Dynamic Thinking

Dynamic Thinking's Blog

• Customer Satisfaction

  2008 Aug 05

  I have made regular more regular postings to my other business blog http://www.dynamicthinker.blogspot.com but am also now posting many of them here. In the last few months CoCo Systems and Dynamic Thinking have comimbined to survey VisiMap users. The article is also a free publication posted under our storefront.
  
  Companies want to know what their customers really think of their products and how they use them. More often than not, they survey them with a series of set questions in multiple choice format. CoCo Systems and its distribution partner, Dynamic Thinking, decided to go a simpler and more direct route to learn more about customer satisfaction with VisiMap software.
  
  VisiMap falls into the classification of visual mapping software, also popularly known as mind mapping software. Mind mapping is the name given to the concept by popular writer and speaker, Tony Buzan. Buzan’s early books on mind mapping stressed its value as a memory tool – keeping ideas in the brain. A later book, co-written with his brother Barry, included insights on its use in getting ideas out of the brain and on to the page.
  
  My own introduction to the concept occurred about 15 years ago, even though mind mapping had been around since the seventies. At the time of certification as a trainer in mind mapping in 1994, I encountered a cumbersome DOS software version and immediately knew that there had to be something better – and there was. I discovered VisiMap, the first visual mapping software written for the Windows platform.
  
  Visual mapping software presents ideas in a tree structure radiating from a central core. Branches can be expanded indefinitely and can be enhanced by colours and images and linked to virtually anything in a file format. As software development has progressed, designers have added a multiplicity of functions without necessarily thinking about whether these are valued or even used. We were far more interested in benefits than features. So we asked our customers:
  
  How has using VisiMap changed or improved your work or your life?
  
  We weren’t really prepared for the flood of almost immediate responses. I was tempted to wonder, “Don’t these people have jobs?” But what was clear was huge enthusiasm and commitment. These were really nice people “Thanks for asking”, said Mike O’Sullivan of Adept, a UK based training and consultancy firm. as though we were doing him a personal favour.
  
  We also weren’t prepared for how long the responses kept coming in. Some people took the time to write quite detailed thoughtful answers. Some, like Alan Williams, the director of Cerulean Visions Limited, a UK based consulting firm, even sent us comments in map format. There were entertaining stories and a highly credible response rate.
  
  Users come from everywhere. South Africans mingle with Americans, New Zealanders, Danes, Australians and Canadians. Their job titles are eclectic. We were not surprised by a large number of consultants. We were more interested that users were also from fields like the military, human resources, litigation law, event management, the priesthood, university administration, film making, medicine, marine day charters and construction. One simply offered “mind-mapping junkie” as a job title. What united all of them was the need to create, refine and organize ideas and information.
  
  And use VisiMap they did – for many things I had already thought of, but many that hadn’t ever crossed my mind. These are some of the many uses that our customers describe.
  
  Getting ideas out of one’s head and on to the screen is still probably the most preferred use. Phrases like “dumping a jungle of issues and problems” “brainstorming”, “free flow of ideas” “personal problems and issues” suggested that users simply like to start with a central topic and let the ideas flow without judging them. “To be critical at the same time as I absorb new information creates bias before I can appreciate the value of new ideas”, observes South African consultant, Armand Kruger. The fact that one can simply start typing and get things down is liberating. “I can lay out ideas without worrying about layout or presentation’, one respondent said. “I can add new thoughts as fast as I can type”, said another.
  
  Users have realized consciously or unconsciously that they can take advantage of the way the brain actually works and processes information. In his important research of thinking preferences and its relation to creativity, Ned Herrmann estimated that at least 25% of the population prefers to look at the big picture right from the beginning. Visual mapping tools recognize that not all people prefer to think in linear mode, - and then supports them in allowing their initial approach to a subject to flow freely.
  
  

• Productivity Improvement

  2007 Jun 13

  My own productivity in writing this blog REALLY needs improvement. The truth is that I am still occupied with other projects to a degree that have precluded balance. They are well organized and I am accomplishing good things in other places. But I am trying to work on continuing on something that I have started. I share that concern with another blogger whose comments reminded me of it today.
  
  He is also familiar with the HBDI and his profile preferences are in the following order: DACB. That means that his preferences sound like this: Big picture thinking, Analysis, People orientation and Procedure/Process. My own are in a different order: DCBA.
  
  The HBDI debriefing materials have some excellent suggestions for working on less preferred quadrants. While it is advantageous to work from strength, it is also good to note one's less preferred preferences and become somewhat more comfortable with them.
  
  The writer has decided to improve his B Quadrant function by keeping a time log and writing what he is doing down every 15 minutes. He's on the right trackfor that one. I'll improve my quadrant A by balancing my accounts, - both personal and business.
  
