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'Brainstorming Doesn't Work' (fastcompany.com)
People aren't necessarily more creative in groups than alone, or vice versa, according to numerous studies. An anonymous reader shares an article: In fact, creativity needs both conditions; our performance peaks when we alternate -- first working alone, then coming together to share our ideas, then going off by ourselves again to mull over what we heard. It's a process. This is because our brains' creative engines are fueled both by quiet mind-wandering, allowing novel and unexpected connections to form, and by encountering new information, which often comes from other people. The typical brainstorm over-delivers on the latter and under-delivers on the former, which means that for lots of people, brainstorming is an utter nightmare. Introverts just feel alienated, and extroverts aren't pushed to reflect more deeply on the ideas they've batted around amongst themselves.
When a manager holds a brainstorming session, my experience is that they use the result to make themselves looks better, while keeping notes to later blame an attendee in case the ideas don't work. Win-win for management. Only meetings of peers sharing ideas seem to make any sense.
I find that it is useful to do brainstorming when it is 2-4 people, each one having worked on a different part of the same system as an example, then it is more or less useful. At least it helps to avoid major mishaps, people who know their particular part of the system / problem can filter everybody's input through their knowledge and at the minimum provide reasons for why a proposed idea will/will not work.
You can't handle the truth.
A lot of times group brainstorming sessions are less about generating new ideas and more about making an open environment to get team members to communicate and share their ideas.
Well, the headline escalated quickly from "People aren't necessarily more creative in groups than alone" to "Brainstorming Doesn't Work".
Ever heard of Duck Debugging? : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The idea is that if you're stuck in a code, only by explaining line by line your reasoning to someone (or even a rubber duck), it'll help you to find the solution yourself.
But you know what's even more efficient? Talking to another person.
The number of time I got stuck for like half an hour, quickly poked a coworker to talk about it only to find the solution 5 min later.
Expert to Expert brainstorming work. It's useless corporate meeting that doesn't : https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Elok
Hell that was probably the best way I had of outlining/planning papers when we were learning how to write essays (eg the 5 paragraph essay) in school. I didn't mind group brainstorming sessions, but usually got more out of doing it by myself.
Sounds largely right, also because in order to understand a problem one often has to try to solve it,
ie. a new idea, and then by wondering why the idea sucks, so start to understand the nature of the problem better.
What people call "iteration".
Meeting with others is a good way to discover why your solution sucks.
Staying quiet in solitude with the mind wandering, is a good way to generate new ideas. [1]
Brainstorming kinda does these in reverse, trying to generate ideas in the high pressure confusion of external stimulus,
and then people go off on their own to wonder why the whole thing sucked so badly.
[1] Under the shower if you're most people, but also drinking ale if you're Inspector Morse, playing your violin if you're Sherlock Holmes, and so on.
My department did that once as part of a team building exercise. A good half of the IT team members' individual contributions were stronger than the group they were put with. I've since learned the value of giving people token decision making ability (bike shed color) instead of letting important decisions be the product of everyone's input.
That's the whole reason why you *announce* a brainstorming session in advance... perhaps by as much as a week, but no less than 24 hours. Everyone is encouraged to jot down ideas on a notepad and bring them to the session. Then no more than two days later, but after everyone has had enough time to reflect upon the session, you come together again to discuss what further thoughts people have on what has been discussed and choose a course of action.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
If there's a conch shell included, Lord of the Flies has you covered already.
when it happens organically, in small companies or in small cohesive groups within a company. Planning brainstorm sessions in the way that HR types would prefer doesn't work as a rule. What does work is an informal get-together in a comfortable space with a whiteboard, and passionate people who know what they're talking about, respect each other, have no time for political BS, and trust each other enough to blurt out the stupid-sounding stuff that can lead to innovation.
I remember when I was no more than 12 years old, reading a Reader's Digest article on brainstorming. One example given was a group of people who were trying to find a way to deliver some kind of explosive charge to the bottom of a liquid-filled bore hole, that was cheaper than the aluminum devices currently in use. They weren't making any headway, and one of the frustrated participants said 'why don't we just put the damn thing in a paper bag?'. That led fairly quickly to the solution - basically a variation on a paper tube. Happily, that lesson has stuck with me all my life.
