SolveYourProblem
Article Series: Brainstorming
Brainstorming, Where Do I Begin?
Group
Brainstorming Rules and Guidelines
Research on group brainstorming has proven
that properly and skillfully managed brainstorming sessions
can foster incredible innovations in any undertaking. The following
guidelines are vital for conducting effective group brainstorming
sessions.
Remember
that brainstorming has rules.
Failing
to follow the rules of brainstorming is failing to brainstorm
altogether.
If, for example, you pose a topic for group brainstorming
and then follow it up with a long monologue, then you haven’t
produced
a brainstorming session at all; you’ve given a speech. For
a group brainstorming session to work, it must adhere to
the basic definition and rules of brainstorming.
Though
the rules for brainstorming vary depending on the source,
Alex Osborn has four timeless rules that get to the heart of
what makes the process of brainstorming distinct:
- Forbid
criticism;
- Encourage
wild and crazy ideas;
- Seek
quantity of ideas over quality;
- Besides
trying to come up with new ideas, combine and improve upon
existing ideas.
Don’t
just seek to harvest new idea - combine and expand upon existing
ideas, whether yours or those of others. As Andrew
Hargadon describes in “How Breakthroughs Happen”, creativity
happens when new ways are found to build upon existing ideas.
The whole point of performing your brainstorming in a group
dynamic is to harness the unparalleled power of different people
with diverse knowledge and experience sharing, blending, building,
and extending upon each other’s ideas.
Take
fear out of the equation. If the folks in your group believe
that they’re going to be criticized, mocked, scorned,
teased, humiliated, demoted, paid less, fired, or in any other
way made to feel bad during and after the group brainstorming
process, then none of them will be any benefit at all to the
process. They’ll be too afraid that they’ll say something stupid
and useless to say anything at all.
Brainstorm
individually yourself before and after any group brainstorming
sessions. In his groundbreaking 1950’s book “Applied
Imagination”, Alex Osborn proposes that creativity is a blend
of both individual ideation and collective ideation. One without
the other is incomplete and not as effective, fruitful, or
beneficial. Brainstorm individually to find at the very least
what the most relevant and critical topic of the group brainstorming
session will be. And brainstorm individually after to find
ways to incorporate the best of the ideas brainstormed by the
group into actual practice.
Integrate
group brainstorming sessions in with other work practices. A company does not thrive on group brainstorming
alone. It relies on numerous other regular activities and procedures
to be fully, creatively actualized. Yet group brainstorming
can be a contributing part of many of those other practices,
activities, and procedures. Incorporate group brainstorming
into every facet of your business operations and your business
will no doubt experience an innovative quantum leap day after
day, previously unachievable even once. One of the most crucial
components of integrating group brainstorming into your business’s
practices is when you begin to implement the most primed ideas
generated in the sessions.
Practice makes perfect. Or maybe better put - practice
makes better practice, better being: more effective, productive,
and successful. If that’s the goal of your business, group,
or organization - to be more effective productive, and successful
- then group brainstorming is a tremendously tool for getting
there. # # # # # SolveYourProblem.com
: 2008
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