Leave the judge at the door

- One of Alex Osborn's original tenets…as he outlined the idea of brainstorming…in his 1948 book, "Your Creative Power,"…was to eliminate idea criticism from the session.…It seems impractical at first.…Not every idea is viable, so why not hyperfocus on…only the ideas that solve the problems in their entirety?…Because in doing so, you're leaving potential ideas unsaid,…ideas that in the hands of another stormer…could be mold into something great.…It's natural to want to judge the ideas as they're shared.…

It may even seem efficient.…This is the convergent thinking exercise that is necessary…to get down to the idea that you'll go forward with.…But doing so comes at the cost…of the divergent thinking exercise…of developing many possible solutions, and this part…of the process is simply too valuable to stagnate.…Keeping the convergent exercise, that focuses on…narrowing the field, separate from the divergent exercise,…where we're ideating, accomplishes two things.…One, it supports the foundational goal of brainstorming,…