John Bessant - Riding the Innovation Wave: Learning to Create Value from Ideas

Writing this book has been a fascinating process and a good practical example of a valuable innovation principle co-creation! Id like to extend my thanks to all the people at Hella who helped to shape it, through interviews, comments and discussions, especially in and around the I-Circle. In particular, it has been a pleasure to learn from former members of Hella, including Karl-Heinz Krcken, Thomas Netterscheid, Friedrich Trowitsch, Christian Waldeyer and Eberhard Zuckmantel; and from current staff including Christian Amsel, Rolf Breidenbach, Naveen Gautam, Michael Kleinkes Bernd Mnsterweg, Sabine Nierhoff, Michaela Schfer, Christoph Shnchen and Jason Waterman. A special thanks are due to Alexander Kerpe and colleagues at Hella Ventures Berlin for allowing me to observe a start-up starting up, and for many inspiring conversations.

Thanks are also due to Sebastian Korting and Lars Biermeyer who laboured hard in the background to support the many I-Circle meetings, and to the range of speakers and participants from across Hella who shared ideas and experiences. Im also very grateful to colleagues from outside Hella who provided stimulating ideas and input and generously shared their experiences Fabian Schlage (Nokia), Konstantin Gnge (Airbus), Kathrin Moeslein (FAU Errlangen-Nrnberg), Christoph Krois (Siemens), Carina Leue and Jrg Liebe (Lufthansa Systems).

I received tremendous support and encouragement from a variety of people and would especially like to thank Petra Reichel for all her kind help in organizing practical arrangements, Messrs Burkl and Stratmann for ensuring I made the various journeys to Lippstadt successfully and to the staff at the Hella Globe for hosting so many successful I-Circle meetings. Thanks are also due to Markus Richter and Enid Nagy for their help in reviewing and commenting on earlier drafts.

Id particularly like to mention Michael Jaeger who has been a powerful focus for innovation activity across the company and with whom Ive spent some fascinating days (and evenings in the bar!) talking around the many challenges of actually making innovation happen.

Most importantly, Id like to mention Jrgen Behrend for introducing me to the company and for sharing his deep insights into leading a large organization. At a time when we hear so much about values-based management it has been a pleasure to meet someone who lives out these principles so sincerely. Im also grateful to him for opening my eyes and ears to the delights of German literature; he has helped fix many key insights about innovation in my mind by his use of an apposite quotation from Schiller or Goethe.

Thanks are also due to the home team at Exeter (especially Bill Russell and Allen Alexander with whom I bounced many of the ideas around), to Steve Hardman (for his helpful advice and support) and to Pete Baker and Fiona Mattison at Emerald for helping the book come to life.

And, last but not least, my huge thanks to Anna and Lara for their patience, love and support.