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There's a great post over at TheOpenForce about the common activities, statements or corporate-culture realities that kill creativity, new ideas and brainstorms at organizations.
Some sessions were noticeably more effective than others in encouraging creative ideas. I started to wonder why that is and came up with the top ways to kill new ideas. If you see these tenets taking hold in your organization, then you need to change things up to get people thinking more radically.
Urlocker laments that he only offers eight items for what he feels should properly be a top-ten list. Others have offered their two, so here are mine:
9. King/Queen Bee Syndrome
In most any organization, there are one or two people whose ideas, by default, get a few extra brownie points, usually because he or she did something spectacular or award-winning a decade ago. The group will then twist itself into rhetorical knots trying to justify why the idea, no matter how strategically misaligned, is just! so! perfect! Challenge this person at your peril. Do so and you may find your primo parking space occupied by the tertiary mail clerk the next day.
10. "I Don't Mean to Be Tactical, But..."
This one is just annoying. When someone says this during a brainstorm, they are telling the rest of the room "I consider myself well above what I'm about to say right now and I want you all to know it." Sometimes, the creativity need itself is tactical in nature—there's just no getting around it. You'll often find that these are the same folks who use the word "strategy" or "strategic" like a comma... sounding ridiculous and fooling no one.
Read the rest over at TheOpenForce.
UPDATE (2010-05-14)
Zack now has a list of eight ideas for how to brainstorm.
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