Ideation is the phase in the innovation process dedicated entirely to generating as many diverse ideas as possible. Quantity deliberately takes precedence over quality. The principle: first open the space, then evaluate. Those who filter too early get stuck with obvious solutions and miss the unexpected approaches that often make the greatest difference.
In practice, Ideation works with clear rules: no criticism during the generation phase, build on others’ ideas rather than shooting them down, and explicitly welcome wild suggestions. A team can produce 100 ideas in 30 minutes if the conditions are right. Selection follows afterward — for instance through dot-voting, where each team member distributes votes across the most promising ideas. The best candidates are then developed further as prototypes.
Ideation traces back to the brainstorming concept by Alex Osborn (1953) and was established as a distinct phase in Design Thinking. The key to success is a clearly defined problem statement as a starting point: without a good brief, even the best ideation session produces only random ideas.
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