How do you brainstorm with your semi/distributed team?

Question

It's difficult to gather around a whiteboard when we can't all... gather around. How do you deal with this?

Elżbieta Jakubowska · Accepted Answer

For me, it usually involves video conferencing and digital whiteboards simultaneously.

Steven Birchall · Answer

@martin_demkowicz from experience, I feel like you the brainstorming sessions need to be a lot more pre-planned and structured versus in person you can be a bit more ad-lib.

The frustration with that is more than it can stifle some of the creativity you want out of the brainstorming session.  You can also get scenarios where some participants are less engaged, or feel they can't speak up as easily in remote than in person.

That said overall, they are relatively small issues in the scheme of things, and would rather keep these sessions with those limitations / frustration versus not have them.

Steven Birchall · Answer

Video Conferencing and then either Mural or Figjam is our usual approach if we can't get everyone into the one space.

Elżbieta Jakubowska · Answer

@martin_demkowicz almost never. I don't find them convinient to use.

Marcin Demkowicz · Answer

@stevenbirchall Sorry for the (travel-induced) delay... finally read your response properly and, now that I have, I can't help but sharing a plug: what if you could have those remote brainstorming sessions without the aforementioned limitations/frustrations? :)

Marcin Demkowicz · Answer

@stevenbirchall Thanks for sharing, Steven. Any frustrations with this (remote) setup? Anything you wish you could do better/easier?

Marcin Demkowicz · Answer

@aaronoleary Do you ever use (real) whiteboards? Why or why not?

Aaron O'Leary · Answer

Kind of a combination we do zooms and ad-hoc and it depends on the level needed really, it works well!

Marcin Demkowicz · Answer

@el_ja Do you ever use the whiteboards built-in to the video conferencing solutions? Why or why not?

How do you brainstorm with your semi/distributed team?

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