Diving Deeper
Expanding Views
Agenda, Day 2
9:00 Expanding the Practice: Sessions (Part One): 90 mins/180 mins
10:30 Coffee Break
11:00 Expanding the Practice: Sessions (Part Two): 90 minutes
12:30 Lunch
2:00 A Conversation with the Elders: David Sibbet, Reinhard Kuchenmüller, Lynn Carruthers, Ulric Roedebeck (PLENARY)
3:30 Coffee Break
4:00 Sharing Our Stories: An opportunity to expand our view of our practice/community with Mary-Alice Arthur (PLENARY)
5:45 Connecting the Dots of the Day: Harvesting highlights & community news with Mary Alice-Arthur (PLENARY)
6:00 End of Day 2
Evening program
6:30 Barbecue
8:15 Boat Cruise
The morning dawned cooler and a bit rainy, but we didn’t care – we were ready to dive into learning together. Today’s theme is Expanding Views and we’re diving deeper into the art and practice of visual thinking to challenge what we know. Twenty sessions were offered this morning, some 90 minutes in length and some 180 minutes, ranging from The Art of Paying Attention to Visuals for Design Thinking and How to Scale Your Business to Thrive. There were opportunities to get to grips with the basics, stretch the edges of practices, and get focused on the business side.
We filled our practitioner suitcases and had plenty to chew on over lunch.
SESSIONS
Anne Jess: Exploring Metaphors for Visual Facilitation Graphic Recording
Listen to the words your clients use – and you will learn a lot about their view of themselves and the world. Do they battle with their suppliers? (war, fighting). Do they promise to knock one out of the park? (baseball, sports). What other metaphors do you hear every day? We’ll explore common metaphors, and look at ways to use them in facilitation and graphic recording. Tap into the wisdom that is in the room to make your work more effective.
My intention was to convene a conversation and poke at our metaphors from a different angle. How can we think about the “whole” metaphor, not just the pieces? Where do these metaphors come from? What is the root symbology? What emotions and human experience are inherent in some of our shapes? What makes some charts resonate with people more than others?
We started the conversation by sharing our favorite metaphor models, including: bridging the gap, a layer cake, a whirlwind, ecosystems (ocean, garden, forest). I introduced the concept of “universal symbols” that humans have been using long before language, and those symbols are rooted in basic shapes that show up in nature and in our own bodies. The meanings are built-in, from our human experience, without conscious thought. The use of these symbols and shapes can evoke an emotional and intangible response in the viewer, resonating, and creating a sense of “familiar” knowing. With each “shape” discussion, I shared my own charts using the shapes as framing metaphor or as a symbol. We also tied the shapes back to our favorite metaphor models.
Some basic shapes with some of their variations and interpreted meanings:
- LINE: the horizon (future), an arrow (direction), a timeline (past, current, future), paths, roads, rivers (ways to get there)
- CIRCLE: wholeness, community, oval (eggs – birth, life), double oval (eternity), orbs (moon, planets – universe), partial circles – arcs or arches (bridges)
- TRIANGLE: strength, change, triads (many models are in “3”s), pyramid (ancient, mystery), iceberg (“just the tip of”)
- SQUARE: box (containment, trapped, confinement), cube (building blocks)
- EQUI-DISTANT CROSS (+): (spirit, earth, and the separation in between), crossroads (conflict, indecision, choice), quadrant models
- SPIRAL: growth, chaos (such as tornado), emergence
- WAVY LINES (usually 3 wavy lines stacked together): ocean, wind, energy
I also gave our participants some handouts to add to their collection of everyday metaphors.
The folks in my session seemed interested and attentive. I appreciated the participation of those who added observations and expanded on the material I presented. I am always in the “learning” mode myself, and enjoyed the insights from everyone.
Learnings: Wow, the time just flew by. There is so much more we can explore. I believe we just “scratched the surface” in our understanding of how basic shapes and symbols influence our connection with our charts. I would have liked to include more interactive activities – maybe next time!
Anne
Anthony Weeks: Visual Storytelling: Elevating visual practice through flow, sequence and story
Julie Stuart: how to scale your business so you can thrive for advanced practitioners
Once you get to the point where you have maxed out your capacity for selling hours/days for dollars, what else can you do to grow your business and grow yourself in terms of doing work you love? When you get to the point where you have enough work, you are in the position to make choices on what kind of work, what kind of clients, etc. so how can you design your business to suit the kind of life you want to live?
