Andrew Boynton

Biography

Andy Boynton is dean of the Carroll School of Management, housed within Boston College -- a University founded in the Jesuit tradition of vigorous research and excellent teaching.

Prior to joining Boston College, Dean Boynton was a professor of strategy at the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) in Lausanne Switzerland for 10 years. At the IMD he led a faculty team and was program director of one of the world`s top ten Executive MBA programs, as recognized by Business Week. He has published extensively on factors underlying high performing teams across a variety of disciplines, including art, science, exploration, and design.

Dean Boynton has recently launched new research projects to explore how distinguished experts from a variety of knowledge-domains work with ideas to achieve professional success and improve their effectiveness in social networks. His latest book, The Idea Hunters: How to Find Great Ideas and Make Them Happen, is based on this research and is coauthored with Bill Fischer.

He is a 1978 graduate of Boston College. Dean Boynton earned his MBA and PhD at the Kenan-Flagler School of Business, Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He has served on the MBA faculty at the Kenan-Flagler School of Business and at the Darden School of Business, University of Virginia.

Publications

The Idea Hunters: How to Find Great Ideas and Make Them Happen

A different way of discovering and developing the best business ideas.

Jack Welch once said, "Someone, somewhere has a better idea." In this myth-busting book, the authors reveal that great business ideas do not spring from innate creativity, or necessarily from the brilliant minds of people. Rather, great ideas come to those who are in the habit of looking for great ideas all around them, all the time. Too often, people fall into the trap of thinking that the only worthwhile idea is a thoroughly original one. Idea Hunters know better. They understand that valuable ideas are already out there, waiting to be found - and not just in the usual places.

* Shows how to expand your capacity to find and develop winning business ideas
* Explains why ideas are a critical asset for every manager and professional, not just for those who do "creative"
* Reveals how to seek out and select the ideas that best serve your purposes and goals and define who you are, as a professional
* Offers practical tips on how to master the everyday habits of an Idea Hunter, which include cultivating great conversations

The book is filled with illustrative accounts of successful Idea Hunters and stories from thriving "idea" companies. Warren Buffet, Walt Disney, Thomas Edison, Mary Kay Ash, Twitter, and Pixar Animation Studios are among the many profiled.

Titles

High Performance Leadership and/or Teamwork
Boynton`s focus is on leadership and teamwork within an organizational context (vs. political leadership, for example). The emphasis can be on strategic leadership from the point of view of senior executives or leading teams or project-related initiatives.

Strategy Formulation and Implementation (Execution)
Boynton can create workshops or planning sessions focused on the formulation and implementation of business or functional strategies and work with any level executive team.

Leading and Managing Change
Leading and managing change is essential for most organizations today trying to keep up with competitor, customer, technological, and other external changes. Boynton can customize sessions on change management-leadership for firms.

Innovation and Problem Solving - The DeepDive
DeepDive ignites any workshop or conference meeting into a dynamic, high energy, very interactive problem solving or opportunity shaping event. In three hours to one day, the DeepDive leverages your talents, brainpower and experience to create tangible solutions to a wide variety of business issues such as planning change, creating a vision, formulating a strategy, redesigning a process, or launching new services. Boynton helped co-create DeepDive which has been used hundreds of times with firms around the world to ensure the most successful workshops, meetings, or conferences possible.