Collective thinking can be energizing, productive and can produce great results. Yet often the setup and the techniques for Collective thinking are poorly taken care of. This leads to meeting frustration, de-motivated teams and poor results. This is your starter kit for satisfying thinking experiences in your collaboration. Use it, have great sessions and let me know if it worked!

1. COLLABORATIVE THINKING !
STARTER KIT
A collection of very basic yet highly effective means to
improve collective thinking put together by Anja Kantowsky !
About this document
>12 years
experience
facilitating
meetings
>20 years
meeting
experience
Passionate
for people
& working
together
Bad
meetings
are a drag
Improving
is easy and
fun! Good
practice
-> results
-> ☺
Collection
of
practices
for joint
thinking
Complete
Scientific

2. Someone opens a matter to
think about
Some don’t answer !
- maybe question is unclear,
maybe they need more
thinking time?
Some answer
Ad-hoc thinking setup in teams
What are we
thinking about?
Inputs mightget lost
Difficult setup
for introverts
Improved setup: !
Write down the matter to think about
With a written topic or
question everyone knows
what to think about
Ways to do this:
Just a topic !
e.g. Sales situation
Narrowing it down!
e.g. Improving our sales
situation
A question!
e.g. What can we do to spur
sales?
Narrowed
down =
easy to come
with input

3. Standard for documenting inputs:!
Taking notes on a flipchart
People utter their thinking
Someone is taking notes
“translation” of
inputs might
cause irritation
Linear setup =a lot of time
for all inputs
Difficult setup
for introverts
Improved setup for gathering of inputs:!
Hand out sticky notes and pen
Handing sticky notes and pen
to each person at the table
helps to overcome all issues
with linear documenting by
someone.
Extra Bonus: !
Silences and opens up time to
really think
Only one
thought per
sticky note
Descriptive &understandable

4. Setup without a person taking notes:!
Put the matter to think about on the table
With a written subject in the
middle of the table the
thinking energy of the group
stays focused.
Great to stop
multitaskingin a group!
The pro setup
Use graphical organizers to
sort inputs right away.
In such a setup, everyone is
asked to locate her/his sticky
notes in the overall picture.
Saves a lot of
time whenjointlyexploring inputs

5. Explore the following topics if you’re up for more
Have fun!