Some are into Britney Spears. I am a giant fan of sticky notes. In fact so much that it sometimes feel like an obsession. I cannot walk past the Post-It shelves in a bookstore without having an extra look, and I literally never go anywhere without a few blocks of them in my backpack.

Now, unfortunately sticky notes have gotten a bad reputation. To some people this whole Post-It creativity feels just a little to nineties, right? And if you have experienced a badly managed brainstorm session with hundreds of notes and no conclusions, its just easy to direct your frustrations at the colourful labels.

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But Post-It notes deserve more respect. It’s a highly effective tool for working with ideas and it shouldn’t be underestimated, – something I re-experienced this week when I participated in a 4-day-event facilitated by Adaptive Path – one of the most successful American UX companies. Designers from all over Europe met in Copenhagen, and soon we had plastered walls and windows at Marriott with drawings and sticky notes. It was amazing. I felt at home. And it proved to me that when used cleverly, sticky notes can help you generate real-solution-creativity.

If you want a quick guide on how to use sticky notes more effectively, take a look at Adaptive Paths presentation on how to become a Sticky Notes ninja including information about basic Post-It methods such as freestyling, clustering and information mapping.