Thinking in Structure – Sweathead Masterclass

I recently attended a workshop by Sweathead’s Mark Pollard and it was eye-opening.

True to form, I grabbed a front-row seat. Funny how people shy away from sitting front in of a workshop but will pay a premium for front-row concert tickets. Why not be as close as possible to the action?

It turned out to be the right move. The session was a refreshing dive into structured thinking. What I loved most was how streamlined it was—no endless slides, just clarity and substance.

Pollard introduced “The Four Points” as a way to structure briefs, with exercises designed to make your work concise and clever—without falling into the trap of using superlatives or overly polished copy. But before we dove into that, he emphasized the importance of lateral thinking—how combining two unexpected facts through linear thought can spark new ideas.

One reminder really stuck with me: the definition of an idea. We often say, “I have an idea!” when really, we’re just sharing a thought. An idea, as Pollard put it, is actually a novel and useful combination of things that don’t usually go together. It’s more deliberate than we tend to think.

If you ever have the chance, I highly recommend attending one of his workshops.

I walked away with this important note to self: put more structure into my ideation process. What a day it’s been to take it all in!

The writer is curious what lives in the bottom of the sea. Or shall it better left unanswered? 
She is also a Curious Colibri.