pick someone's brain

To ask one questions in order to obtain detailed information or advice. You should pick John's brain sometime. He knows all about car engines. I've just started playing professionally, and I'd love to pick your brains for any tips you might have.

Obtain ideas or information from another person, as in I'm out of ideas for decorating-let me pick your brain. This term alludes to picking clean a carcass. [Mid-1800s]

To gather information or ideas from someone who is presumably more expert or more imaginative. This analogy to picking clean a bone or carcass dates from the mid-nineteenth century. “Do you possess the art of picking other people’s brains,” wrote clergyman Benjamin Jowett (1817–93). For picking one’s own brain, see cudgel one’s brains.