[laserbeam]

It's actually unclear what type of puzzles we are talking about. One paragraph later mentions a jury judging puzzle solutions and creativity. We could be talking about open ended puzzles. Think "the marshmallow callenge", LEGO building challenges, or Zachtronics style puzzle games (programming puzzles where you can optimize as much as you want, and the game scores you on multiple competing metrics such as code size and cpu cycles used). It's totally possible to measure creative thinking using open ended puzzles where there's more than one solution, or where trade-offs matter. That mention of a jury judging solutions suggests open ended puzzles are employed here.

[blowski]

Those with enough experience can anecdotally measure the success of brainstorming on projects where they've used it. I'd contribute the un-revolutionary idea that brainstorming works well for some teams trying to solve some problems. The trick is knowing when to use it, not to use it all the time, or rule it out entirely.