Ideation: breakthrough idea construction

In Ideathons, a deliberate attempt is made to create breakthrough ideas. They have tightly directed 2-hour events. The participants work together in small groups of 5 to 6 thinkers.

There are clearly defined areas – not too wide nor too narrow. Areas where there is an urgent need for better ideas. For that purpose, world-renowned creative thinking techniques are being used.

Ideations are thoroughly researched and prepared. The participants learn in an active way about the subject matter. They practice some creative techniques. By actually working together, they build a strong network at the same time.

The Program

Introduction

A most simple, but not simpler exploration of the subject
What is expected as a result of the Ideathon
“No Boring Ideas” and “No Intellectual Property”
A mini-lecture and an exercise about the creative tools to be used

Total of 30 minutes

Three rounds of idea generation

Individually generating ideas by applying a creativity tool (2 min)
Sharing the individually generated ideas in the subgroup (4 min)
The subgroup chooses one most unorthodox idea to further elaborate (1 min)
The subgroup reprocesses the chosen idea by extracting the concept and from there begins generating more ideas (4 min) (reprocessing is like the extraction of plutonium and unused uranium from nuclear fuel of a reactor)
Subgroups prepare a written report of 4 formatted sentences (4 min)
Plenary sharing of the generated ideas by the subgroup, each subgroup 1 minute (10 min)
Spare time (5 min)