How to Solve All of Your Problems

We all learned about brainstorming and teamwork in the office back in the '90's. But often we do not take the time to use these great techniques in our everyday life to reach creative solutions to our problems. Here are some tips on how to brainstorm just about any problem or topic, whether it is with your family, soccer team or corporate colleagues.

Benefits of Brainstorming

· Generates many ideas quickly

· Participants can build on each other's ideas

· Stimulates creative thinking

· Gets everyone involved and fosters team spirit

· Captures everyone's ideas. Allows everyone the opportunity to contribute equally

Guidelines for Effective Brainstorming

· Announce the problem or topic

· Emphasize that "No idea is a bad idea"

· Everyone participates but its OK to pass

· Don't discuss or criticize ideas

· Don't paraphrase ideas

· Record ALL ideas and write them as they occur (flipcharts work best)

· Set a target (15 minutes or 3 rounds)

· Review the suggestions periodically to stimulate ideas

· Involve the participants and provide positive feedback

· Conclude brainstorming by reviewing suggestions

· Maintain a record of the suggestions

Six Brainstorming Techniques

· Idea Quota - have the group come up with at least 20 ideas in 5 minutes

· Martian - Think up the wildest and craziest ideas, then turn them into constructive ideas

· Inversion - Generate ideas to create opposite outcomes, then invert those ideas into viable solutions (e.g. you are trying to find ways to get the family to come to dinner at the same time so generate ideas on all the ways you could keep them from doing it)

· Analogy - imagine an environment that is similar to yours but not the same. Determine solutions and then substitute your ideas back to the needs of your work/family area

· Notestorming - Each person in the group writes one idea on a piece of paper and circulates the note; other members upgrade and improve the idea when the note comes around

· Round - Robin - Start with one idea; one person leads the discussion calling on another person to add to or 'one up' the previous person's idea, resulting in a well-developed solution

So whether your family can't decide who should take out the trash, your church members are in an uproar over how to raise funds for the new sanctuary or your team at work is stuck solving issues, brainstorming can be a fun and creative process for solving all types of problems.