  A good C activity would be to play with your kids, - or listen to music that you love. A good D activity would be to take 500 digital pictures in one session.
  
  Note that the common factor in all these is time. How we spend it really determines the quality - and the balance of our lives.
  

• Free VisiMap Templates

  2007 Apr 28

  Thanks to a good suggestion from customer George Ruggiero, I have now made many of the maps used as illustrations in my book, See What You Think, available in template format. This means you don't have to create them yourself and can personalize them to suit your own needs. You can find them here if you scroll down the middle of the page. There are 20 maps for a start, including several from the book and a few others. Evaluators of VisiMap (you can try it for 30 days at no cost or obligation by going here) might find it useful to look at complete maps.
  
  You are free to use them or publish them in any way you wish. Giving me credit is nice, but not in any way obligatory. And now there is an avenue, kindly provided by VisiMap to share your own maps. You can submit yours for download by sending them as an email attachment through this site or using the contact page of my website. It's a free way to make the world a little better and more productive - as well as being a creative publisher. So please add to our collection.And don't forget the power of conversion. I've had to do several presentations recently and the ability to do the quick export of an image (lots of conversion options in the drop down menu) or a Word or PowerPoint export gets you up and running in no time.
  

• Phantom Competitors

  2007 Apr 25

  I hear occasionally from Business Resource Software's Kylon Gustin, who sends articles to clients and colleagues and the latest one has some good points. He's summarizing Harvard's Michael Porter and I in turn am summarizing his article.
  
  Porter claims that one of the mistakes of small business is that they don't think about strategy. But there is always competition, so they should. He cites five kinds of competition and Gustin calls them "Phantom" because most people are not even aware that they exist. The first task is understanding your position
  
  The five types of competition are pictured on the map. Examining each in turn allows you to think constructively and develop strategies to meet the competitors. It is something we all should be doing from time to time.
  

• Back on Board

  2007 Apr 19

  I'm embarrassed at the gap in writing. Anyone would point a finger at the recent article which states that blogging is losing its charm when people discover that one is supposed to write on a disciplined basis. Mea culpa. It is simply that other tasks have assumed a higher priority. I have been involved in an interesting study of seven inner city churches, which is exploring the best way for them to chart their future. To help with that, I have been re-reading The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge and the Fieldbook which followed it. Even though these books are by no means new, they appear to stand the test of time well. Reading them also reminded me of the benefits offered in the work of Robert Fritz. His two books, The Path of Least Resistance and Creating are similarly relevant and helpful.
  
  I summarized some of Robert Fritz's precepts in my own book. The client, I reference above has a number of problems - too many aging buildings, a lack of volunteers in some cases, faltering financial resources in others. There are short term solutions to problems like these, but as Peter Senge reminds us in The Fifth Discipline, today's short term solutions often result in tomorrow's problems. What such organizations need is a vision and a passion to create something new that will bring new growth from the deep roots that unite them.
  
  And I have been pursuing drawing and painting with a new commitment and seriousness. The collection of art instruction books bought through the years in the hope that I would eventually find time to do something hasn't produced much in and of itself. Why should they? As the taxi driver responded to the passenger who asked him how to get to Carnegie Hall said, " Man, you gotta practice. What happens when I do this is instructive. I always have a vision of where I want to go. In the past year, I have produced a wealth of failures to achieve what I want. But suddenly, I can sometimes say, Yes, I've done it.
  
  This isn't about becoming a successful commercial painter. It's about creating something that was not there before I started. It is wrestling occasional results from many drawings that meet my vision of what I am attempting from many that did not succeed.
  
  Whatever we do, - from learning to play the piano to building a successful organization, the focus has to be on practice. Practice brings learning that all the courses in the world can support but cannot teach. It assumes that one will not get it right the first time. It assumes that talent matters little, but determination and patience matter a great deal.
  
  The morning paper again stresses how much employers are looking for innovative employees. A modest proposal would be to let the ones they already have try stuff and fail a good deal of the time.
  

• A New Release of VisiMap

  2007 Mar 19

  VisiMap 4.1has just been launched and you can find out how to try it or buy it here.
  
  Its new features include:
  • Support for Office 2007 (Outlook, PowerPoint, Project and Word).
  • Export to PDF and XPS formats (these require Word 2007 to be installed).
  • Export to single-file HTML archive (MHTML) format.
  • Compatibility with Windows Vista.
  • Outlook items in maps are now included as embedded package objects in exported MS Word files.
  • When you change the Default Maps folder (via the File Locations form), you are now asked whether you wish to move maps files in the old folder to the new.
  There are several other changes that techies will enjoy and you can find them here.
  