We surfaced the questions everyone brought to the session–see the photos of the sticky notes– categorized them and had some really useful discussions on multiple levels: practical, emotional, business development, life choices, etc.
I heard great response from everyone that they got a ton out of the session, so much so that we had a follow-up session during the open space and plan to continue a dialogue going forward via a Facebook group.
We realized that there are so many of us doing our work with varieties of approaches and models that we can offer our experience, insight and advice to each other as a cohort. Its very exciting that there is now enough of us who are advancing our practices that we can turn to each other for support.
We also want to ensure that there is interesting and useful content at future conferences that contributes to our learning as advanced practioners and discussed possible content we would be interested in having. Here are some graphic harvests from the session:Welcome to EditPad.org – your online plain text editor. Enter or paste your text here. To download and save it, click on the button below.
Lynne Cazaly: Beyond the Wall: Commercialising your Visual Practice, Growing a Movement
Many visual practitioners have taken the step ‘beyond the wall’ of visual recording or graphic facilitation – writing books, speaking at conferences and training others. Extending your practice by commercialising what you know helps position you as an expert… a thought leader in your field.
The opportunities can be incredible and the experience, broadening! But knowing how to position and extend your professional expertise can be a challenge. In this session, I took participants through six other delivery modes for visual practitioners beyond the work you currently do now.
This is about how well you:
- help others
- leverage your ideas, and
- make a difference.
What is thought leadership?
Thought leaders lead their industry as specialists and subject matter experts. Their thinking can be so powerful it helps shift an industry, a way of thinking, a community. It’s all about helping others, leveraging your ideas and making a difference. Are you a thought leader? If you’ve ever coached, mentored, published, spoken or presented, you’ve already got some of your thinking ‘out there’ in the marketplace.
The purpose of the session was to help people who work in the area of visual practice to see that there are opportunities to grow their practice beyond drawing, sketching and visualising. They have a wealth of expertise that can be sold, commercialised and enjoyed to help themselves, their clients and the wider world. The session focused on the unpacking of the thought leadership model of selling and building your expertise. This is not to say that our visual practice skills are limited or wrong; on the contrary, we know some incredible things. We must create longevity for our field and our expertise – applying our thinking to thought leadership can help us lead the way in the work we do and how we help others.
I covered the master model for thought leadership – that you have messages, to deliver to a market through a particular mode.
Those modes of delivery are : speaker, author, trainer, mentor, facilitator, coach. There are other ways of commercialising your expertise, but these were the ones focused on in this session and covered in more detail through thought leadership.
Great feedback from the participants, with ‘wow’ and ‘a-ha’ moments for participants who were looking for ways to go beyond what they currently do. There were at times, realisation that this approach takes work but the rewards could be enormous. There is incredible scope to apply and follow.
I regularly mentor practitioners of all experiences, industries and skills in the thought leadership model – and there is something highly creative about visual practitioners. Their willingness to ‘step in’ to the unknown and learn, their creativity while they are learning, and their open mind and thinking means they are perfectly positioned to embrace thought leadership approaches to growing their practice.
Lynne (Global Thought Leaders Mentor, this session was based on the successful mentoring program which I deliver to my clients)
Michelle Boos-Stone: Selling Clients not just Visuals, but a Powerful EXPERIENCE with Visuals
Miike Keppler: Making Truth Visible — Visualization in psychodrama
The purpose of the session was to present and experience visual Technics in and with various methods of Psychodrama. These methods are used as well in psychotherapy as in coaching. We opened with creating signs and symbols for „truth“ (regarding the title of the workshop) and various terms that are basics of Psychodrama: principles – health, relationship, creativity, spontaneity and the universalizes – space, time, reality, cosmos. Than we worked practically with the psychodramatic methods “social atom“, “inner team“ and ended by transferring these methods to possible applications as conflict management processes or team development.
The participants responded very well and worked intense and deeply by using visualization in personal process. Main result was experiencing inner context as visible for the first time. Second to this the sharing between the participants was strong and intimate. We experienced a very appreciative and open contact within the group. This was just a start and a glimpse of a visual world connecting to therapeutical methods. Participants talked about writing a book about these topics. This will go on. Personal note: The week before I held the same workshop at a Psychodrama Conference at Hannover: completely different comparing the visual technical standard, but very similar in the participants personal experiences .
