Page 154 - Keys to College Success

more times you try to get ideas, the more active your brain
becomes.” Like any other consistent action, working on ideas
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builds new neural pathways in your brain.
5. Acceptance of mistakes as part of the process. When you can risk
messing up, you open yourself to ideas and promote productivity.
Thomas Edison tried over 2,000 filaments before he found the
best one for the tungsten electric bulb. Michalko repackages fail-
ure as a learning experience. “Whenever you try to do something
and do not succeed,” he says, “you do not fail. You have learned
something that does not work.” 23

With your brain primed for creativity, explore actions that will
build creative thinking skill: braingaming, shifting perspective, and When you think through something with others
being an outsider. in a group, the variety of ideas gives you a
better chance of finding a workable solution to
a problem.
Go Beyond Brainstorming
You’ve likely heard of brainstorming—letting your mind freely associ-
ate to come up with different ideas or answers to a question. This longstanding creative
technique demands that you generate ideas without regard to usefulness, and evaluate
their quality later. New research calls the value of brainstorming into question, show-
ing that avoiding evaluating idea quality can result in fewer and less effective ideas.
Researchers report that constructive criticism and dissent generate more ideas and pro-
mote the rethinking and refining that lead to an idea’s most productive form. “All
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these errant discussions add up,” says Lehrer. “In fact, they may even be the most essen-
tial part of the creative process. . . . It is the human friction that makes the sparks.” 25
Teamwork is crucial in today’s workplace, and most modern problems are so com-
plex that to tackle them with any measure of success requires the cooperation of many
individuals. However, the most productive teamwork will incorporate constructive dis-
sent and questioning. Instead of brainstorming, think of it as braingaming—a term that
incorporates the challenges and back-and-forth that can take groups to new heights of
creativity. Remember that you don’t have to sacrifice civility to have a successful brain- Critical, Creative, and Practical Thinking
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gaming session. At Pixar, groups use a technique called “plussing,” which refers to craft-
ing criticism that includes a productive way of improving on the idea in question—as in,
“That might work, and consider adjusting it in this way. . . .” Keep the “plus” in mind as
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you contribute and evaluate.

Shift Your Perspective
If no one ever questioned established opinion, people would still think the sun revolved
around the Earth. Here are some ways to change how you look at the world:
Challenge assumptions. Taking the risk of going against what people assume to be
true can lead you down innovative paths. In the late 1960s, for example, most people
assumed that school provided education and television provided entertainment. Jim
Henson, a pioneer in children’s television, asked, “Why can’t we use TV to educate
young children?” From that question, the characters of Sesame Street, and many other
educational programs, were born. Another example is the company 2Kool and the
clothing and workshops it produces, founded by artists Bimmer Torres and Ratha Sok,
who challenged the assumption that graffiti is simply defacement of property.

Seek out and connect with new and different people. Highly productive compa-
nies and places owe much of their creative bounty to frequent and diverse human inter-
actions. For example, behind the astounding rate of invention at Bell Labs beginning in
the 1940s was deliberate building design, in which researchers were across the hall
from engineers and employees had to travel long hallways—encountering people and
ideas—on the way to lunch. 28

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