Lateral Thinking

by Edward de Bono

  The rich man wanted his daughter to marry the richest of her suitors. But the daughter was in love with a poor student. So she went to her father and said that she wanted to marry the richest of her suitors but how could they tell which was the richest. It would be no use asking them to show their wealth by giving a present since it would be easy to borrow money for this purpose if the daughter was to be the prize. Instead she suggested that her father should give a present of money to each of the suitors. Then one would be able to tell how rich each was by the difference that the present of money made to their usual way of life. The father praised her for her wisdom and gave a present to each suitor. Whereupon the daughter eloped with her now enriched true love.

  In each of these examples a simple reversal proved useful in itself. More often reversals are not especially useful in themselves but only in what they lead to. One ought to get into the habit of reversing situations and then seeing what happens. If nothing happens then there is no loss and there must be some gain in the challenge to the established way of looking at things.

  Practice

  1. Reversal and different types of reversal

  A number of situations are presented to the students each of whom has to try reversing each situation in as many ways as possible. The results are collected and then the different types of reversal are listed. Comments are made on the more obvious types and also on the more ingenious types.

  The same thing can also be done by giving out a subject and then asking for volunteer reversals of it, listing these down on a blackboard as they come in (and supplementing them with one’s own suggestions).

  Possible subjects might be:

  Teacher instructing students.

  Street cleaner.

  Milkman delivering milk.

  Going on holiday.

  Workers striking.

  Shop assistants helping customers.

  Comment

  In some cases the reversal may seem utterly ridiculous. This does not matter. It is just as useful to practise being ridiculous as to practise reversal. In the above examples (and the teacher can generate different ones) it is not just a matter of reversing the given statement but of reversing some aspect of the subject itself. For instance ‘going on holiday’ can be reversed as “holiday coming to one’. On the other hand one might consider a holiday as ‘a change of scenery’ and reverse this to a holiday as ‘complete uniformity of surroundings’.

  2. What reversal leads to

  Here one takes the situation and its reversal and sees what the reversal leads to. This is best done in a general classroom situation. The situation and its reversal are offered to the class and volunteer suggestions are invited as to lines of thought that the reversal might open up. For instance the idea that —holidays might involve complete uniformity of surroundings’ might lead to the idea of freedom from decision, from stress, from having to adapt.

  To begin with it is not always easy to develop further ideas from the reversed situation. That is why it is better to do it in an open class situation rather than require each student to work out something for himself. Once the idea is grasped and everyone seems eager to offer suggestions then each individual student can be asked to reverse a situation and develop lines of thought that arise from that reversal In considering and commenting on these at the end it is necessary to be able to trace the line of development of an idea rather than just have the end product. For that reason the students ought to be encouraged to put down their train of thought.

  Brainstorming 15

  What has been discussed so far includes the general principles of lateral thinking and special techniques for practising these principles and applying them. Brainstorming is a formal setting for the use of lateral thinking. In itself it is not a special technique but a special setting which encourages the application of the principles and techniques of lateral thinking while providing a holiday from the rigidity of vertical thinking.

  The previous sections have described techniques that could be used on one’s own. The practice sessions have involved a teacher-student interaction. Brainstorming is a group activity. Nor does it require any teacher intervention.

  The main features of a brainstorming session are:

  Cross stimulation.

  Suspended judgement.

  The formality of the setting.

  Cross stimulation

  The fractionation technique and the reversal technique are methods for getting ideas moving. One needs to move to a new arrangement of information and then one can carry on from there. The new arrangement of information is a provocation which produces some effect. In a brainstorming session the provocation is supplied by the ideas of others. Since such ideas come from outside one’s own mind they can serve to stimulate one’s own ideas. Even if one misunderstands the idea it can still be a useful stimulus. It often happens that an idea may seem very obvious and trivial to one person and yet it can combine with other ideas in someone else’s mind to produce something very original. In a brainstorming session one gives out stimulation to others and one receives it from others. Because the different people taking part each tend to follow their own lines of thought there is less danger of getting stuck with a particular way of looking at the situation.

  During the brainstorming session the ideas are recorded by a notetaker and perhaps by a tape recorder as well. These ideas can then be played back at a later date in order to provide fresh stimulation. Although the ideas themselves are not new the context has changed so the old ideas can have a new stimulating effect.

  Although the ideas in a brainstorming session are related to the problem under discussion they can still act as random stimuli for they can be far removed from the idea pattern of the person listening to them. The value of random stimulation is discussed in a later section

  Suspended judgement

  The value of suspended judgement has been discussed in a previous section. The brainstorming session provides a formal opportunity for people to make suggestions that they would not otherwise dare make for fear of being laughed at. In a brainstorming session anything goes. No idea is too ridiculous to be put forward. It is important that no attempt at evaluation of ideas is made during the brainstorming session.

