Visual Thinking

The internet is a content machine! A bevy of Design Thinking and Visual Thinking content awaits your attention. We snare much of it in our Google alerts and Twitter keyword searches. Below find a few of the links we think worthy of your time.

Design Thinking vs. Visual Thinking Gamestorming sits at the intersection of the two: a set of visual thinking tools curated to support the design thinking process. For a primer, or reminder, on the differences and relationship between the two, check out Matt Morasky’s explanation. Link

Why Nothing Cuts Through Complexity Like Visual Thinking In this 12 minute interview, Dan Roam breaks down common misconceptions and barriers to visual thinking, explains how our brains are wired for visual thinking and how power and influence flow to those who can visually express ideas. Link

These Three Visual Thinking Tips Will Make You a Brilliant Writer In the final part of his interview, Roam explains that many successful authors draw their ideas before writing them. This piece discusses a framework designed to produce better storytelling, a skill valuable to more than authors. MITSloan Management Review recently published research stating that Crafting Compelling Stories is the number one skill of transformational senior leaders. Link

FiveFifty: The Midlife of Design Speaking of Management publications, this McKinsey Quarterly interactive piece serves as a portal to a deeper design thinking dive. Created to commemorate Design Thinking’s 50th Anniversiary, the piece discusses how design thinking has been good for business and why the digital economy demands more companies adopt. You can pass through in five minutes, or spend many more (McKinsey thinks 50) learning about the ways design thinking impacts not only the products we use but the companies we work for. Link

Editor’s note: Publications like the McKinsey Quarterly, MITSloan Management Review, HBR, et al… are vastly informative. I always feel smarter for having read them. They do a wonderful job identifying trends, distilling academic research and educating on management best practices; they lack, perhaps deliberately, the instructions to implement. Gamestorming can be a wonderful application layer for much of the advice issued in these wonderful publications. As I read their expertise I often jot down a string of games I think might bring their wisdom to life.

All About Empathy Fortune’s Ellen McGirt writes a nice piece on the Empathy Map and its recent update. The Map’s recognition from leading design institutions led to unexpected popularity. The update intends to clarify the Map’s value and reinforce the process for optimizing it. Link Check out the Empathy Map here on the site.

If including this piece feels mildly self-indulgent, I understand.

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