Leadership

The Case Against Brainstorming

By Jessica Stillman

Updated on: January 30, 2009 / 8:59 AM EST / MoneyWatch

The Find: Brainstorming stirs up strong reactions â€" both positive and negative â€" and one blog dedicated to creative thinking is rounding up the case for and against the use of the idea generating technique.
The Source: A post by Mark McGuinness on the blog, Lateral Action.

The Takeaway: Brainstorming haters include some of the most high profile people in leading creative companies. Take this rant from Richard Huntington, director of strategy for Saatchi & Saatchi in the UK:

I hate brainstorms. I hate running them, I hate contributing to them and I hate using them to solve problems. They waste huge amounts of time and talent and they are no f****g good at delivering decent ideas.

Or how about this anti-brainstorming passage from Managing Creative People by Gordon Torr, formerly Creative Director of J. Walter Thompson, Europe, Middle East and Africa:

by far the most egregious example of creative mismanagement is the brainstorm... [Brainstorming] didn't work, it never had worked, it never will work, and there was proof that it couldn't work way back in 1965. If, during all this time, any ideas found their way out of brainstorming sessions and were implemented successfully to the great delight of all, it was in spite of the technique, not because of it.

So what do these highly successful people have against the innocuous seeming technique of brainstorming. Lateral Action lays out a six point indictment.

Not enough good ideas: Studies have compared the quality and quantity of ideas generated in group brainstorming sessions with those generated by individuals working in isolation. The researchers found that groups produce fewer good/relevant ideas than those produced by individuals.
Lack of critical filters: Brainstorming is said to work because critical thinking is banned, allowing for a freer flow of original ideas. But again, the research raises doubts about this. One study compared classic brainstorming sessions with sessions in which brainstormers were told what criteria would be used to evaluate their ideas and encouraged to use this information to guide their idea generation. The 'criteria cued' groups produce fewer ideas, but a larger number of high-quality ideas. The danger with brainstorming is that quantity does not equal quality.
Inhibition: One theory for the poor performance of brainstorming groups is that people feel inhibited by the presence of others, particularly their boss or other senior workers.
Freeloading: In a group situation, lazy individuals can get away with contributing little to the discussion, allowing noisier colleagues to do all the work.
Taking turns: In sessions where people have to take turns to speak, this can slow down the idea generation process. If you think of an idea while someone else is speaking, you have to wait your turn to share it with the group. By the time your turn comes round, you may have forgotten it.
Groupthink: In spite of being encouraged to come up with wild or wacky ideas, there's a tendency for groups to converge on similar kinds of idea. Once this starts to happen, it can be hard for an individual to propose a radically different idea, and risk going against the flow.

Despite the case against it, brainstorming does have admirers, including management guru Bob Sutton, who questions the studies that condemn the technique. His argument: "Many academic experiments into brainstorming are fake. They usually involve people who have no prior experience or training in group brainstorming." While Tom Kelly, general manager of IDEO, says "brainstorming is practically a religion at IDEO, one we practice nearly every day" and goes on to argue that brainstorming is a skill that needs to be perfected over long hours of practice. For more on the topic, Sutton has also laid out his view of the pros and cons of brainstorming on his blog.

The Question: Which team are you on, the haters or the admirers of brainstorming and why?

(Image of brainstormed ideas by Jacob BÃ¸tte, CC 2.0)