Miike
Ryan Robinson: Ink to Pixels: Getting the most out of your hand drawn visuals in Photoshop & Illustrator
Stefan Groß: The Power of Visual Interventions
The purpose of our session was to sensitize the participants to three of the main aspects of live visualization: Text, Images, Structures (i.e. patterns). Separated into three groups, the participants visually recorded a discussion on the subject of “why meetings fail”, each group focusing on a different one of the above mentioned aspect (text, image, structure).
In the following reflection round each of the groups focused on impact, chances, limitations and application. A final harvesting round in the plenum finished up the workshop session, in which the focus was on visual facilitation rather than recording.
We received very positive feedback from our participants. The approach of “going back to the roots” and have a detailed view on the three main aspects of visual facilitation as well as the structure, timing and rhythm of the workshop session itself was very well received.
It was a valuable experience for us, both participating in the conference as well as hosting the workshop session. Impulses, exchange of ideas, feedback … lots to digest. We will focus even more on the visual facilitation rather than expanding further into live recording.
Stefan Groß, Jürgen Böhl, Marco Böhm
Su Min Lim: Sketch Notes Basics: How to record in words and image in A6 format (105 x 148)
Ralph Weickel & Andreas Gärtner: Participate in the creation of a positive-image lexicon
Stefan Behrendt: Design Thinking and Visualization, connecting the dots — experience it!
Anthony Weeks: The Art of Paying Attention: Listening for Stories, Narrative and Impact
Barbara Siegel: What they think when we draw: Neurocognition and Graphic Recording
The purpose of this session was to give graphic recorders/facilitators an understanding of current research on the brain and models of how we think. My hope as a presenter was to provide a basic vocabulary and understanding so that we can make better choices in how to lay-out our charts based on intent. In particular, I focused on brainstorming sessions and how to encourage whole brain thinking.
Cognition models I presented were: left/right brain (still has validity just it’s more subtle than people used to think of it) upstairs/downstairs (from Dan Siegel, no relation), and system one/two (discussed in Daniel Kahneman’s book Thinking Fast and Slow). I suggested that in order to facilitate whole brain thinking we can try to move the eyes in a horizontal eight (infinity) pattern. We had a brief discussion of white space (in general we don’t provide enough) and the difference between recording for a conversation about ideas (infinity pattern) and commitment to change (leading the eye from left to right and off the chart). For me personally, and for my charts, these are aspirational ideas – often in the heat of recording I focus at the level of content and sometimes can’t keep to the intended template.
Participants seemed to be most impressed that we place an emotional tag on everything we see before we know we’ve seen it – the image goes through an older part of the brain (the ‘reptile brain’) before we reassemble the neurological signals into an image we consciously recognize. I also think people responded to the physical exercises I had them do: ‘gut body’ from Janet Willie and ‘lazy eight’ from BrainGym. People were also impressed by the idea that there are different types of memories and how we access them – especially how the memories change depending on the type it is and how we recall them.
This presentation was an experiment for me – while I am not credentialed in this field, life has required that I learn a lot about it. I was pleased to have my knowledge respected and to share it. I hope to write a white paper so that graphic recorders can share with clients brain based reasons for why visual culture works.
I close this comment with how I began my talk: neurology should make sense, and everything that we know from experience with visual culture should be reflected in what is being found out about the brain – if the neurology doesn’t make sense, it’s probably wrong. On the other hand, it’s nice for us to have language and research that confirms what we do know.
Barb
“In 90 minutes I got more info on the brain than in years of study. Thank you – this will really impact my work.” Michelle Boos-Stone
Daniel Perdigão: Visuals for Design Thinking Working: how to draw to improve business processes
Holger Nils Pohl: How visuals can create value in corporate processes
Jill Greebaum: Connecting Our Dots! Understanding the light (and dark) sides of our strengths
Connect Your Dots! Understanding the Light (and Dark) Sides of Our Strengths! focused on understanding ourselves better. Through the use of The Strengths Test, participants increased their self-awareness, discovered ways to fully engage their strengths, and left the session with a more nuanced understanding of themselves, their colleagues, and future relationships.
