So now it's time to come up with some ideas for solutions; solutions that meet stakeholder requirements and user goals. You've found yourself in a creative block and you need to get those creative juices flowing. Ideation is a great way to break the mold of old solutions or even come up with great new intuitive solutions.

Listen and Don't Critique

Ideation is a great way to discover solutions outside the norm. One of the best ways to start off ideation is to allow everyone to voice their opinion in the brainstorming process. Even the receptionist at the front desk might have a good idea, or at least a micro-idea that can fit into a larger scale idea. When facilitating the brainstorming process, you need to make sure that ideas are respected and not critiqued. The point of the brainstorming process is not to critique, but to build upon ideas where possible. You will begin to see that what might be first viewed as a bad idea can be transformed into a good idea.

Avoid a Thinking Trap

You also don’t want to spend too much time on any single idea in the brainstorming phase. You don’t want to get blinded by how great you think one idea is, that you begin to ignore other ideas.

When Does Ideation Make Sense?

You can use these ideation techniques once you’ve completed your experience maps, personas, and user stories. You can create some low fidelity mockups and prototypes based off these ideas and send them off for testing and validation.