Teresa M. Amabile

Updated at: May 21, 2007, 2:17 a.m.

Teresa Amabile is the Edsel Bryant Ford Professor of Business Administration, Head of the Entrepreneurial Management Unit, and Faculty Chair of the Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship at Harvard Business School. Originally educated and employed as a chemist, Dr. Amabile received her Ph.D. in psychology from Stanford University in 1977. Originally focusing on individual creativity, Dr. Amabile's research has expanded to encompass team creativity and organizational innovation. This 25-year program of research on how the work environment can influence creativity and motivation has yielded a theory of creativity and innovation; methods for assessing creativity, motivation, and the work environment; and a set of prescriptions for maintaining and stimulating innovation. Dr. Amabile has held several research grants, including Creativity and Motivation, from the National Institute of Mental Health, and Downsizing Industrial R&D, from the Center for Innovation Management Studies. She was awarded the E. Paul Torrance Award by the Creativity Division of the National Association for Gifted Children in 1998.

Dr. Amabile has presented her theory, her research results, and her methods for stimulating innovation to various groups in business, government, and education, including Lucent Technologies, Procter & Gamble Company, and Novartis International AG. In addition to participating in various executive programs, her main teaching assignment at Harvard Business School is an MBA course, Managing for Creativity. Dr. Amabile was the host/instructor of Against All Odds: Inside Statistics, a 26-part instructional series originally produced for broadcast on PBS. She currently serves as a Director of Seaman Corporation and of the Harvard Business School Publishing Company.

Dr. Amabile is the author of Creativity in Context and Growing Up Creative, as well as over 100 scholarly papers, chapters, and presentations. She serves on the editorial boards of Creativity Research Journal, Creativity and Innovation Management, and Journal of Creative Behavior. Her recent papers include: Assessing the Work Environment for Creativity (Academy of Management Journal); Changes in the Work Environment for Creativity during Downsizing (Academy of Management Journal); and Leader Behaviors and the Work Environment for Creativity: Perceived Leader Support (Leadership Quarterly).