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Getting out of the BOX is the NEW BOX

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Many Minds - Visual Thinking at Work

 

 

Thoughts on the deterioration of a powerful metaphor.

 

The first time I heard someone say "out of the box thinking", I was riveted by the image. So was everyone else it turns out. And now, some fifteen years later, people pepper conversations with it. It has become a cliche. I get the same feeling when I hear that we should "brainstorm" about a pesky problem that has come up for the upteenth time in a meeting. Did you know that a true brainstorm is defined as a temporary fit of insanity. It takes courage and discipline to conduct one effectively. But, usually the casual meeting request is followed by the same old predictable stream of consciousness chatter. And, having appeased our minds with an homage to creativity, we return to the predictable.

The cartoon above came from my sketchbook. It's a product of my wandering mind and pen. People seem to like it, especially the orange box on the right. They single it out as the one that works for them. This has surprised me because I see it as part of a sequence. Singling it out is understandable; it carries some of the power of the original utterance*. But preferring it after all these years is like singling out a word at the end of a sentence for praise. As I drew the five box series I was mulling over how metaphors lose their power as we use them unconsciously. Need some innovation? Push the "think out of the box" button.

One way to retrieve that power is with a picture. My doodle had that unintended consequence: a pleasing recovery. Now, I wonder what we have to do to spark our next inclination to brainstorm?

A side note: the colorizing of the drawing came later on my iPod touch, of all things. I had been showing people the sketch. And in yet another peripatetic moment, I re'-worked it in Sketchbook-mobile, a $3 app from Autodesk! Makes me want an iPad. The colors re-invigorated the metaphor. They put a visual exponent on it!

* I wonder if anyone knows who said, "out of the box thinking" first?

AMBIENT KINESTHETIC MODELING with "HOLY SCRAP"

Working with your hands is inherently satisfying. For many people doodling or fiddling with whatever is at hand staves off boredom during long meetings and workshops . You can take charge of this simple fact by leaving some "holy scrap"
on the table. Encourage people to play with your offerings; but it is best not to attach ANY significance to them. Many will begin to play with them as soon as their attention to the front of the room action fades. And some people will never touch the stuff.
It can be argued that the unconscious manipulators are processing information and thoughts kinesthetically. Many facilitators notice that there is a more benign energy in the room. And frequently there are some wonderful products.HOLY SCRAP is any combination of simple things such as pipe cleaners, play dough, wire, colored paper, tape etc that will entice people to pick them up and play with them. I stick with ordinary stuff that is not branded. People project more of themselves onto things that are not already carrying a big message. 

I have documented this ambient phenomenon informally for a number of years now. Enjoy the photos.

  

 

Kinesthetic Modeling Workshop San Francisco, March 20, 2010

Learn to use KM in your practice. This workshop is geared to facilitators, coaches, and consultants. In one day you will experience the process, learn what makes it tick and become familiar with how to facilitate KM with your clients. Julie Gieseke, a Bay Area coach and facilitator is presenting with me. She's an experienced KM user and teacher. The session is graphically facilitated. You will receive copies of all photos, session graphics and the latest version of the "KM Facilitator's Guide. It will be held in San Francisco or Sausalito. The fee is $250. Attendance is limited to 20 participants.

 Glenn Hughes, John Ward and David Sibbet debriefing a model at VizThink09

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: There are half a dozen posts on this blog that explain the process and its uses. Scenes and information from last year's workshop can be found it the post called COACHES use Kinesthetic Modeling To register contact me, John Ward, with a comment below.

Geoff Ball, John Ward, Charles Tack, Chance Massaro and Elena Duharme at the KM workshop in Berkeley in 2009   

DARWIN's EYE, ...a Thought Leader's Craft

“More than anything else in his life, Charles Darwin liked to look at things. He liked to look at things the way the way an artist likes to draw, the way a composer likes to play the piano, the way a cook likes to chop onions: it is the simple root physical activity that makes the other, higher order acts not just possible but pleasurable.”

There are artists in every area of endeavor; and when the art goes out of anything it becomes dreary. We sink back into habit and routine. The possibility of an innovative future fades from our mind's eye. The quote above from Adam Gopnik's book "Angels and Ages, A Short Book about Darwin, Lincoln and Modern Life" touches on the fact that we all need a, "simple root physical activity" that pleasurably informs the more important things we do in our work.

We all need to have a "craft", something visceral and tangible we do that lets us patiently observe the ordinary and the awesome things that are going on before our eyes. There are countless ways to let our bodies refresh our thinking processes. Cooking, drawing, playing in meetings with with others work for me. What do you do? 

LOGO DESIGNER uses Kinesthetic Modeling

Tania Von Allmen picked up the basics of Kinesthetic Modeling last year at the IFVP (International Forum of Visual Practitioners) Conference in Chicago where I spoke last August. Here is her description of how KM gets her clients to the heart of the matter, the imagery they hold beneath their day to day business preoccupations. 

