The Devil's Advocate

46

Ban the brainstorm

Even if we’re supposed to call it a ‘thought shower’ nowadays, the brainstorm has been the default innovation engine in companies since its unwitting invention by advertising man Alex Osborn in the 1950s.

However, as creativity maven Jonah Lehrer has pointed out, empirical research consistently shows it doesn’t work. As early as 1958, an experiment at Yale University revealed that groups who first worked on their own before coming together to pool ideas produced twice as many ideas as groups that brainstormed.

There’s also a problem with the central tenet of the brainstorm, ‘don’t criticise other people’s ideas’. It certainly makes for very polite meetings. Unfortunately, criticism works.

If you sit back in a meeting ...