How Might We Ideation

Ideation exercises are a great way to get team energy flowing and to expand thinking on challenges or themes that are already in place for your team. How Might We calls on teams to reframe problem statements by taking the position that the answer is unknown and that the team will  consider suggestions that are not guaranteed to work, that there are many potential solutions to the problem. Begin by posting your problem statement  (based on the formula that you used when Reframing the Problem) on a wall where your whole team can engage with it. Together begin posing the question How Might We to each aspect of the problem while proposing a new perspective. For example, if you are creating a food app for university campuses you might have the problem statement: Jordan, the university student, needs access to healthy and diverse food but wants to remain a part of the social community of the cafeteria. Some questions might be: How might we make healthy food more visible to Jordan and other students? How might we incentivize cafeterias to showcase healthier food options? How might we engage with local restaurants to connect them to the needs of the campus community? As team members come up with questions they should write them on post-its and surround the problem statement with them. When you've come up with 5 - 10 questions stop and think about how they might influence your exploration or potential solutions.

When

How Might We Ideation is a tool that will be more useful early on as you begin to unpack the different angles that you should consider when building your research plan.

Why

How Might We Ideation is not only useful when developing a problem perspective but it's also useful as a team building exercise. By encouraging everyone to get involved you'll not only get a multitude of perspectives but also bring everyone into a process that can be fun and will influence the shape and understanding of the problem area going forward.

Supplies & Resources

A white board or wall with sticky notes and markers for everyone.