  

• Not Quite Death By PowerPoint

  2007 Feb 27

  Lest you think I have been snowed in for the past two weeks, I have instead been snowed under with work for an organization that is faced with too many buildings in a geographic area and not enough people using them to warrant their continuing operation – and what to do about it. In the not-for-profit world, these are life cycle issues. To provide some context in a recent meeting, I was forced to rely on the dreaded PowerPoint.
  
  But I learned something that I should have known all along. In thinking through the points I needed to make in map format, I was surprised that I could simply export the map into PowerPoint with the click of a mouse. The little icon was in the tool bar all the time, but I had never needed to use it until then. The first level branches automatically became headings and the sub branches translated into bullets – not too many lines made it to the screen, which is as it should be.
  
  It’s a reminder that any software – and many other familiar tools, have options that we seldom use, but would lessen our workload. We seldom take full advantage of things that are right under our noses.
  
  

• On the Road Again

  2007 Feb 13

  I’m in a comfortable hotel room near Niagara Falls, awaiting a conference engagement tomorrow morning – and arriving early to avoid the snow storm of the year which the Weather Station is very excited about. I’m about to deliver a training session on the HBDI for 50 employees on their annual conference.
  
  I am the first to get a bird’s eye view of this group from the composite view of their individual profiles and they are impressive in their balance- though as is predictable, they could use a bit more C (expressiveness) and D (big picture thinking in their approach.
  
  The Globe and Mail last week quoted Steve Pinker speaking at a conference saying that his assembled group needed to use their right brain more. Since I was not present, I’m not sure whether he was quoted accurately. I know that if the late Ned Herrmann, inventor of the Herrmann Brain Dominance Instrument(HBDI), has been present, it is more likely that he would have said use the right brain in the appropriate situation. It is not as though one side of the brain is superior to the other. Both sides have their roles and we are lucky to have the capability to use both.
  
  To find out more about this you can visit here.
  
  

• Improving Productivity

  2007 Feb 06

  I was distracted from my continuing interest in Wikinomics by a headline in Toronto’s Globe and Mail announcing that the Bank of Montreal is going to lay off 1,000 people “to improve productivity”. Will someone tell me how this works? Are the thousand being let go actually hindering productivity? Have our monthly fees been going to waste all this time, as we support these slothful types? This question even became a topic at Sunday dinner. My son’s take on it is that people at the top get very nervous when the workload seems “just right” – when people seem relaxed and happy on the job. Because the head honcho is more frazzled by the coming quarterly report to the shareholders, he somehow thinks that fewer people could actually do the job because the current ones seem so comfortable. But those who are left after the slashing become the losers of the “just right” workload and it is only a matter of time before the company is in further trouble. The “solution” is more downsizing. More productivity ultimately leads to the death of the company.
  
  As a company of one, downsizing is never an issue for me. But change certainly is. Since the beginning of 2007 I have continued with a blog, acquired a learning site, will acquire wiki software to play with, - all for free. I’ll continue to mine Wikinomics for ideas, because many apply to small and micro organizations in somewhat different ways.
  
  The diagram above is my summary of the design for the future proposed by the authors of the book. It’s a plain vanilla example of a Mind Map – no colour or graphics, - that will become readable if you enlarge it with a click. It has personal notes underneath indicated by the little thumbtack icon, which express some personal observations, challenges and even fears about what this all means. You could take the same approach and document your own.
  
  Back to the BMO and its intention of laying off 1,000 with a memo to the CEO. You’ll need a different thousand in the future. They probably won’t want to work full time for you ever. But you will need their collaborative innovation if you really want to improve productivity.
  
  
  
  
  

• The Perfect Storm - #3

  2007 Jan 30

  Don Tapscott has always been interested in the young. In Growing Up Digital, he initially thought, like Garrison Keillor, that all his own kids were above average technologically, - until he realized that their friends also seemed to be geniuses too. Now he is more focused on what this new generation will bring to the workplace, - and it is a very different style of participation that will at first cause conflicts with the existing workforce. The old style was not about sharing, collaborating, socializing or creating. The new one is.
  
  In reading and reflecting on Wikinomics, I can’t help thinking that we are seeing a sea change that could affect the balance that Ned Herrmann saw in the HBDI. In every group of 100 people, he found, there is a good balance between those who favour, fact, function, feeling and future – and he named these quadrants A, B, C, and D. The new generation appears to be showing a shift to those characteristics that Herrmann attributed to preferences characterized by the right side of the brain. The old business environment would hardly be characterized as social. The new one, by the sheer force of numbers in this cohort, will be.
  
  So here is a simple map to evaluate where your work force stands now. These are the key words valued by the young. Does your organization encourage these attributes or squelsh them? The answer may well relate to your future.
  
  And if you want to know more about the HBDI, there is a free chapter for download this week here.