Brainstorm techniques for product solution ideation

If you need to brainstorm potential solutions to a product design problem, these techniques might help.

Solution Finds You

Steps:

Start with a well-scoped design problem. Eg, “How might we make it easy for groups of people to find a meaningful gift for a friend?”
Reverse the direction of fit. Eg, “What if the solution finds YOU?”
Brainstorm solutions in which this is the case. Eg, “A group of friends sit in a video call and products come and pitch themselves, Shark Tank-style.”

Invert It

This one is similar to Solution Finds You, but this time what we’re reversing is the characteristic we’re designing for, not the direction of fit. Idea from a post by James Clear. Steps:

Start with design prompt. Eg, “HMW help busy professionals get through the grocery checkout line as fast as possible?”
Identify the primary characteristic that your design is solving for. Eg, “fast”.
Invert the primary characteristic. Eg, “Fast” becomes “slow”, and the prompt becomes “HMW help busy professionals get through the grocery checkout line as slowly as possible?”
Generate ideas that would accomplish the inverted goal. Eg, “Let’s accept as many forms of payment as possible, like bitcoin and Russian rubles.”
Brainstorm: what might it look like to do the opposite of the previous step’s inverted solution? Eg, “Let’s minimize the number of jobs that a clerk is doing by separating grocery scanning and payment into separate stations.”

Extremes and Mainstreams

This one comes from the IDEO Field Guide to Human Centered Design. Steps:

Start with design prompt. Eg, “HMW help busy professionals get through the grocery checkout line as fast as possible?”
Identify your main design goal. Eg, “fast” through the checkout process.
Imagine a user who is extreme on this dimension. Eg, a customer who will tolerate absolutely zero time in a checkout line.
Brainstorm solutions for that person. Eg, scan items as they go in the cart so that you can walk straight out.

Analogous Inspiration

From the IDEO Field Guide to Human Centered Design. Steps:

Start with design prompt. Eg, “How might we make it easy for groups of people to find a meaningful gift for a friend?”
Identify a behavior or emotion present in your prompt. Eg, “find meaningful gift.”
Brainstorm other situations where you might observe this. Eg, spouse finding a gift.
For one of those analogous situations, think about how the problem might be solved. Eg, husband is with wife all year. 10 months before her birthday he hears her talking about something meaningful to her. He buys it and puts it in the closet, then gives it to her on her birthday.
Brainstorm applications of the analogous solution back to your circumstances. Analog: friend group maintains a secret list of stuff person likes, then buys one when it’s birthday time.

Mashups