During our time together we
- discovered our personal strengths by completing the Strengths Test (online it can be found here, www.authentichappiness.com)
- described how our Signature Strengths show up in our daily lives — creating brilliance and causing us trouble
- discovered and discussed the Signature Strengths of our colleagues — noting similarities and differences
- explored how working collaboratively/utilizing a great variety of strengths sparks creativity
- developed a plan for using our strengths every day
- (We also made buttons sharing our strengths with our colleagues.)
The participants were totally engaged throughout the session. They delighted in confirming some of their ideas and adding to their repertoire of knowledge and skills — especially how to manage the “dark side” of their strengths.
Participants responded by saying (on the check out/closing chart)
I learned:
- About my strengths
- My values have shifted
- Don’t run away
- That I have strengths
- Affirmation of strengths
- Method to find out core strengths
- Linking the strengths to explain certain behaviors
I liked:
- Atmosphere in the room
- The reflective process
- My strengths
- Explicitly thinking about the light and dark sides
- Safe in the group
- Button (we made them)
I will:
- Learn more about +/- more about me
- Explore the surveys
- Be aware of down-side of strengths
- Explore using this with teams not just individuals
- Apply my strengths more consciously
- Think more about how to use my strengths in struggle
- Take action and improve my weakness
As always in this work, I was struck by people’s delight in discovering both the light and dark sides of their strengths, their resonance with the material, and willingness to think deeply and share openly about the challenges they face in life and work.
Jill
Nevada Lane: Beyond Live Recording: Combining visuals to support organizational change
Karl Bredemeyer: Visual facilitation meets scrum: Visual vocabulary for agile product development
Lisa Morton & Tammi Kay George: Two Brains — One marker: Collaborate to expand your practice – visuals and mind
Lynne Cazaly: Starring the best improvisers of all time
We may not know what the speaker or group will say… or what we will draw. We are improvisers – we roll with the content, we sketch as we feel.
Learn the elements of improvisation that will boost your capability to ‘handle what happens’ while you’re working as a visual practitioner. Onstage improvisers know something great we can learn from. Lynne Cazaly is a trained improviser, performer AND visual practitioner. She’ll show you how to bring the power and relaxation of improv to the visuals you create!
The purpose was to learn more about improvisation, how to use it to boost our capability to perform and deliver in the work we do, and how to open up creative thinking channels – while censoring your critic or fear or failure. The session aimed to build on the principles of improvisation, to play some improv games and to create some ‘visual improv’ activities.
What did we cover in the session?
- Principles of improvisation
- Improvisation applies in music, art, dance and comedy … we can apply it too
- Improvisation games in pairs and small groups
- Trust your spontaneity
- Say ‘yes’, accept and allow
- Fail happily
- Move forward – colour (detail) and progress a story
- Letting go
- Trusting your partner
- Making your partner look good
- Creative improvisation thinking activities of circles and squares
- Interview the expert game – hilarious!
- Listening to music and improv sketching to ‘what you hear’
- Improvisation words and what they can create – choosing three words and making something of it
- Starting pictures and sketches and adding to them – add something, pass it along, add something. Now what is it?
Participants responded wholeheartedly. In true improvisation fashion they ‘jumped in’ and started before they were ready. They embraced the activities and games, they gave good improv! They took risks, supported each other, and made something from every suggestion, activity or task.
That visual practitioners are great improvisers – while I thought this was the case, it was brilliant to see people actually applying improv principles and strengthening their application of them – the more we practiced, the stronger the improv muscle got. We need to be encouraged to risk, try and fail. We need to be brave and bold and while our improvisation is usually on show in the form of a visual, we are improvising all day, every day; we shouldn’t limit that thinking just to visuals. We can do much more with our capacity to build, test, try and improvise.
Lynne
Elders conversation
We had an afternoon dedicated to focusing on deeper purpose. First we heard from our “elders” — four who represent the longer history and practice in our visual thinking field. They were:
- David Sibbet — a pioneer and longtime leader in graphic recording, whose business The Grove in California offered an entrée into graphic recording to millions through their template range and who continues to explore the edge of practice
- Reinhard Kuchenmüller — from Visuelle Protokolle and based in Italy, Reinhard draws postcard sized snapshots and provocations to group process and is now focusing on individual coaching to make a difference
- Lynn Carruthers — President of IFVP and for 14 years the graphic recorder for GBN (Global Business Network), her role was establihed for her with amazing freedom to create. She’s recently left that role and finds herself confronted with her new freedom. She’s also based in California.
