Want to get a group to generate ideas quickly and improve collaboration?  Gamestorming might be right for you!  I attended the gamestorming presentation by Jeff Stafford at the Quality Fair at UMN. 

• Groundrules might be good place to start:judge later, avoid discussion, capture ideas, be specific, build, participate, set time limit and number your ideas. 

• We played with Red and Green card a fun way for assessment of a large group whether it is a yes/no question or ready to move on, etc.

• Have you ever made it out of Target without spending $100?  Rarely.  Well, here we had to prioritize a list of items and collective only had $100 to spend. 

• As the Libraries and units create a vision for the future during budget cuts I think these three questions were key:

1. What are things we need to START doing?
2. What are things we currently doing that we can or should STOP?
3. What are we doing now that works and we should CONTINUE doings?

Another great resources besides the book Gamestorming (I just ordered the Libraries a copy) is creatingminds.org 

This ties into the book I just skimmed, Ideaship: How to get ideas flowing in your workplace.  Two parts that I agreed with in the book are:

1. Get rid of the word "i": I is very divisive and does not build a collaborative environment.
2. Ask for many solutions/ don't reject ideas/ask for more ideas: often there is no one right answer, and if we stop at the first suggestion we might miss another opportunity.

"Good ideas are common - what's uncommon are people who'll work hard enough to bring them about" - Ashleigh Brilliant