1. Framing a Good Question

It is important to frame a good question for a brainstorming session. The facilitator uses the process of coming up with the question as a way to create a focus for the group’s energy. When coming up with the question, the facilitator needs to be aware of some guidelines. If the question isn’t open-ended, you won’t get very interesting results and not much volume.

Most of the time when people tell us “our brainstorm didn’t work,” we find out that they framed a poor question—either one that already assumed a solution or one that was so vague they couldn’t get any traction for generating ideas. Watch out for this when you start to brainstorm with our four-step method.

3. The Brainstorm Itself…

The Rules of Brainstorming

1. Go for quantity, not quality.

1. Defer judgment and do not censor ideas.

1. Build off the ideas of others.

1. Encourage wild ideas.

11: Building a Team

“What we mean is that life design is intrinsically a communal effort. When you are wayfinding a step or two at a time to build (not solve) your way forward, the process has to rely on the contribution and participation of others. The ideas and opportunities you design are not just

presented to you or fetched for you by others on your behalf—they are co-created with you in collaboration with the whole community of players you engage with in life. Whether they think of it this way or not, all the people you meet, engage, prototype, or converse with along the way are in your design community.

We introduced the idea of life design in this book by telling you five simple things you need to do: (1) be curious (curiosity), (2) try stuff (bias to action), (3) reframe problems (reframing), (4) know it’s a process (awareness), and (5) ask for help (radical collaboration). We’ve reminded you of these mind-sets throughout the book as we’ve walked through the various ideas and tools that constitute life design.