- Ulric Rudebeck — saw the power of visuals through David’s work and began to use them himself. That was a few decades ago now and he uses visuals to synthesize insight, stimulate innovation and purpose and galavanize potential in the groups and individuals he works with
The conversation started with the invitation to speak from their deepest knowing of their work and with the question “what keeps us alive as learners?”. Reinhard told of his first step into the practice, inviting others to draw what turned into 1,300 pictures and became a team. Lynn talked about moving from the assistant role to an innovation partner and the free and safe space an organisation offered to explore and deepen her craft. Ulric talked about the kahuna training he experienced and how it taught him to look at everything as a container and the importance of creating bounded space that enables people to step into the unknown. David spoke about how curiosity has driven his learning and his working life; how he works from a practice of sharing as much as possible and focusing on leading the field. Sharing forces him to stay awake, stay current and to keep experimenting and learning. Now he notices that he is approaching his work in a totally different manner, influencing more from being, letting the work flow through him, being a conduit for the group and its higher purpose. He also talked about the transition of caterpillar to butterfly and how we are all imaginal cells.
Since this was a fishbowl session, participants joined the conversation. The elders were asked “what is your advice to young people?”. “I love how fearless young people are — they don’t know what can’t be done so they just do it. Don’t give up your sovereign power to elders,” said David. “Make the choice to share and learn, be an imaginal cell and link with like-minded others.” Lynn said: “Don’t give up paper and don’t sleep with your phone.” “Stay moral”, said Ulric. “This is the beginning of the work, we can develop a culture,” said Reinhard.
After listening, the group then turned to each other to discuss what they’d heard and question arose from the audience. The elders were asked what the future of the field is — it is time to be messengers again, anything is possible right now and the field is exploding, we have hope that this is a way of seeing the whole. And finally — there are so many of us here from all over the world, it is a matter of HOW, not IF.
And a final insight you’d like to leave us with? “We have to understand the language of power and how much power we have when we have the pen.” “We create the containers for possibilities.” “We need to believe in abundance, I’ve decided NOT to work for ass….es any more. Speak with intention, listen with attention.” And finally — “we are not so special, everyone can draw and everyone should! We can help that.”
To read David Sibbet’s reflections on this conversation have a look at his blog.
Ulric Rudebeck’s comments about the conference here.
Storytelling
The elders opened the door, and we walked through it to our own storytelling. We gathered in small groups to share stories around the invitation
Tell about a time when you experienced the artistry, magic or mystery of visual thinking in such a way that it made a profound impact.
People got comfortable on chairs or on the floor, they leaned in, they shared from the heart and relationship was ripe in the room. Then five stories were invited to represent the variety of stories in the room and in our field. We heard these beautiful, poignant snapshots from our work and experience:
- Working on building a school in Ecuador, over coming the language barriers and showing people themselves through visuals.
- Working with high level people in Indonesia in a Theory U process and creating such a trustworthy container that they could be totally honest about how much damage they felt their industries were creating and how they needed help.
- Supporting a workshop in South Africa with participants from Zimbabwe who shared hard and dark stories, just allowing the image to come that might most support. Finally a tree showed up and became even more potent when participants flipped the image on its head.
- Learning as much from the participants as had been offered in a two day training.
- Challenging senior Chinese competitors to draw themselves as 5 year olds and call each other by their childhood nicknames — this created a bond between them that would have otherwise been impossible.
Mary Alice wove the stories together and used them as a lens on our field. What happens when we help people to feel seen — and we allow ourselves to be seen at the same time? How can we help each other see and be seen? What container do we need to be more honest, more vulnerable, more open? What kind of surrender do we need to practice to allow the images to come that will serve most? What is our personal practice? How can we continue to be both teachers and learners, practicing beginners mind? How can we have the courage to push the edges so that people step beyond their self-imposed roles and meet each other freely? How can we do the same for ourselves?
Evening
We came to the barbeque with energy and a focus on starting the party! After a great dinner, it was off in the walking bus to the boat. What a difference it makes to see a city from the water! Raindrops were falling on our heads, but we didn’t mind. There were umbrellas aplenty and wonderful people to share them with and conversation and dancing were the highlights….. Until the raffle!!! Who wouldn’t want to win a prize from Neuland? And the main prizes — a ticket to the next IFVP conference in Austin, Texas and €1,000 of Neuland product — the cheering! The jubilation! The envy! Ok, maybe next time…
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