GOINDKE

Try to locate Prof. Amanullah

Brain, the thinking machine

Or the thinking system

 KEY PRINCIPLES OF
CREATIVITY
 Everyone is creative.
 Individual creativity comes from the
expression
 of individual authenticity.
 Team creativity comes from the
appreciation and synergistic use of
differences.
 Playfulness increases the likelihood that
creativity will occur.
 The more we believe we are creative, the
more creative we will be.
 WHAT IS A SYSTEM
 Understanding the System
 Let us not complicate or even dress in jargons.
 A system is just an arrangement of circumstances
that makes things happen in a certain way.
– The circumstances may be metal grids; electronic
components, rules and regulations or anything else. In
each case what actually happens is determined by the
nature of the system. One can take the function of the
system for granted and become interested in how it is
carried out.
 Making the Chips
 If you put water instead of oil into a frying pan
you would not expect to be able to fry chips.
 If you were to use fat or oil you would get
some ordinary chips.
 If you add a little water to the oil before you put
the pan on the fire, then the temperature of the
oil will rise more slowly and the chips will be soft
on the inside and crisp on the outside - much
more so than if only the oil had been used.
 The nature of the system determines what
happens.
 The brain is a system in which things
happen according to the nature of the
system.
 What happens in the brain is information.
And the way it happens is thinking.
 The Intelligence Trap
 People who consider them selves to be highly
intelligent are not necessarily good thinkers
 The two aspects of those people who get into
intelligence trap are
1. They think they are right so don’t listen to
anyone else. And as they think they are right
so don’t seek out alternatives
2. They consider them selves more intelligent
and hence always try to prove others wrong .
 some aspects of the system
 The first useful thing that can come out of
knowledge of a system is the avoiding of those
errors that arise through
– “thinking the system to be something that it is not.”
– If you want to get your shoes cleaned in an English hotel
you simply leave them overnight in the corridor outside
your room.
– Many an unhappy Englishman has learned that in
America shoes treated in this way disappear never to be
seen again.
– Left outside the door, the shoes are regarded as a rather
eccentric form of tipping or garbage disposal.
 The second useful thing is awareness of the
limitations of the system. No matter how good
they may be at performing their best functions,
most systems are rather poor when it come to
performing the opposite functions.
– One would no more go racing in a shopping car than
shopping in a racing car or using tractor to go to
office
 Where one can, one chooses the system to fit
the purpose.
 More often there is no choice,
– remember this means that a single system will
perform certain functions well but others not so well.
 The third way in which one could use
knowledge of a system would be to make
use of the characteristics of the system to
improve its performance or to achieve
some end.
 The practice of medicine is an obvious
example of this process. For that matter
so is the whole of science, 'Which tries to
understand systems in order to make
better use of them.
 brain system is well suited to developing
ideas but not so good at generating them.
 Knowing about the limitations of a system
does not by itself alter them. But by being
aware of the nature of the system one can
make deliberate adjustments.
– Impact of first ever advertisement
– Subsequent impact of advertising system
 One of the many ways in which our mind
attempts to make life easier is to
– solve the first impression of a problem
that it encounters. 
 Like our first impressions of people,
 our initial perspective on problems and
situations are apt to be narrow and
superficial. 
 We see no more than we've been conditioned
to see --- and stereotyped notions block clear
vision and crowd out imagination.  This
happens without any alarms sounding, so we
never realize it is occurring.
 Here are few interesting examples
 The bucket activity--- matter of perception
 "Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabridge
Uinvervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht
oredr the letteers in a wrod are, the olny
iprometnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat
letteer be at the rghit pclae.  The rset can
be a ttoal mses and you can sitll raed it
wouthit a porbelm.  Tihs is besauae ocne
we laren how to raed we bgien to aargnre
the lteerts in our mnid to see waht we
epxcet to see.  The huamn mnid deos not
raed ervey lteter by istlef, but preecsievs
the wrod as a wlohe.  We do tihs
ucnsoniuscoly wuithot tuhoght."
 

