Brainstorming is a technique for solving problems designed to generate a spontaneous flow of new ideas or solutions within a preset time frame. Whether you’re setting up or leading a group session, understanding brainstorming basics can help you make the most of the technique. Although some people divide the process into many steps, especially when using advanced methods, you can break brainstorming into five steps.

Prepare Session

Session preparation helps create an environment where creative thinking flourishes. The process involves selecting a space where participants can feel comfortable and unrestricted such as a large soundproofed conference room and a method to record ideas such as a white board or flip chart. Once the room is ready, three to 12 people familiar with the topic who can provide different perspectives are selected, as well as a person to serve as facilitator and another as secretary. When the group arrives, their minds are usually prepared for the free flow of ideas with an icebreaker such as a word-association game.

Discuss Topic

Discussing the topic explains to the group why the session is necessary and helps point their minds in a specific direction. The session facilitator introduces the topic to the group and provides some general background information about it including any upcoming deadlines, if applicable. He then outlines the main problem relating to the topic that he needs help solving. The facilitator details previous attempts to solve the problem and ideas generated to attempt to solve it that didn’t worked.

Establish Rules

Setting rules for the session establishes expectations. The facilitator establishes a schedule. For example, he might establish a single session lasting 5 to 15 minutes or a longer session broken into 15-minute increments with 5- or 10-minute rests between. After the schedule is explained, the facilitator outlines the four traditional rules of brainstorming -- the purpose of the session is to create a large quantity of ideas in a set time frame; idea criticism and evaluation is withheld until after the session ends; no idea is wrong and wild, out-of-the-box thinking is encouraged; and everyone can build upon each other’s ideas.

Run Session

Running the session from start to finish helps generate ideas. The facilitator may do this via the traditional group method: participants shout out their ideas and the secretary writes them down. He might mix individual brainstorming with group brainstorming: participants write down four to five ideas for 10 minutes and the facilitator or secretary reads them aloud. During the session, the facilitator refocuses participant attention as needed, reminds participants of the rules when they are broken and stimulates ideas by asking participants to look from different perspectives or create new ideas by developing or combining ones already suggested.

Organize Ideas

Organizing ideas prepares them for group evaluation and discussion for consideration as possible methods to solve the problem. The facilitator or secretary removes duplicate ideas and then the participants remove ideas unrelated to the topic. The participants group the remaining ideas by similar concepts into categories. Once you have the results organized, you can start the process of having the group evaluate the ideas, discuss why some ideas are better than others and rank the priority of the results for further evaluation.