idea vomiting a creative brainstorming
session Alexander Braden Courtney Tye Breyna Fries

by the end of this
session, ! you’ll be able to! • harness the creativity of your team! • spur brilliant ideas from unlikely sources! • use absurdity to ignite your creative genius! • discover your best solutions yet

and together, we’re going to
make sxsw better

ACTIVITY listen, understand + identify
In pairs, tell each other the story of your SXSW experience (the good, the bad and the ugly).! Listener be silent! You should write down any problems/ opportunities he/she hears on sticky notes.! Take 3 minutes for the first person to tell their story as the listener takes notes, and then switch roles.

Alexander Braden Alexander Braden graduated
from SCAD with a BFA in Interactive Design. He is currently a User Experience designer at IBM. He has a love for the way we interact with technology and a fascination with that point in which the digital and the physical become one. ! Courtney Tye Courtney Tye is a visual designer for software products at IBM Design. She currently works on Smarter Cities projects within the Industry Solutions division of IBM and previously worked on B2B commerce. Courtney graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill in May 2013 with a major in graphic design. ! Breyna Fries Breyna Fries is a Visual Designer at frog here in Austin. There she’s responsible for bringing each moment of the design to life with a powerful visual language that strategically extends each brand. She has a BFA in Graphic Design from the Savannah College of Art and Design where she focused on brand development. !

we use ideation! to design
better ! software @!

what is ideation? Ideation is
the process of generating, exploring, and evaluating new ideas.

To have a great idea,
have a lot of them.! Thomas Edison!

what is ideation? • collaborative
problem-solving! • a collection of methods, not a hard & fast process! • diverging + remixing + converging! • finding the best solution possible, not one correct answer

rules !
for ideation

defer judgement

say
!
YES!

encourage !
wild ideas

build on the ideas of
others

STAY FOCUSED ON THE GOAL

one conversation • one conversation
at a time

QUANTITY
is better than
QUALITY

keep in mind...! “Being creative
! is a self-fulfilling ! prophecy”! ! Bryan Mattimore, author, Idea Stormers

cool.! now let’s split into
groups.

where ideation fits in context
of design thinking

first, we need to understand
! the user!

next, we must identify the
problem and frame the opportunity!

how to choose a focus
look for:! • Unexplored/growth areas ! • Common pain points! • Unmet needs! • Missing steps in a process or gaps in an experience! • Unnecessary complexities! !

let’s make the SXSW !
experience better ! example problems ! there’s too little/too slow/too crowded transportation ! it’s tough to plan each day ! traffic is batshit crazy ! i have to wait in line foreverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! example opportunities ! how can we make transportation better at sxsw? ! how can we make the waiting experience better?

ACTIVITY identify your problem +
opportunity Share what you wrote earlier with your group, and discuss which problem or gap in experience you might want to address.! When you have agreed on a problem to focus on, rephrase the problem as an opportunity, i.e., how can we make _______ better at SXSW?! Write your question at the top of one of the large sheets of paper.!

let’s ideate!

idea vomiting • very flexible
method! • allows every member of a group to be heard! • rapid-fire, no talking or discussion! • stream of consciousness, one idea per post-it note! • no idea is a bad idea

idea vomiting • use other
peoples’ post-it notes to spark ideas ! • cluster similar ideas to identify groupings! • to converge on the best ideas, individually vote on clusters you’d like the group to pursue

ACTIVITY idea vomiting + brainwalking
In your groups, write the problem area you chose for ideation on the top of your sheet.! For 10 minutes, idea vomit and place ideas on the sheet.! Take another 10 minutes, and move around the room, contributing to other teams’ ideas.

curveball • Introduce absurdity: !
• The cell towers are overloaded!! • The use of smart phones is gone!! • How does this scenario change your ideas?

clustering

how to cluster • Group
similar ideas together to reveal categories, patterns and/or relationships! • If you find duplicates, stack them on top of each other! • Discard post-its that are irrelevant/don’t make sense! • Give each cluster a name to summarize its content! • Consider what might be missing!

how to vote • Vote
by making a tally mark on the bottom right corner of each post-it! • Each member of the group gets 4 votes! • 2 votes for the ideas most likely to succeed! • 2 votes for the ideas most likely to delight! • Take the top 2-3 ideas that receive the most votes to ideate on further!

