From the archive: How to be a Brain in a Brainstorm
[The third in my series of posts that have disappeared with Interesource, but which I would like to keep available. This one was a look at how to be useful and polite in a brainstorm. It was originally published on 2nd April 2007.]
We often run brainstorms for clients here at Interesource. We have a group of experts, who we refer to as ‘brains’, that we call on to help us with these. They’re all expert in some area of the Internet and are all early adopters of the latest and shiniest stuff. You won’t need to explain to them what Twitter is or mashups are, or how Facebook is different from MySpace for example.
Of course this has its downside too: they’re all remarkably opinionated. Now, of course we love opinions because we’ve all got them and exposure to other opinions is the best way to challenge your preconceptions. That’s why clients pay for brainstorms, after all. The brains also tend to be too radical for most practical purposes, but that again is a benefit because ideas can always be toned down for the market they’re aimed at.
We usually mix in a few Interesource employees as ‘brains’ too. After all, we have experts a plenty on the staff. Recently I’ve been called on for two brainstorms. Here are my observations on what it takes to be useful in one.
You have to remember that you’re in the brainstorm for your opinions and expertise, so it’s OK to say things that are controversial and, in all likelihood, not fully formed or even at all practical.
The flip-side of this is that you’re not there to force your opinions or priorities on other people. You’ve been asked to tell people what you think, not suppress what other people think. You have to trust the people running the brainstorm to harvest the ideas and use the best ones. Just because you think it’s an awesome idea doesn’t mean that everyone else does. People who know me will recognise that this is the bit I really struggle with. Hopefully I’m getting better at it.
The two brainstorms I’ve been in recently have both been very positive and useful, but in both there was some behaviour that I felt was unhelpful. The first instance was one of the attendees telling the group ‘you haven’t come up with anything new’. Let’s deconstruct that.
First: you don’t *have* to come up with anything new in a brainstorm. They can be super-efficent ways of transferring knowledge, and that’s a great outcome. Second: a brainstorm group should behave as a team, not a series of individuals in competition with each other. If the brainstorm hasn’t produced anything new and it should have then the whole team has failed. It’s no good accusing the rest of the group of failure and trying to stand outside the failure.
This notion of it being teamwork is why brainstorms often start with trust games. Tim often runs brainstorms here and he usually makes people reveal an embarrassing hobby or fact about themselves to break the ice. This is great because it helps people to relax, lets everyone get some sense of the people they’re in a room with. After all, they may never have met several of the participants before.
I usually feel quite a lot of pressure before a brainstorm because I feel that there’s an expectation that I will say something brilliant or original and that’s difficult to do. You’re in a room with some very bright people and you don’t want to look stupid in front of them. But you have to remember that this is why there is no bad idea in a brainstorm – just say what you think.
You also have to submit to the moderator’s discipline. A good moderator will understand the client’s brief very well and will steer you away from topic areas that are not relevant. It’s important not to be offended by this; it doesn’t mean that the idea is bad, just that it’s better to move on to talk about something else. And for heaven’s sake, don’t keep trying to get your big idea back into the conversation if it’s moved on from there.
Running a good brainstorm is a tricky blend of finding people with egos and confidence who don’t mind shutting up when they’re told or listening to things they fundamentally disagree with without attacking it.
Comments
Leave a Reply
