More MindGenius - Mind Mapping Software

Time 2021-06-03 14:18:12

Web Name: More MindGenius - Mind Mapping Software

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Biggerplate Unplugged returnedfor 2015 earlier this month, and our very own Jamie MacDonald was inattendance, flying the flag for MindGenius in London.We were once again among a greatbunch of experienced and knowledgeable friends from the mind mapping community,with a few friendly MindGenius user faces in the crowd!For his speech at the conference,Jamie decided to discuss some of the barriers that prevent individuals andteams being effective contributors in day-to-day working environments. In a businessmind mapping software perspective, Jamie demonstrated how mind mapping software,such as MindGenius acts as a catalyst for more effective and productive way ofworking.Until next time thanksBiggerplate!Harvard Business School Professor Michael Porterargues that competitive strategy is about being different . He comments: Itmeans deliberately choosing a different set of activities to deliver a uniquemix of value . In one of his early books Porter defines competitive strategy as a combination of the ends (goals) for which the firm is striving and the means(policies) by which it is seeking to get there .There are many textbook definitions for a StrategicPlan, but in basic terms it could be described as:The following mind map provides a visual overviewof a typical Strategic Planning framework 1.Review Past PerformanceMost Strategy Planning starts with a review of past performance a critical look at current situation where each area of the business is reviewed in terms of performance, what worked well, what didn t go so well, and areas for improvementThis is an important facet of kick-starting any strategic review or plan and provides meaningful insights into both positive and negative aspects of previous and/or current performance. There are many ways of doing this, including tools and techniques such as SWOT analysis, etc, but it is important to execute this part of the involving the right people (for credible and accurate insights and for decision-making and direction setting as the exercise progresses).2.Develop a Vision StatementA Vision Statement should be both an aspirational and inspirational description of where the business is going and what it aims to achieve in the medium to long-term. It serves as a clear guide for the direction the business wishes to take, setting out the high level primary goals.3.Develop a Mission StatementA Mission Statement outlines the core purpose of a business and its reason for existing. It should help guide the business strategies, articulate its overall goals, provide a roadmap and guide any decision making.A Mission Statement should also clearly outline products and services, which markets will be served and how; and communicate intended direction to the organisation, customers, and stakeholders.4.Identify Strategic ObjectivesAt this stage, the aim is to develop a set of high-level Objectives for all areas of the business.They need to highlight the priorities, goals and objectives that will ensure delivery of the vision and mission.A view of the end-objectives and results required for each objective is a must.Aligned with the first stage of Review, in particular the SWOT analysis, other key aspects of setting these objectives would be: building on the identified strengths; ensuring plans and actions are in place to take care of areas of weakness; identified opportunities are factored in and included; actions are in place to counter any perceived threats.This stage is very much aligned with the next stage of implementation 5.Implementation PlansThe distillation from the Vision, Mission and higher-level Strategic Objectives needs to filter down to Departmental, Team and individual Objectives and Action Plans.The who, what, where, when, and how needs to be agreed and communicated.Plans are now more operational and process aligned with SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-related) objectives agreed and put in place.These objectives also need to take into account Performance Indicators, Resource allocation and budget requirements.6.Performance ManagementAll the Objectives and Action Plans need to be continually reviewed against the agreed outcomes or Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).Targets and results need be continually monitored and reviewed.The whole Strategy and related objectives, plans, projects, etc, must be managed in such a way that strengths and weaknesses can be quickly and easily identified and acted on, with the ethos of continuous improvement and business excellence at the core of the strategy.In terms of the executing and managing the whole end-to-end process of Strategic Planning, an increasing number of planners, managers, directors and business leaders are now turning to business mind mapping software to map, visualize, shape, present and communicate in key aspects of: Brainstorming sessions at the scoping and planning stages Creatively applying problem solving and other tools and techniques such as SWOT, etc. More efficient and focussed planning, running and follow-up of meetings Capturing individual and team contributions to ideas, knowledge and experience Gaining understanding on the both the big picture and component parts Better, well-informed decision making and prioritisation Scoping, planning and authoring documents, reports and presentations Creating, allocating, monitoring and managing Objectives, Tasks and Actions Planning, scheduling and managing ProjectsFor those of you engaged in any of the Strategic Planning process, from the initial performance review, through to implementing and managing objectives, actions, projects, etc., I would thoroughly recommend the use of mind mapping software. It truly does augment and add value to your existing suite of daily-use applications through its highly intuitive and engaging capture visualize manage processes and functions, enabling increased productivity, clarity on all work activities and higher quality outputs (to name but a few!).Dr. Peter Moir of Relequa Analytical Systems Ltd shares his use of MindGenius to overcome writers block when writing a Research Paper. He has also created a template map to help others