This delightfully written book is designed to help managers become more thoughtful, creative and intuitive in their thinking. It shows how to apply innovative thinking to all aspects of the value chain, from insightful discovery to designing and developing a product to deliver it to the consumer. The author improves upon the value chain metaphor to bring in the concept of a cycle of continuous change. As this cycle repeats itself, it becomes an ascending spiral of increasing value to the customer.

With the help of vivid examples, S Ramachander argues that while there is enormous scope for new product development in India, building a brand or a successful business requires resourcefulness, creativity and, above all, a flexible approach along with large doses of patience. He presents an array of techniques and tools for creative problem solving and introduces several new frameworks which have all been tested in real life situations.

In particular, he develops the notion of the value spiral and the concept of meta marketing, both which will help practising managers to: Understand customers and develop perceptive mental models; Link insights to business goals; and Create innovative strategies along the value chain to achieve these goals.