Brainstorming is dead, long live the DreamTeam
Hand on heart, how often did you have to participate in a brainstorming session last week? How effective was this process and how valuable was the result? Probably rather moderately. It happens not too infrequently that participants in a brainstorming session leave the meeting unsatisfied instead of bubbling over with new ideas. The reason is a relatively simple one. Give me a rundown of the rules of brainstorming. And that’s where we have the problem. There are no universal rules for brainstorming, but unfortunately, there are often no internal rules either. It is not uncommon for a brainstorming session to end in chaos and confusion.
Mario Pricken not only rethinks brainstorming in his book “Kribbeln im Kopf” (Tingling in the Head) but also incorporates his experiences from the last few years in the creative industry into the DreamTeam method. I would like to introduce you to the basic rules of the DreamTeam method in this blog because it has helped me tremendously in my creative processes.
The briefing
As you can see from the graphic above, everything starts with a briefing. Most briefings are far too extensive or, unfortunately, not meaningful at all. Rarely do you get a briefing with exactly the content you need as a creative. So the first step in the DreamTeam method is to put the information from the briefing, all the documentation, and what the client is trying to say between the lines, on paper. The result should be a sentence. The formulation of the goal.
One should not underestimate that this is a very intensive step. But if you are prepared to invest the time in analyzing the actual customer problem, you will save yourself a lot of time afterward. Once the goal has been formulated and the creative team has been briefed, the search for ideas can begin.
The search for Ideas
Now comes the exciting part. In the brainstorming phase, you let your imagination run wild. There are no limits and no restrictions. The aim is to create a pool of ideas as large as possible. From this idea pool, you can then draw in the next step.
It is important that everyone plays by the same rules. The first rule is - criticism yes, but at the right time. Nothing kills the flow of ideas more than the one colleague who takes every idea apart into its individual parts. In this phase of brainstorming, it is not about developing mature ideas and certainly not about considering whether an idea can be implemented. That’s what the next step is for.
Developing and selecting ideas
You now draw from a large pool of ideas and your task is to put each idea through its paces. A somewhat critical eye is required in this phase. Take each idea and develop it further. Can you think of the ideas further? Does it correspond to the briefing? The aim of this phase is to ensure that only those ideas survive that have real potential. It often turns out that two idea splinters from the previous phase can be combined very well.
When you have clearly reduced your pool of ideas to a well-thought-out selection, then wait with the idea evaluation. Take some time off and sleep on it. Often, in your euphoria, you cannot immediately judge which ideas really have the potential for the future.
Implementation
You now have a well-developed idea that meets the brief but also has potential for the future. This is the point where most people would stop. Unfortunately, this is also the point where averageness arises. A well-developed idea is unfortunately far from being a mature idea. Now it’s time to question the idea, revise it, reject it, and start all over again. Because you can be sure that if you don’t go through this process, your customers or target group certainly will. Every idea, every product, and every service is questioned. So it is advisable to be one step ahead of all these people. By going through this process before it is possible to find answers to problems that were not apparent before.
Overwhelmed now? Don’t worry, I was too. Breaking up old processes and implementing new ones is not a pleasant task and not always an easy one. Nevertheless, I can only recommend the DreamTeam method for any kind of idea development. It offers support and structure in a very chaotic phase of a project and thus enables professional work with ideas.