After the storm . . .

After the brainstorm come clear skies . . . at least one can hope, right?

After you have generated ideas about your purpose and ideas to explain that purpose, your paper should look like a bloody mess. This unorganized randomness may bother you; however, this part is like cleaning out your garage. Once everything is down on paper, you can decide what to keep, what to discard, and what ideas group together.

Do not ever throw these ideas out since you may need them later for a different project or later on in this project. Since you don't want regrets or wasted time, keep all brainstorming sessions with your notes on projects--at least until the project is completed. Then you can keep the final product and toss the notes that lead to its completion.

At this stage, you can either get a clean sheet of paper to group ideas or use a different colored pen to circle what you want to keep and draw lines between connected ideas. This is similar to mind mapping where you have a main circle in the center (hub) of the page and spokes out from the hub are related ideas. . . . like this: o--O--o.

For example, if you are planning an event, you may have the name/type of the event in the center. Then you would have sent out one line to a circle for budget, another for invitations/guests, another for decorations/theme, another for presentation/speakers, another for food, and another for staff. You may need more later or related to each of the topic points listed. However, this format will allow you the opportunity to see what you need to do and review. You can work up a checklist for each of these sections and a person delegated to head each part.

Once you have the items and ideas organized, you can see what you're missing, if you're missing anything. This step will give you a chance to step back and review what you need to do without your head being muddled with ideas and no clear direction. Once you have the ideas organized, you can then work up a rough outline that will keep you focused as you put together your document.