Brainstorming and Thought Diversity A Guide on Making Both Work
Brainstorming and Thought Diversity: A Guide on Making Both Work
An estimated 75% of the American population has a fear of public speaking. That’s around 200 million people. You may think this is why you can’t get some workers to speak up during each brainstorming session.
It may be part of it. However, your team may also be struggling to embrace thought diversity. Members of your team may feel like others won’t listen to and respect their opinions.
Luckily, there are plenty of steps you can take to bring more inclusive conversations into your workspace. Read on to learn more.
What Is Thought Diversity?
Each individual has unique personal experiences. These make these individuals approach and act on problems in ways that are different from others. These variations are known as thought diversity or diverse thought.
Why Is Diverse Thinking Important?
Those who travel often experience increases in creativity. Experts suspect that interacting with another county’s locals can challenge the mind’s preconceived notions. The individual then walks away with new ways of thinking.
Makes the Team More Creative
A similar situation can happen between diverse individuals in the workplace. In a diverse team, workers also interact with people from other cultures, countries, etc. This should change their ways of thinking.
Creative Ideas Come From Diversity
Also, the most creative ideas have to come from somewhere. Usually, they come from taking parts of what has come before and putting them together. If everyone in your workplace thinks the same way, they won’t create new ideas.
It Can Save Your Business
Without creativity and new ideas, your business may be unable to solve problems. You can’t avoid these problems as they naturally come with time. If your team can’t solve problems, your business can fail.
What Factors Limit Thought Diversity?
Most people likely think that stereotypes, prejudices, and discrimination make diversity in the workplace harder to manage. They’re right.
These ideologies can lead to exclusion and outright disrespect. As a result, minority workers may feel like they should stay silent. They may also just agree with what everyone else says.
However, these ideologies aren’t the only barriers to diverse thinking. Many more factors limit diverse thought as well. You can learn about some examples below.
Differences in Workplace Culture
Workplace culture differs around the world. In many Asian countries, lower-level workers regularly do not speak up against higher-level ones. In Western countries, all workers are allowed to speak.
What happens if a Western worker goes to Asia or vice versa? Asian workers may consider lower-level Western workers disrespectful. Western workers may consider Asian workers to not be team players.
The workers wouldn’t act this way on purpose. Unfortunately, team members may not understand the cultural differences. So this misunderstanding can continue into infinity and cause tension between team members.
Language Cultural Differences
Language isn’t just words. It’s also gestures, eye contact, and more. These aspects can vary greatly across cultures.
Diverse thinking can’t play a part in brainstorming if the diverse thinkers are misunderstood. Also, some gestures may even be offensive in certain cultures but amiable in others. Misunderstandings like these can lead to workplace tension.
Beyond that, communication issues can create distance. Workers may get frustrated if no one can understand them and decide not to talk.
How to Tell Your Team Has Low Thought Diversity
A lot of diverse thinking issues can slip under the radar if you’re not careful. It’s important to keep your eyes peeled for the signs of these issues. Once you identify the exact types of problems you’re dealing with, you can start figuring out how to solve them.
Team Members Are Self-Censoring Themselves
Self-censoring can take a few different forms. Team members may stay quiet because of disrespect, miscommunications, and workplace expectations. They may also blindly agree for these same reasons.
Team members may also try to speak up and then hesitate. Then they may say something that seems different from their original thought. This could indicate that they are changing their thoughts to more acceptable ones.
Team Members Are Treating Diverse Thinkers Poorly
This sign of low diverse thinking can be more obvious than others. Some people may be willing to say out loud that they don’t like a person’s opinion. They may also talk over the diverse thinker and/or use certain exclusionary words.
Other times, poor treatment can be more subtle. Team members may not react to a diverse person’s thoughts at all or give them certain threatening gestures. You may even find that a diverse team member has gotten threatened or poorly treated behind your back.
Team Members Are Not Challenging Authority
Team members should only respect higher-level workers so much. If team members respect their bosses too much, they won’t challenge their thoughts. You may also find a situation where a boss won’t let team members challenge his or her authority.
Both of these circumstances can severely limit how open the team is to new ideas. Some of the signs of team members refusing to challenge authority figures are as follows.
Refusing to Acknowledge Flaws
Times change and businesses need to change with them. However, team members may not believe that the business’s operations need to change. For example, a magazine publisher may not think it has to offer an online version of its magazine because “no one reads online”, “people like holding magazines”, etc. It’s very important to look out for this issue if your business has won a lot of acclaim. This level of success may trick team members into thinking their leaders are always right.
Shooting Down Outsider’s Opinions Quickly
Team members don’t just shoot down outsiders’ opinions because of stereotypes or cultural differences. They may just not want to challenge workplace authorities.
