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I love a good bad idea…don’t you?

The truth is…in a healthy organization…there really are no bad ideas…at least not in the organizational sense.

Here’s what I mean…

If you have someone on your team who is coming up with ideas…who is trying to do their best for the organization…who understands and buys into your vision…then every idea he or she has holds the potential to be a good idea.

Even the so-called bad idea usually triggers another better idea, which often leads to the best idea…

It launches discussion…it generates momentum…it spurs dialogue…

Sometimes the best ideas start because someone offered what others at first thought was a bad idea.

Effective brainstorming often involves a lot of bad ideas that help shape the best ideas.

Part of healthy team building is creating a culture where all ideas can come to the table, no idea is dismissed, and there is a freedom to critique, scrap and improve ideas.

If you start labeling bad ideas you shut down team member’s willingness to share more ideas…

Great leaders learn to welcome all ideas…bad ones and good ones…knowing that it encourages idea generation…and that ideas are a lifeline of a growing, healthy organization…

Perhaps the bad idea you’ve been tempted to dismiss is an open door to your next masterpiece idea.

What do you think? Does your organization welcome bad ideas?  Have you seen one bad idea stir a discussion that led to a good idea?

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Ron Edmondson

Author Ron Edmondson

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Join the discussion 18 Comments

  • JenM says:

    I’m reading this post a few years late. But I just recently had this happen. I was organizing an event. I bounced an idea off someone. Even as the words

    left my mouth, I knew it was a BAD IDEA and I told her so.

    A few weeks later she came back with a more feasible, cost effective

    • JenM says:

      Sorry my phone is giving me problems! She took my original idea in a slightly different direction and made it better. We processed it some more and came up with something not just good, not great, but exactly right. All because someone took a second look at my really bad idea.

    • ronedmondson says:

      Love it. 

  • Great post. All ideas are worth hearing. Most may not be usable, but allowing creativity to shine through is worth the effort.

  • jack42 says:

    many years ago, the single adults were meeting with the pastor about ways to interact with our visitors. We all had interesting ideas. One person, challenged and never really with it, suggested taking them to dinner. We rolled our eyes at this because we were smarter and knew better; she never said anything that made sense.

    I don't remember what any of the other ideas we came up with that day in 1992 were, but that dinner idea has been put into practice in some form or fashion ever since.

  • Eric says:

    You're absolutely right Ron. Shutting down ideas burns people from sharing, and I think it also prevents others from catching the creative spirit. Naturally, I'm an introverted do-er, not necessarily a creative-er. (yes, I did.), and cultures like this help those like me grow into a more creative asset to the organization.

  • Scott says:

    So often we are quick to label something a "bad idea" based on preconceived assumptions or limitations. We should take an "anything goes" approach to generating ideas – and refine those ideas or mine them for the best one. Great post.

  • Jeff says:

    Nice post, Ron. It sparked two additional thoughts/memories:

    1) I've heard it recommended that smart organizations actually appoint someone to be on the lookout for "Bad news" and "challenges to assumptions" in order to act as a counter to our natural tendency to discount anomalies and discomforting info. This goes along with your posts advocacy of "bad ideas" as a creative challenge to the organization

    2) I've also heard of people doing "Pre-mortems" on good ideas. Prior to commencing work on a good idea, everyone imagines that it's 6 months or a year into the future and the good idea ended up being a catastrophe – their job is to take that imaginary future and explain what went wrong. This gets at ways to safeguard the implementation of good ideas (or reasons to select a different idea/approach) that can't be reached any other way. I would imagine that you could also do the flip side of that. You could take a "bad idea" and imagine that it's 6 months later and the bad idea actually become a huge success – what happened?

    – Jeff

  • Idea rules the world. Before you write off an idea re-examine it very well.

  • Good one Ron! I've seen a lot of spin offs from bad ideas. In fact, it is the times that we've also had a lot of bad ideas that we got some good or best ones! The challenge is in making sure that the "criticism" of the ideas is not one that shuts others down, but gives confidence for them to just throw in ideas no matter how "lame" they may seem… good one ron!