Product Design: Lessons from IDEO

The Perfect Brainstorm

Brainstorming is practically a religion at IDEO, one they practice nearly every day.

 

The Art of Innovation

Value Innovation

Entrepreneurial Creativity

Culture for Innovation

Innovation Process

  

 

IDEO Tom Kelley creativity innovation quotes

Make brainstorming a religion. The buzz of a good brainstormer can infect a team with optimism and sense of opportunity.

Tom Kelley

IDEO

 
 

"The buzz of a good brainstormer can infect a team  with optimism and sense of opportunity that can carry it through the darkest and most pressure-tinged stages of the project... Though brainstorms themselves are often playful, brainstorming as a tool – as a skill – is taken quite seriously," says Tom Kelly.

   SuperCreativity new product design best practices innovation culture

 

 
 

In a company without many rules, IDEO people have a very firm idea about what constitutes a brainstorm and how it should be organized:

Duration: Sixty minutes in an optimum length. The level of physical and mental energy required for a brainstorm is hard to sustain much longer than that.

  

IDEO's 6 Innovation Practice Tips

Cross-pollination Tips

Trend Spotting

Work as Fun

  

 
Product Design Innovation Process A-Z/360 by Vadim Kotelnikov  

Don'ts: "Brainstorming sessions aren't presentations or opportunities for the boss to poll the troops for hot ideas. Nor should they feel like work. And brainstorming is most definitely not about spending thousands of dollars at some glamorous off-site location."

  

 
 

Idea engine: "Brainstorming is the idea engine of IDEO's culture. It is an opportunity for teams to "blue sky" ideas early in a project or to solve a tricky problem that's cropped up later on. The more productive the group, the more it brainstorms regularly and effectively."

  

Brainstorming

10 Rules

Techniques

How To Run

  

 

 

 

Mini-courses

  

Your growth boosters

 

Teaching by Example