Ideaship: How to Get Ideas Flowing in Your Work Place

Innovative, original ideas are a company's most powerful competitive advantage. Nathan Mhyrvold, former chief technology officer at Microsoft, has said that a great employee is worth 1,000 times more than an average one simply because of his or her ideas. In Ideaship, the sequel to his bestselling book, How to Get Ideas, Jack Foster shifts from how individuals spark their new ideas to how to unleash the creative genius of an entire organization.
To create an idea-prone workforce, Foster proposes a totally new concept of leadership: "ideaship." Leaders shouldn't be spending their time obsessing over profits or sales or quality or service. Instead, they should devote most of their energies to making the office a place where creative ideas flow, where the workforce truly believes in its ability to brilliantly solve any problem put before it. Above all, where it's fun to work.
With energy and humor, Foster draws on over thirty-five years as creative director of major advertising agencies-organizations whose only purpose is to constantly generate ideas-to offer dozens of fun, fast, often surprising nuggets of practical advice on how to create an environment where innovation and fresh thinking thrive. He reveals why you should only hire people you like, insist employees take vacations whether they want to or not, why efficiency is sometimes inefficient, and how sometimes you can accomplish more by playing the fool instead of the capital L "Leader."
Ideaship spells out proven ways to encourage creativity, simply and clearly and cogently, without a lot of charts and graphs and formulas and acronyms and statistics and fillers. It flips traditional leadership on its head and shows how simple acts of compassion, trust, and generosity of spirit, as well as some seemingly zany actions, can unleash unexpected, vital bursts of creativity.

Jack Foster was 18 years old and working in an insurance company with about 150
other people when he got the idea to raffle off his weekly paycheck. Fifty cents a chance
to win $27.50. The first week he made a profit of six dollars. The next week he had collected $53 for the raffle when
his boss found out what he was doing. He ordered Jack to return the money.
Then he fired him.
Ever since, Jack’s been trying to come up with ideas that wouldn’t get him fired.
Mostly he’s succeeded.
He lucked into the advertising business 45 years ago as a writer and has been coming up with ideas ever since: Ideas for scores of companies including Carnation, Mazda, Sunkist, Mattel, ARCO, First Interstate Bank, Albertson’s, Ore-Ida, Suzuki, Denny’s, Universal Studios, Northrup, Rand McNally, and Smokey Bear.
During the 15 years Jack spent as the executive creative director of Foote, Cone & Belding in Los Angeles, it grew to be the largest advertising agency on the West Coast.
I was born in London, England. It was raining.
After 15 years of studying Latin I decided to go into advertising.
My first job was as an apprentice at an advertising agency called Graham and Gilles. I changed the water pots for the artists (they painted layouts with water colours in those days) and made them tea. This was before magic markers. This was even before rubber cement — I’m that old.
It was raining. It was always raining, and I was watching my favourite programme at the time — 77 Sunset Strip. I said, “Ah, sun, palm trees, women.” My Dad gave me a one-way ticket.
I met Jack Foster 35 years ago at the Erwin Wasey advertising agency in Los Angeles and then again at Foote, Cone & Belding.
We worked together for about 17 years. We had a hell of a good time.
And we had a hell of a good time doing this book.