 
 red
 green
 blue
 orange
 black
 blue
 yellow
 gray
 red
 pink
 Links between Intelligence
and Genius
 Academics tried to measure the links
between intelligence and genius. But
intelligence is not enough to warrant
genius for e.g
 Marilyn Von Savant, whose IQ of 228 is
the highest ever recorded, has not
exactly contributed much to science or
art
Creativity and Intelligence
 psychologists reached the conclusion
that creativity is not the same as
intelligence. An individual can be far
more creative than he or she is
intelligent, or far more intelligent than
creative.
 Most people of average intelligence,
given data or some problem, can figure
out the expected conventional response
 Solving a problem
 When we are faced with a problem we
analytically select the most promising
approach based on past experiences,
excluding all other approaches, and work
within a clearly defined direction towards the
solution of the problem.
 Because of the soundness of the steps
based on past experiences, we become
arrogantly certain of the correctness of our
conclusion
 Reproductive Thinking
 Typically, we think reproductively, that is
on the basis of similar problems
encountered in the past.  When
confronted with problems, we fixate on
something in our past that has worked
before.  We ask, “What have I been
taught in life, education or work on how
to solve the problem?” 
 What do genius say about
solving a problem
 Geniuses think productively, not
reproductively. When confronted with a
problem, they ask,
 "How many different ways can I look at
it?“
 "How can I rethink the way I see it?",
and "How many different ways can I
solve it?" instead of, "What have I been
taught by someone else on how to
solve this?"
 Example

 What is half of ----?

 Let me rephrase the problem
 In how many ways we can half ----?
 step further
 In how many ways we can write -----?
 13, Thirteen, XIII
 Let us half them in different ways
 A productive thinker tend to come up with
many different responses, some of which
are unconventional and possibly unique. A
productive thinker would say that there
are many different ways to express
"thirteen" and many different ways to
halve something.
13/2=6.5

13= 1 and 3

THIR TEEN= 4

XIII = 8
 Once we have settled on a perspective,
we close off but one line of thought. 
Certain kinds of ideas occur to us, but
only those kinds and no others.  Have
you ever looked closely at the wheels
on a railroad train? 
 They are flanged. 
 That is, they have a lip on the inside to
prevent them from sliding off the track. 
 Originally train wheels were not flanged ---
instead, the railroad tracks were.  Hundreds
of thousands of miles of track were
manufactured with an unnecessary steel lip,
because the problem of railroad safety had
been expressed as:
– “How can the tracks be made safer for trains to
ride on?” 
– Only when the problem was redefined as: “How
can the wheels be made to secure the track more
securely?” was the flanged wheel invented.
 Difference Between Einstein
and the Average Person
 Einstein was once asked what the
difference was between him and the
average person.
 He said that if you asked the average
person to find a needle in the haystack, the
person would stop when he or she found a
needle.
 He, on the other hand, would tear through
the entire haystack looking for all the
possible needles.
 We just stop once we find the first
solution.
 The attitude is that there is no need to
think further.
How would you describe this
pattern?
 Most people see the pattern as a
square composed of smaller squares or
circles or as alternate rows of squares
and circles.
 It cannot be easily seen as columns of
alternate squares and circles. Once it's
pointed out that it can also be viewed
as columns of alternate squares and
circles, we, of course, see it.
 This is because we have become
habituated to passively organize similar
items together in our minds. Geniuses, on
the other hand, subvert habituation by
actively looking for alternative ways to
look at things and alternative ways to
think about them.
Productive Thinking in lieu of
Reproductive
 Feynman proposed teaching productive
thinking in our educational institutions in lieu
of reproductive thinking.
 He believed that the successful user of
mathematics is an inventor of new ways of
thinking in given situations.
 He believed that even if the old ways are well
known, it is usually better to invent your own
way or a new way than it is to look it up and
apply what you've looked up.
 Reproductive Thinking

 Reproductive thinking leads us to the

usual ideas and not to original ones. If
you always think the way you've always
thought, you'll always get what you've
always got--the same old, same old
ideas.
 List all possible uses of a paper clip
 Make a list of those things for which paper
clip can not be used.
 Let us explore the following possibilities
– As food item
– Can be used for driving
 CRZY
You want to learn creativity then
nothing is wrong in going so
wild
 Strategies
Some of the strategies that are common
to the thinking styles of creative geniuses
in science, art, and industry throughout
history are.


