MY FAVOURITE PICTURE FOR THE WEEK: Evolution of the Internet in Graphics

[Source: The Grove Consultants International/David Sibbet]

STRATEGIC VISIONING & ALL THAT JAZZ

The process of creating a vivid picture of the future is an important step in designing a future that is better than yesterday & today. It applies both to the organisation as well as the individual.

A clear, motivating picture can inspire us to reach for the sky & overcome challenges & problems that come along.

Once created, a compelling vision will begin to impact today, as a foundation for new directions.

The brilliant neuro-scientist Dr Karl Pribram of the Stanford University has often described such a phenomenon as an "image of achievement", which in reality has powerful multi-sensory implications, especially for an individual.

By the way, he has postulated the brain model, known as 'Holographic Brain', to help substantiate his theory.

In fact, I like the way futurist Joel Arthur Barker puts it in perspective:

"The future is something you create; not something that happens to you."

”You can & should shape your own future; if you don’t, someone else surely will.”

Crafting a meaningful vision of the future - irrespective of whether it's for an organisational or personal setting - isn't always that easy or simple, but it can be done, with proper coaching & guidance.

Essentially, 'strategic visioning' takes concerted efforts to explore, think, assess, plan, organise, execute, control & monitor. Once a vision is established, one has to follow-through consistently as well as persistently.

To draw lessons from success coach Anthony Robbins, in addition to having the sensory acuity to stay focused on the defined objectives, one also needs to have the mental flexibility to make immediate adjustments & changes, if things are not working according to plan.

After all, success is always the function of making corrections.

Personally, my most profound learning experience with "strategic visioning" came from the late Datuk Eric Chia, former Chairman & CEO of the United Motor Works Group, during the early eighties, when I had just joined the group's Singapore subsidiary as a marketing manager. [When I first met him, he was 'Datuk', but later became 'Tan Sri' after I had left the group in 1987. He will always be in my fond memory as Datuk Eric Chia.]

I had already described my personal learning encounters with him in several earlier posts of my 'Optimum Performance Technologies' weblog.

My next most productive learning experience with 'strategic visioning' came personally from the legendary corporate strategist Jim Channon in Kona, Hawaii, during the early nineties.

The third encounter came from all the amassed learning materials of large-scale graphic facilitation guru David Sibbet of Grove Consultants, & a few others.

In a nut shell, 'Strategic visioning' is just a powerful term to denote the process of designing a compelling future, for an organisation as well as for an individual.

Dilip Mukerjea likes to call it 'Lifescaping'.

After all, as scenario strategist Arie de geus, & also author of the classic, 'The Living Company', has argued so brilliantly, an organisation is also a "living organism", metaphorically speaking.

Interestingly, as a sidetrack, our planet earth is also a "living organism". Thanks to Dr James Lovelock & his Gaia hypothesis, even though planet earth's friendly genius Bucky, or more officially addressed as R Buckminister Fuller, preferred 'spaceship' as an analogy.

Nonetheless, other experts in the field have fancy term for 'strategic visioning': futurcasting; futurescaping, visioncrafting, just to name a few.

Unlike the traditional & more mundane "strategic planning", which is a readily accepted practice among many businesspeople & professionals, 'strategic visioning' encapsulates a more cogent, cohesive content-rich, big-picture, gestalt-provoking metaphorical perspective.

Operationally, right-brain visual thinking, combined with left-brain analytical approach, plays a vital role in the 'strategic visioning' process design.

My good friend's beautiful lifescape, as recapitulated below, captures the whole essence - the "strategic heartbeat", so to speak - of 'strategic visioning' with its attendant operational intensity, extrapolating from the hindsight of the past, merging with the insight of the present & integrating with the foresight of the future.

Strategically, the purpose of 'strategic visioning' is to help one - organisation or individual - to answer the following pertinent & yet critical questions:

- what have you been?

- where are you now?

- where do you want to go?

- how do you get there?

- how do you keep going?

- how do you know when you get there?

I reckon, the most distinctive feature of 'strategic visioning', based on my own personal & professional experiences, & as compared to 'strategic planning', is the extension of the envisioning of possibilities, where one paints possible future scenarios in order to to think more deeply about the future.

The foregoing is actually a relatively new area of expertise known specifically as 'strategic or scenario exploration', which I will have to cover separately.

In fact, the more possible futures one can imagine & prepare for, the better one will be able to survive that unexpected future that will most assuredly come about.

It is my personal intention to use the next & subsequent posts to explore with readers how 'strategic visioning' actually works, by riding on Dilip's wonderful masterpiece as an intellectual platform.


[To be continued in the Next Post. The bottom image in this post is the intellectual property of Dilip Mukerjea.]

INTRODUCING LIFESCAPE, A Masterpiece from Dilip Mukerjea

Here's another brilliant intellectual creation from Dilip Mukerjea. It's an example of a lifescape, & the attendant methodology is called 'lifescaping'.

In simplistic terms, a lifescape is just a roadmap from point A to point B, or endpoint.

Because it's visual, it automatically engenders a gestalt perspective.

Hence, it can capture readily all the pertinent bottlenecks, obstacles as well as signposts or milestones, & even the performance metrics, all in visual forms, of one's intended journey towards a preferred future or desired outcome, in any kind of setting - be it organisational, professional or personal.

