By Teresa Torres · producttalk.org · @ttorres on X · LinkedIn
Teresa Torres argues that good design comes from deliberately generating many ideas rather than waiting for a single flash of insight. She notes that the effortless-seeming "a-ha" moment rests on a lot of prior work, and that a strong design often takes ten or twenty iterations to emerge. Her practice is to identify the two or three make-or-break areas of a tricky problem, brainstorm around twenty-five options, sleep on it, and repeat. Even when the first idea wins, the exploration deepens understanding of the problem and improves the final result. For product managers, this is a reminder that volume of exploration, and tolerance for weak early ideas, is a discipline worth practicing.
01Key takeaways
- Expect the first ideas to be weak and generate many more before judging.
- Focus exploration on the few areas most likely to make or break the solution.
- Use sleep or time away to return with fresh perspective on the same problem.
- Treat exploring alternatives as valuable even if you end up with your first idea.
- Withhold quality judgments during ideation so you can reach better ideas that build on weaker ones.
02Key sections
- The grind as a metaphor
- Torres frames ideation as something you must push through, not something that simply arrives. Good ideas are rarely the first ones generated.
- Why the a-ha moment is misleading
- Sudden insights look effortless only because the preceding work is forgotten. Creative breakthroughs usually sit on top of sustained effort.
- Her iteration routine
- She targets the two or three areas that will make or break a design, generates many options for each, and returns to the problem after sleeping on it.
- Value beyond the final answer
- Even when the first design is kept, considering alternatives improves it and deepens understanding of the problem being solved.
- Suspending judgment
- Bad ideas are a necessary path to good ones, and good ideas often build on earlier weak attempts, so all ideas matter during this phase.
03From the post
“As I mentioned last week, I'm working with a design intern this summer. We were talking about the over all design process, when I argued, when you get to the ideation stage you have to grind it out. I like this metaphor. You can't just have one or”
Summary and takeaways written by PM Atlas; quotes are short excerpts. © the original author.