When brainstorming goes right, it goes really right. The group feeds off each other's contributions, each person building off of what's already been said until the group produces ideas that they might not have come up with individually. Everyone leaves energized and enthusiastic.
However, effective brainstorming sessions like these can be rare. Adding structure to your brainstorming sessions can mitigate these problems. Round robin brainstorming is an effective brainstorming method to ensure that your sessions are productive and that every voice is heard.
This blog post will cover what round robin brainstorming is, how it can help your teams, and what its potential downsides are. We'll also share some templates to make round robin brainstorming a breeze.
What is round robin brainstorming?
Round robin brainstorming is a method of structured brainstorming. Here's how it works:
-
Gather everyone together, whether virtually or in the same physical location. The facilitator explains the problem that the group needs to solve and the goal of the brainstorming session. While the facilitator can answer questions, they should not let people start diving into solutions yet.
-
Ask people to take a moment to think quietly about possible solutions. They will write their ideas down somewhere, whether that's on a physical index card if you're all together or on a virtual sticky note on a digital whiteboard.
-
The facilitator passes each person's written idea to someone else in the group, such as passing index cards around the table or assigning them to someone on your virtual whiteboard.
-
The participants read the idea that the facilitator passed to them and they use it as inspiration to create another new idea of their own Then, they pass the original idea cards to the facilitator.
-
The facilitator redistributes the second round of ideas to everyone, and the group repeats the process as many times as needed.
-
At the end of the session, the facilitator or the group can organize the ideas, eliminate repeats, share feedback, and decide on next steps.
Round robin brainstorming can help solve some of the common problems of brainstorming including:
-
Groupthink: Brainstorming is supposed to bring diverse perspectives to a problem, but when people start talking, they tend to get stuck on each other's ideas. They may not actually bring their own creative contributions and instead focus on what the loudest person is saying.
-
Peer pressure: If the majority of the group loves an idea, the one person who has concerns may not feel comfortable speaking up. It's sometimes hard to go against the group's consensus, especially if there's a power difference between members or they don't know each other well enough to be comfortable disagreeing.
-
Personality differences: Some people just have a hard time speaking up, especially if they have to work to insert themselves into a fast-paced conversation. If you have both loud and quiet people in the same room, the quiet people may not have space in the discussion to speak up.
-
Disengaged participants: If the group members aren't invested in the purpose of the brainstorming session, they won't give it their all.
Benefits of using the round robin method of brainstorming
The round robin method can help resolve the four main challenges of brainstorming:
-
Avoid groupthink: Because participants have to come up with ideas on their own, you'll get more diverse contributions than if everyone gloms onto the first spoken idea in the meeting.
-
Reduce peer pressure: Participants can share new ideas based on others' contributions without having to speak up or be the loudest in the room. They are free to share their ideas, even if they are different than the most senior members on the team.
-
Reduce friction between co-workers with different personalities: Everyone gets a chance to add their ideas, no matter their collaboration style. No one person can dominate the brainstorming session.
-
Increase engagement: Everyone plays an active role in the round robin method. Each person is expected to come up with an idea to pass to the next person. This helps everyone stay focused and involved.
After completing your round robin brainstorming session, you should be left with a wealth of new ideas to sift through as a group.
Disadvantages of using the round robin brainstorming method
Traditionally, round robin brainstorming happens in person with physical index cards. When it's time to swap ideas, you pass your card to the next person. Depending on who that person is, this system could potentially lead to peer pressure, bias, or shyness.
For example, if the person next to you is senior to you, you may feel more inclined to make their idea work, even if you don't think it's the right way to go, or you may not take the most junior person's unique idea as seriously. Simply put, if you know who you're passing your idea to, you might have a harder time giving your most honest contribution without thinking about how they will receive it.
The best way to eliminate this problem is to anonymize the contributions. If you're using index cards, the facilitator should shuffle them before redistributing them so no one knows whose idea they have. Virtually, the facilitator should find a similar method, like private mode in Lucidspark, to guarantee anonymity.
Another possible challenge of the round robin method (and similar brainstorming methods, such as brainwalking) is that it tends to favor introverts. Round robin brainstorming is usually done in silence since everyone is reading and writing by themselves. Many introverted team members will love it, but if your team includes a lot of extroverts who want verbal discussion to stay engaged, you might be better off with another structured brainstorming method–or at least a robust discussion of the collected ideas at the end of the session.
How Lucidspark makes round robin brainstorming easy
Lucidspark is a virtual whiteboard packed with powerful features to make brainstorming effortless. If you’re doing your round robin brainstorming with a hybrid or remote team, use Lucidspark to make your virtual session just as productive and energizing as an in-person one.
It’s easy to capture your ideas as fast as they come with sticky notes. To get the most of the round robin method, you can turn on private mode. This makes all sticky note authors anonymous, and you can keep it that way even after the session has ended, eliminating the majority of the risks that can come with round robin brainstorming, like groupthink. As your group writes down their ideas, use the in-app timer to keep the meeting running on track.
Lucidspark also offers an extensive template library to help you accelerate your brainstorming sessions. Here are a few we recommend you try:
