Avoid These Common Anti-Patterns

As you generate ideas, be sure to avoid these common anti-patterns:

Not including diverse perspectives. Most of the exercises in this book are designed for product trios to do together. However, ideation is best done with the entire team. You want to make sure everyone has a chance to contribute their ideas. You also might consider inviting key stakeholders who bring a different perspective. The more diversity in the group, the more diverse ideas you’ll generate. However, make sure that you set the context for ideation by sharing your target opportunity and the customer context in which that opportunity occurs.

Generating too many variations of the same idea. When we get stuck generating ideas, we tend to riff on variations of the same idea. If we try to list as many types of animals as possible, once we identify lions and tigers, we might add pumas, cheetahs, and snow leopards. This can be a good tactic for increasing the number of ideas that you generate. However, when selecting three to be in your consideration set, you want as much diversity as possible. So, this can’t be the only way that you generate ideas. Instead, deliberately work to identify categorically different ideas. If you get stuck, look for inspiration from analogous products. Analogous products don’t need to be from your industry. In fact, the further away they are from your industry, the more likely you’ll uncover diverse ideas. So, ask, “Who else has to solve a problem like this?” and then investigate how they solve it.

Limiting ideation to one session. Hosting a brainstorming meeting is a common business norm. We expect to generate ideas in one sitting. But research on generating ideas shows this isn’t the most effective tactic. Instead, give ideation the time it deserves. Let your ideators consider ideas over time. Take advantage of the brain’s innate ability to incubate a problem.

Selecting ideas that don’t address the target opportunity. When ideating, you want to encourage your participants to defer judgment. As a result, it’s not uncommon to end up with solutions that don’t address your target opportunity. Before dot-voting, remove any ideas that don’t address your target opportunity. Otherwise, it can be easy to get distracted by a shiny idea that might be a good idea for some day in the future but isn’t a good idea right now. In the previous chapter, you made a strategic decision when you chose a target opportunity. Don’t undo that work now.