How to generate ideas
All you need is one piece of paper, your favorite cafe, a pencil and a lack of inhibitions
Often I am asked to think up a few ides on a specific topic, or to come up with a new architecture for a product.
This can be really difficult, especially when you have to get somthing quick. Here is one of the methods that I use to do this I call it an Ideas sheet.
The process is straight forward,
- get out of the office … find a cafe, park, street corner any where that is comfortable that you are in control of any interuptions.
- get a blank piece of paper,
- Clear your mind for a while
- Think about the essence of what is being asked for,
who is it for?
why is it fun?
what is so great about it? - When you get an idea write it down on the paper, if words are too restrictive … then draw a picture.
- Now try to completely forget the last idea, turn the page up side down so that you cant read it. or place another piece of paper on to of it.
- Go back to thinking of the essence of the issue or what you want to make, when you get an idea .. repeat.
- Now just keep going till the paper is full
- If you spend more than an hour on this then give up, try again another day.
As you can see this often makes some funny ideas. Which are all good. When you come to discuss the ideas with your collegues they can all have a good laugh, which really helps with making the job fun.
3 Responses to “How to generate ideas”
chay
This seems like a good way to ‘solve’ those kind of problems that have a fuzzily defined problem-space..
The problem for me is step 6, I tend to quickly determine my favourite – perhaps this would be a good way to become more disciplined in this respect, and keep a more open mind.
I rekon this kind of free-form tactic can probably be well applied to a lot of things outside of design, especially towards creative areas, and might help overcome ‘writers block’ by teasing out the beginnings of ideas…
simon
I developed this method simply because I became fixated on one idea. Which I knew to be a duff idea. So I thought … how do I forget the last thing I did?
Ive used this on lots of things now and some times it really works, I would be very interested to see if the method works for you.
Will
I’m pretty fixated on getting away from paper and doing everything electronically – but your method highlights one of the problem issues in doing that – its very hard to save your first idea and start afresh on another… There is something extremely useful about paper, in that once you have it written or drawn on, that’s it. On a laptop your first idea often morphs so much through continuous changes that you lose the meaning of your original thought completely… and occasionally the will to live!
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