What is an ideation session?
An ideation session is a brainstorm with a purpose. A group of people, usually mixing creative, strategy and sometimes client or specialist voices, comes together around a clear question, such as how to launch a product, how to tell a brand story or how to solve a design problem, and produces as many possible answers as it can before choosing the most promising to develop.
Good sessions are designed, not improvised. They have a brief, a facilitator, a time limit and techniques that help people think differently, from quick rounds of ideas to exercises like reverse brainstorming, mood boards or deliberately thinking of the worst possible answer.
The practice is older than it sounds. Agencies have run versions of it since the 1940s, when the advertising executive Alex Osborn popularized brainstorming at BBDO and set out its first rule: no criticism while the ideas are flowing.
Why it matters
Why an ideation session matters
The first idea is rarely the best one. Ideation sessions push a team past the obvious answers to the interesting ones, by generating volume first and judging later. They also bring different perspectives into the room: a strategist sees the audience, a designer sees the image, an editor sees the story, and the combination often produces something none of them would have reached alone.
They build ownership, too. People who helped shape an idea are more likely to champion it through the long process of making it real.
In practice
How an ideation session works in practice
- 01
Preparation does most of the work. The facilitator shares the brief in advance, with the problem, the audience, the constraints and any research, and asks people to come with a few starting thoughts. The room, or the online whiteboard, is set up, and the group is kept small enough for everyone to contribute, often six to ten people.
- 02
Many facilitators open with a few minutes of silent, individual writing before anyone speaks, a technique often called brainwriting, so the loudest voice in the room does not set the direction for everyone else.
- 03
Then the group generates ideas quickly with no criticism allowed, often in timed rounds, clusters and builds on them, and finally narrows down using the brief as the filter. The output is a short list of ideas with a sentence or a sketch each, and an owner for each one.
- 04
Afterwards the strongest ideas are worked up into concepts, tested against the strategy and presented. Remote sessions follow the same pattern on shared whiteboards, with the bonus that quieter people often contribute more when they can type before they speak.
Watch out
What people get wrong about ideation sessions
Starting without a brief. A session that asks for big ideas with no problem to solve produces a wall of sticky notes and no direction. The better the question, the better the ideas.
The second mistake is judging too early. When the most senior person in the room reacts to every idea, the group starts editing itself and the interesting thoughts never get said. Separate generating from judging, and keep hierarchy out of the first half.
Finally, many sessions end without a next step. Ideas that are not owned, written up and developed are forgotten within a week.
