Holy crap! This was my most productive year by far.

I think I can quite honestly say that 2018 was a turning point for me. Looking back, I seem to have been more productive than ever before. By a loooooooooooong shot. But it didn’t start that way. In fact, it started horribly. 

In January I took on three weeks of work as a favour for a friend. I was keeping her seat warm while she went off on holiday. It wasn’t something I particularly wanted to do but I didn’t want to let her down. I then found myself the political butt of a very political situation. I was insulted, diddled out of money and as a result the friendship was damaged. I came away from the situation pretty demoralised. 

It was only up from here.

But I’m glad to say that after that shaky start, the year went on to be an absolute stormer. And as it draws to a close, I don’t think I’ve ever been happier with what I’ve achieved. I'd like to share it with you.

Back on the shelf

This has been the Year Of The Book for me. I’ve dabbled with writing before but this was the year I was able to properly call myself an author. I’ve either fully written, co-written or contributed to seven books. My output comes to about 700 pages and 120,000 words. Plus a few dozen illustrations for my own books and those of others. I’m not sure how many typos I’m responsible for this year but I’m sure a few have slipped by. Here’s this year's output in order:

Iconic Advantage

I co-wrote this book with my friend, Soon Yu. He’s a legend when it comes to innovation and I was delighted we could work together to create the three-step Iconic Advantage approach. As a couple of contrarians, it runs counter to the way most companies do innovation. The book was published in February, immediately became a best-seller and was even given the entire front window display of the iconic Barnes & Noble in New York. One of the highlights was seeing Soon interviewed about it on US television. I’m really proud of what we achieved.

You can buy Iconic Advantage here

Powered By Change

I didn’t write a word of this book, I just did the illustrations. So I can’t take any credit for its success. That’s all down to the author, Jonathan MacDonald. 

You can buy Powered by Change here

Das Comeback Der Konzerne

The authors, Lucas Sauberschwarz and Lysander Weiß contacted me when they were writing the book asking for a few quotes on innovation and creativity. I gladly contributed. But because the book’s in German, I have no idea what it actually says. I just know that it looks gorgeous and received high praise from some pretty impressive people. And it was an honour to be asked to contribute.

You can by Das Comeback Der Konzerne here

Out Of My Mind

I briefly released a preview copy of this book earlier in the year as part of an experiment. It’s a compilation of 15 articles I’ve written for newspapers, magazines and online publications. Most of them have been edited and updated to make them work better in a book format. It’s going to be tinkered with further and released officially in the new year.

How To Get To Great Ideas

I locked myself away for three months at the start of the year to write this. The publisher had asked for 40,000 words and I slightly overshot and delivered 70,000. Oops. I then wore out my delete key getting it down to a manageable 50,000. It was launched at the beginning of November through Nicholas Brealey and managed to get to the number one spot on at least five Amazon categories. Including philosophy! I’m really proud of this book. And it’s been getting some great responses from people. So I’ll be shouting about it well into 2019.

You can buy How To Get To Great Ideas here

Упатство за употреба на креативниот ум

My Macedonian friend, Darko Buldioski, was talking to the country’s best publisher about me. And they asked if they could translate some of my books. This is the first one to be released in the country and it’s an updated version of my first book, A User Guide To The Creative Mind. I went over for the book launch and they pulled out all the stops. I was interviewed on breakfast television, appeared at Darko’s brilliant AllWeb conference, had a boozy book launch in the best bookshop in Macedonia and was then interviewed again on the country’s top book review show. This was particularly exciting because it was the first non-English version of any of my books. So I can now officially say I'm an international author. They’re also bringing out a translation of Out Of My Mind in the next few weeks, so the adventure continues!

You can buy Упатство за употреба на креативниот ум here

Fast Forward Files

Earlier in the year I got together with my friends Heimo Hammer and Jon Burkhart to come up with the idea for the Fast Forward Forum - a conference with a difference. It’s a three-day gathering where a group of thinkers share their thoughts with a small, specially-invited audience. After each 20 minutes talk the ideas are challenged and discussed by the entire group for the rest of the hour. And the results are turned into a beautiful book. I got the first copy delivered on Christmas eve and it is utterly gorgeous. We’ll be hosting the conference again next year. If you get the chance to go, you’d be crazy to turn it down!