It's the uncensored moments that make brainstorming work; that's why it tends NOT to work in most corporate environments, where failure to self-censor may be career-limiting at best, and career-ending at worst.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
I'm glad someone is publishing information that confirms what I've found to be true for years. Force-fitting people together and making them build something in rapid-fire fashion with half-thought out ideas doesn't make for a good experience. Anyone who's ever worked with me knows that my approach to a problem is to identify what's wrong, go have a think on it, do some research and present a semi-formed opinion/argument for discussion. Most of my job these days is reading and writing...and my backlog of reading is extremely long. But, coming to the table with a little knowledge on the subject is better than having people blurt out the first thing that comes to their mind. At best it's not fully thought out, and at worst people are just saying whatever they can think of to avoid not saying something.
Now, can we please fund some studies on how bad "open workspace" offices are for productivity? They may work great for salespeople, marketing folks or 25 year olds pulling all nighters and shooting Nerf guns at each other...but a real workplace needs a mix of environments. You need a quiet personal space to make phone calls, read or work on things. You also need the ability to host a small group in something less formal than a meeting room. I hate to use the word "stand up" or "scrum" because there's all sorts of negative connotations around that. But, having something where people are just human to each other instead of being project management robots is a good way to exchange ideas. I can't tell you how many multi-hour meetings I've sat in with project managers who are using the exact same phrases from their PMP training manuals. I've never taken the coursework for PMP, but I seriously think all PMs are told "this is the exact language you must use when coming to Stage 2.3.5.22 of your Generic Software Project Plan."
That would be a pissing contest.
Team is a German acronym for "Toll, Ein Anderer Macht's!" (Great, someone else is doing it).
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The only brainstorming session I was ever involved in was in Small Group Communications at college. The instructor put me in with a group of Vietnamese students. They in turn nominated me as the group leader because I was the only white guy in the group. I don't remember what the subject was but I did all the work, gave the presentation and the instructor gave me all the credit. The Vietnamese guys were upset that they didn't get any points as contributors to my presentation and the instructor also deducted additional points for their lack of participation.
...who believes that all people work the same.
Pathological brainstorming being the structured kind, where they bring in an outside facilitator who tells everyone that no idea should be criticized and that everyone should be given an equal chance to speak. This is what happens when the organization is in a rut, and upper management so is desperate that they are resorting to gimmicks.
Fuck that.
Get the right people in the same room with a whiteboard and let them go at it, no holds barred. I have seen amazing things accomplished in such situations. Introverts are usually fine in small groups, with people that they known or are stuck with for a while, especially when the topic is something about which they are passionate. Extroverts tend to talk too much, so being able to interrupt them is a necessity. Holding the session at an off-site location, away from where the participants normally work, helps get people out of their comfort zone. Judicious amounts of alcohol can lower people's inhibitions, which can be helpful in certain (but not all) kinds of brainstorming situations. A looming deadline, or perhaps a major award for success, can also help keep people focused and productively on task.
Being successful at brainstorming isn't the problem. What's really hard is getting bureaucratic support to implement the ideas that are created during the brainstorming session. But that's a whole 'nother rant.
Or to stop the retarded ideas from repeatedly being floated to a long list of people. Get it out once, shoot it down once. Move on.
"-1 troll", i.e. disagree - although the focus of the creativity is different with a shift towards "how can I game the group dynamic to get my idea to the top of the pile."
var outcome = participants <= 2 ? Outcome.chanceOfSuccess : Outcome.fail;
Requiem for the American Dream
So, yet another "brilliant" MBA idea, like open offices, forced-ranking, goal-setting and scrum has been demonstrated to be ineffective? Too bad all of these decisions are made on instinct and emotion rather than on what the actual data suggests.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
If funding grant was involved, absolutely!
There is _no_ idiot proof way of manufacturing clever thinking. Who'd have thought that?
John_Chalisque
To say that brainstorming flat out doesn't work? Now that's just a grabby headline that got me to post this rant.
