The secret top startups use for effective Brainstorming Techniques

If you’ve ever left a brainstorming session without a clear solution, you might not be applying the process correctly. Brainstorming is a key technique for business creativity, but many companies organize brainstorming sessions hoping creativity with flow, only to end up with a whiteboard full of random words and not a real solution. Trust me, it’s more common than you’d think.

Top Startups have figured out a different approach. It’s not about sitting ina circle and throwing ideas around randomly. Their trick for truly effective brainstorming is simple but powerful: First, diverge, then converge.It might sound a bit complicated, but it’s easy. 

What does that mean?

The problem with many brainstorming sessions is the ideas are judged too quickly. Brainstorming is a technique that needs to be broken down into two phases: Divergence and convergence. The divergence phase focuses on generating as many ideas as possible without fear of evaluation.

In an environment where everyone weighs in on every idea, creativity gets , and the session becomes unproductive. The most innovative startups have learned that to generate valuable ideas, you need to separate the creation process from the evaluation process.

Here’s where the divergence and convergence technique comes in:

1- Divergence: First, generate as many ideas as possible without filters or criticism. The crazier, the better. The goal is quantity.

2-Convergence: Then, filter, group, and refine the best ideas to identify the most viable or innovative ones.

What is brainstorming, and who created it?

Is a group creativity technique developed by Alex Faickney Osborn in the 1940. The goal is to generate as many ideas as possible without filtering them initially, allowing for the exploration of innovative solutions before selecting the best ones.

Real examples of Brainstorming in innovative companies

Airbnb: Innovation in the business world relies heavily on divergent thinking. Companies that have revolutionized their industries, like Airbnb, have used divergent thinking to innovate in the hospitality industry by offering creative and unconventional solutions.

Tesla: Similarly, Tesla has thought outside traditional limits. Instead of following the established path, these companies sought new business models and creative solutions to old problems.

Kepler: At Ketpler, brainstorming is used as a powerful tool for problem-solving. The goal is to generate divergent thinking so that many ideas emerge, becoming the very inspiration for the solution.

How to apply this method to your team?

If you want your next brainstorming session to be truly productive, follow these steps:

Warm up

Before starting, do a quick creativity exercise. For example, challenge your team to come up with 10 unusual uses for a common object (like a paperclip or a bottle). This helps activate the creative mindset.

Divergence phase: generate ideas without filters

Set a time limit and ask each person to write down as many ideas as possible on post-its or digital whiteboards.

No judging or evaluating ideas during this phase. The golden rule is “Yes, and…” instead of “No, because…”.

If ideas start to flow slowly,try using triggers like:

• “How would we do this if we had an unlimited budget?”
• “How would a startup like Tesla or Netflix solve this?”

Convergence phase: select and refine

Now it’s time to review the ideas. Group them by themes and let the team vote on the most promising ones.

Ask yourself:

• Which one are realistic?
• Which ones could scale?

Once you’ve selected the best ideas, refine them with more details and define the next steps for execution.

Do you need to be together and brainstorming at the same time?

Innovation can still happen without unnecessary meetings. In startups and companies with globally distributed teams, live brainstorming sessions can be challenging. Asynchronous brainstorming allows everyone to contribute when they’re most inspired, without the need for a meeting.

How to do it?

Create a document or digital space (e.g., Notion, Slack, Miro, Google docs, etc.). Then, share the question or problem to be solved. Set a deadline of 24-48 hours for everyone to contribute ideas. Finally, review and select the best ones in a later convergence phase.

This method allows people with different creativity paces to participate without pressure, improving the quality of the generated ideas.

Move from basic to advanced

You might already have a structured team that knows your brainstorming dynamic and feel that you’re doing many of the things we’ve discussed. But now, it might be time to take it to the next level. If you want to elevate brainstorming, here are some unconventional techniques that startups are using:

• Brainwriting 6-3-5: Six people write down three ideas in 5 minutes. Then they pass their ideas to the next person, who expands them. In just 30 minutes, you generate 108 ideas. Sounds crazy, right? But totally possible.
• SCAMPER: Based on specific questions to modify and improve existing ideas: Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put to another use, Eliminate, rearrange.
• Reverse question method: Instead of asking “How do we solve x problem?, ask “How would we make the problem worse?” This unlocks valuable insights.
• Iconic companies role: Each team member should think about how an iconic company (Apple, Tesla, Amazon, Netflix, etc.) would solve the problem.

These techniques help break thinking patterns and find innovative solutions.

Why have startups placed so much importance on developing good brainstorming?

A good brainstorming session is just the first step. What truly differentiates successful startups is how they turn those ideas into actionable decisions.

Who has the final say?

Not all decisions can be by consensus. Some startups assign a final “decision-maker” who makes the last call after the brainstorming session.

