How to conduct a braimstorming session

Before brainstorming session:

·         Define a one sentence clear and focused objective.

·         Choose participants

o    Select a diverse and eclectic team

o    assign leader role (who is also a timekeeper)

o    assign script role (to write ideas on whiteboard)

·         Prepare material

o    whiteboard

o    clean wall

o    lots of post-it notes and markers

During actual brainstorming session:

1.     Write the one sentence clear and focused objective on white board

2.     Let wild ideas flowing

·         script writes ideas as they come on another whiteboard (meanwhile ideas are also written on post-it notes)

·         probably ideas will start with the most rational ones, but don't stop at the 1st good idea that comes, spend more time than you think, letting people write and post their ideas

3.     Classify/group ideas written on post-it notes by main topic

4.     Precise/detail main objective in SMART statements

5.     Remove ideas that cannot fit SMART objective 

6.     Vote on remaining ideas

7. Assign actions items to follow on most promising ideas

generating Innovation by linking different fields

About the T9 inventor:

King had an uncanny ability to look at problems from various angles, discovering new ways to solve complex issues, recalled Mason Boswell, a Seattle patent attorney who worked closely with the inventor.

“He would often ask questions that connected two fields in a way I had not thought of but that clearly pointed the way to interesting innovation,” said Boswell. “He also had a point of view five to 10 years into the future, thinking about devices in a way that transcended current hardware limitations and going more to what could be common down the road.”

Read http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/09/martin-king-t9-dies

Read also about Triz: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRIZ

Innovation Quotes: Brainstorming

"The problem is never to get innovative ideas in your mind , but how to get the old ones out."

"We can believe that we know where the world should go. But unless we're in touch with our customers, our model of the world can diverge from reality. There's no substitute for innovation, of course, but innovation is no substitute for being in touch, either." Steve Ballmer

"My innovation involved taking an idea from the telecommunications and banking industries, and applying that idea to transportation business." Frederick W. Smith

"The metaphor is perhaps one of man's most fruitful potentialities. Its efficacy verges on magic, and it seems a tool for creation which God forgot inside one of His creatures when He made him." Jose Ortega y Gasset

"But an innovation, to grow organically from within, has to be based on an intact tradition, so our idea is to bring together musicians who represent all these traditions, in workshops, festivals, and concerts, to see how we can connect with each other in music." Yo-Yo Ma

"The mind ought to sometimes be diverted that it may return the better to thinking." Phaedrus

"Don't try to come up with the proper answers ; target coming up with good questions." Stanford professor Bill Lazier

"Every act of creation is first of all an act of destruction." – Pablo Picasso