Brainstorming Exercises

• When (and when not) to use brainstorming exercises
• Where Brainstorming Exercises fit in
• Types of Brainstorming Exercises:
  • At a flipchart
  • The Affinity Diagram
  • The Delphi Method
  • The Stepladder technique
• 3 things to remember about Brainstorming Exercises

When to Use Brainstorming Exercises:

Brainstorming Exercises are not something to do on a whim.  There are specific circumstances that best lend themselves to Brainstorming Exercises:

• When you want to generate a number of ideas quickly.
• When you want to engage a group or team in problem solving.
• When you need to be innovative and creative.

When Not to Use Brainstorming Exercises:

Brainstorming Exercises are not to be used in all cases.  In particular, you should not use them:

• When you already know the answer or solution you will use.  Never string people along giving them they illusion they have input, when they really don’t.
• When you’re not looking for options or feedback.  In some cases, a manager will not want to solicit her team for feedback.
• If you or your organization is too conservative to do anything differently.  If all of their ideas are going to be shot down, you are better off not asking your team for ideas.

Where Brainstorming Exercises fits in

Brainstorming is one piece of the process of generating ideas and implementing them:

1. Frame the question.  Ensure you have a clear idea of the question your asking or problem you are trying to solve.
2. Brainstorm ideas and options. Use some of the options here to generate ideas.
3. Evaluate ideas and options. After brainstorming, you will want re-engage your more critical brain.
4. Move to Action.  All the ideas you generate in a brainstorm are useless unless you do something about them.

Brainstorming Exercises

At a flipchart

• Start with a specific question.  Ensure that your group all has a common understanding of the question or problem statement.
• Use green-light thinking only.  There should be no evaluation or criticism at this point.
• Use more than one scribe to get ideas happening in rapid succession.
• Tell everyone to start their sentence with “Yes, and…” , and go around the group in sequence.
• Once you have run out of ideas to write down, you can go back and begin to evaluate and condense your ideas.

Affinity Diagram

• Start with a specific question.  Ensure that your group all has a common understanding of the question or problem statement.
• Have everyone write his/her ideas on a Post-It note.
• Assign two people to put the Post-Its into categories.
• Get two more people to edit the categories yet again
• If there are a large number of ideas, you may want to refine the categories several times.

Delphi Method

• Start with a clear question.  Ensure that your group has a common understanding of the question or problem statement.
• Have people write down their ideas anonymously, and send them to a facilitator, or collector of ideas that is viewed as neutral.
• This is normally done outside of a meeting.
• Schedule a meeting and present all the ideas generated to the participants.
• Evaluate and condense ideas.

Stepladder technique

• Provide a clear question to all members of the group.  Ensure that your group all has a common understanding of the question or problem statement.
• Have two members meet to discuss their individual ideas one on one.
• Introduce a third member who presents her ideas to the first two.  The first two member would then discuss their ideas with the newcomer.
• Add group members one at a time.  This can be done over the course of several meetings.
• Once all group members have contributed, evaluate and condense ideas.

3 Things to Remember About Brainstorming Exercises

1. Brainstorming isn’t a free-for-all.  To get the benefit from brainstorming, you should put some structure around it.
2. There are variations that may be more appropriate to your situation.
3. Beware of the extroverts, and encourage the introverts.  Extroverts are very comfortable throwing ideas around and verbalizing their ideas.  Introverts have as much to contribute, but need to be drawn out.

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