Why can't a room filled with specialist marketers from different disciplines ever produce a great integrated idea? Underscore Marketing's president relates some wisdom.

If you work at an agency that is one of several servicing a client's business, you know how those big, integrated brainstorming meetings work. Usually, they're run by an overenthusiastic account planner with a bad case of "permagrin." The gist of the meeting? Come up with an idea that can be executed across multiple media touchpoints.

You also know how they tend to unfold. While Mr. Permagrin is scribbling notes on an easel in purple magic marker, people from various agencies try to talk over one another until there's a long, awkward silence. During that silence, you're probably thinking one of three things:

A) These people are all morons. I'm surprised no one has to remind them to breathe.
B) These people are all morons. There's no way this idea will play out in [insert media vehicle here].
C) These people are all morons. How can I keep them from ruining this perfectly good idea?

I can't help you with A or B. 

C, however, is a conundrum as old as the concept of the brainstorming meeting itself. And despite all we've learned about ideas and how they come about, it appears many of us are confused about how to come up with an integrated idea that actually has legs.

Here are some axioms I wish every integrated brainstorming meeting would adhere to:

1) Yes, Virginia, a great idea can come from anywhere. But that doesn't mean it has to come from everywhere. There's nothing wrong with a direct mail person coming up with a great multi-platform campaign idea. Nor is there anything wrong with a creative director coming up with a cool media idea. Great ideas can indeed come from anywhere. But that doesn't mean that every person in the room gets to tweak the idea.

Ideas are fragile. If too many people mess with them, they either become crippled by compromise or they fall apart entirely. If there are 20 people in the room representing a dozen disciplines, each with his or her own political and personal agenda, no idea can survive the process of everyone putting a personal stamp on it. If you try, you will likely try to make the idea do too many things and it will fail.

2) There are stupid ideas in brainstormings, no matter what the moderator tells you. Brainstorming meetings have engendered such a culture of free expression that we're often afraid to speak out when someone clearly has wandered off course. While it's true that successful brainstorming meetings ensure people aren't intimidated into holding ideas back, we need to come to terms with the notion that there are worse things in marketing than an unexpressed idea.

For instance, integrated meetings usually involve a large number of people, usually with high billable rates (since you want the good thinkers in any strategic idea-generating session) and tough-to-coordinate schedules. You need to make the most of the time you have together. In other words, if I have to choose the lesser of two evils, I'd rather suggest that the group move on to another idea rather than listen to 20 minutes of blather about an idea that most people in the room agree is off-strategy.

3) Every problem doesn't need to be solved in the meeting. Remember, you're participating in a brainstorming in order to identify a good integrated marketing idea for your client. You're not there to work out every tactical detail that falls under every strategic idea. In fact, those issues are best resolved later, when all parties have digested what's been discussed at the meeting. 

Too often, I see moderators try to take ideas and put them into "buckets" according to what media vehicles they might make use of, or according to which strategic objective they most directly address. That doesn't make the best use of everybody's time, and it kills ideas. Instead, summarize the idea and let the direct mail folks come back after the meeting and tell you if they think it will fly in their discipline. Let the client provide some feedback after the meeting about which idea best addresses the business. Don't try to get it done in the meeting. You'll waste time and resources.

For many agency people, simply hearing the term "integrated brainstorming meeting" elicits a groan. I think that if we learn to challenge some of the new-age conventional wisdom about how these things should run, we might be more productive, and brainstormings can become enjoyable again for all of us.

Tom Hespos is the president of Underscore Marketing and blogs at Hespos.com. Read full bio.