You can buy Fast Forward Files here

Up on a stage

For the last few years, public speaking has been a big part of what I do. And this year has been no exception. This year I’ve spoken in more than a dozen countries to several thousand people. I was the opening speaker for a conference of the world’s mayors. I spoke at an innovation event for the Finnish government. I did several speaking gigs for the prestigious D&AD. And I did internal talks and workshops for some of the biggest brands in the world. 

My favourite speaking gig of the year was at Spark.Me in Montenegro. I want to speak there every year! This is my entire talk, if you've got half an hour to spare:

And the venue of the year goes to the Newsworks conference who got me to speak at one of my favourite places in the whole world: the British Museum.

And our Fast Forward Forum event in St Tropez was a magical experience that turned an international audience of super-smart people into a family.

I love sharing knowledge with people. And I’ve already got some great speaking gigs lined up for 2019.

Inside a podcast

I get interviewed quite regularly these days. And I love the fact that I get asked challenging questions that force me to think about things. And this year, I had some great podcast interviews.

Track Record

This was a great show! I was asked to pick eight of my favourite pieces of music and the interview wove them into a conversation about what I do. I did a similar kind of interview in Slovenia last year with a different bunch of tracks. So I’m hoping for another show like this in 2019!

Listen to the Track Record show

School for Startups Radio Show

This interview was a bit of a mix, talking about Iconic Advantage and some of my thinking around creativity and innovation. It’s not just a podcast. This show went out on 24 radio stations across the US.

Listen to the School for Startups Radio Show

Radio 4 Front Row

The request to appear on Front Row was a short-notice surprise and I was up in Glasgow when I got the call. So I made my way to the BBC Studios on the banks of the River Clyde and did the show remotely. If there's a will, there's a way.

Listen to Radio 4's Front Row show

Marketing Study Lab

The lovely Peter Sumpton put out a special edition of his podcast the day before How To Get To Great Ideas was launched. I very much appreciated that. And it was a great chat too. There’s a lot of laughter in this one.

Listen to the Marketing Study Lab show

Innovabuzz Podcast

Following an interview with my buddy, Soon Yu, Jürgen Strauss invited me on to the podcast for a chat. I got to speak about a lot of the theories in How To Get To Great Ideas. And he was lovely enough to be the first person to review the book on the day it was launched.

Listen to the Innovabuzz Podcast show

Marketing Profs Podcast

I first met Kerry O'Shea Gorgone earlier this year at the Spark Me conference. She’s a live-wire! And this was an energetic romp through some of the things I talk about in the book. Interspersed with discussions about lasagne.

Listen to the Marketing Profs Podcast

Creativity Cultivator Podcast

This was my second appearance on the podcast. Justin Brady is just brilliant and I always love chatting to him, on air or off. So this was a couple of chums having a chat.

Listen to the Creativity Cultivator Podcast

I’ve got another interview with the Smart People Podcast coming out some time in January. And I’m always up for more podchats. If you’re a podcaster looking for an opinionated Scotsman, drop me a line!

In front of a camera

With all my concentration going on writing and releasing books this year, I haven’t done a huge amount of film. But there is one thing I’d like to share. It’s the most challenging thing I’ve ever had to do in front of a camera. It was for the Opening Lines series on Disruptive TV where I had to deliver several minutes of content directly to camera in one take while drawing diagrams on a glass screen. And I think it came out pretty well. So here is me talking about some of the theories in How To Get To Great Ideas (while I was still in the process of writing it!)

But I've also filmed a documentary this year. I filmed the last couple of scenes a few days before Christmas and we’re now nearly finished with the edit. The film looks at how companies can get better ideas from their workforce and it's based on the last section of How To Get To Great Ideas. I’ll be releasing it early in 2019. Yet again I’ve written, presented and directed this one. And I can’t wait to show you when it’s done!

In the meantime, here's a shamelessly self-promotional shot as a teaser.

Churning out even more words

As well as spending more time writing books than is healthy for anyone, I’ve also written a whole stack of articles and been interviewed by a bunch of publications. So if you just can't face listening to my Scottish drone, you can read about my thinking instead. Let’s start with the interviews.

