Category Archives: mindmapping software

Good Start for a New Year

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Happy New Year – and let’s start with possibility as summarized in Ben and Roz’s Zander’s wonderful book. You can enlarge the map if you need to by clicking on it

There are two good uses for Maps – note making – getting your ideas down, having a look at them and sorting out what their order should be in order to move toward doing something about them – but also note taking – summarizing other peoples’ ideas and practices. Maps need to be inspirational in this second mode – with reminders of the emotional tone as well as the fact of the message. So that’s why I took the time to add images to this one – created in VisiMap- to make it more evocative. I also added notes under some of the headings.

The Art of Possibility is a great reminder for starting the year. It’s not new, but that doesn’t make it any less relevant. If you want a copy of the map with the attached notes, just ask. It is easy to send. And making further comments about what it says will keep me busy for a few days.

I rediscovered this book in my own library through reading another one, Nancy Duarte’s Resonate. She references the TED talk that Zander gave as a model of what a presentation should be. Meeting him there where he embodies what he cares about is also a model for all of us going forward.

Customer Responses – Part 4

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Once a map exists, many users find VisiMap a useful way to move forward. “Onsite minute taking” and “planning agendas” get frequent mentions. “Sharing first drafts with users allow for virtual brainstorms”, commented a user. “Seeing the range of complexity reduces tension”, said another. Other users note visual maps’ ability to “establish and maintain an overview”, essential when multiple concerns and details tend to cloud the big picture. Maps are a useful way to maintain status reports. “Recording phone calls” is another way to keep the record straight.

Organizing one’s work and one’s life sparked many responses. “I use it for
job analysis and see the relationship of tasks”, says Kathryn McKee, the
co-author of Leading People Through Disasters, who first learned about the
software when working for Standard Chartered Bank as a Human Resources
executive. She should know because she experienced and had to deal with six
disasters in seven years.

Glen Hammond, a Manitoba based college instructor uses VisiMap to summarize ideas for a fast review before teaching. Another user creates a mini portal for access to other documents on his company network and the web. The ability to create “hyperlinks to frequently used sources” is one of VisiMap’s strengths. A daily task list developed by another user indicates both the number of tasks and their relationships. Such use allows one to streamline work in chunks and groupings, a decidedly more effective use of time. One used VisiMap “for setting up and planning a new business”. Dafydd Lewis has used it to document the McKinsey Seven S framework.

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Customer Responses – Part 3

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Users identified work related benefits that show consistent patterns.

Article writers like Jim Rait like to list the main points and expand on them. When the article exceeds its limit, it is also easier to contract the copy to respond to the original main points. Other writers of books and doctoral theses like to “ map the big ideas and then hang random thoughts on appropriate branches”. At that point it is possible to switch to outline mode and flesh out the ideas with ease. One writer drafted an entire novel this way.

VisiMap also offers advantages for less literary writing, such as proposals.
“I can check that the proposal contains the essential information and that it focuses on and directly responds to client needs”, a respondent observes. There is an excellent chance he got the job. Roy Strodl, a skills development consultant, has written a number of articles and contributed to various planning textbooks, all of which were outlined and then the first draft was written using VisiMap. He says, “I love the ability of being able to move the structure of the document around, which is very hard to do once the document is in Word”. Neil Botten, managing consultant at NAB Associates, and principal lecturer in strategic management at Westminster Business School says “VisiMap has been invaluable in mapping out a number of books and other publications prior to writing fairly large commissions for my publishers.”

Speech writing is a related use. “It’s easy to build a structure and change it easily,” one user said. A parish priest has to preach on assigned readings; he looks carefully for common themes, identifies three key ones and expands upon them. One senses that his listeners will hear something coherent that they can take away. “As an occasional speaker at public conferences, I have found VisiMap invaluable in ordering and organizing the content of a piece,” said Ray Currie, of Towerhouse Training Limited. “Not only does it summarize and link the content that I have identified to date, but it also prompts memory and imagination.” His contention is borne out by recent brain research.

When the map is completed it also provides an interface for a speech or address, – a better tool than a text for a speaker who knows his content and can make eye contact with his audience rather than bury his face in a printed sheet. One user summarizes it well by noting VisiMap’s ability to “shape communication”.

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Customer Responses – Part 2

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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.

But that’s just the starting point. Once users can see what the ideas are, they naturally move on to refine them. Phrases like “ordering thoughts” “refining ideas”, defining scope” culling from the many” “organizing” “seeing relationships” “reducing complexity” all suggest active minds at work. “I find VisiMap a useful tool to lay out visually all the ideas that could be in a film (usually far too many to include) then sorting and culling, trying different combinations of ideas until robust patterns are identified to suggest the story arc,” observes Peter Shepherd. The benefit is simplicity. When items are all on the same page, it is easier to see what one is thinking.

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What our customers told us – Part 1

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A recent survey of VisiMap users has provided us with a good deal of information. I’m going to share the findings in small doses over the next few days.

PASSION FOR VISIMAP
What Our Customers Taught Us

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.

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