Edward de Bono is regarded by many as the leading authority in the world in the field of creative thinking and the direct teaching of thinking as a skill.

He has written 62 books with translations into 37 languages and has been invited to lecture in 54 countries.

He is the originator of lateral thinking which treats creativity as the behaviour of information in a self-organising information system - such as the neural networks in the brain. From such a consideration arise the deliberate and formal tools of lateral thinking, parallel thinking etc.

Among these tools are the brilliant "six thinking hats" method, now in use by organizations such as Prudential Insurance, IBM, Federal Express, British Airways, Polaroid, Pepsico, DuPont, and Nippon Telephone and Telegraph (possibly the world's largest company).