[acb-hsp] Why Brainstorming Doesn't Work

[peter altschul]

Why Innovation By Brainstorming Doesn't Work
  By Debra Kaye February 28, 2013
  Anything--even doing laundry--will help you dream up new ideas 
better than sitting in a meeting, says Debra Kaye, author of "Red 
Thread Thinking." A case study of the history of the single-use 
detergent pod.
  Eleven men and women file into a conference room and take their 
places around a large table.  Coffee cups and pastries are 
assembled in front of them.  George, the leader, steps up to a 
large whiteboard and scrawls across the top "SOAP STORM SESSION 
9/18/1`.was "Okay, let's begin," he tells the group.  "Let's just 
start free-associating.  What do we think of when we think clean 
laundry?" he asks.  "To get the ball rolling, I'll write a few 
words down," he says and dashes off chore, piles, whites and 
brights, and fresh on the board.  "What else?" he asks.  Several 
people add a few more words: time-consuming, fold, bright, 
uncontaminated, pretty, nice, old-fashioned, and pleasant.
  The meeting continues for about an hour, with more words and 
thoughts added.  The plan was for the team to come up with a new 
idea for laundry detergent.  When the meeting is over, the team 
members file back to their cubicles, word lists in hand, to 
ponder the outcome--but none of them ever produced any new 
insights into doing laundry that would lead to a new product.  
That's because the group made the fatal error of trying to 
innovate by brainstorming around the idea of the central 
attribute of laundry--cleanliness.  So while they came up with a 
pretty long list of words, none of the few concepts that came out 
of the meeting--"cleans in a shorter time," "cleans without 
presoaking," "brightens without fading"--was out-of-the-box 
spectacular.
  This scenario takes place every day in office suites around the 
world.  That's an important point to remember, because companies 
everywhere are brainstorming the same things about clean laundry 
as my imaginary team.  Everything about clean laundry likely has 
been thought of before.  It turns out that a brainstorming 
session is a great place to load up on baked goods and caffeine, 
but it's not so great for generating ideas.  In fact, the team in 
my imaginary example would have come up with more original 
associations and innovative thoughts had they stayed home and 
sorted a sock drawer, taken a hike, relaxed in a bathtub, or done 
just about anything else autonomously--including a load of 
laundry.
  The conventional wisdom that innovation can be 
institutionalized or done in a formal group is simply wrong.  
Part of what we know about the brain makes it clear why the best 
new ideas don't emerge from formal brainstorming.  First, the 
brain doesn't make connections in a rigid atmosphere.  There is 
too much pressure and too much influence from others in the 
group.  The "free association" done in brainstorming sessions is 
often shackled by peer pressure and as a result generates obvious 
responses.  In fact, psychologists have documented the 
predictability of free association.
  You can see this clearly from the responses to "clean laundry" 
in my example.  One association feeds off the next in an expected 
fashion.  The leader does what leaders often do--inadvertently 
gets the upper hand by throwing out certain words that generate 
conventional results, thereby dominating and directing the "free" 
association of the group.
  As I said earlier, the team should have been given the day off 
to do laundry.  That's pretty much what happened at 
Philadelphia-based Cotbn Wash Inc.  Originally the company was a 
cotton mill that spun cotton and made sweaters.  In the 1980's, 
the owner's wife developed a gentle detergent that would wash the 
sweaters without yellowing or stretching.  Flash forward about 30 
years.  Nina E.  Swift, wife of the original owner's son, 
Jonathan Propper, was doing laundry one day and realized that 
even though she loved Cotbn Wash, she disliked measuring and 
pouring liquid or powder from a jug or a box.  Both were messy, 
and she used far more detergent than was recommended (measuring 
is imperfect and people err on the side of generous, she 
discovered).
  This was a mega consumer insight.  Was it just she who felt 
this way, or was it everyone? She talked to Jonathan, who thought 
she was on to something.  So he brought the idea to his small 
company and created Dropps, a single-use package of detergent.  
One small package, similar to those used in dishwashing packets, 
washes a load of laundry--all you have to do is toss it in the 
wash and go.  It solved a lot of problems--no more measuring, 
mess, or waste.  The product also benefited the environment by 
using less water, plastic, and packaging.  No phosphates or 
chlorine means it's green.
  "The technology actually existed for the dissolvable laundry 
detergent package," says Dropps's Remy Wildrick, who calls 
herself the pragmatic side of Propper's creative mind.  "And the 
patent happened to be owned by a person in Philadelphia, which 
was just a nice side note.  We bought the technology from him and 
developed Dropps." The product is sold online, at independent 
retailers, and at Target.  Other larger manufacturers didn't 
introduce their versions of the single-serving detergent pod 
until years later.
  "What's funny is that the technology was sitting there for 
quite a while, but none of the big guys were using it.  They were 
sticking to the same old jugs and boxes--but in mid-2012 they all 
started coming out with uni-packages," says Remy.  Since Dropps 
is small, it can't compete on volume sales with the big guys, but 
it can compete on the product's green aspects and focus on the 
fact that it contains Cotbn Wash detergent, which has an almost 
cult-like fan base, especially among the environmentally 
conscious.
  Fresh ideas come when your brain is relaxed and engaged in 
something other than the particular problem you're embroiled in.  
In the Dropps situation, Jonathan Propper's wife identified a 
problem, and he made a connection to a solution, a technology 
that existed for another application.  This is the polar opposite 
of what happens in brainstorming sessions.  Long showers, soaks 
in a tub, long walks, or doing chores are frequently when those 
"synapses" that find alternative solutions to a problem in new 
ways all hit together so that the big idea can spring.
  Published as an excerpt from Red Thread Thinking: Weaving 
Together Connections for Brilliant Ideas and Profitable 
Innovation with permission from McGraw-Hill
  Debra Kayeinin is a trends consultant specializing in brand 
strategy.  Follow her on Twitter at at DebraAKaye.
  Copyright B) 2013 Mansueto Ventures LLC.  All rights reserved.