Geniuses look at problems in
many different ways
 Genius often comes from finding a new
perspective that no one else has taken.
Leonardo da Vinci believed that to gain
knowledge about the form of problems,
you begin by learning how to restructure it
in many different ways.
 In order to creatively solve a problem, the
thinker must abandon the initial approach
that stems from past experience and re-
conceptualize the problem
Geniuses make their thought
visible
 Galileo revolutionized science by making
his thought visible with diagrams, maps,
and drawings while his contemporaries
used conventional mathematical and
verbal approaches.
 Once geniuses obtain a certain minimal
verbal facility, they seem to develop skills
in visual and spatial abilities which give
them the flexibility to display information
in different ways.
 Geniuses produce
 A distinguishing characteristic of genius is
immense productivity. Thomas Edison held
1,093 patents, still the record. He
guaranteed productivity by giving himself
and his assistants idea quotas. His own
personal quota was one minor invention
every 10 days and a major invention every
six months.
 Geniuses make novel
combinations
 Dean Keith Simonton, in his 1989 book
Scientific Genius suggests that geniuses
are geniuses because they form more
novel combinations than the merely
talented.
 Consider Einstein's equation, E=mc2.
Einstein did not invent the concepts of
energy, mass, or speed of light. Rather, by
combining these concepts in a novel way,
he was able to look at the same world as
everyone else and see something different.
 Geniuses force
relationships
 If one particular style of thought stands
out about creative genius, it is the ability
to make juxtapositions between
dissimilar subjects. Call it a facility to
connect the unconnected that enables
them to see things to which others are
blind. Leonardo da Vinci forced a
relationship between the sound of a bell
and a stone hitting water. This enabled
him to make the connection that sound
travels in waves.
Geniuses think in opposites
 Physicist and philosopher David Bohm
believed geniuses were able to think
different thoughts because they could
tolerate ambivalence between opposites
or two incompatible subjects.
 The swirling of opposites creates the
conditions for a new point of view to
bubble freely from your mind. Bohr's ability
to imagine light as both a particle and a
wave led to his conception of the principle
of complementarity. Thomas Edison's
invention of a practical system of lighting
involved combining wiring in parallel
circuits with high- resistance filaments in
his bulbs, two things that were not
considered possible by conventional
thinkers, in fact, were not considered at all
because of an assumed incompatibility.
Geniuses think metaphorically
 Aristotle considered metaphor a sign of genius,
believing that the individual who had the capacity to
perceive resemblances between two separate areas
of existence and link them together was a person of
special gifts.
 If unlike things are really alike in some ways,
perhaps, they are so in others.
 Alexander Graham Bell observed the analogy
between the inner workings of the ear and the
vibration in a sheet of steel and conceived the
telephone
Geniuses prepare themselves
for chance
 Whenever we attempt to do something
and fail, we end up doing something else.
As simplistic as this statement may seem,
it is the first principle of creative accident.
We may ask ourselves why we have failed
to do what we intended, and this is the
reasonable, expected thing to do
 But the creative accident provokes a
different question: What have we done?
Answering that question in a novel,
unexpected way is the essential creative
act. It is not luck, but creative insight of
the highest order.
 Moral of the Story
 Recognizing the common thinking
strategies of creative geniuses and
applying them will make you more
creative in your work and personal life.
Creative geniuses are geniuses because
they know "how" to think, instead of
"what" to think
 MYTHS SURROUNDING
CREATIVITY

