CardStorm to get ideas on the table

You've likely engaged in brainstorming activities before.

Often times brainstorming occurs by those in the room announcing their ideas, and a facilitator writing them down on a white board or flip chart paper. We're then left with the challenge of refining the list - removing duplicates and obviously poor candidate ideas. Then given a smaller subset of good ideas, we may then need to find common ideas or themes, or simply prioritize the list. All this is challenging when starting from a list on paper or whiteboard. Basically the brainstorming part was easy, making sense of the results becomes the difficult bit.

But we're card modelers now, right? We know that using card sorting and modeling techniques we can make sense of large amounts of information.

Group CardStorming

Cardstorming is a brainstorming technique described by Larry Constantine & Lucy Lockwood in [?]. It's a very effective way to brainstorm then move quickly and directly to using card sorting and modeling techniques to do the tough work with the information we've acquired.

To run a cardstorming session:

1. Arrange a group of participants facing each other around a worktable
2. Place on the table a couple big stacks of index cards and fat felt tipped markers
3. Designate one or two participants as recorders. One recorder is sufficient in a group of 5 or less, two is better in a group of 6 or more. It'll be the recorders' responsibility to record ideas directly onto index cards as participants shout them out.
4. Determine how you'll end your session: either time-box the session using a kitchen timer, or agree the session ends when there's a long uncomfortable silence between ideas.
5. Start the brainstorming by inviting participants to shout out ideas while recorders write them on 3×5 cards and toss them into the middle of the worktable where participants can see them.
6. When the time is up, or an uncomfortable silence is reached, it's time to stop.

Remember the most important rule of brainstorming: do not discuss or criticize ideas during the session. It's okay to ask a clarifying question but nothing more.

Brainstorming is supposed to be fast paced and fun. You can kick creativity up by shouting out silly or obviously inappropriate ideas.

If the recorder gets behind, it's ok for him to shout "whoa, whoa - give me a minute here." It's also okay for another person to help out and begin recording. But it is important the participants see and hear the ideas being tossed out. If everyone talks at once and/or writes at once, they're not hearing, thinking about, and leveraging each other's ideas to come up with more ideas.

One variation is to allow everyone to record their own ideas. This works so long as the ideas are spoken aloud so everyone gets the opportunity to hear.

Silent CardStorming

CardStorming out loud isn't always the best solution.

• Sometimes the ideas being generated require time and thought.
• Sometimes the ideas are sensitive such that the person suggesting them may not feel comfortable shouting them out.
• Sometimes the ideas are just too darn long to write quickly in a fast paced brainstorming session.

Use Silent CardStorming to allow participants time to write and reflect, then merge the brainstormed ideas together using an affinity diagram.

1. distribute cards and markers to each member of the collaborative group
2. ask a framing question or introduce the topic they'll be brainstorming around. It helps to write it on a whiteboard or poster paper displayed where everyone can see.
3. decide on an appropriate sized time limit, or agree to let the activity continue as long as participants have ideas.
4. ask each participant to being silently writing ideas on cards, on idea per card
5. when brainstorming is complete either because the time limit has expired, or participants are no longer writing, signal the end of brainstorming.
6. At this point everyone will have a stack of cards. There will likely be duplicates or similar ideas. And, everyone needs to hear each other's ideas. Invite each participant one at a time to read their ideas aloud and place them out on a table top or stuck to a wall where everyone can see them. We're beginning our model.
7. Ask anyone with duplicate or similar ideas to place their idea cards near the card already in the model. Make sure the read them aloud as they do.
8. Continue until everyone has read their ideas aloud, and placed them in the model.
9. Invite anyone with new ideas based on what they've seen so far to write those ideas onto cards, and add them to the model.

Silently CardStorming is less fast-paced and energizing than Group CardStorming. But, you can be sure you'll get participation and ideas form everyone involved.