The Mind Mapping Software Weblog

Beyond hierarchies: A better paradigm for mind mapping?

Shelly Hayduk, writing in TheBrain Blog, recently posted an article that suggests that traditional hierarchical mind maps may not be the best way to present complex information and knowledge. She points out that almost all software interfaces today are limited to organizing information into hierarchies, where a piece of information can only be categorized into one place. A case in point: the traditional file manager view in Microsoft Windows, where the directory tree resembles an expandable and contractible outline.

Here's where things get a little controversial: While Shelly acknowledges that mind mapping software offers an improved information hierarchy, it shares the same limitation as the directory tree of your computer's filing system, because each topic can have only one parent. If you want to create a link from one topic to a branch that is distant from it, this is somewhat hard to represent visually, especially in a very large map.

In contrast, PersonalBrain, the desktop software developed by her employer, is designed to create complex connections between widely disparate topics. Each node in the visual map can have connections to numerous other topics, enabling you to display non-hierarchical relationships between pieces of information. As a result, Shelly says TheBrain can be used to display and manipulate maps consisting of several thousand nodes, while giving a more complete picture of each node's multitude of relationships.

Please note: This isn't meant to be a commercial for TheBrain, but to highlight the philosophical differences between TheBrain's approach to visual information management and that of "traditional" mind mapping software.

What do you think? Have you downloaded and evaluated PersonalBrain? What was your experience? How well does it do at helping you to visualize relationships between ideas in your maps? I look forward to your feedback.

Using mind mapping to clarify and strengthen your business

Gideon King, the founder of NovaMind, is a big fan of Squidoo, a free service that enables registered users to create resource pages on various subjects. But rather than create a set of links to cool mind mapping resources, Gideon has decided to take a different approach: to utilize this service to develop a series of articles about applications of mind mapping software.

This Squidoo "lens" on Using Mind Mapping to Clarify and Strengthen Your Business is a case in point. In it, Gideon explains how to use mind mapping software to create a company mission statement, how to set goals, plan your website and sell your ideas, all illustrated with brightly colored mind maps. They all recommend that you download and utilize a copy of NovaMind to create these maps, of course, but thankfully Gideon employs a "soft sell" approach. The bottom line is that he has created an informative article that many new mind mappers are likely to appreciate. He has also created lenses on How to Mind Map and Business Continuity.

"Visual thinking school" reveals how to solve business issues, communicate better - with pictures

Dave Gray, the CEO of XPLANE, has launched a multi-part "Visual Thinking School" on Squidoo. It consists of a series of "lenses" (resource pages) that together form a "mini-course" on various facets of visual thinking, including:

• An introduction to visual thinking
• Visual communication skills - how to make your messages more clear, concise and consistent
• Visual vocabulary - Learn about a set of elements, or visual "words" that make communicating visually possible
• Visual thinking tools - This lens is still under construction, but Dave's tools of choice are pencil/pen and paper.
• Visual thinking spaces - Some work spaces are more conducive to visual thinking than others. Dave shares some tips for setting up your workspace to support it.
• Sketching - All about learning to "see" visually - it's not as hard as you think!
• Signs, symbols and icons - These elements are ways to represent a complete thought in a simple way. Dave explains how to utilize them.
• Information design - This is the discipline of developing structures which allow people to find information that's relevant to them (e.g., website design and structure is a great example)
• Visual mapping - A way to think through complex problems or solve problems - visually. This mini-course does focus on mind maps, concept maps, flow charts and other techniques.

Dave is a pretty brilliant guy. Even though most of these presentations don't deal directly with mind mapping or mind mapping software, many of the underlying principles and concepts are here, and are explained briefly and clearly. I highly recommend that you check out these visual thinking resources!

VizThink launches regional "Visualizing Information" workshops

VizThink, a new community of visual thinkers, recently announced a new regional workshop series that is aimed to help businesspeople to improve their visual thinking skills. These sessions, which will be held in Chicago and New York, will be run by Dave Gray, the founder and chairman of XPLANE (a leading consulting and information design firm), and Karl Gude, the former graphics director at Newsweek magazine. Here's a brief synopsis of what you'll learn, from the workshop web page:

"They will show you how to visualize your ideas so you can think and communicate with greater clarity and effectiveness. Working individually and in small teams, you will learn and practice visualization techniques that have been successfully used to improve innovation and accelerate change at some of the world's leading companies. After completing this workshop you will have a toolkit for thinking and presentation effectiveness - your presentations of complex information and strategies will never be the same."

The New York session will be held on Friday, May 2, 2008, 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. at the Crowne Plaza White Plains in White Plains, NY. The Chicago session will be held on Wednesday, May 7, 2008, 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. at the Conference Center at UBS Tower in Chicago, IL.

I haven't met Karl Gude, but I did recently have a long phone conversation with Dave Gray; he's a fascinating guy, that's for sure!

For more information about these new workshops, please visit the session web page.

Mind Mapping Manifesto - Early feedback from mapping experts

Early feedback from the mind mapping community on my new e-book, The Mind Mapping Manifesto, has been very positive. As I explained in an earlier blog posted, I wrote this e-book to spread the word about the business productivity benefits of mind mapping software, and to help executives to make an informed decision about investing in it.