 Creativity is an innate skill and cannot

be acquired by means of training
 You need to be a rebel to be seen as
creative
 Artists are the only creative beings
 Creative Thinking
 Creative thinking is much more than using our imaginations
to invent lots of new ideas. Creative thinking is
– a lifestyle,
– a personality trait,
– a way of looking at the world,
– a way of interacting with others and
– a way of living and growing.
 Living creatively means
– developing our talents,
– tapping our unused potentials and
– becoming what we are capable of becoming through self-discovery
and self-discipline.
 Anytime we are faced with a problem or dilemma with no
learned or practiced solution some creativity is required
(Torrance, 1995).
Creativity is a vital ingredient in meeting
the challenges of a continuous life cycle, a
cycle in which growth and change are the
norm from conception throughout life.
 A life filled with growth and change
requires a conscious effort to think
creatively, it takes practice.
 To develop creativeness, the mind needs
to be
 exercised
 as well as filled with materials out of
which ideas can be formed.
 The richest fuel for ideation is first hand
experience (Osborn, 1963).
 Creativity is the ability to see a situation in
many ways and continue to question until
satisfaction is reached. This satisfaction
can be defined in as many different ways
as there are people experiencing it, but it
basically boils down to personal
satisfaction and how you choose to define
satisfaction.
 16 Ways to Jump-start
Creativity
 ONE-A-DAY
 BRAINSTORMING BOARD
 IDEA LOTTERY
 CREATIVE CORNER
 ICONS OF CREATIVITY
 LET'S DO LUNCH
 BRIGHT IDEAS NOTEBOOK
 STUPID IDEA WEEK
 CREATIVITY BY COMMITTEE
 HALL OF FAME
 LEFT AND RIGHT BRAINS
 IDEA QUOTAS
 TICKET OF ADMISSION
 CHANGE "Yes, but ..." TO "Yes, and ..."
 THREE WAYS
 FRESH EYES
ONE-A-DAY
Ask each person to try to improve one aspect of their job each day,
focusing on the areas within their control.  At the end of the day, people
should meet and ask each other what they did differently and better than
it was the day before.

BRAINSTORMING BOARD
Put up a bulletin board in a central area and encourage people to use it to
brainstorm ideas.  Write a theme or problem on a colored card and place it
in the centre of the board.  Provide pieces of white paper on which people
can write their ideas to post on the board. E.g. suppose you have difficulty
closing a particular sale.  You could describe the sale situation on a
colored card, post it on the brainstorming board and ask people to post
their ideas and suggestions

IDEA LOTTERY
Have a monthly "idea lottery," using a roll of numbered tickets.  Each time
a person comes up with a creative idea, he or she receives a ticket.  At the
end of each month, share the ideas with the staff and then draw a number
from a bowl.  If the number on anyone’s ticket corresponds to the number
drawn, he or she gets a prize.  If no one wins, double the prize for the next
month.
CREATIVE CORNER
Provide a special area for people to engage in creative thinking.   Stock the area with books, videos on
creativity, as well as learning games and such toys as beanbags and modeling clay.  You might even
decorate the area with pictures of employees as infants to suggest the idea that we’re all born
spontaneous and creative.

ICONS OF CREATIVITY
Ask people to display items on their desks that represent their own personal visions of creativity in
business.  For example, a crystal ball might represent a view toward future markets, a bottle of Heinz
catsup might represent a personal goal of 57 new ideas on how to cut expenses, and a set of jumper
cables might symbolize the act of jump-starting your creative juices to get more sales.

LET'S DO LUNCH
Encourage weekly lunch-time meeting of three to five
employees to engage in creative thinking.  Ask
meeting participants to read a book on creativity;
each person can read a different chapter and share
ways of applying creative thinking to the organization.
Invite creative business people from the community
to speak to the group.  You could ask them for ideas
on how to become more creative in your business.
BRIGHT IDEAS NOTEBOOK
Present each person with a notebook.  Call the notebook the
"Bright Idea Notebook," and ask everyone to write three ideas in
the notebook every day for one month on how to improve your
business.  At the end of the month, collect all the notebooks and
categorize the ideas for further discussion.

STUPID IDEA WEEK

Make idea generating fun.  Have a "Stupid Idea" week and stage a
contest for the dumbest ideas.  Post entries on a bulletin board
and conduct an awards ceremony with a prize.  You’ll enjoy the
camaraderie and may find that the stupid ideas stimulate good
ones.

