I want to thank everyone who came last Wednesday. It was a great pleasure to meet and speak with you. Please feel free to contact me or visit my site, http://www.scottthorp.com.

I also want to follow-up on a question that Kevin asked about methods of brainstorming in groups. I had stated that Alex Osborn’s original method was a bit flawed and Kevin had stated that his groups were using a newer version set forth by IDEO, a design group. If you don’t mind, I’d like to clarify a little more what I said. I think I missed a thing or two.

The original Brainstorming technique set up by Alex Osborn has the following rules:
• No criticism. The group should not evaluate any ideas until it is finished generating them.
• Freewheeling is welcomed; the wilder the idea, the better.
• Quantity is the goal; the more ideas you think up, the more likely you are to find the best ideas.
• Look for combinations of previous ideas, and for improvements on previous ideas

IDEO added a few more rules to that set:
• Stay focused on topic
• Stick to one conversation at a time
• Be visual (Markers and post it notes)
• Be physical (get up and move around)
• Use the space (whiteboards surround each room and Post-it notes are everywhere).

IDEO’s version is better than the first rules set in place by Osborn. And the main reason that they are able to create so many great things is that because their designers are implicitly guided by the drive to be creative and original. They also use trained facilitators for every session, and the rooms are properly set up with whiteboards and paper.

But studies have shown that normal groups people begin to think alike and therefore aren’t as creative as advertised. They don’t generate as many ideas nor do they generate as wide a range of ideas as the members would do separately. There are three main reasons why:
• Production blocking: members have to listen to each other’s ideas which takes energy away from generating their own ideas. Also, topics tend to cluster into a few groups because members fixate on what has already been presented.
• Social inhibition: some people hold back for fear of what others will think.
• Social loafing: in groups, people don’t feel as accountable

With all this it may seem that group brainstorming doesn’t work at all. That’s not the case. Group brainstorming sessions do many things well. They create energy for projects. They can move quickly to create unique and innovative solutions. And they add diversity to opinions.

Below are the most recent guidelines for group brainstorming.
• Don’t use groups for additive tasks—tasks that people could do separately and ten sum up. Instead, use them for complex and improvisational tasks. Have people generate ideas separately and then bring them to the group.
• Keep groups to the minimum number of members required.
• Use a facilitator to conduct the meeting.
• Because complex and unexpected innovations emerge from innovative groups as a whole, group rewards need to be in place.
• Allow the group to alternate work with frequent breaks, and switch constantly between group and individual activities.
• Compose groups to be diverse and have complementary skills
• Keep in mind that group members who are low in social anxiety and who enjoy group interaction will perform better.

Again, thanks for the opportunity and I’ll be trying to come to some more meetings in the future.

Sincerely,
Scott Thorp

I also want to follow-up on a question that Kevin asked about methods of brainstorming in groups. I had stated that Alex Osborn’s original method was a bit flawed and Kevin had stated that his groups were using a newer version set forth by IDEO, a design group. If you don’t mind, I’d like to clarify a little more what I said. I think I missed a thing or two.

The original Brainstorming technique set up by Alex Osborn has the following rules:
• No criticism. The group should not evaluate any ideas until it is finished generating them.
• Freewheeling is welcomed; the wilder the idea, the better.
• Quantity is the goal; the more ideas you think up, the more likely you are to find the best ideas.
• Look for combinations of previous ideas, and for improvements on previous ideas

IDEO added a few more rules to that set:
• Stay focused on topic
• Stick to one conversation at a time
• Be visual (Markers and post it notes)
• Be physical (get up and move around)
• Use the space (whiteboards surround each room and Post-it notes are everywhere).

IDEO’s version is better than the first rules set in place by Osborn. And the main reason that they are able to create so many great things is that because their designers are implicitly guided by the drive to be creative and original. They also use trained facilitators for every session, and the rooms are properly set up with whiteboards and paper.

But studies have shown that normal groups people begin to think alike and therefore aren’t as creative as advertised. They don’t generate as many ideas nor do they generate as wide a range of ideas as the members would do separately.

There are three main reasons why:
• Production blocking: members have to listen to each other’s ideas which takes energy away from generating their own ideas. Also, topics tend to cluster into a few groups because members fixate on what has already been presented.
• Social inhibition: some people hold back for fear of what others will think.
• Social loafing: in groups, people don’t feel as accountable

With all this it may seem that group brainstorming doesn’t work at all. That’s not the case. Group brainstorming sessions do many things well. They create energy for projects. They can move quickly to create unique and innovative solutions. And they add diversity to opinions.

Below are the most recent guidelines for group brainstorming.
• Don’t use groups for additive tasks—tasks that people could do separately and ten sum up. Instead, use them for complex and improvisational tasks. Have people generate ideas separately and then bring them to the group.
• Keep groups to the minimum number of members required.
• Use a facilitator to conduct the meeting.
• Because complex and unexpected innovations emerge from innovative groups as a whole, group rewards need to be in place.
• Allow the group to alternate work with frequent breaks, and switch constantly between group and individual activities.
• Compose groups to be diverse and have complementary skills
• Keep in mind that group members who are low in social anxiety and who enjoy group interaction will perform better.

Again, thanks for the opportunity and I’ll be trying to come to some more meetings in the future.

Sincerely,
Scott Thorp

Marcus is ready to make the journey south and leave the horrible Atlanta traffic behind, for at least a day or two.

As Kevin mentioned, Marcus is the founder and CEO of Squidbid, a competitive purchasing platform. Squidbid is currently in beta with plans to launch a licensed product version early this year.

I’m looking forward to hearing some of the lessons he’s learned over the years. It should be great.

I think the biggest issue that the city will have to overcome with any sort of “technology enabling” is how to best spread the word of this new technology. If the city suddenly (or slowly) starts a big technology push, what’s the best way to let people know about them? Of the 30 or so people at Refresh, only a handful knew about initiatives that the city was already undertaking…for example the 311 service and the interactive crime mapping. I also think that it’s important to note that the vast majority of the people at the Refresh event were “come heres” (ie, not originally from Savannah), which in my mind means that “from heres” may not be as open to any sort of technological advances that the city makes, and therefore even harder to spread the word about these advances.

With that being said, I think the easiest thing for the city to implement is opening up the data for public consumption. If someone then wants to process this data into usable and useful applications, it only makes sense to do this. It benefits both the general public and the city.

Portland, OR was successful in opening their public transit scheduling and arriving data to the public-over 40 projects have been created since on multiple platforms. Android, Braille machines, GPS devices, iOS, Web Browsers.

http://trimet.org/apps/index.htm
http://developer.trimet.org/

The idea about creating APIs for the city and giving citizens the freedom design outlets for that information, combined with an overhaul of the the local government’s web presence, could be a very powerful tool in making Savannah a more tech enabled community. Not to mention the reduction in time and expenses it would take for the city to manage all of these projects individually.

I love this city and would happily volunteer my time to be involved in a project like this if it made Savannah a better place for everyone. Get just a few people in a room together and great things can happen.