Gregg Fraley

Jena McGregor (@jenamcgregor) wrote an interesting piece recently for the Washington Post titled “Why Brainstorming Doesn’t Work.” Her piece interprets some rather exciting new creativity research done by Steve Smith of Texas A&M and Nicolas Kohn of University of Texas as saying brainstorming doesn’t work. That’s not what the study is saying really. The research by Smith and Kohn is valid and helpful in my view — and does indeed illustrate one of the challenges  of group brainstorming. Essentially, Smith and Kohn say that when people see ideas others have generated in a group brainstorming session the ideas influence — actually inhibit — the groups ability to generate a diverse set of ideas. The test group that didn’t see each

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I have to admit that I’m a bit jealous of Jeff DeGraff. He’s written an excellent book — so good I have author envy. DeGraff is an impressive innovation expert, consulting and coaching high level executives, but his book is really not targeted to that elite group. As the title suggests, it’s for You. Innovation You: Four Steps to Becoming New and Improved is quite simply a very useful book. Personally useful. Most books with the word Innovation in the title are not terribly exciting, particularly for someone who is not say, a VP or CEO of a major company. Sadly, for average people, or small business owners, most innovation books are quite overwrought with innovation from a large corporation

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It’s become clear to me lately that we take for granted the idea of….an idea. At a recent idea generation session I was conducting a classic Post-It Note brainstorm. Things were flowing and “ideas” were getting out…sort of. What I noticed on the Post-It’s was that some of the ideas were not even half-baked ideas. Some were one word exclamations, or something. Frankly, it would be hard to call some of the material an idea at all. At best, some of them were nascent ideas. I realize that this kind of chafe is often necessary to get to the wheat. Still, even with coaching to be more specific, lots of what I got was not even a complete thought. In

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Ideas can make you sick. Okay, not sick exactly, but a word many of us would associate with new and different — high quality ideas — is “vomit.” It’s not pretty this new idea business. A Cornell University study was published recently that I feel compelled to share. The study reveals our deep and nearly unconscious reaction to new ideas. The link here is not to the actual study but a summary article written by Mary Catt for Chronicle Online, a Cornell blog (thank you Mary). In People are biased against creative ideas, Catt reveals the studies key results. Essentially the study says: * creative ideas make us feel very uncomfortable (think vomit) * people rule out creative ideas and

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I’ve been in and out of a lot of board rooms in the last few months. I’m in selling mode, but also, in listening mode. Nearly every conversation I’ve had has me more firmly believing that one of the problems with large organization innovation is it simply moves too slow. Now, I realize that’s a fairly obvious thought. Still, why is it that organizations are accepting of the fact that their “cycle” of innovation turns over once or twice a year? I don’t see a lot of urgency around changing this, I see a lot of acceptance. This is an opportunity to improve many are overlooking. Here’s why I think so. I’m focused, as is Kiln (I’m a partner in

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I really have to say something about this notion that brainstorming / idea generation / ideation can be made into an efficient process. I’ve read a couple of interesting pieces on this lately, this idea it can be made more efficient, so you only get “good” ideas. If only it were so… I’ll grant you that sometimes the questions posed for an “idea campaign” are too generalized and therefore rake in a lot of useless ideas. I’ll also grant you that converging on a few good ideas when you have thousands to wade through is a challenge. I totally understand why an organization would be seeking a more efficient way to arrive at a nice small batch of really good

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So, you’d like to be more creative. It’s good news, it’s a giant step beyond “I’m not creative”. If you’re “not creative” — stop saying that to yourself and, boy, do you need the list below! Before the thought and motivation leave you, try to get into action and actually Do Something Creative Now. Something that might become a habit, like smoking, only positive. Many people have the ‘more creative’ impulse and then let it float away on the raft of inaction. 10 Ways to Be More Creative, Right Now: 1. Go out and buy a notebook, a cool one, an easy to carry around one. Then start making lists in it of ideas for your various needs. Have a

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Here’s a guest post from good friend and colleague Doug Stevenson. A brief note about Doug — he’s probably the most inspirational trained brain to be found on the planet — he’s the ideal “idea man” and if you need someone to give you 100 ideas about Anything, this is the guy. This is his account of his CPSI (Creative Problem Solving Institute) experience. I’d asked him to do a guest post as I couldn’t attend this year. I find it pretty amazing the lengths people will go to to connect with their creativity and the creative community. In challenging times, take Doug’s advice, don’t worry about your brakes — head for the light, and never retreat in your quest for

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“If you’re gonna brainstorm… please do it like it’s 1999″…(sing this to the tune of Prince’s 1999). I’ve been busy lately doing a training course for salespeople called SalesStorming. My course is not rocket science, it’s just applied creativity concepts focused on selling challenges. I’ve been in front of about 50 sales reps in recent weeks and although they are regularly involved in highly complex sales challenges (the kind that are difficult to win, with long sales cycles, and require a team effort) virtually none of these sales professionals had any idea, really, about how to brainstorm. It was fun to bring them into the new century of creative thinking. In two days we were thinking up breakthrough ideas and

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How many of us lose any sense of our creative selves and never recover? Between the schools, soul crushing jobs, and the myths that surround creativity, it’s hard to find your creative self. And there is no lost and found for creativity. Well, maybe there is… I’m thinking about this because The Creative Problem Solving Institute just concluded in Atlanta, Georgia. Also known as CPSI (“sipSee”) it’s an amazing event and it’s been happening for over 55 years. Normally I’d be there but work has conspired to keep me away. CPSI, was my creativity lost and found, really, an inflection point in my life. Trust me, you are creative, and there are lots of ways to “get it back.” In 1987

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