Mind mapping experts believe I've hit the nail on the head. Here's a case in point:

Jaime Nast is widely regarded as one of the world's most authoritative experts on mind mapping. From 1992 until 2006 Jamie directed Buzan Centres USA and was the only Senior Master Trainer representing Buzan Centres worldwide for mind mapping and other mental literacy skills. She is the author of the popular book, Idea Mapping, and has trained thousands of people on visual mapping skills.

In short, when Jaime, talks, people listen. Here's what she has to say about The Mind Mapping Manifesto:

"Chuck Frey has done it again! No one is more thorough in analyzing mind mapping software, collecting statistics on how professionals are using various products, sharing the benefits and time savings people are experiencing, and helping sort through the strengths of various software packages. This e-book is a must-read for busy executives everywhere."

Other bloggers covering mind mapping have also praised my new e-book:

"The Mind Mapping Manifesto... offers some fantastic advice on how to use mind mapping software to better deal with information overload, gain clarity on key projects and objectives, and become a much more efficient organizer. I highly recommend this book."

-- Eric Blue, Eric Blue's Blog

"Chuck has gathered in one place research from disparate sources, to show how today's knowledge worker faces new challenges, and how many have not found the tools to cope. In the Mind Mapping Manifesto, he sets out to unblock this logjam. If you are not mind mapping now, I urge you to read this manifesto."

-- Vic Gee, The Mind-mapping.org Blog

To survive and thrive in today's hypercompetitive world, you need better tools. This e-book is a comprehensive roadmap that will help you to take tame information overload, plan projects more effectively, make better decisions and revolutionize your workflow.

Why not invest in your future today?

Demystifying mind mapping

Vern Burkhardt from IdeaConnection.com recently interviewed me about mind mapping and mind mapping software. We start out discussing what mind mapping is, and then focus on its value as a business tool. To read this interview, please click here.

Amazing insights into the relationship between information overload and visual thinking

A writer from management guru Tom Peters' website recently interviewed Dan Roam, author of the new book, The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures, about visual thinking and how it can help business people to cope with a variety of business challenges, including information overload. While this fascinating interview doesn't specifically mention mind mapping, the principles of visual thinking that it highlights do have relevance to mind mapping:

"We're approaching a perfect storm of information complexity. The only possible way to deal with it is for us to become much more visual in the way we do business. Here's what I mean. Due to globalization, it's becoming increasingly likely that an entire project team won't speak the same language. That's storm number one. Storm number two is information overload. If, 50 or 100 years ago, the greatest decision-making challenge someone faced was not having enough good intelligence, the problem today is the opposite; we have too much information. That's only going to continue to get worse. Storm number three is more complicated communication, due to global supply chains and true global integration of business processes: more channels, more people, more participants, more formats. Combining those three storms... makes getting even the simplest message across to someone very difficult. The good news is that visual thinking presents a way to address each one of these issues. Visuals are independent of language.

"On the information complexity side, visual thinking provides us an incredibly powerful set of tools for looking at complex sets of data... If we use some of the basic tenets of visual thinking, suddenly we find ways to visually triage our way through too much information. Patterns start to come out and we get better at intuitive pattern recognition so that we can more effectively interpret the data."

"Visual thinking is the universal problem-solving tool kit."

I love the concept of "visual triage." It speaks to the idea of sifting through the ideas and information you have collected, determining which elements are the most important, and rearranging them within your map accordingly.

As you know if you've been reading this blog lately, the relationship between information overload and mind mapping is the core theme of my latest e-book, The Mind Mapping Manifesto. Click here to learn more.

The Mind Mapping Manifesto is Now Available

My new e-book, The Mind Mapping Manifesto, is now available! It aims to help business people to understand what a powerful business tool mind mapping software is, and how it can help them. Here is a brief summary of the valuable insights and advice it contains:

• The true cost of information overload and multi-tasking (it will open your eyes to a looming crisis)
• What research proves about the benefits of mind mapping software in business (the productivity impact is substantial!)
• Perspectives from 10 mind mappers on the impact this type of software has made on the way they think, plan and work.
• A list of over 20 business applications where mind mapping software can be used to increase your efficiency
• Ten tips on how to select the right mind mapping program for your needs
• A checklist to help you identify your needs
• Reviews of 5 top mind mapping programs that I personally recommend
• My “best of” list of the programs that offer the greatest performance in 8 key areas.
• A collection of over 50 resources where you can discover the best tools, resources and advice about mind mapping software

Invest in your future by ordering The Mind Mapping Manifesto today!

Coming soon: The Mind Mapping Manifesto

Recently, I hinted in this blog that I'm about to launch a new e-book, entitled The Mind Mapping Manifesto. It aims to help business people to understand what a powerful business tool mind mapping software is, and how it can help them to:

• Conquer information overload,
• Make better decisions,
• Reach clarity faster on key issues,
• Become a more creative problem solver, and
• Supercharge their effectiveness.

I'm really excited about how it has come together, and I think it will really help to build the business case for mind mapping software. I hope to launch it some time next week. If you would like to be notified as soon as it is published, please click here.

The revolution is about to begin!

Getting started with mind mapping podcast now available

Tom Crawford from the VizThink community recorded a video podcast with me earlier this week, where we talked about a number of topics related to mind mapping, including:

• What is mind mapping?
• Paper versus computer-assisted mapping
• The history of mind mapping
• The future of mind mapping
• Web-based versus computer-based mapping tools
• New features in demand by users
• How to get started with mind mapping for beginners

Click here to view this video, or download the MP3 audio of our discussion. I hope you enjoy it!