CREATIVITY BY COMMITTEE
Establish a "creative-idea" committee made up of volunteers.  The
goals of the committee should be to elicit, discuss, and implement
employee’s ideas.  The committee can record the number of ideas
on a thermometer-type graph.  The company should recognize and
reward people according to the quantity and quality of their
creative contributions.
HALL OF FAME
Turn an office hallway into an Employee Hall of Fame.  Post
photographs of those whose ideas are implemented along with a
paragraph about the person, the idea, and its impact on the company.

LEFT AND RIGHT BRAINS

When brainstorming in a group, try dividing the group into left-brain
(rational) thinkers and right-brain (intuitive) thinkers.  Ask the left-
brainers to come up with practical, conventional and logical ideas;
ask the right-brainers to come up with far-out, unconventional and
nonlogical ideas.  Then combine the groups and share the ideas.

IDEA QUOTAS
Thomas Edison guaranteed productivity by giving himself and his
assistants idea quotas.  His own personal quota was one minor
invention every 10 days and a major invention every six months.  A
way to guarantee creativity is to give each employee an idea quota
of, say, five new ideas a week.

TICKET OF ADMISSION
Require everyone to bring one new idea as their ticket of admission
to any group meeting.   The idea should focus on some aspect of their
job and how they can improve what they do.
CHANGE "Yes, but ..." TO "Yes, and ..."

Someone offers an idea in a meeting, and many of us are tempted to say

"Yes, but ..."  To change this mind set , whenever someone says "Yes, but ..."
require the person to change "Yes, but ..." to "Yes, and ..." and continue
where the last person left off.

THREE WAYS
Employees shouldn’t waste time thinking of reasons why something can’t
work or can’t be done.   Instead, they should think about ways to make
something work, and then get it done.  Ask employees to think of three job-
related goals, targets, or tasks they think can’t be accomplished.  Then ask
them to figure out three ways to accomplish each of them.  Then do the same
thing yourself.

FRESH EYES
Invite people from other departments to your brainstorming sessions and
ask them how they would solve your problems. helped out in bringing new
ideas

Lastly, don’t forget to thank people for their ideas.  Design your own "Thank You
For Your Great Idea" cards and distribute them freely to contributors.  Ask
the CEO to sign each card with a personal message.  Stock up on instant
lottery cards and include one or two in each card to show your appreciation.
24 WAYS TO KILL CREATIVITY
 24 WAYS TO KILL CREATIVITY
Force everyone
Force everyone
Never, ever
Never, ever examine
examine yourself
yourself to work
to work
with your
with your system
system
Make your
Make your strategic
strategic
Never hire
Never hire smart
smart people. 
people.  plans and
plans and goals
goals
as vague
as vague as
as possible
possible

Whatever itit isis you

Whatever you do,
do, do
do itit over
over Never offer
Never offer meaningful
meaningful
and over
and over and and over
over again
again incentives or
incentives or rewards.
rewards.

Never allow
Never allow people
people to
to loosen
loosen
Discourage all
Discourage all questions
questions
up in
up in meetings
meetings

Encourage aa corporate
Encourage corporate mind-set
mind-set Discourage all
Discourage all initiative
initiative

Maintain aa highly
Maintain highly centralized
centralized
Kill ideas
Kill ideas immediately
immediately
sales organization
sales organization
 24 WAYS TO KILL CREATIVITY
Do not
Do not be
be accessible
accessible
to
to Never allow
Never allow intuitions
intuitions
your people
your people
Cultivate blandness. 
Cultivate blandness. 
Never Appreciate
Never Appreciate aa creator
creator

Promote your
Promote your least
least
creative
creative worry about
worry about taking
taking risks
risks
people
people

If someone
If someone offers
offers an
an idea,
idea,
tell them
tell them it's
it's irrelevant
irrelevant

If someone
If someone wants
wants to to try
try something
something Do not
Do not buy
buy or
or read
read any
any books
books
new, remind
new, remind themthem about creative
about creative thinking
thinking
of all
of all their
their past
past failures
failures and
and mistakes.
mistakes.

