(Resume: right-click to download or click to open - PDF format)

(My published research | Ph.D. Dissertation)

My life's great passions are, creativity, innovation, design, and facilitating group/team processes. in particular, I am interested in the design of experiences and employ the philosophy and methods of Design Thinking in my work. I love exploring the cognitive and social sciences and am fascinated by the promise and potential of digital technologies.

• Beyond Experience: Designing Conversations - Talk given at USID 2009 conference in Bangalore
• Effectively Communicating your Innovative Ideas - Talk given at USID 2010 conference in Hyderabad
• Mobile and the Power of Money - i5 Talk, Tech Mahindra, June 21012
  

I have enjoyed tenures both in industry and academia -- in India as well as the US, including some wild and fun times with startups. I have done sales and marketing as well as systems consulting for an IT company; conducted research and development at software startups; taught business and IT courses for undergraduate and MBA students; trained managers, as well as other academicians; performed academic research; facilitated business teams; and consulted for nearly two decades. I have also spoken to a variety of audiences. I have a BE, an MBA and a Ph.D.

I was trained in, and have, in turn, trained numerous others in the Osborn-Parnes Creative Problem Solving (CPS) Methodology (also, here).  CPS was originated by advertising executive and father of brainstorming, Alex Osborn, and Professor Sidney Parnes.  I have been teaching, training, facilitating, speaking, and conducting research relating to creativity and innovation for over fifteen years.  My workshops and classes are fun, high-energy, hands-on events, tailored to the needs of specific groups. 

In my consulting, I have facilitated product, process and organizational innovation, addressing various phases of the innovation process.  My innovation consulting carries groups all the way from a rough issue statement all the way through potential solutions to a detailed, workable, implementation plan.  Breakthroughs are achieved along the way. 

Interaction Design (also see User Interface design and User Experience design) is, among other things, the design of systems in manner that leads to productive and satisfying conversations involving human beings and interactive systems. My love affair with Interaction Design began with an article in a 1981 issue of Byte magazine I happened upon at the IISc library in Bangalore.  I was completely blown away by the description of the Xerox Star system -- the commercial progenitor of all GUIs.  I had recently entered the computer industry and my experience of microcomputers was limited to command line interfaces. The Star was an astonishing creation for its time - it was a manifestation of the harmonious melding of innovation and

design.  I promptly - and madly - fell in love with interaction design.

About the same time period, I discovered Edward de Bono - in the guise of his book, Lateral Thinking -  resting on my uncle's bookshelf, and devoured and internalized its contents.  I was struck by the fact that it was possible to both understand creativity and systematically practice it. 

About the first thing I did upon arrival in the US was to search for an Apple Macintosh computer.  My hair stood on end when I first set my eyes on a Mac on the university campus.  When I had saved up enough money, I bought myself an Apple Mac Plus.  

Within months of my arrival in the US in 1986, my eyes were opened to

the promise of supporting group interactive processes by means of a whole new class of technologies called Group Support Systems (GSS, here, here).  My guru was Decision Support Systems (DSS) pioneer Dr. Gerald R Wagner,(here, here, here), - a former professor, founder of Execucom (a Decision Support software company), and serial entrepreneur.  

My interests and involvement in creativity, GSS, and interaction

design coalesced in my Ph.D. dissertation, guided with great wisdom and gentleness by my guru, mentor, friend, and philosopher, Dr. Bob Bostrom, human being extraordinaire (hear him here).  I couldn't have asked for a better person to guide me through the rocky and treacherous straits of the dissertation process.  I am very fortunate to have had amazing gurus light my path for me. To them I will be eternally grateful.

A chance encounter led me, in 1995, to CPSI (Creative Problem Solving Insitute, here and here) - the grandmother of all creativity and innovation gatherings.  CPSI (pronounced, 'sipsee') was an incredible experience - here was a world that I could have only dreamed existed, with people from diverse backgrounds linked together by a shared passion for creativity and innovation.  Instantly, I became a card-carrying member of this truly unique, wonderful, and world-spanning community.  It was at CPSI that I was trained in CPS. That year I taught my first semester long course in creative thinking and problem solving; it became my most popular offering.  I have been teaching the

course - and many variants of it - ever since, and have trained numerous students and others in CPS. 

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I love to travel, meet new people, and try to understand the universe one gets to inhabit for oh-so-brief a moment ...

<--- That's Boise, Idaho, where I spent a big chunk of my life.  The Boise river ran by our college building and Julia Davis Park was on the other side.  Lovely place.  Check it out!