  Attempts at evaluation might include such remarks as:

  ‘That would never work because…’

  ‘But what would you do about…’

  ‘It is well-known that…’

  ‘That has already been tried and found to be no good.’

  ‘How would you get that to…’

  ‘You are leaving a vital point out of consideration.’

  ‘That is a silly, impractical idea.’

  ‘That would be much too expensive.’

  ‘No one would accept that.’

  These are very natural remarks but if they are allowed then the brainstorming session is useless. Not only is one forbidden to evaluate the ideas of others but also one’s own ideas. It is the job of the chairman of the session to stop any attempts at evaluation. He must make this quite clear at the start of the session.

  Thereafter he need only say: ‘That is evaluation,’ in order to put a stop to it.

  The other type of evaluation which must be guarded against is the evaluation of the novelty of an idea. The object of a brain-storming session is to produce effective ideas. Usually this means new ideas otherwise one would not be holding the session. But the purpose of the session is not actually to find new ideas. During the session a long forgotten idea may be resurrected and found to be very effective.

  The evaluation of novelty might include such remarks as:

  ‘That is not new.’

  ‘I remember reading about that some time ago.’

  ‘That has already been tried in America.’

  ‘That was the way it was done years ago.’

  ‘I thought of that myself but threw it out.’

  ‘What is so original about that idea?’

  To counter such tendencies the ch
airman has to say, “Never mind how new it is, lef’s have the idea and worry about its novelty later.’

  Formality of the setting

  Lateral thinking is an attitude of mind, a type of thinking. It is not a special technique, much less a formal setting. Yet the value of a brainstorming session lies in the formality of the setting. The more formal the setting the better. The more formal the setting the more chance there is of informality in ideas within it. Most people are so steeped in vertical thinking habits that they feel very inhibited about lateral thinking. They do not like being wrong or ridiculous even though they might accept the generative value of this. The more special the brainstorming session is the more chance there is of the participants leaving their inhibitions outside. It is much easier to accept that ‘anything goes’ as a way of thinking in a brainstorming session than as a way of thinking in general.

  Within this formal setting one can use all the other techniques that have been described so far for restructuring patterns and also those techniques which are yet to be described. One can try dividing things up into fractions and putting these together in new ways. One can try reversal. One does not have to apologize for it or even explain it to the others. The formality of the session gives one the licence to do what one likes with one’s own thoughts without reference to the criticism of others.

  Format for brainstorming session

  Size

  There is no ideal size. Twelve people is a convenient number but a brainstorming session can work very well with as many as fifteen or as few as six. Less than six usually becomes an argument and with more than fifteen each person does not get enough opportunity to contribute. If there is a larger group then it can be broken down into smaller groups and notes can be compared at the end.

  Chairman

  It is the chairman’s job to guide the session without in any way controlling or directing it. He has the following duties:

  1. The chairman stops people trying to evaluate or criticize the ideas of others.

  2. The chairman sees that people do not all speak at once. (The chairman must also pick out someone who has been trying to say something but is always outspoken by a more pushy character.) The chairman does not have to ask individuals to speak. They speak when they want to. Nor does he go round the circle asking each in turn for ideas. If however there is a prolonged silence the chairman may ask an individual for his thoughts on the matter.

  3. The chairman sees that the notetaker has got an idea down. The chairman may find it necessary to repeat an idea or even to summarize an idea offered by a participant (this summary must be approved by the person whose idea it was.) The chairman may be asked to decide whether an idea is already on the list and so does not need listing again. If there is any doubt or the originator of the idea claims it to be different then it must be listed.

  4. The chairman fills in gaps by offering suggestions himself. He may also call on the notetaker to read through the list of ideas already recorded.

  5. The chairman can suggest different ways of tackling the problem and the use of different lateral thinking techniques for trying to generate different ways of looking at the problem (e.g. the chairman may say, ‘Let’s try turning this thing upside down.’) Anyone else may of course make the same suggestions.

  6. The chairman defines the central problem and keeps pulling people back to it. This is a difficult task since apparently irrelevant flights of fancy may be very generative and one certainly does not want to restrict people to the obvious view of the problem. As a guiding rule it may be said that any single flight of fancy is allowed but sustained divergence so that one comes to be considering a totally different problem is not allowed.

  7. The chairman ends the session either at the end of a set time or if the session seems to be flagging — whichever is earlier. The chairman must not run the risk of boring people by extending the session indefinitely if it seems to be going well.

