Timescales and ideaspace: An examination of idea generation in design practice

Abstract

The generation of novel ideas is an important and difficult part of the creative design process. Much of the research on idea generation is focused on formalizing techniques to support idea generation and characterizing the effectiveness of these techniques as measured by quantity, quality, and creativity of ideas. Less is known about idea generation ‘in the wild,’ particularly idea generation across different timescales (i.e., idea generation across a multi-month project alongside idea generation in a period as small as several minutes). We present a qualitative case study of a professional design team's use of idea generation with analyses at five emergent timescales. At each level we look at the structure, the content, and the actions of the team.