Rapid validation

Instead of discussing ideas for weeks, startups like airbnb and Tesla test ideas with small, quick experiments before committing significant resources.

Prioritization with the ICE method

Ideas are evaluated based on Impact, Confidence, and Effort (ICE Score) to focus on the most promising ones.

A brainstorming session without a clear decision-making system can generate many ideas… but few actions

What makes brainstorming work?

The success of brainstorming doesn’t just rely on the method itself, but also on how the human brains works during creative processes key psychological factors include:

• Verbal production effect: When people verbalize their ideas out loud, their brains process them more deeply, enhancing creativity.

Production blocking: This happens when a participant feels pressured to respond quickly, causing their creativity to block. Techniques like brainstorming help prevent this issue.

Fear of evaluation: If team members feel their ideas will be judged, they may hold back their best contributions. That’s why creating a safe environment is key.

• Principle of free association: Many innovative ideas emerge when the brain connects seemingly unrelated concepts. This is why tools like mind maps are also effective. 
• Zeigarnik Effect: Our minds tend to remember unfinished tasks better. One strategy is to end a brainstorming session with open questions so the brain keeps generating ideas after the session ends.

Understanding the psychology behind brainstorming helps optimize team dynamics and unlock their maximum creative potential.

What factors influence the quality of a brainstorming session?

Brainstorming is an effective technique only when certain key factors are in place. It’s not enough to just gather people in a room and say, “Think outside the box!” Psychological, environmental, and organizational factors can either enhance creativity or turn the session into a series of awkward silences and obvious ideas. To generate a high number of ideas and keep all team members engaged, it’s essential to:

• Create a conducive environment, using stimulating colors and ensuring natural lighting to promote focus.
• Use tools like mind maps to structure and visualize ideas more clearly.
• Foster cognitive diversity within the team, incorporating different perspectives that enrich that creative process. 

These elements make the difference between a truly productive brainstorming session and mere mental downpour with no impact.

1- Physical and emotional environment: The space matters more than you think.

Creativity doesn’t happen in a dull gray cubicle with hospital-like lighting. The environment can inspire or completely block ideas:

Lighting and Colors

Natural light: Improves mood and helps with thinking. If not available, use warm light, cold white just makes you want to scape.

Space design

• Open vs. Closed spaces: Collaboration bs. Privacy. They key balance.
• Flexible furniture: Moving around shifts perspectives (and prevents people from falling asleep)

Ambient Noise

• Silence kills inspirations. Moderate noise (like a quiet café) Helps. Tools like Noisli can save you from a library-like brainstorming session. 

2. Time of Day: When are the best ideas generated?

When do we think best? It depends on what you’re looking for.

Morning vs. Afternoon: Mornings are great for logical tasks. Afternoons are perfect for creative ideas. Moderate cognitive fatigue makes us think outside the box because we’re too tired to stay insed it. 

As for session duration, if it’s less than 30 minutes, there’s not enough time to warp up. More than 45 minutes can cause mental fatigue. The solution: 25-minute Pomodoro sessions with breaks.

3. Team’s Emotional state: the brain needs security to create.

If there’s a fear of being judged, forget it: no one will share crazy ideas (which are often the best ones). Speaking ideas out loud helps develop them.

1. Cognitive diversity: They key to truly innovative ideas.

If everyone thinks the same, the ideas will be clones. Harvard Business Review says that diverse teams generate 35% more disruptive ideas.

How to improve Diversity in Brainstorming

• Mix different areas (marketing + sales + engineering + magic)
• Involve outsiders (someone who knows nothing about the topic will ask twice).
• Use the stranger method. How would someone with no knowledge of the topic solve this?

5. Without limits, there’s no focus.

Set a clear objective.

What problems do we want to solve?

What is the scope of the ideas?

How do we know if an idea is good? (“I like it” is not a criterion)

Can techniques like brainstorming be complemented with others like design thinking?

Brainstorming is a key component of design thinking, a problem-solving approach based on creativity and empathy for the user. In this context, it is used the ideate phase process:

1. Empathize: Understand the user’s needs.
2. Define: Identify the core problem.
3. Ideate: (brainstorming) Generate multiples solutions.
4. Prototype: Build preliminary versions of the idea.
5. Test: Try out and refine the solution.

Design thinking reinforces the importance of structuring brainstorming sessions so that they not only generate ideas but also lead to actionable and testable solutions.

How does it impact organizational culture?

Beyond ideas generation, brainstorming influences a company’s culture by:

Foster innovation: Companies that promote open brainstorming send the message that creativity is valued.

Breaking hierarchies: By removing barriers between executives and employees, everyone can contribute ideas, regardless of their position.

Creating a mindset of continuous improvement: Teams that engage in regular brainstorming develop habits of experimentation and constant learning.