"My method for designing logos has been to have a client sit down and review a list of words I give them. We narrow down the list together and create a vision statement of 3 core words. We use the words as a benchmark for whether we are on track with the logo design. The challenge with this is going from this very left-brain mode into the symbolic realm. A logo is really a visual representation of a vibration that has a feeling at the core of it.

 
 Kinesthetic modeling gives me the tools to get a client right to the feeling and often to the symbol itself. That doesn't mean that if someone selects a rubber duck on the model to represent their feeling of childlike delight in the work they do, that I make a rubber duck their new logo. It does mean that we can have a discussion about how childlike delight is what they bring to their work and how they invite their customers to participate in and enjoy that experience with them. We would then explore visually other ways of expressing the feeling and experience of "childlike delight" and maybe end up with a symbol that is playful. whimsical, colorful, etc.
 
Also, KM helps my clients shift into right brain mode very naturally and this is a challenge for people who do not see themselves as "creative" and would like to put everything on me to "dress them up". I like that it completely breaks their pattern. They have no idea how to do it "right" and usually they just surrender into going with it and tapping in to resources they didn't know they had.
 
 Finally, KM is the best way I know to deal with weird group dynamics and power structures. It really does level the playing field and allow people to express themselves and their ideas in a way that often doesn't come out in a stuffy meeting. It gives the heart a voice because of its kinesthetic nature. The results are always very authentic, deep, and transparent.
 
 The bottom line is KM helps shorten the distance between a client's vision and the visual representation of that vision. For that reason, it is a tremendous tool in my toolbox."

Tania Von Allman's links: [email protected]   www.LuminosityStudio.com

The LEADERSHIP CHALLENGE - bird's eye view

I have lost track of the number of Leadership Challenge workshops I have captured graphically over the past six years. I am always refreshing my understanding of this powerful program developed by Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner. Recently, in a session with a group of government executives the big picture came together nicely under pressure. We had too little time to share the gist of the program with executives who were about to receive their 360 LPI (Leadership Profile Index) evaluations. The LPI is the statistical tool that is the umbrella for the TLC program. I say "umbrella" because everyone's best practices are at the heart of The Leadership Challenge and the 30 behaviors surveyed by the LPI extend to the perimeter of each person's working territory. Take a look at this 35,000 foot view that I sketched up for the occasion. It's about 3' across.

At the center our personal bests point to the Five Practices. Each practice carries two commitments and is embodied by six behaviors. It is those 30 behaviors, as they are perceived by the people around the leader, that the LPI measures. The Leadership Challenge emphasizes the frequency of these behaviors as perceived by others. They are the benchmarks for one's leadership growth. The umbrella extends out to include everyone the leader comes in contact with.

A word about PERSONAL BESTS: If you ask any group of aspiring leaders to share the stories behind their personal bests on the front line, you will hear the the attributes that point to the Five Practices of The Leadership Challenge program. More than 25 years of research continue to support this remarkable core premise that everyone understands what it takes to be a good leader.

For more information on Leadership Challenge workshops contact Sonoma Leadership Systems - www.sonomaleadership.com or John Wiley & Sons - www.leadershipchallenge.com

MEETING GRAPHICS

REAL TIME VISUAL CAPTURE of important ideas, conversations and decisions boosts the productivity of any group."We help 'at-risk' urban kids refurbish donated airplanes. Then THEY fly them to the customer". Lyn Freeman of Build-a-Plane in LA explains his revolutionary educational program to a conference convened in San Diego by The Big Picture Company. John Ward captures his ideas in the drawing shown below.

GRAPHIC FACILITATION means...

Increased participation, retention and productivity

Heightened big picture awareness in complex and challenging situations

People make new connections and better decisions

Differences and contradictions are easier to resolve

People bond more readily

Teambuilding simply happens!

GRAPHIC FACILITATION WORKS BEST for...

Offsites & Workshops

Strategic Planning

Innovation & Problem Solving

Re-Organization & Shifting Paradigms

Team Building

Below are more of John Ward's drawings from the Big Picture Company's Program Design Meeting.

For more information on the innovative educational programs of The Big Picture Company and Build A Plane, use the following links: www.bigpicture.org or www.buildaplane.org

COACHES use Kinesthetic Modeling

Coaches try KM by the Bay, Berkeley Marina, March 28, 2009 - Geoff Ball, John Ward, Charles Tack, Chance Massaro and Elena DuCharme discuss the debriefing of a model. Seven others participated in the workshop.

Coaches can use Kinesthetic Modeling, especially at the beginning of a relationship, to quickly discover the "issues beneath the issues" that their client brings. The surprise factor in the modeling activity disarms the conscious mind. Workshop participants saw how ordinary objects can be more powerful than words; and that the more time people spend mulling over seemingly contradictory images, the greater their opportunity to make new connections. KM deliberately thwarts our conscious mind's natural tendency to jump to conclusions and actions that only reflect the things that we already know. The session was an opportunity for coaches to literally get their hands on KM and discover the value it can bring to their  practices.