  8. The chairman organizes the evaluation session and the listing of ideas.

  Notetaker

  The function of the notetaker is to convert into a permanent list the many butterfly ideas that are put forward during the session. The task is a difficult one since the nebulous ideas offered must be reduced to manageable note form. Moreover the notes must not only make sense immediately after the session but some time later when the context is no longer so clear. The notetaker has to write fast for sometimes the ideas follow one another very rapidly. I The notetaker can ask the chairman to hold things until he can catch up. The notetaker may also ask whether a particular summary of the idea is acceptable (e.g. shall we put this down as, ‘More flexible traffic light system’?).

  The notetaker must also assess whether an idea is new enough to be added to the list or whether it is already covered by a similar idea. If in doubt he should ask the chairman. It is better to put down duplicate ideas than leave out different ones, for the duplicate ones can be removed later but the omitted ones are lost forever.

  The notes must be in a form that is immediately readable, for the chairman may ask for the list to be read out at any stage. It is not a matter of carefully transcribing shorthand some time after the end of the session.

  It is useful to tape record a session as the playback may set off new ideas by repeating early ideas in a new context. Nevertheless even when the session is so recorded it is still essential to have a notetaker. At some time a summary list has to be made even of a tape and there is also the need to read out the list during the session.

  Time

  Thirty minutes is quite long enough for a session. Twenty minutes would be enough in many cases and forty-five minutes is an outside limit. It is better to stop while people are still full of ideas than to carry on until every last idea has been forced out The temptation to carry on if the session is going well must be resisted.

  Warm up

  If the members of the group are not familiar with the technique (and perhaps even if they are) a ten minute warm up session is useful. This would deal with some very simple problem (bathtap design, bus tickets, telephone bells). The idea of this warm up session is to show the type of ideas that may be offered and to show that evaluation is excluded.

  Follow up

  After the main session is over the participants will continue to have ideas on the subject These can be collected by asking each participant to send in a list of further ideas. If copying facilities are available then the list of ideas generated during the session can be sent to each participant with instructions to add any further ideas of his own on the bottom.

  Evaluation

  As indicated above there is no attempt at evaluation during the brainstorming session itself. Any tendency to evaluate would kill spontaneity and convert the session into one of critical analysis. Evaluation is carried out later by the same group or even by another group. It is important that some sort of evaluation is carried out even if the problem is not a real one. It is the evaluation session that makes a worthwhile activity of what would otherwise be a frivolous exercise. In the evaluation session the list of ideas is sifted to extract the useful ore. The main points in the evaluation are as follows:

  1. To pick out ideas which are directly useful.

  2. To extract from ideas that are wrong or ridiculous the functional kernel of the idea which may be generalized in a useful way (e.g. in a brainstorming session considering the problem of rail transport one idea put forward was that trains should have tracks on their roofs so that when two trains met one could pass above the other. The functional idea here is fuller utilization of the same track or better use of carriage roofs.) The idea of using a magnet to pull apples from the trees would be considered as finding a means to bring apples en masse to the ground instead of picking them individually or as pretreatment of the apples in order to make them easy to pick.

  3. To list functional ideas, new aspects of the problem, ways of considering the problem, additional factors to be taken into consideration. None of these are actual soluti
ons to the problem but merely approaches.

  4. To pick out those ideas which can be tried out with relative ease even though they may seem wrong at first sight.

  5. To pick out those ideas which suggest that more information could be collected in certain areas.

  6. To pick out those ideas which have in fact already been tried out.

  At the end of the evaluation session there should be three lists:

  Ideas of immediate usefulness.

  Areas for further exploration.

  New approaches to the problem.

  The evaluation session is not just a mechanical sorting, for some creative effort is required to extract usefulness from ideas before they are discarded or to spot an idea which looks as if it ought to be discarded but can in fact be developed into something significant.

  Formulation of the problem

  While any problem can be the subject of a brainstorming session the way the problem is formulated can make a huge difference to the success with which it is tackled.

  Too wide a statement of the problem may bring about a variety of ideas but they are so separated that they cannot interact to bring about that chain reaction of stimulation that is the basis of brainstorming. The statement of a problem as, ‘Better traffic control’, would be too wide.

  Too narrow a statement of the problem restricts ideas so much that the session may end up generating ideas not about the problem itself but about some particular way of handling it. The statement of a problem as, ‘To improve traffic lights’, would not lead to ideas about traffic control by means other than traffic lights. It might not even lead to ideas on better traffic control by traffic lights for attention might focus on ease of manufacture, ease of maintenance and reliability of traffic lights quite apart from their functional importance.