Reinforcing internal communication: Teams that brainstorm frequently improve their ability to debate ideas constructively.

An organizational culture that values brainstorming encourages long-term creativity and enhances problem-solving within the company.

The role of a facilitator in a successful brainstorming session

The facilitator in a brainstorming session is not a boss, a teacher, or the guru with all the answers. Their role is more like that of a conductor, someone who ensures that all ideas are heard without any one person dominating the conversation or the group falling into an awkward silence. What’s their mission? To make creativity flow without turning the session into a chaotic mess of meaningless ideas or a rigid meeting that kills spontaneity. To achieve this, they must maintain a crucial balance:

Provide structure without rigidity. A bit of order is necessary, but without stifling creativity.

Ensure everyone participates. Not letting only the extroverts speak while the rest simply nod.

Guide without imposing. It’s not about directing the conversation, but rather facilitating the natural growth of ideas.

How to keep the group’s energy up

A good brainstorming session without energy is like a coffee without caffeine: Technically it works, but no one enjoys it. A good facilitator knows that the meeting’s atmosphere is key, and if there’s no dynamism, creativity fades. To avoid this, they can apply several strategies:

Strategic pause: A short break at just the right moment can prevent the team entering “automatic mode”

Quick dynamics: Short games, 30-second challenges, or even a simple unexpected question can unlock minds.

Change of environment: If the team feels stuck, moving the meeting to a new location or changing the format (like switching from a circle discussion to post-it notes) can make a difference.

Use of visual stimuli: Images, mind maps, or whiteboards can help ideas take shape more quickly.

The point is, a good brainstorming session should feel like a purposeful conversation, not like a theory class where everyone takes notes but isn’t involved.

Guide without influencing too much

Here’s where the line between facilitating and manipulating becomes thin. If the facilitator starts praising certain ideas more than others or rephrases everything according to their own viewpoint, they may unintentionally steer the team’s thinking. When that happens, the session stops being a brainstorming session and becomes a simple validation of what the facilitator wants to hear.

To avoid this, it’s key to:

• Ask open-ended questions: Instead of “Does anyone have another idea?” ask, “How could this even more innovative?”
• Encourage collective building: Instead of discarding an idea that seems weak, invite the group to improve it with questions like, “How could we make this work?”
• Respect silences: Sometimes, the best idea emerges after a few seconds of puse. There’s no need to rush the process.

In the end, the success of a brainstorming session isn’t measured by how many ideas are generated, but by the quality of those ideas and the level of engagement from the team. An effective facilitator isn’t the star of the session, but the one who makes everyone feel part of the process and leaves with the sense that they truly created something valuable together.

Digital tools that will help facilitate brainstorming in a structured way

Not only can you apply the divergence and convergence method, but you can also rely on digital tools to optimize the process. Some options that can enhance the quality of your brainstorming session include:

Miro: Ideal for collaborative mind mapping and idea structuring.

Notion: Great for documenting and prioritizing generated ideas.

Stormboard: A platform specifically designed for team brainstorming sessions.

FigJam (From Figma): Excellent for diagramming ideas in a visual and interactive way.

AI: There are various apps with artificial intelligence that can help unlock new ideas or enhance those already on the table.

Each tool allows for better structuring of the session, prevents ideas from being lost, and makes it easier to select the most valuable ones.

Real use cases: Companies combining AI and human brainstorming

Many companies are already integrating artificial intelligence into their creative processes. Here are some examples:

Netflix: Uses AI to analyze consumption patterns and generate ideas on what type of content may work best in different markets. Based on this date, creative teams develop concepts more aligned with what the audience wants to see.

Coca-Cola: Ha used AI to design advertising campaigns based on insights from social media. Ai detects emerging trends, but the final decision and tone of the message are still in the hands of the marketing team.

L’Oréal: Integrates AI in its product innovation process. It analyzes customer reviews and industry trends to inspire new formulas and beauty concepts.

How to combine AI and brainstorming without losing the human essence?

• Use AI as a starting point, not a final solution: The best ideas emerge when machines suggest and humans refine.
• Don’t accept everything AI suggests without questioning it: Its value lies in broadening the perspective, but human judgment is still essential.
• Leverage AI for what it does best: Speed and analysis. Use it to generate many quick ideas and then filter the best ones with the team.

Ultimately, AI may not have the creative spark of a brainstorming conversation in a room, but it can be the tool that accelerates the process, uncovers new perspective, and allows humans to focus on what truly matters: turning ideas into real innovation.

Conclusion

At this point, you’re more ready than ready to have a successful brainstorming session. Remember, it’s a powerful tool for creativity and innovation, especially in hybrid and remote environments. Foster an inclusive environment where all voices are heard, and don’t be afraid to combine different methodologies and tools. When we do this strategically, the results can be amazing.