The shocker for me, came when someone said, "Most of my work with clients is conducted on the phone. How can I possibly use KM in that situation." I was stumped, exhibiting a perfect case of founder's blindspot, I said flatly, "I can't see how". Chance Massaro didn't even hesitate. He explained that in his latest most interesting work coaching elders on the phone he often asks them to re-arrange the objects in front of them on the table. "They get a lot out of it; and I don't need to see the model. I just ask them to tell me what they are now seeing." The important thing, it turns out, is what the client gets out of the process. I've always known that the models are just temporary frameworks for deepening one's thought processes. But, the old sculptor in me is so secretly enthralled by and attached to the eloquent little worlds that people create when they model that I couldn't bear not to see them. So now, having taken some of my own medicine I now know: YOU CAN FACILITATE A KINESTHETIC MODELING EXPERIENCE ON THE PHONE. Thanks Chance!

KM induces a quiet pondering mind state that is hard to achieve, even in rich dialogue. Here, Vance Williams, Geoff Ball, Charles Tack and Chance Massaro pore over their model. One participant called it, "the glow around the unconscious".

Thanks to Julie Gieseke who helped organize the workshop. She captured much of the session graphically. You can see one of her charts above.

The Buzz was about KM at VizThink 2009

The Kinesthetic Modeling (KM) session Monday at VizThink was a sellout. Tuesday, many conferees were asking for an encore. That evening after dinner a second group got together. They were intrigued to experience how simple kinesthetic activity liberates visual expression and original thinking.

For more pictures and all of the meeting graphics associated with these sessions, click the "VizThink09" slideshow link in the right column of this blog.

Be sure to check out David Sibbet's perceptive post about the evening session at http://www.davidsibbet.com/david_sibbet/2009/03/kinesthetic-modeling-whole-body-vizthink.html

The process is a goofy one, admittedly. First, you dump some stuff (Holy Scrap!) out on a table and arrange it so that it says something about yourself. You're not allowed to explain it. Instead, you let other people tell YOU what it "looks like", but not "what it means". And finally you can say what you were up to. All the while, your table mates are writing down what people are saying so that you can take it all in. 

What's going on here? Well, this icebreaker is designed to coax you out of your abstract intellectual take on "reality". If you're going to use KM to do some original thinking about something that vexes you, you'd better side track your stale habitual thought patterns. The KM process is rooted in the idea that your thinking begins with sensation and proceeds to imagery then to metaphor and later (only milliseconds later) to explaining and intellectualizing your experience: from visceral to conceptual. If you can just get back to that first take on something that is important to you, you have a shot at getting beneath the knee jerk intellectual categorizing that we all do, especially in a crisis. KM literally gets people unstuck. The more hidebound they are, the better it works.

Below is one of the models that was made at this stage

Dan gave an eloquent explanation of how it shows the way he, a lawyer, works. Wherever you are Dan, I hope you will comment on this model. I, for one, am always moved by the sophistication of the expression. KM seems to access people's innate ability to think visually and there does not appear to be a learning curve the way there is with drawing. People just do it. And their delight in the process is disarming.

THOUGHT ARTIFACTS

You can understand the models as thought artifacts. For a short time after they are made a group can use them as armatures for all their thinking around an important issue. Because the thoughts are externalized in the form of simple objects, the thinker is less likely to feel vulnerable or be attacked for what she has made. And because the models are so unassuming they are easy to rearrange as ideas evolve.

SERIOUS MODELING

It is only a short hop from the icebreaker to the modeling of extremely complex situations. In both VizThink workshop sessions we tackled the impact that the global financial collapse will have on the VizThink community. In less than 20 minutes each table generated a rich model of the existing situation, which was then ready for de-brief. In KM, examining the model is where the value is extracted. A short modeling activity can often generate a day of powerful conversation.

The de-briefs followed much the same pattern as the icebreaker, progressing from what it looks like to what it means. Then each table was asked to suggest options that the VizThink community could consider to remain viable through the hard times ahead. At VizThink we only had time for a quick flyby. But you will see that, even in this brief exercise, there is a wide range of thinking. Nothing seems to be off limits; and you can see that even these hasty models could serve as springboards for rich strategic discussions. As we wrapped up the modelers at most tables felt that they had barely mined the significance and potential of what they had made. The groups' comments were captured graphically Monday afternoon by Regina Rowland and Julie Gieseke; and on Tuesday evening by Nick Payne. Their charts are below.

In less than an hour the models are full of inspiration & practical suggestions,

the products of many people thinking together simultaneously with their hands. 

The VizThink Community as a DIASPORA!

Kinesthetic Modeling is a facilitation and coaching tool designed for professionals in organizational settings. You can give it a try based on the information in this post. Or, if you want to learn how to facilitate the process for others, workshops are available. See the link in the right column of this blog. For more pictures and all of the meeting graphics associated with this session, click the "VizThink09" slideshow link in the right column of this blog.