Rules of Brainstorming
Professor Robert I. Sutton's (Stanford Engineering School) "Eight Rules for Brilliant Brainstorming":
1. Use brainstorming to combine and extend ideas, not just harvest them
2. Don't bother brainstorming if people live in fear
3. Do individual brainstorming before and after group sessions
4. Brainstorming sessions are worthless unless ideas lead to action
5. Brainstorming requires skill and experience both to do and especially to facilitate
6. A good brainstorming session is competitive - in the right way
7. Brainstorming sessions can be used for more than just generating ideas
8. Follow the rules, or don't call it a brainstorm
Any of the above leap out at you as particularly important? Is there a rule that you think is missing? One that is most frequently violated?
1. Use brainstorming to combine and extend ideas, not just harvest them
2. Don't bother brainstorming if people live in fear
3. Do individual brainstorming before and after group sessions
4. Brainstorming sessions are worthless unless ideas lead to action
5. Brainstorming requires skill and experience both to do and especially to facilitate
6. A good brainstorming session is competitive - in the right way
7. Brainstorming sessions can be used for more than just generating ideas
8. Follow the rules, or don't call it a brainstorm
Any of the above leap out at you as particularly important? Is there a rule that you think is missing? One that is most frequently violated?
posted by ROInnovation at 2:50 PM
5 Comments:
Couple of ones i think need to be added:
- dedicate time to brainstorm, be it half a day or 3 days, concentrate purely on being there and generate ideas (no other meetings, phonecalls etc)
- enjoy it, taking brainstorming too seriously results in boring ideas.
- have a vision for the brainstorm, how you are going to get from A to B, structure is an important part of brainstorming.
- if you agree to take part, take part. If you don't want to be there, don't go.
If you have an idea then tell everyone, not just the person sat next to you. Should be banned!
I haven't come across the brainstorm individually beforehand though, sounds sensible.
It's interesting that the competative thing comes up again - I think that's why Super Groups woorked well as the Super Groupers were competative with each other, and then the clients became competative too as they didn't want to be shown up. I'm still trying to find the balance between that and being adversorial though. Perhaps outsiders are the key.
I was happy to see that you did NOT have a rule about "there are no bad ideas". That is often put forth as a core rule of brainstorming, but in my experience setting some criteria about what sort of ideas you are looking for can be a good idea.
You could view this as part of being competitive in the right way. The trade-off is that the rules/goals should be few enough to preserve creativity and enforced loosely enough to avoid creating fear.
Hi Brian
Yes, I totally agree with you - you need parameters before embarking, just like you need to ask the right question and keep the objective central to the whole brainstorm.
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