Brainstorming

Brainstorming
Brainstorming is a creativity technique by a group of people to find a solution to a specific problem by gathering a list of spontaneously generated ideas contributed by the participants.
Who can participate? :
It can be a mix of both experts as well as people from different degrees & levels. But one who is leading the session must be careful with mix so, that people participating doesn’t feel reluctant or over do it.
Requirements:
 Have a specific purpose.
 Have a comfortable location.
 Should be clear about what is required and know what to do with it.
 Establish ground level rules.
 Communicate the focus point to each and every participant.
 Make sure session doesn’t last longer than 30-40 mins.
 Should know how it is to be facilitated.
How to Prepare For Brainstorming:
 Prepare a clear and concise definition of the area of interest.
 Set time bound for the participants to generate ideas.
 Set criteria who all can participate in the session.
 Ideas evaluating criteria to be prepared.
How to Conduct Brainstorming Session:
 Share as many ideas as possible abiding to the ground rules.
 Encourage participants to think out of box and build on other ideas.
 Record ideas or jot down the ideas so that they are clearly visible to all participants.
 Do not limit the number of ideas as the session main motto is to explore as many ideas as possible.
Wrap Up The Brainstorming Session:
 Once we are getting near to the time limit we should start on the evaluation as per the pre determined criteria.
 Create list of ideas, combine the ideas which are appropriate and eliminate duplicates.
 Rate the ideas based on available techniques like voting and etc.
 Distribute the list of ideas.
Advantages:
 It brings people together into a creative process & increase the social nature of the project.
 Increase the volume of ideas & possible ways of dealing with the situation or problem
 It’s in expensive.
 Encourages creative thinking and thinking out of the box.

Disadvantage:
 Can take too much time if not managed or controlled properly.
 May generate lot of ideas which may not be considered.