If someone
If someone becoming
becoming collapse of
collapse of the
the company
company
preoccupied with
preoccupied with aa problem,
problem, was beyond
was beyond your
your control. 
control. 
tell them
tell them to
to think
think about
about itit on
on
their own
their own time,
time, but
but not
not yours
yours
 BREAK YOUR HABITS
Habits stabilize our behaviour. 
They allow us to act efficiently and
concentrate on the tasks we choose to
focus on. 
HOW TO BREAK
YOUR HABITS

VARY YOUR
DAILY ROUTINE

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED
WAYS
OF THINKING

PAY ATTENTION

PARTICIPATE IN AN
ACTIVITY THAT IS
UNCHARACTERISTIC FOR YOU
 HOW TO BREAK YOUR HABITS

1. VARY YOUR DAILY ROUTINE

Smallest changes builds flexibility for exp

 Take a different route to work. 

 Sit in a different chair when meeting with visitors. 
 Use a fountain pen to sign letters. 
 Have curry or falafel for lunch instead of soup and a sandwich. 
 Take a bath instead of a shower.  Watch a different television news
broadcaster. 
 Make new friends. 
 Shop for groceries in a different supermarket. 
 Read a different newspaper. 
 Listen to a different radio station. 
 Exchange cars with your spouse or some other family member for a week. 
Instead of driving to work, take a bus.
2. CHALLENGE ACCEPTED WAYS OF THINKING.

3 . PAY ATTENTION

"Every time we get back in touch with ourselves, the conditions become
favourable for us to encounter life in the present moment.“

4. PARTICIPATE IN AN ACTIVITY THAT IS UNCHARACTERISTIC FOR

YOU
Deliberately program changes into your daily life.  Make a list of things
you do by habit.  Most of the items will probably be those little
things that make life comfortable, but also make it unnecessary for
you to think.  Next, take the listed habits, one by one, and
consciously try to change them for a day, a week, a month.
WAYS TO SPICE UP YOUR
MEETING
 WAYS TO SPICE UP YOUR MEETING
Energize your meetings with the following tactics, exercises, and
suggestions.
1. IDEA TICKET
Ask each person to bring, at least, one new idea or suggestion
about the problem which is frame in advance of meeting. Start
the meeting by reading everyone’s contribution.

2. IT’S SHOWTIME
Think of your meeting as a theatrical production – with
sets (colorfully decorated classrooms), props (well-designed
materials), and plot lines (theme) with the manager as the
director.

3.  THE SOUNDS OF SUCCESS

Just like in the movies, in meetings, music can help set the
tone and heighten the experience for participants You may
want to use the sound of roaring crowds to cheer people on,
laugh tracks to loosen people up when they get uptight, jungle
noises when someone becomes too negative, and so on.
4. YOU’RE FIRED
ask the participants to imagine that they are “fired.”  Now ask
them to reapply for their own jobs.  This will shock and force them
to rethink about their knowledge and competencies and, most
importantly, what they need to do to improve.

5. EVERYONE’S A CONSULTANT
Ask each person to write a current job-related problem or concern
on a blank sheet of paper.  After allowing a few minutes, ask each
person to pass his or her problem to the right.  That person reads
the problem just received and jots down their responses.  They are
given 60 seconds to respond to the individual sheet.  Keep the
process going until each person gets his or her sheet back.  Then
share and discuss the ideas.

6. TOYS R US
Just having toys in the room will change the feeling in the room
and invite people to be more open and playful.  Have the
participants choose a toy and give them time to explore it.  Then
ask them to compare the problem or issue under discussion with
the toy.
6. TAKE A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE
Write the alphabet vertically on the chalkboard.  Then ask for names of
famous (real or fictional) people for each letter:  A=Neil Armstrong,
B=Alexander Graham Bell, C=Charlie Chaplin, D=Leonardo DaVinci,
E=Albert Einstein, F= Fred Flintstone and so on.  Have each person in the
group pick a random letter.  One might end up with Albert Einstein or
David Letterman.  Then have each person think about how the famous
person might approach the problem.  Finally, have the group share their
perspectives.  How, for example, would William Shakespeare improve
office morale?

7. WALK IN THE CUSTOMER’S SHOES

In this approach, people turn around to find out what it’s really like to be
someone in a different position. 

8. TELL A STORY
Storytelling is one of the oldest ways to teach and transform. 
Storytelling, for example, can help people
envision the future they want and how to achieve it. 