I think there's two camps to this that really need to be addressed that showcased the skewed write-up:
Yes brainstorming in a forced group --- it's utterly pointless most of the time. You have people who don't want to be there who are warm bodies in a chair, one's who do and just shit on every possible to solution to protect their 'body of employment' with less (or more work), one's who just throw out buzz words to look important but can't implement or do shit, the one's who road block the shit out of everything because they want to wrap some corporate or bureaucratic tape around it to 'process-ify' the idea, etc. The list goes on and on. That's at least my experience with that, anyways.
Now, brainstorming in a group in terms of, you, the brain-stormer, going to seek out some group (peers, a few colleagues, ect.) for input on your idea to make sure there might be another/better/alternative way (if you're too deep in your own mulling and you actually notice it), you want some actual feedback with people you actually care to get feedback from --- I'm all for this. The point I'm driving home is the constructive criticism and peer input to solidify, reduce or confirm your idea to begin with.
That's forcing yourself to document your work.
Brainstorming is when one or more people just speak whatever is on their minds, in the hope that they'll arrive at a solution they wouldn't have thought of if they'd stayed on the rails. It's a way to force people to think outside the artificial mental box they may have constructed by pre-defining a problem incorrectly. The main hindrance to brainstorming has been well-known for over 60 years. When you put people into a group, they tend to want to conform to whatever they think is the prevailing opinion of the group. So rather than unshackling the creative process, the group can end up limiting it.
Once you know about this pitfall, you can take steps to avoid it. That's why people advocating brainstorming sessions always say not to judge what others are saying - because a crazy stupid idea may be a stepping stone to a good idea. Unfortunately, the judgmental people who kill this type of creative process have used their bag of tricks on the headline - converting "brainstorming sometimes doesn't work" into "brainstorming doesn't work."
Many of my best ideas come while driving home, taking a shower, 4am when I can't sleep, or when taking a crap.
Table-ized A.I.
This is covered in the book "Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking":
https://www.amazon.com/Quiet-P...
Specifically, pages 87-92. Very similar conclusion there.
Do you have ESP?
It sounds like the finding is more that brainstorming is not a complete solution. They acknowledge two components of creativity, and point out that brainstorming works well for one part of an alternating pattern. Instead of this being a pro- or anti-brainstorming argument, this information should be used in HOW to best utilize brainstorming. If you think the solution to ALL problems is indiscriminate brainstorming, then it's not going to work, and will mostly just be torture.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
I think the brainstorming itself does work due to the fact everyone actually considers the problem, rather than ignoring the e-mail/voicemail/whatever asking for solutions. It enables to get input from all sources, not just the one bonehead who actually takes the time to read his inbox.
Wish the title was not misleading. Something like "The right and wrong ways to brainstorm" would've made a lot more sense. It'd be like saying "eating food contributes to death" with a summary saying "only certain foods are to be avoided." Damn this alarmist bullshit.
No individual will ever come up with the stupid ideas a committee will.
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
Your brainstorming works because while you have not figured out the exact script, you understand the method and concepts to complete the task. This is what I believe would be common among all people who brainstorm successfully as individuals. They use the Socratic method to interrogate the process they have in mind and come up with the best solution.
In a group, brainstorming can work if you have the right set of people with the intellectual capacity to debate and question (Socratic Method), and similar to the individual, knowledge of the concepts and methods needed to complete the task.
Then we have "Corporate" brainstorming, which unfortunately lacks those same principles. Lacking the basics, people and groups hang out in quiet (AKA "Safe") spaces and "brainstorm". Those sessions are not usually eventful. In the occasion where an idea comes out of the session, it's quite horrible.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
The article isn't even about brainstorming but more about when a creative process works better alone or in group. The creative group session can take many forms.
Their main theme is that depending on the individual the optimal strategy can be different. Some people work better alone.
Just as well often people prefer a combination, alternating group and individual stages.
All pretty sensible and bland I would think.
If you hired on merit then your staff have the skills to think.
If staff have to be educated on the job, they will never deliver any new ideas.
The only skill they have is to ask for more advice.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
already knows brainstorming is BS anyway, especially when you try to death-march everyone into it.
Quality takes time and effort, and the best ideas happen when you're doing other things. Like walking or taking a shower.
That's what I saw when I read the title. I'll keep that in mind Mr. Government....or not ;)...get it?