It’s important to distinguish this from discriminatory issues. Pay attention to how team members react to the new opinion. They’ll likely defend the business rather than pick on some aspect of the team member.
Five Ways to Encourage Thought Diversity in Brainstorming Sessions
Each diverse thinking barrier requires a unique approach. However, you can apply some of the following techniques to a variety of situations.
1. Help People Prepare Beforehand
Diverse thinkers may perform better if they can prepare before a brainstorming session. They can take the extra time to define their ideas in a way everyone can understand. They may also be able to learn about, anticipate, and correct any cultural barriers.
Beyond that, some people just don’t perform well under pressure. Feeling unaccepted in the workplace can raise stress levels and lower performance levels even further. Giving people a head’s up about the meeting greatly lowers this pressure.
Send Out Resources
In addition to a warning, give everyone all the knowledge and resources they need. This can include an agenda, data, reports, a list of previous action items, and anything you feel is necessary. Also, make sure to send them a long time before the meeting starts. People will likely need a fair amount of time to review the materials and prepare ideas.
Let People Work Alone
You should also encourage people to work alone before the brainstorming session. Working independently can boost a person’s creativity. Beyond that, it’s best to approach problems with as many different methods as possible. Furthermore, people won’t need to deal with pressure from colleagues when they work alone. Therefore, they will likely create solutions that are more in line with their values.
2. Provide Some Different Mediums For Brainstorming
Some people may not feel comfortable joining in a conversation vocally. This can happen partly because of communication barriers and stereotypes. However, they may also have trouble getting a word in when everyone else is talking.
A good way to solve these issues is to not limit the brainstorming session to speaking alone. Try to consider offering other methods of communication.
Have a Writing Pad
Try having a writing pad. Everyone can pass this around and write down ideas. You can then acknowledge these ideas and discuss them at some point during the meeting. This writing pad can help people who don’t want to speak have a voice. In addition, it can help people stay anonymous. They’ll feel safer speaking their minds this way.
Send in Ideas Beforehand
Is the meeting going to be online? If so, a writing pad may not work in quite the same way. Using the chat box will also reveal who sent in an idea. In this situation, consider asking the team to send their ideas to the team leader beforehand. The leader can then discuss the ideas with the team during the meeting. He or she doesn’t have to mention any names and probably shouldn’t.
3. Be Honest About Successes and Failures With Team Members
Do your best to have team members remain on an even footing with you and any other team leaders. This will help them see you as a human being with flaws just like them. This will make them more likely to challenge your ideas when they think you’re wrong.
Share During Retrospective Meetings
Retrospective meetings are types of meetings where employees acknowledge a company’s failures and successes over a time period. These meetings will help a team learn what steps they should take moving forward. Be sure to talk candidly during these meetings. Talk about your own mistakes during the year and how you overcame them. Make sure other team leaders do this as well.
Talk About the Successes of Team Members
It’s not a good idea to say who gave an idea before it’s implemented. Some people may oppose the idea of they know who it’s from. However, it is a good idea to acknowledge who gave an idea when it’s a success. This may challenge team members’ preconceived notions about their colleagues. In addition, your team members will know that their ideas get implemented. This can make them more likely to offer their ideas in the future.
4. Use Some Collaboration Exercises
Try to mix up your meetings with some collaborative exercises. These can gently encourage everyone to participate. Team members may also appreciate the change in pace.
With research, you should find plenty of ideas online. You can also try one or more of the brainstorming methods below.
Crazy Eights
Each worker will have a template with eight boxes. In eight minutes, they each need to fill the boxes with eight sketches. Once the timer rings, have everyone share their ideas.
Step Ladder
Two people discuss a topic first for an amount of time. You then add a team member after each period elapses. At some point, the whole group should be discussing the topic.
Round Robin
Have one team member give an idea. Then you can go around to the other team members. Have them each contribute something to the new idea.
Try to get every member of the team to participate. If there isn’t enough time, wait until the next meeting. Then call upon people who didn’t go before.
5. Take Action For Diversity
Having employees take classes on diversity can help foster thought diversity. However, some workers may feel hesitant to accept diverse team members. You can deal with these issues in a few different ways.
Talk to Employees Privately
Don’t call your employees out on prejudices in front of everyone. This may make them resentful. It’s better to acknowledge their issues privately.
You can pull problematic team members aside to talk to them. You can also make diversity issues a part of their employee reviews.
Lead By Example
If team members look up to you and other leaders, they’ll imitate you. Make sure you acknowledge any prejudices you have and overcome them. Also, do what you can to learn about the different cultures of your team members.
We'll Help Your Team Collaborate Effectively
Fostering thought diversity can take a lot of work. However, your company will benefit from your efforts.
Your company can also benefit from our online collaborative whiteboard. It’s the perfect tool for brainstorming, task management, design thinking, and more. Try our premium version for free by signing up for an account on this page.