Ideation leads to creation

The concept of ideation is often used in the design world to rapidly formulate raw ideas for new developments.

Ideation can be an effective way to come up with ideas for library developments required to meet new challenges. These could be around aspects of your physical or digital library space, services to teachers and students, or extending the library’s reach to the wider school community.

There are a number of different approaches to the ideation process. However, they share a common goal of addressing an issue or a question to be solved. Ideation is usually part of a more comprehensive design process and acts as a catalyst to bring collaborative brainstorming around an initial concept to a stage where it can be tested, tweaked, improved and implemented.

If this sounds like something you’d like to initiate as part of your 2015 developments you will want to explore Ideo’s Design Thinking for Educators toolkit. The Ideo approach is very much centred on the library user, meaning any new services and spaces being developed are done so with the user in mind at all stages.

This toolkit, which is available as a free download from the Ideo website, incorporates the ideation process within its 5 step model of design thinking. In addition to the full 121 page toolkit you can also download ‘Design thinking in a day’. This is a great introduction to the design thinking approach, and the ‘Designers workbook’, which provides you with practical activities to work through each part of the process.

A design thinking approach to developing new school library programmes and services will help consolidate your collaborative efforts by involving interested staff and students. How can you see this approach working for you in the year ahead?

Image: Ideation by Maxine Ramsay