There are numerous ways to stimulate creativity including: brainstorming, brainwriting, and using analogies or metaphors. Before you begin these techniques, try restating the problem. For instance, complaints have been received due to delays in shipments from the warehouse. We could state the problem as "identifying ways to minimize customer complaints," but we might also come up with creative solutions if we looked at "how to ensure customers have accurate information about date of product delivery" or "how do we keep customers informed about the status of delayed orders."
Still another way to generate ideas is to question our assumptions. They may be erroneous, and raising issues that would seem already to have been considered and resolved may be one way to determine some faulty conclusions.
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Most of us are familiar with brainstorming, which is a form of free association.
Brainstorming is usually done in groups, and individuals call out ideas that are written on a chart. No idea is evaluated until the session is completed. Then the group works on the list, linking common ideas and separating the chaff from the wheat.
Brainwriting is free association done on a piece of paper. You begin with a single word or phrase in the center of the sheet. Over a five or ten-minute interval, you then write down as many single words or phrases that come to you. Where ideas are related, lines can be drawn, and groups of ideas can be circled to form islands of thought.
Linking the islands generally triggers workable solutions to a problem.
Analogies or metaphors, sometimes just words randomly selected out of a book, can also spark thoughts about a situation. For instance, scrap levels have risen due to lack of training of new workers. You need a way to speed training. Choose an object, like a pen or a book, then come up with some metaphors or analogies to the object, then use these metaphors or analogical thoughts to trigger ideas to solve the training program. For instance, a book is like a library in that it contains a lot of information. In some ways, experienced workers are a library of knowledge. So why not set up buddy systems for the newer workers to help speed their job orientation? See how it works?
"What if" questions can trigger lots of ideas as can repeatedly asking the question "why" during a discussion. Don’t forget who, what, where, and how questions, either, like:
- What would happen if we…?
- How could were arrange the program to…?
- Why did we settle on doing … this way?