3 reasons brainstorming doesn’t work

I was recently running an away day for the senior management team of a consumer finance business. The managing director was keen for the team to spend time away from day-to-day pressures exploring ideas to boost revenue and improve margins. But kicking off the session, I explained straightaway that brainstorming doesn’t work and that we wouldn’t be doing any.

The evidence is clear: brainstorming doesn’t work. Since the invention of brainstorming in the late 1950s, many studies conducted by business schools and employers have conclusively shown that brainstorming groups tend to underperform. Let’s look at three reasons why brainstorming doesn’t live up to the hype.

1. Brainstorming groups hit verbal traffic jams

Imagine there are eight people in a team and they have 20 minutes to generate as many business ideas as they can. Dividing the 20 minutes by 8 means that each person can at most speak up for 2.5 minutes.

But imagine that we now split that group of eight into two smaller groups with only four people in each. They still have 20 minutes, but now each individual could potentially speak for 5.0 minutes each.

Do it again. Split the overall eight into four pairs and each person in each pair gets 10.0 minutes to speak.

So, the first reason brainstorming groups tend to be sub-optimal is because they hit verbal traffic jams. Only one person can speak at a time – and when that person is speaking, the others in the room are effectively blocked from speaking up and generating ideas.

2. People like to conform

One of the rules of proper brainstorming is that all ideas are valid and that no idea is stupid. But that only works in theory. In practice, groups tend to be heavily steered by the more influential people in the room.

Suppose the managing director makes a suggestion. Unsurprisingly, everybody else will probably go down a similar route. They will conform – even though they probably won’t even realise they are doing it.

3. People engage in freeloading

If the team where you work is like most teams, then you probably have a few people who tend to do most of the talking. Unfortunately, that means that some people engage in what psychologists call social loafing – freeloading or basically doing less because others will pick up the slack.

Freeloading isn’t always easy to spot in most existing teams. But the evidence is categorical: it happens. As a result, brainstorming groups tend to underperform as compared with the same number of people working individually.

Moving beyond brainstorming

OK, so data from many different types of organisations show that brainstorming groups typically generate fewer ideas – and that those ideas are of poorer quality. (The research paper by Brian Mullen and his associates is a great place to start if you’re interested in the data.) But what’s the solution?

When I facilitate away days or other client discussions, I often start by encouraging a period of individual work – that everybody should sit in silence writing down their ideas on paper or perhaps Post-It notes. It’s usually just for a few minutes.

Yes, generating ideas solo is harder work. Yes, it is less fun than just shouting out ideas. But the fact that it’s harder work is probably a good sign: the harder work pays off with a higher quantity and quality of ideas.

I’ll then encourage people to come together in pairs to look at each other’s ideas with a view to generating further ideas. Then the pairs come together to form groups of four. And so on.

At the same time, psychological studies show that physical movement can be energising. So, I sometimes have people walking around to various flip charts, too.

In summary, if you’re interested in having a fun but unproductive time, then by all means engage in group brainstorming. But if you want better-quality outputs, then get people working individually first.

Chartered Psychologist Dr Rob Yeung

Twitter: @robyeung

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