Brain Writing
The sequential building of ideas without evaluation.
Goal
To generate divergent ideas by using other's ideas to trigger them. An opportunity for each participant to voice up.
Attachments
Materials
Instructions
Before
Setting: for larger groups tables of 5 or 6 people each is better.
Pre-Work Required: The focus question and the instructions to the participants need to be clear.
During
1. Hand out sheets of paper.
2. Ask people to put the focus question at the top of the sheet
3. Each person is to write 3 ideas on the sheet of paper.
4. Each person passes their sheet to the person on their right.
5. Each person reads the sheet and writes 3 new ideas on the new sheet.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 until the sheets have come back to the original writer.
Note. The same process can be done by having one flip chart sheet of paper hanging on the wall for each participant. The participants then move from sheet to sheet.
After
Follow-Up Required: Process the ideas generated.
Usual or Expected Outcomes: One list of ideas per participant
How success is evaluated: lists of divergent ideas
Background
Derived from: unknown
History of Development: unknown
Comments (1)
This can be used online, anonymously, in real time or asynchronously to kick start a piece of work (project review, product design etc). A platform such as Mural could be used or something like Google Sheets.