Inspire creativity in your staff through team brainstorming. Ten simple steps will turn your brainstorming session into a team-building experience promoting shared leadership and creative thinking.

Are you tired of trying to come up with new program ideas? Inspire creativity in your staff through team brainstorming. Ten simple steps will turn your brainstorming session into a team-building experience promoting shared leadership and creative thinking. If you have a large group, divide them into smaller groups of five or six. Put people of different backgrounds and experiences on each team. Assign roles such as spokesperson and secretary, and give each person talking chips to establish equal participation and encourage time limits.

1. Write the mission of the session so everyone can see it.
2. Lay out the specific criteria the group must meet.
3. Discuss ideas and share possible solutions. Any idea—no matter how different—is acceptable!
4. Keep the energy level up with fun team-building breaks.
5. Establish a signal for when a team is stuck in one train of thought and needs to move on.
6. If a group’s ideas start to fizzle out, let one member visit another group so she can bring back fresh ideas.
7. Create a signal to indicate negative criticism. Encourage open-minded thinking.
8. Encourage creativity, and make sure everyone’s ideas are recorded.
9. Let teams present their ideas to the whole group. Encourage friendly competition by voting on the best ideas or by creating incentives.
10. At the end of the brainstorming session, discuss next steps to turn the ideas into actions. Prioritize the ideas, develop a time line and assign tasks.