Most people read the newspaper, the one that’s printed on paper. The typical newspaper font size is between 8 and 9 points. A typical newspaper compresses a lot of information in a very small space. Large headlines are used to generate interest and the reader can selectively choose what he/she wants to read. Take a look at the game scores in the sports section or the financial information presented in the business section. Again, a lot of density, a lot of information in small spaces.

Yet when we produce business documents, we are compelled to use comically large font sizes to accommodate our audience. If our audience is capable of reading a newspaper, then we should compress more information into fewer pages. At higher density, people see the big picture, the flow, the structure, and can selectively choose what they want to read. They’re also forced to focus their attention on your report and really digest the information presented.

More thoughts and examples on this later.

I just got back from an Edward Tufte one day seminar yesterday. Below is just a transcription of my notebook. In the following weeks, I’ll highlight a few points. In the mean time, I suggest you attend a course if you can. It comes with four of his books. Otherwise, read them, they’re full of insightful thoughts.

• The long-term goal is to zero out the interface. It’s all about the content or subject matter.
• A good diagram should be read carefully as you would with a paragraph of words.
• Don’t pre-specify a method (e.g., don’t go in to a problem saying you’ll visualize it).
• Study maps, it uses lines, colors, words, and layers. No more putting boxes around words. It creates optical clutter.
• Supergraphics, or figures that contain many dimensions of data, allows the audience time to work with their own cognitive styles.
• Presentations should start with a high resolution data dump, a supergraphic.
• Use your own time for the audience to read your material. Don’t expect them to read it on their own time.
• Create a technical brief, rather than slides. It should be a Word document, or your preferred document editor. Hand this out ahead of time and give the audience time to read it. The presenter is then cross-examined.
• Create complete integration of information.
• Use sparklines. They can be inserted anywhere, particularly in text. Stop labeling everything figure, title, and caption. It’s just clutter.
• Don’t design to the lowest common denominator. Expect the best, not the worse, in your audience.
• Reports, graphs, and charts can have the level of complexity of the sports section in the newspaper.
• Find good examples and copy them.
• For non-fiction reports, mimic the tables in the sports section or the market data presented in newspapers. They’re proven.
• The job of the customer is not to design the product.
• Show mastery of detail. If you want clarity, add detail. It sound contrary but works.
• The point of an information display is to promote thinking.

As an analyst, I spend my days working with data, defining business requirements, calculating, pivot tables, graphs, and analytical work. With an underdeveloped right brain, I set out to figure ways to integrate my creative artistic abilities into my analytical work. It started out with a discussion with a friend over coffee about how she’s using her right brain and I’m using my left. We concluded that I should figure a creative outlet. With that, I went to Target and bought a classic Crayola 64 crayon box. It has yet to be used.

As a management consultant, I’m called upon to explain complex topics to executives and directors and to communicate results to the lay reader. My organic chemistry notes in undergrad were all pictures. I used a lot of picture to illustrate some convoluted concepts.

After stumbling upon a few websites through my regular blogs, I came across VizThink, a visual thinking community blog. After a few hours, I read all their posts and dug through each one.

• Dan Roam’s Back of the Napkin
• Dave Gray and Sunni Brown’s Gamestorming
• David Sibbet’s Visual Meetings
• Nancy Duarte’s Slide:ology and Resonate

I also ran out and bought things to help me practice my new skillset:

• Sketchbook Pro for Mac and iPad
• Wacom bamboo tablet
• Two whiteboard and two acrylic boards
• A lot of butcher paper and many sharpies

At first, my work products were terrible. My handwriting was awful and my drawings were terrible. But with all things, it just takes practice, practice, and more practice.

I’m not there yet. I’m still honing these skills.

In June, I’ll be attending Edward Tufte’s course on Presenting Data and Information. I hope to have him sign my iPad.

In September, I’m taking a course through The Grove International on Principles of Graphic Facilitation and Workplace Applications.

Are you a visual thinker or graphic facilitator? How did you get started? Who inspired yet?

Have you learned something completely outside of your field and applied it? How did you do it?

