Anthony Mills

Executive Director - Global Innovation Institute (US)

Anthony Mills

Anthony has a passion for two things:
1) Connecting businesses with their next big opportunities.
2) Helping businesses reinvent themselves into engaging, human workplaces that can't help but unleash breakthrough innovation.

Anthony is a globally sought-after thought leader on emerging markets, responsive growth strategies, corporate innovation, business insights, workplace experience, entrepreneurship, product design, and Design Thinking. His work at GInI has had a deeply profound and lasting impact on businesses all over the world.

Anthony is also an award-winning and internationally-recognized innovator, having brought numerous innovations to the companies he has served. He is a deeply associative thinker — a consummate rainmaker — with a classic "Innovator's DNA" profile. His lifelong disdain for the status quo, and his love for pursuing "what's next", have garnered him a well–earned reputation as an agent of change. Furthermore, having traveled the world and experienced many cultures up close, he understands people, and with them, the markets they make up. He knows how to combine insight and empathy with imagination and creativity to conceive real solutions to customer's "deep–down" needs and desires. And he knows how to connect business insights in ways that let companies deliver the winning value propositions and customer experiences they need to truly lead their markets.

Anthony's abilities in strategic innovation build on 30 years of leadership in business, where he has held executive and management positions in numerous disciplines, including strategic management, design, engineering, marketing, manufacturing, and product management. This has given him a broad and holistic perspective on innovation that is rare among business leaders. He remains deeply embedded in each of these disciplines, and knows how to bridge them to deliver innovations that have a lasting impact on the business, its markets, and the world.

Anthony holds graduate degrees in engineering and management from North Carolina State University (Raleigh, NC) and Aquinas College (Grand Rapids, MI), respectively.

36 articles · Page 1 of 2

Wisdom From Above The Clouds
Culture5 min read

Wisdom From Above The Clouds

the challenge for businesses is not simply pursuing more of the same... more of what they've always done.

Anthony Mills · 29 April 2025

What's In Your Sandbox?
Culture10 min read

What's In Your Sandbox?

In the one camp, we have the Lean Startup model, which directs us to learn fast by failing fast via a Minimum Viable Product, or MVP.

Anthony Mills · 29 April 2025

The Power of a Simple Question
Practice3 min read

The Power of a Simple Question

The process next moves to Testing Inquiry, where we postulate hypotheses and test these against our observations and insights.

Anthony Mills · 29 April 2025

The 7 Deadly Sins of Innovation
Culture6 min read

The 7 Deadly Sins of Innovation

The greatest sin is when we as businesses think it is about us and our offerings, and we forget that it is really about the market and its needs.

Anthony Mills · 29 April 2025

Seven Roads of Innovation–Based Growth
Innovation8 min read

Seven Roads of Innovation–Based Growth

Businesses can grow through seven innovation strategies, including product, technology, market, and category innovations, along with spin-outs, spin-ins, and acquisitions.

Anthony Mills · 29 April 2025

On Innovation as a Spiritual Journey
Innovation8 min read

On Innovation as a Spiritual Journey

This article explores the deeper, spiritual motivations behind lifelong innovators, suggesting that their drive to innovate stems from an intrinsic yearning to connect and make the world a better place.

Anthony Mills · 29 April 2025

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