In his book Creative Thinking in the Decision and Management Sciences, James R. Evans points out that “intellectual playfulness” (that is, having fun) is one of the most critical elements of the brainstorm process.
Having fun or adding humour is important because it frees people from negative thinking, but at the same time, stimulates thinking that will go beyond the pedestrian. Humour allows people to have fun with the problem, or look to different solutions – often unusual solutions. This doesn’t mean to have a laugh-fest without purpose. It means allowing people to explore new avenues and thought in a risk-free environment.
In short: if it’s not going to be fun, forget it.
Some simple tips:
- Create the right environment by having food and beverages. Much like a car needs petrol to run, the brain needs fuel to stimulate creative thinking. Personally I prefer food/drinks which contain natural stimulants, such as caffeine or sugar. I get heaps of people who ask if they can serve alcohol. Generally no. Alcohol is a depressant, which means it slows down brain activity. But as someone who never turns away a glass of pinot noir (just in case any of you are thinking about holiday presents for yours truly), alcohol is a nice thing to add at the end of the brainstorm for celebration.
- Have games and exercises to kick-start the brain - and keep it stimulated. To continue to car analogy, think of ice-breakers as letting a car warm up after starting it in the winter. And, once you've engaged the brain, exercises keep it stimulated through exercises which use the basic elements of creativity, such as free association, metaphors, attribute listing, combining and merging, evolution, mind mapping and others.
- Schedule your brainstorm when attendees’ brains are most active. Granted, this one's not always easy to implement. But, when I have the opportunity, I try to schedule two brainstorms: one in the morning for those who are more alert then, or one in the afternoon, for those who come alive at the end of day. Also, this may sound obvious, but don't schedule brainstorms over lunch. How can you speak your ideas if your mouth is full?
- Control distractions. The more modern technology proliferates, the worse it gets. Telephones, laptops, Blackberries, iPods ... you name it, and I don't care "cool" or "hip" they are, they don't help people focus in a brainstorm. Tell people to turn them off, or if their body will go into colvusions without them, at least ask them to put them on silent.
- The easiest tip of all? Stand up. Doesn’t it make sense that the brain ‘relaxes’ when the body is idle? Standing up simply gets more blood moving, and more blood moving increases the brain’s creative effectiveness.
If you have any other tips, please share them with me so I can share with others.