ACTIVITY converge Return to your
station and take 10 minutes to cluster.! Take another 5 minutes to vote for which clusters you’d like the group to ideate on further.! Each person gets 2 votes for the ideas most likely to succeed, and 2 votes for the ideas most likely to delight.! !

let’s play back!
our ideas

what other ideation ! methods
are there?

lots.! questioning assumptions! wishing! redefine
the opportunity! brainwalking! semantic intuition! picture prompts! journey maps! forced questioning! attribute listing! role playing! analogies + metaphors! associations! mind mapping! reverse roles!

our 4 favorites questioning assumptions
make a wish + worst idea picture prompts sketching + storyboarding

METHOD 1
questioning assumptions

METHOD 1 questioning assumptions •
In your groups, rapidly generate assumptions (whether true or false) you may be making about the problem/opportunity area in front of you. Aim for at least 20-30 assumptions and list them out on a large sheet of paper.! • Use the assumptions to trigger new ideas.

METHOD 2 make a wish
+ worst idea

METHOD 2 make a wish
+ worst idea MAKE A WISH • In teams, generate as many wishes as you can. How would you solve the problem if anything were possible? Use the list of wishes as thought starters and triggers for new ideas. WORST IDEA • In teams, generate as many terrible, silly, ridiculous ideas as you can. Use the list of bad ideas as thought starters and triggers for new ideas.

METHOD 3 METHOD 3 picture
prompts

METHOD 3 picture prompts •
Gather photos and spend several minutes studying them. Individually list ideas the photos inspire. Consider actions, interactions and relationships (and the lack of these) in each photo as food for thought.! • Spend a few minutes discussing your ideas with another member of your group. How can you improve your ideas? How can you build upon them?! !

METHOD 4
sketching + storyboarding

METHOD 4 sketching + storyboarding
• Decide whether you’d like to sketch a concept, or storyboard an experience.! • If you decide to sketch, draw several quick thumbnails rather than one detailed image.! • If you decide to storyboard, try to tell your story with images and use as few words as possible. Make sure your story has a beginning, middle, and end.

as a group, choose one
! of the 4 methods & take 20 ! minutes to ideate!

questioning assumptions make a wish
+ worst idea • In your groups, rapidly generate assumptions (whether true or false) you may be making. Aim for at least 20-30 assumptions and list them out.! • Make a wish: In teams, generate as many wishes as you can. How would you solve the problem if anything were possible?! • Use the assumptions to trigger new ideas. • Worst idea: In teams, generate as many terrible, silly, bad ideas as you can. ! • Use the lists of wishes and bad ideas as thought starters and triggers for new ideas. picture prompts • • Gather photos and spend several minutes studying them. Individually list ideas the photos inspire. Consider actions, interactions and relationships (and the lack of these).! sketching + storyboarding • Spend a few minutes discussing your ideas with another member of your group. How can you improve your ideas? How can you build upon them? Finally, play back to the group as a whole. Sketching a concept: Draw several quick thumbnails rather than one detailed image.! • Storyboarding an experience: Try to tell your story with images and use as few words as possible. Make sure your story has a beginning, middle, and end.

what’d you ! come up
with?!

let’s compare Look back at
the ideas you jotted down at the beginning of the session. How do they compare to the ideas you have now?

thank you.!
!

contact us Alexander Braden! Courtney
Tye! abixd.com! aebraden@us.ibm.com! courtneytye.com! ctye@us.ibm.com Breyna Fries! breynafries.com! breyna.fries@frogdesign.com!