Posted by Jutta Goldammer from Visionautik Akademie

Make sure there is a clear purpose and intention for your ideation process. What do you want to gain ideas for? What outcome are you looking for? Is this clear to everybody in your group? Take some time to clarify purpose and aims.

You will do this exercise in trios. There are perspective spaces all over the place (show what perspectives there are and where they can find them). You can choose any perspective space you feel attracted to as a group. Each group can visit several perspective spaces. There is no need to visit all the spaces. Stay as long as you feel inspired by a perspective space.
Each of the 3 has a different role. Change roles for each perspective space so everyone has the chance to be in each role at least once.

Give an example by showcasing one perspective. Let's say the perspective space "Buddha".
Person 1 steps into the circle. Step over the border with the clear intent to step into Buddha's shoes now. Connect with what it feels like to be Buddha. What would he suggest to solve this problem? What would Buddha's ideas be? Person 1 can close their eyes and fully concentrate on generating ideas from that perspective. It is just a collection, a brainstorming, no need to make sense at this moment, no need to judge or to assess the ideas. Just say whatever comes up in your mind as you imagine what Buddha would suggest. Encourage each other to act out -- whatever helps to take on the specific role: use gestures, shout, talk with a low voice, sit down or stand. It is fine to exaggerate the role.

Person 2 records what she/he hears on Postits. Record only the main points, no need to transcript everything. Record also ideas, fragments, utterances you find funny or even stupid at the moment. Listen with an open heart, try to get the gist. Write down one thought/idea per post-it.
Person 3 listens to what person 1 says and uses that to trigger own ideas. Write down your ideas that pop up to your mind while you listen to person 1.

When you have had enough, Person 1 deliberately step out of the circle and the role (step over the border and shake it off to become yourself again). Person 2 can also take a few notes of ideas that might have popped up while he/she whas recording. Person 2 and 3 take your post its with you. Have a moment of break, moving, breathing, relaxing and then move to another perspective space.

Divide the groups into trios. If the number of your group cannot be divided by three, make one or two groups of four. The fourth person will have the same role as person 3.

(45-60 minutes)
Each group moves to one of the perspective spaces. If a perspective space a trio would like to visit is being used by another trio, the joker space can be used to avoid waiting.
Give at least 30 minutes time for this phase, so each trio has the chance to at least visit 3 different spaces. We found 45 minutes to an hour an ideal time to immerse into this ideation process from different perspectives. Each group can go at their own pace.

Gather the group and explain the next step:

Two trios combine to a group of 6 around a workspace (pinboard wall, big space on the wall with pinboard paper, black- or whiteboard.
They alternating sticking the post-its on the wall and read out what the idea was about. There should not be long explanations about each idea, but the others should understand what it was about. It is not necessary anymore to know which idea was generated in which perspective space.
Clustering similar ideas can help to find an overview of what there is.

Find out which ideas could be really useful for your purpose. Tell each other what ideas attract you and why. How can those ideas be taken further? How could you refine those ideas and make them colorful and alive? Allow them to stay with an idea that caught their attention and look into how they can develop it. After having brought alive several ideas, select in your group which idea you would like to continue refining and prototyping. Offer the groups marking dots, they might be helpful to select the most promising ideas in their group.

Inexperienced groups might need a facilitator for that step. If you don't have facilitators for each subgroup of 6, you can alternately assist your group with your facilitation skills and encourage them to ask you for help if needed.