with the same process "If like me you struggle getting started writing, anything, and find yourself staring at a blank screen and the cursor flashing saying come on type something for goodness sake". A technique that I use, just as I am using now, is to start writing just what s in my head without thinking about sentence structure or choice of words.Another great technique is using MindGenius. It s a way of pulling together information that I think I might need to work into my piece of writing at some point. To facilitate this I construct a MindGenius map. In this case I m writing a research paper and to help you get started on your own paper, I ve turned my efforts into a template.The really useful thing about this template is you don t have to be thinking in terms of a beginning, middle and end, or, in this case, Introduction, Results and Discussion, before you can write. Basically we re talking about a means to get around the so-called Writers block .Just to get going, copy and paste the tile and authors of possible relevant publications into the Introduction arm as separate branches, add a sub-branch and paste in the abstract if you want. Copy and paste from the pdf, or write in sentences or small sections, from the text of these papers into the branches where you think a comment in your own words may be required.Alternatively, you may like to just quietly sit and think, why am I writing this paper? , who is it for? and as you come up with some thoughts put them into the Purpose branch. Start in your mind to build logically how your idea can be described. Start laying out this logic by writing your thoughts as Results branches. As you do this, have in your mind to create a Hook, something about your research that will grab people s attention. Place this hook right at the beginning of the Introduction.Our goal is to communicate your idea. Communication skills were not taught to scientists when I was at third level education. Thinking about the best way to communicate and what I m hearing these days is simple. We learned to read and learned about life through people telling us stories. Why not tell your idea as a story? The Introduction sets the scene for your story. A journey is travelled and Results collected on the way. Our finale is the Discussion showing how it all comes together and wouldn t it be good to have a bit of a cliff-hanger to have your readers wanting more.Give credit where credit s due. Inspiration for my template came from a lecture by Professor Simon Peyton Jones, University of Cambridge. There will be key aspects of your work that has come from other researches. Don t just acknowledge these contributions but show how they are important to you and where they fit in. Use the template to structure these references. Doing this will bring focus to your work, clarify your thinking and show you do actually know what you re talking about.Once you ve got your background information and the results sections to support your idea on the template, drag, copy/paste the information to re-organise what you have into a coherent story. Add/delete branches as you see fit. My most recent effort started with 3 Results branches, expanded to 6 and then ended up at 4. Two of the branches marked as next paper . Yes, only include what has merit in supporting your idea and don t use up precious column space just because you think people want to see you ve done loads of work. They don t and it doesn t matter.You should now have a good feel for what you want to say, so just start writing whatever section or parts feels most comfortable. Update the template as you write. Highlight in colour parts that are completed, needs revisiting (but move on and come back later), requires more data , and so on. Honestly, it does get easier as you keep writing and you ll find your own rhythm or flow.When you get to a satisfactory draft of your paper, dispense with any fears and get somebody to read it through and appreciate the feedback."Dr. Peter MoirDirectorRelequa Analytical Systems Ltd www.relequa.comRead More...Former NHS professional Mary Duggan returns with her second blog post. Recalling moments from her role within the Healthcare sector, Mary shares her experiences, challenges and her methods to overcome the most difficult of business matters. Actually, this isn t so much about creating a compelling vision as creating the engaging narrative that accompanies it. All of us have probably had the same experience of listening to a charismatic leader describing their vision for the future. It is exciting, it gets our hearts beating faster, we leave the room determined to make that vision happen. Then we sit down and think about it. That s where it starts to unravel a bit, and the practical souls among us start to wonder what the vision actually means and what it might look like if it came about, and how would we know that we d got there. I ve certainly experienced that little heart-sink moment when I realise that although the vision sounded beautiful while I was listening to the inspirational presentation, once I ve left the room I am no longer exactly sure what it means in reality. It is very hard to describe something that doesn t currently exist in concrete enough terms for people to engage with it and make it happen. A while ago, I was involved in some exciting large-scale transformation work within an NHS Foundation Trust. We had planned a series of public transformation events where we would invite stakeholders to put some meat on the bones of the vision. We knew from past experience that presenting people with slides full of statistics and structure diagrams would not generate much creativity. One of my colleagues suggested that if we presented a set of stories that showed people where we thought we needed to make changes it might be more fruitful. Indeed, it was. We crafted half a dozen stories about fictional service users (though drawing on actual experiences) that described care that while not being terrible wasn t good enough, either. They were short, to the point, and told in the first person. At the events, six people got up and narrated the stories. You could have heard a pin drop. The content that was then generated was powerful. So, what s that got to do with Mind Maps, you might ask. We used the workshop content to