Idea Generation Part 2
HMW’s
How might we make raising a child more enjoyable? (This one was used only very shortly. The four participants were a little confused on the directions so it was used just to loosen them up on the idea of sketching)
How might we make the diaper changing process more effective/enjoyable?
How might parents change/dispose of diapers better?
How might we make Diaper Pails more effective?
Set Up
3 of the 4 people I used to conduct my brainstorming session are a group of friends I met while on a spring break trip to Germany in my Freshman year. The 4th participant is one of Abby’s roommates. We all have very diverse backgrounds and personalities, but get along well and are very comfortable around each other, which I thought would make for a very productive session.
Abby: International Business & Marketing, French studies and Business Law minors
Jack: History and Anthropology
Zach: Political Science major, Russian Studies minor, overall stand up guy
Payton: Psych/Pre-med
The session was conducted on Saturday, Nov 2nd in Abby’s apartment and with warm ups, the main session, and final comments the session lasted about an hour. We devoted about 10 minutes to warm up, 10 minutes for each of the three HMW statements and 15–20 minutes for grouping/liking ideas and final comments. In addition to the warm up game I developed, we played Tigers are Awesome and Negative Word Ball.
To do the brainstorming sketching, regular printing paper was cut in half and the participants were instructed to sketch relatively large pictures on each half page. They were given different colored sharpie markers and as the sketches were finished they were instructed to announce their ideas to the group and lay the sketch out on the table.

Warm Up
The Warm Up game I developed I named “Grocery Cart”. It involves word association and quick reactions based around food. One person will say a 2–3 word food/drink and then make eye contact or point to another person in circle. That person must then come up with a new 2 word food/drink that starts with the first letter of the last word said to “add to the cart”. For example: if the first word said is Apple Pie, then the next person may say Pineapple Juice, the next person would have to come up with something that starts with a J and so on.
Brainstorming Session
After doing the warm up sessions we began the sketching portion of brainstorming. They each grabbed a sharpie, a stack of paper, and some assorted chocolate for motivation.

After the first prompt we realized the table was not large enough, we then transferred everything to the floor, quickly reorganized and began sketching the rest of the ideas. They were told that there were no wrong ideas and to simply sketch the first thing that came to mind after each sketch was finished.

After about 20 more minutes the group was relatively burnt out and we had gotten through all of the prompts. They then began sorting all of the cards into various groups. Like in the class section, as they were starting to burn out I told them they could also create ideas that were “the worst” way to solve the problem. This helped them stay more creative and some of the ideas actually aligned with a few I had created from my own brainstorming activity.

Eventually the participants consolidated the cards into about 5 categories. I did not have a good way of having them mark cards so I simply had them check each card they thought was particularly novel or that they especially enjoyed. Afterwards I collected the cards to analyze later.

The group ended up making 73 sketches in 30 minutes. The first prompt was very slow going as they were still trying to get used to the concept and I could tell they were hesitating/ thinking about each idea too much. After reiterating that they do not have to be conscious of what they sketch. It picked up on the second prompt. The third one was also hard for them, as none of them had ever used a diaper pail and 3 of them had never heard of it until I briefly explained it before starting. I think having a group with slightly more knowledge or background with the product would be helpful. Not that they would need to know a lot, but by having such minimal knowledge of what the concept of the product even is I could tell is was hard for them to try and improve something they already were unfamiliar with. They also had a tendency to talk a little more in depth about each sketch and attentively listen to one another, which slowed them down a little further. Overall the group only made about 3 sketches a minute.

Of the top 10, 6 were made by the same individual. Many of their ideas incorporated ways to add fun factors to the diaper pails. Where it says “Vegetable Garden” there is actually 6 pages under it all related to composting or fertilizer, so that seemed to be a very common theme. The idea of corporate branding is also interesting, whether it be decals to go over regular trash bins, or new ones specially designed to resemble characters.
Top 10 Ideas

