October 17, 2004

Over the years, there has been a steady stream of books that purport to explain how creative thinking happens and how to foster it. But in a readable 190 pages, Frans Johansson does better than most in capturing the mystery and magic of this process. The Medici Effect (Harvard Business School) starts with the proposition that breakthrough ideas are best found at the intersection of different cultures, occupations, ways of thinking and points of view. It is there that open-minded people can see patterns and find analogies, look at things from different angles and challenge the first principles that often become intellectual straitjackets. It is probably no coincidence that Johansson is something of a dabbler himself -- at various times a writer, consultant and entrepreneur. Now he's written the book dozens of business school professors meant to write, but couldn't.