FireFly Facilitation

There is a new focus for innovation – and it is called design thinking.  It is all about breaking down the organizational silos and making everyone in the company responsible for innovation.  One of the chief proponents is Tim Brown -  CEO and president of IDEO and author of  Change by Design 

Tim Brown is an industrial designer by training, and has won numerous design awards.  His team even appeared on a news show, demonstrating how to create a new and improved shopping cart in just 4 days.  His passion is finding ways design can be used to promote the well being of people living in emerging economies. [In fact, many innovative ideas are being created by focusing on these emerging economies].

 He says one of the keys to great ideation is great preparation.  And great preparation begins with a design brief.  Here he captures the power in his own words:

“The difference between a design brief with just the right level of constraint and one that is overly vague or overly restrictive can be the difference between a team on fire with breakthrough ideas and one that delivers a tired reworking of existing ones.”

And I have found this to be true in my work facilitating innovation sessions, though it may seem counter-intuitive.  Often, the clients I work with say they want the brainstorming session to be very broad because they want to “empower” the participants.  In fact the opposite tends to happen.   When the “creativity canvas” is too wide, it actually either leads to too many ideas that are off the mark and not actionable or too many ideas that do not address the most critical challenges. 

As Brown says above, with just the right ending to the sentence – “How might we…” – you too can catch your team on fire with creativty aimed in the right direction!

Here are 3 more specific things you can take action on right away to become a positive force for innovation on your team!

Deal with other, more insidious “trust busters,” too. One common behavior I see on teams that damages and limits trust is sarcasm disguised as humor.  In order to innovate, people must be able to connect with each other in a real, deeply personal way.  If one or more members (especially the leader) are constantly throwing barbs at other team members under the guise of humor, they’ll cause an erosion of trust.

Make sure quieter fireflies have a chance to glow. Certain people may naturally dominate the discussion while others tend to hang back and go with the flow.  If your big talkers are always allowed to verbally run over the quieter/less visible members of your team, the same ideas and solutions will always get implemented.  Instead, ask everyone to jot down their initial ideas in silence and then share them, round-robin style.  Ask people to speak in headlines.  Or ask everyone to “self-police” their participation levels.

As a team leader, don’t keep too tight a lid on the jar. Just as fireflies’ lights fade when they’re held captive, a leader who dominates and controls his or her team will squelch creativity.  Take deliberate steps not to do this. Don’t sit at the head of the table. Use positive reinforcement (both verbally and nonverbally). Don’t get into a prolonged conversation with only one or two other team members. Share your opinion on the topic last.

Imagine being invited to a friend’s house for dinner. You arrive with an appetite, excited to see what’s on the menu. Your host begins the meal by serving light salad of fresh vegetables, and the two of you chat about the day at work.

Having dispatched of the salad, you look forward to the main course. Five minutes pass, and then ten more. Although you’re enjoying conversation, your host still hasn’t served another dish. As your stomach begins to rumble, you wonder when your friend will realize that he/she has forgotten to bring out the next round of food.

Finally, your host clears away the salad bowls, and you prepare for the arrival of a long-overdue entrée. However, something curious happens. Instead of being served a plate of pasta or chicken, you’re treated to a small cupcake—and that’s it!

An Agenda with Substance

Many meeting-goers can relate to our confused, underfed dinner guest. They show up to a conference room expecting to take part in something substantial, but nothing of consequence is ever discussed. When the meeting adjourns, they feel as if their time has been wasted, and they wonder why they were asked to come in the first place.

The world moves faster than ever, and people’s time is precious. Respect your coworkers and clients by making sure your meetings are meaningful. Before asking for a slot on everyone’s schedule, I would suggest creating a pre-meeting checklist.

• Is it absolutely necessary to meet in person, or could information be passed along in an email?
• Do I have clear objectives to accomplish at the meeting?
• Does the meeting’s objective really require a group decision?

Until you can answer, “yes” to all three questions, don’t schedule the meeting. Otherwise, you’ll frustrate your employees by frittering away their time.

When facilitating a problem-solving session, I enjoy a lively debate in which everybody is participating and ideas are flowing spontaneously from everyone in attendance. However, sometimes meetings don’t start out with a bang. When you’re trying to open up dialog, a wall of silence isn’t exactly an encouraging welcome. What happens if no one ventures forth input? How do you spark conversation when those in the room seem fearful to speak?

One tool I use is brainwriting. This process taps into the unique perspective of each person and encourages them to build upon the ideas of others. The anonymity of the exercise along with its emphasis on stretching ideas further and further increases the odds of coming up with . . . well, odd and potentially novel solutions.

Let me walk you through how this exercise works, and you will see what I mean:

1. Give each member of the problem-solving team—ideally, four to six people—a blank sheet of paper.
2. On the top of the page, have them write an agreed upon problem statement. Then, ask them to draw vertical lines to separate the sheet of paper into three columns.
3. Set a timer for two minutes. Each participant should brainstorm three solutions, writing one in each column.
4. After the buzzer sounds, ask each person to draw a horizontal line under their solutions across the entire page. Then have them pass the sheet of paper to their left.
5. Now, set the timer for three minutes. Have the participants add to or build upon the existing suggestions by writing their own ideas underneath the original solutions.
6. At the end of three minutes, the papers should again be passed to the left. The process should be repeated as many times as there are people around the table. During each round, allow slightly more time since the addition of ideas makes it harder to think up new solutions.
7. When you’ve finished going around the table, post the sheets of paper on the wall so that each person can read the ideas. Ask them to write their initials beside the ones they think are most likely to solve the original problem. Better yet, see if they can combine ideas from one or more pages to generate an exponentially better idea.

I’ve found brainwriting to be ideal when people are afraid to voice their ideas or when one person is dominating the discussion. Brainwriting jumpstarts the flow of ideas and invites everyone into the problem-solving process. The resulting ideas are collaborative and creative—often leading directly to successful solutions.