generate some new stories that described the desired future state. Then someone pointed out that we didn t have corresponding stories from the point of view of the staff who would be delivering the transformed services. We started trying to draft them but while it had been fairly straightforward to create service user perspective stories, it was much harder to get into the mechanics of how the services would actually be delivered. I assembled a group of experienced staff, along with my laptop, a projector and a set of simple questions that I had placed in a Mind Map. The questions really were simple: Imagine a future, say 5 years from now. The transformation that we are talking about now has come about and the changes are now part of normal working practice. What would staff be doing that is different from how they are working now?How might working relationships be different? How might this feel?What sort of things might happen between now and having a completed/embedded transformation? How might those events feel?Are there any places we don't want to go?The Map, with these questions, was projected for the group to see. People were invited to reflect on the questions and share their thoughts. A couple of hours of intense conversation followed. I captured comments and thoughts in the map as they were spoken I made no attempt to sort or analyse. The group was able to see themes and patterns emerge for themselves and people were able to select which they wanted to explore in more depth. The end result was a rich and detailed picture of how both concrete working processes and more nebulous cultural issues would need to change, and the actions that would be needed to drive this. So far, you could argue that this was simply an electronic brainstorming process. One of the problems with brainstorm output is that it remains as a set of hastily written flip-chart sheets that lose clarity very rapidly. I suspect that when something is handwritten, it takes more of an effort to correct it or choose more effective wording, but when something is digital it can be edited quickly and cleanly. This encouraged the group to seek precision in what they were saying. The second important factor that comes into play is the ability to use the analytical tools that MindGenius offers. The group discussion had already highlighted some themes, which were used as the analysis categories. It took a short time after the group to categorise all of the comments, sort them into category groups and re-present them to the participants as a coherent and powerful narrative. The unexpected part of the experience for me and for the group members was how exiting and moving the process was. The group quite literally saw their vision take shape in front of them. Look out for Mary's third blog post coming soon.It s almost time to down tools, abandon your desk and enjoythis season s festivities but before then, have you planned ahead for 2015? Mapping out tasks, priorities and deadlines provides theideal format to capture, sort and categorise your own or your team s workload.The mapping exercise allows you to visualise everything and arrive at decisionson workload levels, importance, priorities and what needs to be delegated.Additional functionality enables categorisation, allocationof resources and timescales, filtering and other mechanisms for tracking andreporting.We all subscribe to the adage that failing to plan isplanning to fail . The use of mind mapping software to organise objectives,tasks and general workload really does help you to plan, organise and worksmarter to be that bit more thorough, efficient and effective.The area of Project Management covers a wide and variedspread of project types and sizes from relatively small projects coveringshort timescales, through to complex multi-faceted projects involving manypeople and covering months, sometimes years of work. The size, type and natureof any project will dictate the amount of time, resources, methodologies andprocesses.Our experience and research indicates that, regardless ofsize and type, many projects fail due to poor or inadequate planning. This isthe pre-scheduling stage, the crucial up-front capture of the project requirementsand the project work breakdown structure (WBS) the stage that everything elsehinges on, where if important aspects are missed; project success ispotentially placed under immediate risk.The use of mind mapping software to brainstorm, capture andstructure the all-important up-front project WBS enables planning to be betterfocussed and effective. This highly visual way of capturing project data isengaging and more naturally suited to this process than traditional static,linear methods such as schedules and spreadsheets.More often than not we are required to research or examineand evaluate lengthy or complex pieces of information. It is that sense ofbeing faced with a mass of information to interpret it and make sense of it allthat can sometimes be a daunting prospect.Mind mapping software saves us time and a whole lot ofeffort in the way we can capture key words and phrases and quickly de-clutterchunks of information. The visual aspect appeals to the way we naturally chunk information to reduce complexity and gain better insights into what itall means.The fact that we can group, move, sort, colour-code,categorise and/or filter on mapped information gives us various options ofworking with and interpreting information quickly, effortlessly and in a lesslabour-intensive way than some traditional methods.In practically everything we do, we almost subconsciouslytake our ideas and knowledge through an information journey process capture,understand, analyse and decide. We all embark on these information journeyscontinually in most of our business activities. We don t always process ideas,creativity, knowledge and experience in the most effective or efficient ways,the result of which is misunderstandings, misconceptions, missed opportunitiesand missed deadlines (to name but a few!).Too many times we miss things; we don t utilise ourcreativity as much as we should; we re not thorough enough; we don t have theright tools and techniques for thinking things through.Mind mapping software is one of the best enablers forvisualising data and facts. We can take any problem or opportunity and run