Brainstorming Tools Literature Review and Introduction to Code Development K. Nordland August 28, 2006 1
Contents 1 Definition 3 2 Alex Osborn 3 3 Brainstorming and Stage-Gate 4 4 Recent Developments 4 5 The EDGE Brainstorming tool 5 6 Future development 6 2
1 Definition The American Heritage Dictionary of English Language[1] defines brainstorming as brainstorming n. 1. A method of shared problem solving in which all members of a group spontaneously contribute ideas. 2. A similar process undertaken by a person to solve a problem by rapidly generating a variety of possible solutions. From those definitions the purpose is clearly to solve a problem and the defining characteristic is the speed at which ideas are produced. It s also been generally accepted that the way to do this is in a group setting. 2 Alex Osborn It is easier to tone down a wild idea than to think up a new one. - Alex Osborn The term brainstorm was coined by Alex Osborn in 1939. It was first published in his book, Your Creative Power [3] in 1948. The technique for harnessing the creative power of a group of people recognized that simply gathering people to generate ideas was not productive. The tendency was to judge existing ideas rather than create and add ideas. In Your Creative Power, Osborn laid out 4 simple ground rules for group brainstorming. 1. Judicial judgement is ruled out. Criticism of ideas must be withheld until the next day. 2. Wildness is welcomed. The crazier the idea the better; it s easier to tone down than to think up. 3. Quantity is wanted. The more ideas we pile up, the more likelihood of winners. 4. Combination and improvement are sought. In additions to contributing ideas of our own, let s suggest how another s idea can be turned into a better idea; or how two or more ideas can be joined into still another idea. 3
Other tips for successful brainstorming are to target 5-10 people, invite members that represent an assortment of experience and include at least a few self starters. It s also very important to state a specific topic for the brainstorming session. With too broad of a topic, it s too easy to lose momentum. So brainstorming has existed for more than 55 years. It s obviously not a new development or tool. In fact, the brainstorming process was around long before product development processes were. 3 Brainstorming and Stage-Gate One of the most commonly used product development processes is the Stage- Gate process, developed by Robert Cooper. Dr. Cooper s book, Winning at New Products [2] describes the Stage-Gate process. In this book, he lays out that the ideas come before the stages or the gates, but notes that it s these ideas that drive the new products. While the focus of the book is how to succeed with a new product once the idea has been developed, without the idea, there is no new product. Cooper evaluates the brainstorming method as an example of a group creativity method. In addition to the rules laid out by Osborn, Cooper also suggests running the session off site, sending out a presession mailer to start churning over the problem, and using a moderator to run the session. As I expand my literature search and review on additional product development processes, it is my hope that I will show how other existing processes also make use of brainstorming techniques. In showing this, it ll reaffirm the usefulness of the brainstorming tool created, no matter whether the user follows the EDGE process, the StageGate process, or any number of other processes. 4 Recent Developments Recent developments in brainstorming is that group dynamics can interfere with the effectiveness of brainstorming. While rules try to minimize the criticism of crazy ideas, the fear of making out of the box suggestions among coworkers can reduce the number of suggestions made. [4] Paulus, et. al. recommends incorporating 4 new rules into the standard 4 rules. These rules should help minimize unproductive chatter, keep the session moving. 4
Unfortunately, many sources agree that groups do not have the creative power that an individual has. This isn t to say that group brainstorming activities are useless, but more guidance and structure should be laid out ahead of time to best make use of the group brainstorming session. Improvements to the typical brainstorming session include ways to protect the feelings of the participants. This psycological safety will help the participant feel safe enough to open up and offer the more creative, although not necessarily accepted ideas. These are the ideas that drive the creative cycle and help encourage more ideas. 5 The EDGE Brainstorming tool The brainstorming tool created is designed to flow from the function tree. Once the higher level functions of a design have been determined, the governing functions should drive the topic of the brainstorming session. Currently, the brainstorming tool has an area for a user to enter in a topic for the session, but within the context of the information flow, this topic will be populated from a previous location. The tool, as it stands also has a field called Method. This method field will allow expansion of the brainstorming session tool to also be used for a brainball session. This enhanced functionality will be coming in the months ahead. The beginning screen asks a user to enter in their project number, the long and short topic (which I have mentioned, the short topic will flow from the functions defined), the method (to be a pull down list of options such as brainstorming or brainball), the location and the observations. Once the brainstorming session has been initiated, the user is asked to enter the usernames of the participants in this brainstorming session. This will allow those users to also see this session listed in their session list. After entering in the users involved, the next step is to enter in the ideas developed in the brainstorming session. The page presently is devoted to simply entering in and displaying the ideas as entered. This page also may serve the purpose of displaying the rules of brainstorming. Currently the footer of the page always has a link to the Wikipedia article on brainstorming, although in the future this link will be a reference back to the FACETS brainstorming tutorial. Some guideline could be made for a target number of ideas or a target length of time spent. Once the ideas have been developed, the session is only half done. The 5
next step is categorizing the ideas. To accomplish this, the category name can be entered, and then the ideas in that category checked and then the category saved. This screen will update to show already created categories. It also removes ideas that have been categorized and only displays the uncategorized ideas. It s okay to leave ideas uncategorized if they are suitably unique. The purpose to categorizing ideas is to avoid a confusing vote tally that may not properly reflect the group s intent. For example, if 3 ideas are quite similar, and all get 2 votes while 1 unique idea gets 3 votes, the view is that the one idea is the most desirable one, where in actuality, once the similar ideas have been grouped, their 6 votes is clearly more desirable than 3. After the categorizing is complete, the voting system is available. The way that the page is currently developed, every time you access the voting site and save the results, it saves the new votes. NOTE: It does NOT add the votes to the current totals. To use the system as it stands, all voting should be done at the same time and the voting recorded in the system for the record and to drive further idea development. After voting is complete, the summary page will display the session information, participants, and a vote ranked display of the categories with all the included ideas. 6 Future development Still to come! The observations should be editable from this summary page. Also, it may be more visually pleasing to not repeat all of the vote tallies and categories for each idea. This is a live project and all of this is tweakable to better fit the needs of the users as the system is used and benefits and weaknesses are discovered. 6
References [1] The American Heritage dictionary of the English language. Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 4th edition, 2000. [2] Robert G. Cooper. Winning at New Products. Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, second edition, 1993. [3] Alex F. Osborn. Your creative power: how to use imagination. C. Scribner s Sons, New York, 1948. [4] P. B. Paulus, T. Nakui, and V. L. Putman. Group brainstorming and teamwork: Some rules for the road to innovation. In L. Thompson and H. Choi, editors, Creativity and innovation in organizational teams, pages pp. 69 86. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2005. 7