Listing and enumeration can be useful creative methods. Start with a clear prompt to drive idea generation with clarity, set a fixed time, constraints help creativity. Write one idea per post-it/note/node. When done, present each idea with one sentence to give context, and aggregate the explained ideas to create clusters by topic or other useful aggregating ideas.
This facilitated creativity activity is similar to the “Post-it, post-up” gamestorming tool.
Generating ideas about Problem-Solving
Thanks to Lady Bear, we’ve come up with a list of ideas related to the question, “What do you think and do when you have a problem to solve?”
The initial list.
A list of possible concepts, actions, ideas related to problem-solving, generated in 5 minutes:
- Simplify
- Count (inventory)
- Separate
- Order (Sort)
- Trash (
Thrashwould have been far more evocative but definitely out of context. Thanks to Brendan Seibel.) - Catalog
- Knot, mark
- Tie, connect
- Be patient
- Search
- Find
- Research
- Ask
- Situate, position
- Place side by side
- Observe
- List (THIS!)
- Present (put in the way so you can stumble upon it)
- Memorize
- Learn, understand and prevent
- Visualize
- Combine
- Compare and contrast
- Make a paragon
- Imagine
- Play
- Tell a story
- Beautify
- Explain
- Do not procrastinate
It’s hugely satisfying to spend no more than 10 minutes with another person to come up with raw creative material to work on. That’s what it took to create the previous list.
List, enumerate, itemize, count, inventory.
When you’re stuck and don’t know where to start from, take a partner and play to list their ideas following a clear and concise starting question. You will have the maximum creative outcome with the minimum effort.
