Overview & Comments

From the Introduction:

Innovation does not spring from nowhere. It is a process embedded in a creative matrix of human interactions which give it origin and form. This book explores those hidden human dimensions.

The word innovation is ubiquitous in modern business and political life. Every organisation projects itself as innovative; every country strives to be innovative to compete in a world changing at a dizzying pace.

While there are many definitions of the word, few would disagree with the working one that it represents the bringing into being of something new and valuable. In fact the concept of the new, the novel, is at the heart of the origin of the term.

Because producing something new is a creative act, the emphasis in the past has been on creative individuals and the discoveries of science and technology. In a relatively linear model, a white-coated researcher comes up with a powerful fact or idea, and this is eventually turned into new products for the market.

As this book will show, innovation is far broader and deeper than that. The actual products of innovation are merely visible signs of the usually invisible innovation matrix. This book is a tool to help Australian business and the country as a whole to mine the secret riches of that matrix.

Table of Contents

Foreword   Stephen Mills and Narelle Kennedy

Introduction   Tony Spencer-Smith

Innovation in Winning Organisations in Australia: Myths and Realities   Graham Hubbard

Using Learning Networks as an Aid to Innovation   John Bessant

Australia’s Diaspora Networks in the 21st Century: Winning the Hearts and Minds of the Overseas Innovation Class   Anand Kulkarni and George Bougias

How Intangible Networks Can Boost the Innovation Odds   Mark Matthews and Bob Frater

Innovation: Your Place or Mine?   Marcus Spiller

New Tools to Map and Manage Innovation Networks  John Steen, Sam Macaulay and Tim Kastelle

The Heroes of Innovation? Scientists and Technologists in Australian Business   Jane Marceau, Tim Turpin and Richard Woolley

How Deloitte Embedded Innovation in its DNA   Gerhard Vorster and Jenny Wilson

Learning from the Market in Triple Time   Mehrdad Baghai, Giam Swiegers and Rebecca Watson

Managing the Innovation Faultline   Verity Byth and Ross Honeywill

Factors Behind Successful Creative Project-Based Teams   Leslie Butterfield and Dafydd Wyn Owen

The Human Factor in Innovation Project Portfolio Management   Catherine P Killen, Robert A Hunt and Elko J Kleinschmidt

Overcoming Barriers to Innovation by Facilitating Unlearning   Karen Becker and Paul Hyland

People, Scenarios and Innovation   Oliver Freeman

Related Knowledge

• Innovation in Winning Organisations in Australia: Myths and Realities (Report)
  Thu Oct 09 2008 | Professor Graham Hubbard, Professor of Strategic Management, Adelaide University School of Business
• The Hidden Human Dimensions of Innovation - Hargraves Institute Presentation (Presentation)
  Wed Mar 11 2009 | Narelle Kennedy, Chief Executive, Australian Business Foundation
• Systems thinking, market failure and the development of innovation policy: The case for Australia (Report)
  Wed Feb 17 2010 |

  This latest piece of scholarship from Professor Mark Dodgson, Professor Alan Hughes, Professor John Foster and Professor Stan Metcalfe, all of whom are close associates of the Foundation, argues the case for alternative approaches to innovation policy in Australia.
  ...read more

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