Human-Centered Design: From Synthesis to Creative Ideas

1. 00:07Hello everyone! We are at the HPI School of Design Thinking.
2. 00:10This is where teams of students work on different projects
3. 00:14applying the design thinking methodology and right now there's
4. 00:17a team which is applying different techniques of brainstorming
5. 00:20to come up with a lot of ideas. Hi guys! Could you tell
6. 00:24us what you're working on?- So right now we're trying to solve a problem that Ali has.
7. 00:28So, Ali is a young law student who we met during our interviews
8. 00:32and he lives in Berlin, he is very passionate about social project and wants
9. 00:36to get engaged but he is also very busy balancing his studies and also his
10. 00:40student job on the side. So yeah, he's
11. 00:44quite active on social media, like most of us.
12. 00:46But we'll see where we can go from that.
13. 00:50So the "How might we" question that we're trying to solve
14. 00:53and that we'll use for our brainstorming session is
15. 00:56"How might we help Ali to contribute to meaningful social work
16. 01:01even though time is a scarce resource."- So no we are going to use
17. 01:07different brainstorming techniques to be able to come up with different
18. 01:10new ideas.- Right, and I would suggests to start with
19. 01:14silent brainstorming. So everyone of you takes some sticky notes and writes down the ideas
20. 01:21on one sticky note. So each idea on one sticky note.
21. 01:24And I set the timer on three minutes.
22. 01:38For silent brainstorming make sure that everyone has sticky
23. 01:41notes and markers. Set maximum five minutes on the timer.
24. 01:45The team would write down their ideas silently in a short amount
25. 01:49of time. Tell them up front that they should go for as many ideas
26. 01:53that come to their mind. When time is up the team shares their
27. 01:58ideas on the whiteboard or any surface, one person at the time.
28. 02:03When a team member is sharing, tell others to listen carefully.
29. 02:07This may spark a new idea in their mind and they can write it
30. 02:11down and share it afterwards. We recommend to use this technique
31. 02:15in the very beginning of an ideation session.
32. 02:17It will allow everyone to free their minds from all ideas they
33. 02:21have without any influence.
34. 02:26The "Hot Potato" is a physically active brainstorming technique.
35. 02:30You need a ball or something fluffy and round that you could
36. 02:33throw and catch easily. Stand in a circle with your team and
37. 02:38start by throwing the object to a team member.
38. 02:41That person is supposed to come up with an idea very fast
39. 02:44and say it out loud. He or she then throws the object to another team
40. 02:48member and it continues like this.
41. 02:52Here you would need a coach or a team member that takes a facilitator
42. 02:56role, who writes down each idea that is shared on a sticky note.
43. 03:00Otherwise everyone is just shouting out ideas and will forget
44. 03:04them by the end of the session. The facilitator will read the ideas
45. 03:09once again at the end and puts them on the whiteboard or another
46. 03:12surface. This technique is really good for pushing people to
47. 03:17come up with wild ideas fast and without any judgment.
48. 03:21We suggest that you try to go through this technique at least
49. 03:24for five minutes. Teams often feel uncomfortable in the very
50. 03:28beginning and need to get into the flow of this very fast
51. 03:31and spontaneous technique. In this technique
52. 03:35both your body and brain is engaged. Physical movement activates
53. 03:40different parts of your brain and helps you think differently.
54. 03:46"Photo brainstorming" is a technique for changing your perspective.
55. 03:50All you need is a picture. Print out a large image on an A4
56. 03:53paper and put it up on a wall or in the middle of the table.
57. 03:58The team looks at this picture and tries to come up
58. 04:02with ideas associated to what they see
59. 04:05and capture each idea on a sticky note. Different attributes
60. 04:09of the picture, for instance colors, shapes or a landscape in
61. 04:12the picture may inspire individuals differently.
62. 04:16This technique triggers different associations and creates
63. 04:19a space for new combinations and ideas. You can either do this
64. 04:24session like a silent brainstorming where team members write
65. 04:28down their ideas on sticky notes first and share it at the
66. 04:30end, or write each idea down and say it out loud during the
67. 04:35session. We recommend to set the time between five to ten minutes
68. 04:39for this session.
69. 04:43The last technique that we want to demonstrate in this video
70. 04:45is a way for your team to act out the brainstorming principle
71. 04:49of "building on the ideas of others". We call it "Plus five".
72. 04:54To start, ask the team to have a look at the ideas that are
73. 04:57already on the board, then each member picks one idea they would
74. 05:01like to build on. Make sure that no one picks their own idea.
75. 05:06Now each team member has to come up with at least five more
76. 05:09ideas that built on that idea they picked. This can be done in
77. 05:13five to seven minutes. Again: noting down the ideas is done silently
78. 05:18and all ideas are shared afterwards. As you notice, this technique
79. 05:23is not suitable for your first round of brainstorming.
80. 05:27The team should already have collected a pool of
81. 05:30ideas to choose from and build on. This technique helps teams
82. 05:34to elaborate and add to ideas and make them more concrete.

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