Ready, Set, Go: 8 Ideas in 8 Minutes – Crazy 8s

How They Work Crazy 8s are a simple sketching exercise: Everyone folds a blank A4 sheet of paper three times in half, creating eight fields. Then the 8 "crazy" minutes begin: Everyone uses a thick black Sharpie to draw one idea in each of the eight fields. However, there is only one minute available for each sketch. I play nervous music and sporadically announce the remaining seconds for a sketch, which – quite intentionally – increases the stress for the team. Good Reasons for Crazy 8s The time pressure, the limited space, and the requirement to sketch instead of write force the team to think visually and concentrate on the essence of an idea. There is a subtle but important difference between "What explains my idea?" and "How do I explain my idea?". The focus on the essential, the "what,