9. WHAT IF?
Have the group create two opposite extreme ideas.  For instance, what
would you create if you had all the resources (people, money, time, etc.)
in the world?  Then, ask what would you create if you had no resources? 
Then try to combine the two into a practical, affordable idea.
10. LOOK AT SOMEBODY ELSE
With this approach, ideas and solutions come by looking for ideas in
unrelated fields. 

11. TRY A DIFFERENT RHYTHM

a regular rhythm propels us along and tells us what to expect next.  But if
the rhythm goes on too long, it dulls our imagination and we stop paying
attention to the world around us.  Consequently, we need to break the
rhythm.

12. COMBINE THINGS IN DIFFERENT WAYS

This is a technique that Fred Stryker used to create daily plots and stories for
“The Lone Ranger.”  He created a chart that consisted of the major parts of
the story: good characters, bad characters, kinds of crimes, different kinds of
weapons, variables for each category and numbered them.  Each day, he
would ask a colleague for a series of random numbers (one per category). 
Then he looked up the items corresponding to the random numbers chosen
by colleagues, and began writing a new story based on those items.  You can
do the same with any challenge.  Separate and list categories and write
possibilities under each category.  List a dozen or so different possibilities for

each.  Then randomly combine them and brainstorm the possibilities.

14. LEFT-BRAINERS AND RIGHT-BRAINERS
Divide the group into left-brain (rational) thinkers and left-brain
(intuitive) thinkers.  Ask the left-brainers to come up with a
practical, conventional and logical idea; ask the right-brainers to
come up with a far-out, unconventional and illogical idea.  Then
bring the group back together and combine the left-brain idea with
the right-brain idea to see what you get.

15. TRY A DIFFERENT ORDER

The obvious way to plan a project or think through a process is to
start at the beginning and work through it logically step by step. 
But by shaking up the accepted sequence of things, people see
processes in a new light and become open to new approaches. 

16. IDEA MARKETPLACES

Announce the theme of the meeting, and then invite everyone to
identify a related issue for which they’re willing to take
responsibility.  When someone suggests an issue, he or she
becomes the sponsor, writes the issue on a large sheet of paper,
and posts the sheet on a wall.  The process continues until all of the
suggested issues have been posted.  Next, have participants take
part in an “Idea Marketplace” in which each person signs one or
more or the large sheets to discuss the issues.  The sponsors get
together with their groups in private to discuss the issues and
record the ideas.
17. IDEA GALLERY
1. Participants stand silently and write their ideas on the sheets. 
Then the participants are allowed to walk around the "gallery" and
look at the other ideas and take notes.  Now, using the other ideas
to stimulate further thought, participants return to their sheets and
add to or refine their ideas. After additional writing, the
participants examine all the ideas and select the best ones. 
2. Another option for the gallery technique is to ask participants to
draw or diagram their ideas instead of listing them

18. USE YOUR IMAGINATION

When we compare problems to something unusual, we tend to
have a need to understand it.  Consequently, we break it down and
analyze the different parts to see if this will allow us to understand
it or make it somehow familiar.  When this happens, we form new
links and relationships that may lead to breakthrough ideas. 

19. SILENT BRAINSTORMING

Each participant silently writes three ideas on the tops of sheets of
paper.  One idea per sheet.  The sheets are passed to the person on
their right.  That person is asked to write down an idea that
improves on the one listed at the top of the sheet.  If participants
have difficulty improving on the idea, ask them to list new ones. 
Do this for all three ideas.  After five minutes or so, the idea sheets
are again passed to the right.  Continue the process until all
members receive their original papers.
 AIRPLANES
Have each participant construct a paper airplane.  Each participant
writes down an idea on the airplane and sends it flying to another
participant.  Upon reading what’s been written on the airplane, he
or she writes down a modification or improvement of that idea, or
an entirely fresh possibility and then sends it flying to someone
else.  Continue the exercise for twenty minutes and then collect
and categorize the ideas.

 PARTICIPATE IN AN ACTIVITY THAT IS UNCHARACTERISTIC FOR

YOU