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Brainstorming
with Note Cards brainstorming
Why Use It
This thinklet combines
many of the advantages of both personal and group brainstorming. It
encourages the open exchange of ideas while maintaining the creative energy
that can spring from combining individual inputs.
How to Use It
Participants
work independently to generate an initial set of ideas as well as to
evaluate, modify, or improve on other team members' contributions. This is an excellent tool for quickly
stimulating ideas from a large group of people.
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Step
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Description
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1
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Clearly identify the
problem or situation for which the team needs to generate ideas or
solutions.
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2
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Working individually, have participants generate three to five ideas
and write them on separate note cards.
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3
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Depending on the level of anonymity you want to maintain,
redistribute the cards to the other team members in any of the following
ways:
a. Have each person place them in a pile on their
right for the person next to them to take.
b. Place all of the cards in the center of the
table for anyone to take.
c. Appoint one person to collect, shuffle, and
redistribute the cards.
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4
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For the next 15-20
minutes, participants should take a note card and either
a.
Build on the original idea and add
improvements or comments to that note card.
b.
If a card
stimulates a totally new idea, write it down on a new card to be added to
the pile.
Note: Use the rules for
brainstorming: encourage all ideas, strive for quantity, and defer judgment
until it is time to evaluate the ideas.
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5
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Collect the note cards and sort them into categories.
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6
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Using the categories and
ideas, the team should go into traditional group brainstorming to develop
more ideas.
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7
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Examine all ideas (note
card and group) to uncover the most creative and feasible idea.
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Information Source: Arthur B
VanGundy, Idea Power (New York,
AMACOM)
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