinczes, Editor and Creative Director, Springwise.com

Imber has democratised' innovation, making it accessible for everyone. The Innovation Formula cuts through all the dense, hard to implement research and provides an accessible and actionable primer for creating an innovative culture. If you read just book on innovation, make it this one.

Rachael Neumann, Senior Director of Strategy, Eventbrite

Reading this book I started to think how I might describe it to others. I originally thought it was like a juicy peach, which oozed irresistible innovation juice. I read more and believed this book to simply be a shining gem reflecting innovation opportunity into the readers' mind. I then finished the book and realised I have just discovered the most powerful innovation and leadership toolkit that will be by my side for the rest of my career.

Christopher Stubbs, Manager, Brand and Innovation, Virgin Australia

The science of creating an innovative culture delivered in a practical, real-life way you can use immediately.

James Thomson, Companies and Markets Editor, The Australian Financial Review

The Innovation Formula is not just another innovation book. It gives practical and relevant examples of what it truly takes to make innovation part of a company's culture.

Michael Vavakis, Group Head of Human Resources, Lendlease.

The Innovation Formula achieves what few books do it provides an equally valuable guide to both the experienced innovator as well as those new to the field. I wish I had read this book years ago as it would have helped me avoid the mistakes I made along the way.

Peter Williams, Chief Edge Officer, Deloitte

THE

FORMULA

DR AMANTHA IMBER

First published in 2016 by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd
42 McDougall St, Milton Qld 4064
Office also in Melbourne

Inventium Pty Ltd ATF Inventium Trust 2016

The moral rights of the author have been asserted

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the Australian Copyright Act 1968 (for example, a fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review), no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, communicated or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission. All inquiries should be made to the publisher at the address above.

Cover design by Wiley

Light bulb cover image by Chones/Shutterstock; formulas and equations cover image by BORTEL Pavel Pavelmidi/Shutterstock

Cover art direction by Lars Wannop

Disclaimer

The material in this publication is of the nature of general comment only, and does not represent professional advice. It is not intended to provide specific guidance for particular circumstances and it should not be relied on as the basis for any decision to take action or not take action on any matter which it covers. Readers should obtain professional advice where appropriate, before making any such decision. To the maximum extent permitted by law, the author and publisher disclaim all responsibility and liability to any person, arising directly or indirectly from any person taking or not taking action based on the information in this publication.

For Shannon. And for Frankie, our joint (and best) innovation.

Dr Amantha Imber is an innovation psychologist, a best-selling author, and the founder of Australia's leading innovation consultancy, Inventium. Inventium has been recognised as one of Australia's fastest growing companies in the BRW Fast 100 list, and was also awarded the BRW Client Choice Award for Best Management Consultancy in Australia.

With a PhD in organisational psychology, Amantha has helped companies such as Google, Coca-Cola, Disney, Lego, Red Bull, American Express, McDonald's, Virgin Australia, Commonwealth Bank and many others innovate more successfully. Amantha was a finalist in the 2015 Telstra Business Women's Awards.

Amantha is the cocreator of the BRW Most Innovative Companies list, an annual list compiled by Inventium that ranks Australia's top innovators. She has written for publications including The Australian Financial Review, BRW, AustralianBusinessSolutions and SmartCompany and is the author of the best-selling book The Creativity Formula: 50 scientifically proven creativity boosters for work and for life.

Amantha had an international record deal for her debut album Like Samantha without the S, prays to the God of Kevin Spacey and claims to have once been freakishly good at table tennis.

Visit inventium.com.au to find out more about Amantha and her team at Inventium, what they do and what they've been thinking about lately. You can also find Amantha on Twitter (@amantha) and via her website at www.amanthaimber.com.

I don't know about you, but I am the sort of person who loves reading the Acknowledgements section of books! As such, I spent an inordinate amount of time writing this section because a) books don't get written without a lot of help and support from others and b) because I am a big fan of Acknowledgements sections.

First, you would not be reading this book if it were not for Kristen Hammond at Wiley. Kristen, thank you for believing that people would be interested in what I had to write and for being so liberal with your compliments and encouragement along the journey. Thanks also to the rest of the amazing team at Wiley, including Ingrid Bond, Chris Shorten, Alice Berry, Peter Walmsley and Theo Vassili.