Divergent Vs Convergent Thinking

In "Think Like a Rocket Scientist", Ozan Varol talks about two types of thinking that are crucial for idea generation - divergent thinking and convergent thinking.

While many people may not be familiar with the terms per-se - most people are familiar with the concepts they represent. Divergent thinking is most similar to what people know of as brainstorming - it is thinking of ideas in free-flow, without restrictions, no matter how potentially ridiculous or impractical. Convergent thinking, by contrast, is usually thought of as closer to critical, or scientific/engineering thinking - what is possible and what is practical given real world constraints.

While most people are familiar with these two types of thinking, Varol makes the point that most of the time, people don't leverage them correctly - or at least in a way that produces the optimal outcome.

Let's take an example. A bunch of people on a team gather in a conference room to discuss how to solve a particular problem. People start spouting out ideas, but almost as fast as Person A mentions an idea, Person B comes along with a 'yeah, but..' that nixes the idea. How likely is it that Person A is going to continue volunteering ideas? Not very likely - they got shot down, and it's a natural human response to start closing up after being shot down. The result is what most everyone has experienced - an initial flurry of ideas, followed shortly thereafter by everyone starting to converge on a single idea, many times put forth by either a person of authority, or by whoever in the room has the loudest voice. It may seem something productive has happened, since an idea and a plan of execution was the result of the meeting, but a few critical things occurred:

1. Because so many ideas were shot down, the team members don't feel their input was valued.
2. The idea that gained traction was likely an idea that stayed within the well-worn confines of how things have always been done, which likely has its own challenges.
3. The opportunity to come up with a really game-changing solution to the problem was ruined before it had a chance to be explored.

What really happened here was that the initial divergent thinking process was stunted. It is true that with divergent thinking, many of the ideas will be tossed out quickly - but the truth is also that a great idea is a close cousin, or a simple tweak of, a not-so-great idea. I think everyone has experienced, at least to some degree, a state of flow where ideas and thoughts and connections flow freely and things become elegant and simple. Yet, getting into that frame of mind is not necessarily quick and easy - we have to be kind to our (and others') creative selves, not be too critical right out of the gate, and prevent the rational and critical part of our brain from overtaking the creative side during this time. How many times have you had a list of ideas, thought you had identified the winning horse right away - but after a refining process, it turned out that another idea was the unexpected winner? The goal of divergent thinking is to expand on the field of potential ideas, not trim it down from the start.

Which leads to... convergent thinking. Convergent thinking is a critical component, but it is important that it be engaged in at the right time - which is, ideally, when divergent thinking has come to it's natural end. At that time, it's not just that all the single ideas are still on the table - it's that all the ideas and combinations of ideas are still available. The single idea by itself may be ridiculous, but when combined in a unique way with another idea - a very elegant and simple solution may present itself. This is why it is so important that divergent thinking be allowed for as long as possible, and not be considered a waste of time. Once you've entered the convergent thinking phase, you figure out which ideas and combinations are not worth pursuing, and which ones still move the needle in terms of achieving the end goal.

By allowing a full divergent thinking process the opportunity to thrive, followed by the convergent thinking process to gradually determine which ideas are worth pursuing, you increase the chance that a simple, elegant and truly impactful solution will present itself, as opposed to being limited by the 'same old' style solutions used in the past.