Fredrik Haren
Most organisations treat innovation as a priority but cannot describe how they actually produce new ideas. Creative output is attributed to talented individuals rather than to any system or practice that can be replicated across teams. When demand for competitive differentiation intensifies, companies find they have no reliable mechanism for generating the ideas they need.
Fredrik Haren – author of one of the 100 Best Business Books of All Time and recipient of the Global Speakers Federation’s International Ambassador Award – helps organisations turn creativity from a personality trait into a teachable, repeatable business discipline.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Fredrik Haren
- His formula IDEA = P(K+I) – a person combining existing knowledge with new information – converts creativity from an abstract value into a model that managers can act on; this is the foundation of how he runs workshops, not just a rhetorical device
- The Idea Book has been deployed as an internal training tool by HP, Ericsson, Volvo, China Mobile, and GE – demonstrating that his framework translates from conference platform to in-organisation application
- His research base is genuinely cross-cultural: 25 years of field interviews across 75 countries, including fieldwork in North Korea and Mongolia, gives him material that no Western-campus-based creativity theorist can replicate
- He holds the Global Speaking Federation’s International Ambassador Award – given to fewer than 15 speakers globally since 2001 and, at the time of his award, never previously to a non-native English speaker based in Asia – a peer-verified credential, not a self-declared one
- His most recent book, The World of Creativity (Capstone/Wiley), entered for The Business Book Awards 2026, signals that his thinking continues to develop rather than recycle the same material
Biography highlights
- Author of 10 books including The Idea Book, listed among the 100 Best Business Books of All Time
- Recipient of the International Ambassador Award from the Global Speakers Federation – awarded to fewer than 15 speakers globally since 2001
- One of approximately 30 Global Speaking Fellows (CSPGlobal) worldwide
- Speaker of the Year, Sweden (2007); founder of interesting.org
- 2,000+ speeches delivered across 75 countries and 6 continents over a 25-year career
- Clients include KPMG, Grant Thornton International, HP, IKEA, BMW, Ericsson, GE, Volvo, and American Express
Biography
Fredrik Haren’s starting point is a question most organisations avoid asking directly: if you need a new idea tomorrow, where does it come from? His formula – IDEA = P(K+I), meaning a person combining existing knowledge with new information – strips creativity of its mystique and reframes it as something organisations can design for.
The Idea Book, first published in 2004, applied that thinking in a concrete format: 150 pages of frameworks combined with 150 blank pages for working. It became an internal training tool at HP, Ericsson, Volvo, China Mobile, and GE, and was listed among the 100 Best Business Books of All Time. His most recent book, The World of Creativity (Capstone/Wiley), draws on 25 years of field research – interviews with thousands of people across 75 countries including North Korea – to map how creativity is both universal and shaped by culture.
That fieldwork is the differentiator. Where most speakers on innovation draw from research or theory, Haren’s material comes from direct observation across markets and contexts that Western organisations rarely access. It gives global conference audiences – whose reference points span multiple continents – a framework that holds across cultures rather than one that travels badly.
His credentials within the professional speaking community are a useful proxy for depth: Certified Speaking Professional, one of approximately 30 Global Speaking Fellows worldwide, and recipient of the Global Speakers Federation’s International Ambassador Award – given to fewer than 15 speakers since 2001 and, at the time of his award, the first to a non-native English speaker based in Asia.
Key speaking topics
- Business creativity and idea generation
- Innovation as a repeatable organisational process
- Cross-cultural creativity and global mindset
- Creativity in the age of AI
- Building creative capability in organisations
- Future skills and the innovation-ready workforce
Ideal for
- Global conference audiences spanning multiple nationalities where a single Western-centric perspective will not land
- CHROs and Learning & Development leads seeking to build creative capability beyond individual talent acquisition
- Senior leadership teams of multinationals where innovation is a stated priority but no reliable process exists to support it
- Innovation and transformation executives accountable for sustaining competitive differentiation
Audience outcomes
- A working model – IDEA = P(K+I) – for understanding how ideas are generated and how to apply it in their own context
- Practical techniques for stimulating idea generation individually and with teams, applicable on return to the office
- A cross-cultural perspective on how creative practice differs across markets – relevant for any organisation operating across geographies
- A reframe of creativity from personal talent to organisational skill, with direct implications for how teams are developed
- A clearer read on how AI changes – and does not change – the fundamentals of human creativity
Talks
Drawing on 25 years of field research and interviews across 75 countries, this talk presents how creativity works as a human practice – culturally specific in expression, universal in structure – and what organisations can learn from how creative people operate in contexts far outside their own.
Key takeaways:
- Why creativity is shaped by cultural context and why this matters for global organisations building innovation capability
- How diverse ways of thinking across markets can become a strategic asset rather than a coordination challenge
- A framework for applying insights from global creative practice to the speaker’s own organisation
A practical keynote and workshop on what creativity actually is, why organisations systematically inhibit it, and how to reverse that through a structured, teachable approach grounded in the IDEA = P(K+I) model.
Key takeaways:
- The specific cognitive and organisational habits that block idea generation – and how to interrupt them
- Tools for developing new ideas individually and in teams, built around the IDEA = P(K+I) model
- A set of exercises applicable immediately, designed to shift the team from passive consumers of ideas to active generators
An examination of how AI is challenging established assumptions about what creativity is and where it comes from – and what this means for the humans responsible for driving innovation in their organisations.
Key takeaways:
- What AI can and cannot do in the creative process, and why the distinction matters for strategy
- How to use AI as a tool for expanding creative output rather than replacing human idea generation
- A revised framework for thinking about human creativity in a context where machines can produce at scale
An exploration of how organisations operating across cultures can turn creative diversity into a structural advantage – drawing on Haren’s research from over 75 countries into how cultural context shapes idea generation, problem-solving, and innovation.
Key takeaways:
- How cultural background shapes the way people generate and evaluate ideas – and why homogeneous thinking teams underperform
- Why global organisations are sitting on an untapped creative asset and what prevents them from accessing it
- Practical approaches to building cross-cultural creative collaboration into everyday working practice