Using Brainstorming
Are you familiar with lateral thinking? Well if you are, then you are familiar with the principle of brainstorming. This is a method used to think outside of the box…looking at things from a different perspective.
This type of thinking has been around since the 1940s but was brought to us as lateral thinking by Dr. Edward De Bono in a book called “The Use of Lateral Thinking”. He had a very complex definition, but he basically stated that the goal was to think creatively and totally breaks free of any conventional thinking patterns.
Lateral thinking is using brainstorming. Ninety-nine percent of the population uses conventional thinking, or another name would be vertical thinking. This is the opposite of lateral thinking and therefore prevents any effective brainstorming. When we confront a problem, we have in us a preconceived idea of what the problem looks like and how it should be resolved, or maybe we think that it can’t be resolved at all since our vertical thinking does not allow us to see any options. If it isn’t logical, then we are not able to think it.
By using logic, we separate anything that doesn’t apply away from the problem. We are taking a linear step from every problem to a solution. We have our preconceived ideas of right and wrong. We will inject our “common sense” to help us find a solution. We then come up with a very dry, very sensible and logical solution, one that is accepted by society as something that “yes, that makes sense, that must apply, it has to work.”
So, what do we do? We are in this box, and can’t get out. How do we change our thinking? There is a psychological inertia that is created by our vertical thinking that is difficult to redirect. But there are techniques that we can use to specifically stimulate lateral thinking. To accomplish this we will be using brainstorming techniques.
Using Brainstorming is applying a method of fractionation, which takes a problem and divides it into segments or fractions. The segments are individual parts to the problem and need to be looked at separately. They don’t need to make any sense nor do they need to be logical. They can also overlap with another segment.
Breaking down these individual segments is the idea of this whole equation. This is much simpler than taking on the entire problem at one time. Once each segment is considered, then they can be put back together, like a patchwork quilt. This way the solutions are created in a radical, but beautiful and effective way.
