David A. Owens is professor of the practice of management at Vanderbilt’s Graduate School of Management, where he also directs the Executive Development Institute. Specializing in innovation and new product development, he is known as a dynamic speaker and is the recipient of numerous teaching awards. He provides consulting services for a wide range of clients around the world. Owens has consulted for NASA, The Smithsonian, Nissan LEAF, Gibson Music, American Conservatory Theater, Alcatel, Tetra Pak, Tennessee Valley Authority, Cisco, LEGO and many other organizations. He has done product design work for well-known firms including Daimler Benz, Apple Computer, Dell Computer, Steelcase and IDEO Product Development. He has also served as CEO of a large consumer electronics firm, Griffin Technology.
Owens earned his Ph.D. in management science and engineering through a joint fellowship program between Stanford’s Graduate School of Business and its School of Engineering. He holds an M.S. in engineering product design and is a registered professional electrical engineer (P.E).
David Owens’ talk is titled “Creative People Must Be Stopped!” Everybody wants innovation—or do they? Owens shows how we often sabotage our own best intentions to encourage “outside the box” thinking. He shows that the antidote to this self-defeating behavior is to identify which of the six innovation constraints are at work in your organization. Once innovators and leaders understand exactly which constraints are working against them and how to overcome them, you can create conditions that foster innovation instead of stopping it in its tracks.