The 90-10 Rule

If you work in creativity of any type, you know the 90-20 Rule, also known as Sturgeon’s Law.

OK, technically, Sturgeon’s Law is Ninety percent of everything is crap.

No, he did not create it specifically for brainstorms, but at the same time, it summarises every brainstorm.

At your last brainstorm, didn’t you notice 90% of the ideas were completely useless, but 10% were worthy of more discussion?

I noticed this odd effect from the moment I started working as a creative director. Every brainstorm had a slew of nasty ideas, but amongst them, there were some golden nuggets of brilliance. It didn’t matter what I did, the percentage never changed.

More so, it’s pretty much an unbreakable rule.

When I pointed it out to other people, the most memorable retort came from a senior person who told me I needed to facilitate brainstorms better, because all of the good ideas should come out at the beginning of the workshop, not all scrambled together.

Two words: As if.

That is not how the brain operates. The human brain cannot, literally or metaphorically, organise itself.

It can think about what it thinks, but it doesn’t have any perspective of what it is thinking – like an idea – until it gets that idea out of its head.

It’s not until the idea is finally external that the brain can use its other, better skills to analyse and critique the idea.

As my Nana Eklund used to say, “Every idea sounds good in your head. It’s not until you’ve told someone else that you know if your brain’s been lying to you.”

Brainstorms Have Only One Priority: MORE MORE MORE

It’s essential in brainstorms to generate the largest amount of ideas because …

90% of your ideas will be bad, wrong, improbable, immoral, criminal, inane, ho-hum, been-there-done-that, senseless, blah blah blah.

10% of ideas will be good, moving, impactful, hilarious, engaging, memorable, yes yes yes!

The good thing about the 90-10 Rule is most people get it immediately, so they give up the negativity. (Well, a little bit.)

Other people aren’t clear on differences between negativity and criticismn. You might help them understand by using .

At the same time, don’t worry so much about the 90-10 Rule that y’all start to debate in the brainstorm which is which.

Focus on volume. If you mathematically increase the total volume of ideas, exponentially you also increase the 10% of the best ideas.

Or, as the cliché goes: Rising tides lift all boats.

Here's some ways to generate more ideas in brainstorms

Here’s six ways to beat the 90-10 Rule at its own game.

1. More and shorter brainstorms!

Because many brainstorms don’t create a lot of ideas in one sitting, schedule shorter brainstorms (30 minutes is good) and more of them.

Some people brainstorm better at different times of day. Schedule morning and afternoon brainstorms. Not only will your morning and afternoon people go the brainstorm they prefer, it gives busy people options to attend the meeting best for their diary.

2. Write everything down!

If you don’t write down the bad ideas (the 90%), you won’t know you have the good ideas (10%). The key: don’t type up the bad ideas after the meeting is over.

Now, that said, I often type up strange ideas because I might use them another time.

You might also encourage people to fix bad ideas. Or, by writing everything down, people can return later to keep adding more ideas.

3. Use less people in brainstorms!

Lots of people can dilute the quality of a brainstorm. Try for 2-3 people only. Less people are also easier to schedule.

Use Brainstorm #2 (with new people) to continue from Brainstorm #1. You aren’t starting from scratch. You can ask the group from Brainstorm #1 to come to Brainstorm #3 and continue to build on the last set, or keep going with more fresh ideas.

Obviously, smaller meetings work well if you only have a few people in your organisation or department.

4. Stand up!

The brain works more efficiently when the body is active.

5. Do not hatch and grade!

A chicken farmer does not grade their eggs until all eggs are hatched. So, do not criticise ideas in the middle of a brainstorm. You want volume! Get ideas out, then look back at what you have when your brainstorming is finished.

6. Don’t focus on the bad 90%.

Unless a bad idea is so intruiging that you might improve it, stay focused. Don’t waste time critiquing the crap.

Focus on the good stuff. Improve the good stuff. Play around more with the good stuff.

Excuse me? Bad ideas have value?

Yes, for two reasons.

Almost every bad idea can be improved. Just change what is bad about it to improve it.

Or, if you only have one idea, you don’t know if it’s good or bad … until you compare it to a bad idea.

That’s part of the reason why you need a Plan B. If your good plan doesn’t work, what’s your back-up?

How else have you helped improve your brainstorms by addressing the 90/10 rule to get more ideas than less? Please add your thoughts and comments below.