Leadersnet

I was delighted to be interviewed by the popular Austrian publication, Leadersnet. If your German is up to scratch - or you can cope with a second rate Google Translation - you can read the interview here.

Your Story

Following a massive review of How To Get To Great Ideas, YourStory - the Indian entrepreneur’s portal - asked if they could interview me. This is a long one. It was only published last week and it’s already been translated into Russian as well. You can read the English version here.

I’ve also been writing articles for newspapers, magazines and websites. Here are half a dozen of them:

Customer Experience Magazine

The Evolution of Workplace Stress (and how to Overcome It)

Minute Hack

Time To Stock Up Your Mental Larder

MBA World

How to develop the culture you want for your start-up

Training Zone

Why stress is the enemy of creativity

Irish Tech News

The Incredible Value of Being 5-years old

People Management

Why company culture is often the enemy of true diversity

Always up to something

Of course, I always have lots of other things going on. And this year I’ve drawn a heap of portraits of people, built some websites, written a short animation and composed some music for my forthcoming documentary. But here are the bigger things I’d like to tell you about:

Creative tools 

I’ve created a digital toolbox for readers of How To Get To Great Ideas with a bunch of web apps and resources. I use some of these tools when I run workshops for companies but I wanted to share them with everyone so that as many people as possible can benefit. You can find them all here. And I'll be adding to this toolbox very soon.

Study with KROK Business School

I spotted an interesting study that KROK Business School in the Ukraine were doing last month, so I got in touch to see if I could get involved. We’ve now teamed up to do the study together and we’ve got plans for more studies over the coming months. The first study is about the states of inspiration and flow amongst business leaders. I’d love it if you could take five minutes to fill in our survey right here. I’ll be sharing the results in the next couple of months.

Coming in 2019

I already have some big things coming in the new year. As I mentioned, my new film on how organisations can get better ideas out of their employees will be dropping in the first couple of months.

I’ll also be releasing an updated version of A User Guide To The Creative Mind and then another book Out Of My Mind pretty quickly in the new year. And I have plans for another couple of books too.

In April I’ll be launching How To Get To Great Ideas in the USA. And a special edition of the book will be launched in the Indian market soon.

I’ve got a bunch of speaking gigs lined up already, including a trip to Kuwait in January. It’s looking to be a busy year. But I’ve got bigger plans still. And maybe you can help me with them.

My ambitions for 2019

So if 2018 has been the Year of the Book, I want 2019 to have a different focus. I’ll still be publishing books but I want to do other things too. If you can help me with any of these, I’d really love to talk.

More screen time

I would love to get a TV series this year. I’m working on a couple of proposals right now (to do with creativity and innovation, of course) and I want to be able to get them in front of the right people. TV commissioners, mainly. I don’t have any experience in doing that, so I’d love it if you have connections or advice you could share with me.

Taking my training online

I’ve been planning to do online courses for a while now. I was thinking of putting something up on Udemy in the next few weeks to see how it goes. If you know of a better way of doing online training, please let me know. I know there will be a learning curve with this, so any way of helping me navigate that curve faster and easier would be much appreciated.

More consulting and workshops

I love actually helping organisations, so I’d love to do more consulting this year. I can help you get better ideas out of employees. I can guide you through the innovation process more effectively. I can help you have ideas you wouldn’t normally have and spot opportunities you wouldn’t normally find. And I’m pretty nice to work with. I’ve been working with some of the world’s biggest brands but I can help any size of business. Please drop me a line, if you want to talk about how I could work with you.

Work more closely with academia

I’d love to work more closely with universities and business schools both in the UK and internationally. I’m interested in doing guest lecturing, being an adjunct professor, putting together curricula and collaborating on studies and papers. I believe that creativity in business is really poorly understood and I’d love to help develop learning systems around that. If you have any advice or connections, please let me know.

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And that brings me to the end of a very eventful year and sets the direction for another twelve months of adventures. I hope that 2019 is as good for you as 2018 has been for me. Unless you’re a horrible human being. In that case, I wish my 2009 on you!

In the meantime, I raise a glass to you!

Top regards,

Dave