| New product development relies on the generation of new ideas to support the problem-solving process. With the focus on idea generation research on the brainstorming method, with its issues of production blocking, topic fixation, and social inhibition, alternate methods are examined for improvement. This study investigated methods of ideation to determine which methods generated a higher return rate on the quantity and quality of ideas generated and gained further knowledge on the quantity-quality relationship. A stratified sample population from an automotive original equipment manufacturer were divided into four ideation treatment groups: (a) Nominal Group Technique, (b) Brainwriting, (c) Brainsketching, and (d) Random Stimulus to measure the quantity and quality of ideas generated in terms of solution completeness and feasibility. The results show that the nominal group technique, of individuals working alone, outperformed the other group methods in generating quantities of ideas and quantities of quality ideas and that brainsketching demonstrated the highest efficiency percentage of quality ideas within a given treatment. The findings show that both individual ideation techniques and group idea generation techniques result in the percentages of quality ideas at 21% +/- 5% with the brainsketching method generating the highest ratio of quality to total quantity of ideas at 26%. |