In a more elaborate form, one can also display mission, vision & value statements, as well as critical success factors, with bold actions as part of one's gameplan, all visually, on the roadmap.

In a nut shell, a lifescape is a quick snapshot of where you want to go, how you want to get there, & what are the likely problems, as well as opportunities, along your journey path.

When 'Neutron Jack', or better known to most people as Jack Welch, embarked on his well-known GE Workout during the early eighties, the first thing he did was to engage David Sibbet of Grove Consultants to create a one-page vision map - which is a variation of lifescape - for all employees to stay focused & committed on the chosen recovery path.

Please stay tuned, as Dilip is currently working on a complete hands-on strategy guide with templates & worksheets to help you craft out your own lifescape.

STORYBOARDING: MY PERSONAL JOURNEY & PERSPECTIVES

In retrospect, I had actually learned the storyboarding technique from the intellectual works of three gurus (not in any particular order):

One is Mike Vance, the creativity guru who once worked with the legendary Walt Disney & his animation studios. [He now runs the Creative Association of America creativity consulting outfit.]

The second one is Jerry McNellis, who calls his storyboarding methodology, 'compression planning', in conjunction with group problem solving.

The last one is David Sibbet of Grove Consultants International. David's methodology has a different twist to it, as it resonates more closely with what is now known as 'graphic facilitation', in conjunction with strategic visionising.

I still own the basic equipment, materials & resources, which I had procured from each of them respectively during the nineties.

It is often acknowledged that the legendary Walt Disney pioneered the storyboarding methodology.

Incidentally, Mike Vance wrote the book, 'Think Out of The Box', with Diane Deacon in the nineties. The book had a profile on Walt Disney, among many others.

Mike Vance calls his storyboarding process, as applied to creative thinking, 'displayed thinking'.

In this particular post, I will only concentrate on talking about my personal adaptation & single user experience with storyboarding.

In subsequent posts, I will share my insights with regard to each of the above-mentioned storyboarding &/or graphic facilitation processes, within the context of group dynamics.

In the light of its original & predominant usage in the movie world, a storyboard is just a visual organisation of the exact movie sequences, usually in the form of rough sketches drawn by artists, & arranged in a logical sequence, before the actual filming.

The storyboard, in this case, allows the movie director to define, show &/or flesh out some important aspects of the movie, together with the actors & actresses &/or action director, who will take care of the action choreography.

I have always used an adaptation of the original storyboarding process as envisaged by Walt Disney in my training design & development.

One of my early fellow trainers has often said to me, there are only three important elements in any successful training workshop:

1) Substance;

2) Sequence;

3) Showmanship;

I often use a rudimentary version of the storyboard to fulfill the second element.

To execute, you can use a white board or even a flip chart.

Firstly, jot down what you intend to teach the participants, & write each idea in a post-it note.

One idea, one note.

Next, display the completed note on to the board or flip-chart.

Then, repeat this process until all possible ideas are captured on post-it notes.

Upon final completion, i.e. after displaying all the completed notes on the board or flip chart, just stand back to take a close look. A big picture view, so to speak.

When you think of a new idea, just jot it them & paste the note into the arrangement.

Or if you think one of the ideas does not fit in for some reasons, just remove it.

Shift or shuffle the completed notes around to complete your intended sequence.

If necessary, think of idea clusters, especially when the training needs to extend into two or more days.

The post-it notes allow you to do wonders. You can also use different colour post-it notes to denote different idea clusters.

Once you are happy with the final arrangement, i.e. the storyboard, you can proceed to write out the curriculum for your training design.

In a brainstorming session, you can also use the storyboard to work out the sequential steps of implementation.

I often take the opportunity to teach small kids how to use the storyboard to fish out important aspects in the life history of any famous person.

For example, I will give the kids a comic book on Albert Einstein.

Then, with the aid of an A2 sized construction paper, some post-it notes of 3 colours, & through the journalists' questions (5W1H), I will get them to chart out the life history of the famous person, especially his major influences & notable accomplishments, covering three phases of his life as follows:

- as a young boy;

- as a young man;

- as a successful physicist;

Like me, kids are always fascinated by Albert Einstein as well as the power of storyboarding.

They are most happy to use the opportunity to display their memory skills as well as drawing/sketching abilities, in addition to learning a useful planning tool.

In a subsequent post, I will also share with readers another variation of mine, with regard to storyboarding.

In execution, it's actually my fully adapted version of the industry-strength 'PERT CHART', a visual planning & project management tool, for parents to help their kids & teenagers to chart out their academic as well as life pursuits.

In his excellent book, 'Surfing the Intellect: Building Intellectual Capital for the Knowledge Economy', Dilip Mukerjea, has introduced a more elaborate form of storyboarding, under 'Creativity Technique #10: Storyboarding: The Disney Methodology', from page 123 to 131.

Another good book that touches on the 'Disney Methodology' is William Capodagli & Lynn Jackson's 'The Disney Way'.

The beauty of storyboarding is this: It makes your thinking VISIBLE!

As one of the gurus put it: Think it! See it! Do it!

As a group process, it's great fun, & synergy happens when everybody is having fun!

It also leverages collaborative time. It gets every body on their feet, facing the storyboards on the wall, fully involved in the outcome. Best of all, it fully utilises multiple avenues of learning modalities.

[to be continued in the Next Post.]