3 Things On Leading A Creative Story-Based Meeting
As you already know, I was a pastor in my time before opening my own business. I also spent some time doing everything creative. Towards the end of my career working in the church world, I led many meetings that required a lot of creative brainpower, but none were as fun as a scripting meeting we had every week. Don’t get me wrong, writing the script every week wasn’t the fun part. But it was with the creative people around me. We would spend our time talking about life, how we were doing, and eventually, we got to work brainstorming.
Brainstorming done right can be a powerful tool, but done wrong…well…that can be a detriment to crafting the best story. Good brainstorms help get creative juices flowing. It encourages thinking outside the box. Bad brainstorms hinder creativity and become a nuisance and just another unproductive meeting.
Here are three things to remember when brainstorming.
It’s not about anybody’s one idea.
There are no bad ideas.
Don’t use the word “no”
First off, Brainstorms aren’t about one person’s idea. If there is someone on the team who always seems to be pushing their ideas over others, it can be detrimental to reaching the potential of creativity. Sometimes, people feel like their ideas are the best and all others are not as good. That person, no matter how good their ideas may be at the time, will eventually cause the brainstorm to turn into brain ruin. If that person isn’t a team player and only looking out for their own interests and not willing to look at the team as a whole, they might not fit the culture of your brainstorm and you may need to ask them to leave.
Second, there are no bad ideas. I don’t know how many times I suggested bad ideas in a brainstorm that I knew weren’t great ones. But here is why that isn’t bad. Sometimes those bad, silly, crazy ideas lead others to think about something in a different way. Oftentimes when I would suggest what I considered to be a bad idea, it eventually led to a creative direction based on some silly thing that was said. It may not have been my suggestion, but being a part of the team helped us get there.
Lastly, don’t use the word “no”. There is nothing that shuts down the conversation like “no” in a brainstorming session. It goes over like a fart in church. It keeps any further ideas that people were thinking about from coming out because they don’t want to get shot down. I am not saying you should use the word “yes” to everything...although you should try that….that could be a fun brainstorm. What I am saying is don’t use the word no. Instead of no, say, “can we explore that more?” Or, “Interesting, what would that look like?” Or, “Let’s run down that road a bit further.” These allow the person to feel heard and others to jump in on the idea as well.
Remembering these 3 things in leading a brainstorming session will help you and your team be more creative. And with story-based marketing, creativity is what inspires the stories. It also helps you create a culture of trust and trust is the foundation of a high functioning team.