There’s many studies out there on the difference between writing notes and typing notes. I’ve done both, primarily handwriting during my K-16 years, and typing in my graduate studies years. Anecdotally, I can say that I comprehended and remembered more when I wrote my notes by hand. My handwriting will never be able to capture notes verbatim as my typing can but I find that I remember more when I write.

Lifehacker wrote a great piece that includes links to several studies on why you learn more effectively by writing than typing.

As a personal experiment, I’ve been migrating toward using ink and graphite as an alternative to these nice keys on my Mac Book Air. Conceptually, it makes sense. Writing a “p” or a “d” is significantly different than pressing those keys. The peak of my comprehension and memory from notes came from my chemistry class in undergrad. My notes were full of doodles and imagery. They weren’t verbatim recordings of the professor’s verbal speak. They were synthesized thoughts that summarized the concepts and ideas of the lecture.

To commit to this, I signed The Doodle Revolution manifesto by Sunni Brown.

Graphic facilitation and visual thinking is one of my personal interests. I’ve been reading up some a variety of topics. This community is very tight knit and there’s always a common set of players. One of them is Dave Sibbet of The Grove Consultants International.

Below is a very detailed webinar (90 minutes). I’ve watched the entire recording to confirm that it’s very valuable. I definitely recommend you watch it. Dave also demos Sketchbook Pro as a digital recording device.

In my search to learn more about visual thinking, visual note taking, and better idea facilitation, I came across Gamestorming (Amazon Affiliate Link). It’s written by Dave Gray, Sunni Brown, and James Macanufo. They even have a great blog and forum for all kinds of user experiences and examples.

Gamestorming is about an innovation method to creating new ideas and strategies for success. The standard business process isn’t designed to accomplish this no matter how much resources you put into the beginning of the process and how many measures you put to track the outputs. Pumping more and more through the Henry Ford conveyor belt isn’t going to help your company come up with new ideas. Instead, Gamestorming is about getting people to get up, move around, and design.

Traditional business meetings has the three basic roles:

1. Facilitator
2. Scribe/Notetaker
3. Time Keeper

People sit around the table, a facilitator hopelessly tries to engage the group of executives around the table to answer questions while the notetaker scribbles the babble. After the designated time, the time keeper calls time and everyone, with a sigh of relief, gets up and leaves.

Using the book’s tagline, Gamestorming is a playbook for innovators, rulebreakers, and changemakers. There’s no reason to follow the traditional model of group facilitation. In the modern information era, the traditional chain of command approach to management no longer applies. As a result, there is a need for a modern playbook, a set of strategies for the modern workforce. Gamestorming realized that the here’s a list of commands tasks approach doesn’t work. Modern workers need a new way of working.

What are some of my favorite games?

Dot Voting – In many occassions, there are just too many good ideas running around. As in everything we do, there’s only so much time and resources going around. I like to use sticky tabs for voting. Each participants gets a set amount of sticky tabs, as agreed upon by the group. We then determine if an idea could have more than one vote.

Forced Ranking – I also use forced ranking to get a group to agree on one prioritized list. I like to run through the process several times, each with discussion, to make sure that the group really agrees.

There are so many more games in the book I look forward to using.

I’ve always been amazed at the artists who can make incredible imagery on the iPad using just their fingers. Rachel Smith, now with The Grove International posted a wonderful video on how to use tools on the iPad to make visual notes and diagrams. She then posts in amazing details how she took her notes into production to make the video on her blog. Definitely need to follow through after the video and check out her post.

Via {Ninmah Meets World}

Thanks to Katie Piatt for posting this on her blog as well.

I found this video to be very thought provoking. My ideas come when I’m not trying to find new ideas. As a result, I found innovation to occur during conversation, idle moments, sleep, and relaxing activities.

Gamestorming, a set of best practices compiled from innovative approaches authored by Dave Grey, Sunni Brown, and James Macanufo. The book contains 80 different “games” that can be played to develop new ideas, innovate, and create.

My new project is to take each of these games and create a playing card or self-contained kit.