The problem with brainstorming

Perhaps the most famous technique for idea generation and the most mocked in TV shows such as The Office is the brainstorm. Lots of organisations use this exercise in some form to come up with new ideas, but it isn’t a panacea – in fact it might be the very opposite. It’s a traditional and much-used method for creativity. A group of people meet up and use flip charts, Post-it notes and Sharpies to come up with creative ideas.

Search online for how to brainstorm and 68 million answers come up. Amazon lists more than 500 books of techniques. There are many ‘rules of the game’ and probably a dozen brainstorms going on somewhere near your place of work right now.

A group activity, the brainstorm is a session of up to a dozen people where everyone is encouraged to come up with spontaneous ideas to solve a problem or deliver change. The idea is not to think any of your ideas through, but to blurt them out. The moderator of the brainstorm has a duty to capture every idea and give encouragement and endorsement by writing them up.

The prevailing rules of brainstorming

We have been involved in many brainstorming sessions. We have led and conducted many brainstorms. The truth is that it’s a good way of giving people a shared sense of problem-solving. It’s also a relatively pleasant way of passing a few hours at work. Usually, it encourages enthusiasm and involvement. There’s just one problem: it really isn’t that great a way of coming up with creative ideas.

One reason is this: “No idea is a bad idea” is one of the sacred rules of brainstorming.

The concept is based on the theory that ideas are like young plants. Rain too hard on them and they will wilt away. Don’t criticise. Warm them in the greenhouse of sunshine approval. This is one of the founding rules laid down for brainstorms by Alex Osborn of ad agency BBDO, who coined the term in 1948. It’s one that is still widely employed today, together with the other rules of emphasising quantity of ideas, allowing freewheeling thinking and building on the ideas of others. While other techniques for the sessions will vary, these rules usually prevail.

This is despite a relatively little-known study conducted as long ago as 2000 that seems to prove the opposite of what we tend to believe, or at least are told as being one of the principal rules of brainstorming. Criticism does not deter ideas. In fact, it encourages them. In an academic experiment, The liberating role of conflict in group creativity by Charlan Nemeth at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, individuals in small groups were given the problem of solving traffic congestion. The research was conducted in San Francisco and Paris. The rules were the same except for a test set of groups who were told to feel free to debate and even to criticise each other’s ideas.

Most creativity coaches and moderators would predict that allowing criticism and challenges would be the death of ideas. In fact, in these carefully controlled conditions, the reverse was true. Allowing debate led to more ideas, significantly more. These results may seem surprising. However, given the following two requirements for creativity, they are no surprise.

Requirements for fostering creativity

The first requirement is diversity of thinking. The second is authenticity, to be yourself. If people in the brainstorm are similar in how they think rather than diverse, this may well make for an easier – and perhaps happier – session, but there will be fewer different ideas.

Furthermore, if the people in the brainstorm are not similar in how they think but have been asked to follow a rule that they must not debate or criticise, then they may well be self-censoring to ensure a happy and obedient session. The effort required in worrying about not offending others by a spontaneous negative reaction to ideas can suppress creativity. This doesn’t mean criticism is required, just that people don’t have to stop themselves being critical. The “don’t rain on ideas” rule can be replaced by a “don’t take criticism personally” mandate. Everyone should be free to be themselves and to say what they really think, with courtesy and kindness, but also with the courage of their convictions.

Think hard before your next idea generation session. Is the required outcome and priority that people should have a good time? If so, definitely keep to the standard rules. But if you have a real need for creativity and a diverse range of solutions, then it’s absolutely worth breaking the “no idea is a bad idea” rule.

The author of the aforementioned study says that she believes that disagreements open the mind: “Faced with an alternative conception of reality and a different way of thinking… we actually search for and consider more options.”

For creative ideas, look elsewhere

Extroverts tend to thrive better in brainstorms than introverts. Interrupters tend to get more ideas out than non-interrupters. If you like to live spontaneously, you’ll enjoy them more than careful planners. All of this limits the range of ideas that will be produced.

Sheena Iyengar, a professor at Columbia Business School, has compiled academic research on idea generation, including a decade of interviews with more than a thousand people. She concludes that group brainstorming is usually a waste of time. She points out that the ethos of brainstorming – suck up any judgement and build on what others say – is better suited to “polite conversation at a dinner party” than to problem-solving at work. She says: “You do not get your best ideas out of freewheeling brainstorming sessions.”

Enthusiasm is brilliant at work, and creativity belongs to everyone. But within the constraints of a brainstorm, the tension of coming up with original ideas that please the boss can be enormous and makes the chances of creative thought even harder than usual. In W1A, the wonderful spoof TV show about the BBC, a team of PR specialists are made to play a game of ping-pong with the twist that they have to come up with a new idea for a show every time they hit the ball. The US series of The Office spoofed idea generation too with a ludicrous episode where the team have to come up with an ‘urgent’ idea for the boss, Michael, to write in wet cement before the cement dries. Brainstorms can have a role to play, they do make people feel involved and they can be fun. But they aren’t going to get you new ideas.

This is an edited excerpt from A Year of Creativity: 52 smart ideas for boosting creativity, innovation and inspiration at work by Kathryn Jacob and Sue Unerman, published by Bloomsbury Business

AMBA & BGA members can enjoy a 30% discount off the RRP for ⁠A Year of Creativity, courtesy of the book club. Please click here for details.