itthrough any technique that involves drilling into the detail of who, what,where, why, when and how? Mapping is an excellent way of brainstorming, ideageneration and generally capturing knowledge, experience and creativity.a career spanning over 30 years in healthcare including front line work as anOccupational Therapist and more recently within Lead Service Improvement, MaryDuggan recalls the significance of mind mapping software within her role.Through her years of experience, Mary adapted her tools and approach in orderto achieve a more productive and intuitive way of working. Recalling aparticular moment in her career, Mary explains just how much mind mappingsoftware revolutionised her role.Every mind map tells a storyimprovement is generally seen as a systematic approach that walks peoplethrough the stages of assessment, diagnosis, problem definition and solutiongeneration. That's how we like to think about it anyway. It is ascomforting as the London Underground map - logical and straightforward tofollow. Many of us will recognise that it also bears as much relationshipto the real world as the London Underground map does. The process is auseful guide, but at some point you have to involve real people and real-lifecomplex and messy situations. Then the dissimilarities between the mapand the territory begin to appear.years ago, I was working in a service for older people with mental healthproblems. We were fairly sure that we could be using our resources moreeffectively. As part of the initial assessment and diagnostic stage, Iarranged to interview a group of men whose wives all had dementia and werereceiving services from us. I had a well-constructed question set allready to go. Within the first minute of the interview, it all started tofall apart. I asked the first question. One of the men replied"I'll tell you how it's been..." and began to tell the story of hisexperience. I tried to draw him politely back to the question. Heignored me equally politely and carried on with his story. I bowed to theinevitable and listened carefully as he and his companions told me what it hadbeen like to see their wives struggling more and more with everyday life andtheir experience of trying to get help. As they ended their stories, Irealised that they had answered all of my questions, naturally and eloquently.Most importantly, they knew that their stories had been heard.wasn't using mind-mapping back then. I had to spend a considerable lengthof time transcribing a tape recording of four men with very broad WestYorkshire accents. Then I had to try to sort their answers into themes.I got there eventually.a few weeks ago, I did some work with a team who were concerned about theend-to-end time that their referral to admission process took. Theyprovide a rehabilitation service for people who need longer-term support toregain their independence. There was a general feeling that the processwas lengthy and cumbersome. The team hadspecifically requested support with some lean techniques.had done some initial data exploration which seemed to be telling us that apartfrom a few outliers, the process generally took an acceptable length of time.So what was the problem? They wanted to map the process becausethere were aspects of it that they were still not happy about and wanted tofind a way to articulate this.turned up to the next session, armed with huge sheets of paper and packs ofsticky notes. They sat and regarded the blank paper thoughtfully. Thenthey began to talk about the process and how they experienced it. Theconversation was free-flowing and divergent. I already had my laptopconnected to a projector, so I suggested that we used a mind-map rather than aprocess map. This let them continue with their exploration of the issueswith the added benefit of seeing the mind-map build up as they spoke.They began to make some very interesting points about the underlyingdynamics of the process of trying to find a good plan of care for individualswho may be quite chaotic and who certainly don't fit neatly into anypigeon-holes. This can create significant levels of anxiety among thepeople who are trying to support them, and this anxiety easily rubs off ontoprocesses. The conversation moved away from how can we speed up theprocess to how can we take some of the anxieties out of the process . This required a very different approach fromeliminating waste and work-arounds from a process. It helped the team realise that they neededto work on helping their stakeholders to understand the process, and that to dothis they needed to use the right language to help people to understand thepart they play in that process.Workingwith mind-maps is a great way to harness free-flowing conversations. In my experience, this is usually the bestplace to start. Then, having heard theunderlying story, you are in a good position to select some more structureddiagnostic tools. You will be using yourtoolkit with precision and intentionality.isn't difficult to create templates for many of your favourite diagnostictools. If you check out the Problem Solving section in the built-in templatesin MindGenius, you will find that there are some there already set up for yousuch as 5 whys, cause and effect and key questions.added advantage of using a mind-map as your starting point for serviceimprovement activities is that even at the earliest stage, you will find peopleidentifying potential actions. You arewell aware of the dangers of leaping into solution generation before properlyanalysing the situation, but there is that natural human impulse to offersolutions. Mind-mapping lets you haveyour cake and eat it. You can create adedicated branch in your map for actions.After exploring the story of the situation and running some diagnostics,you will be able to see which of those actions are worth pursuing. It's the work of seconds to then drop theminto an action planning map.friends over at Biggerplatehave launched a new initiative which will see the mind map library focus on aparticular subject theme each month. For the month of October, the team havebeen focussing on Productivity and encouraging all users to share their ownproductivity maps. Head over to Biggerplateand check out our latest and most productive maps yet! Read More...This is the official blog for MindGenius mind mapping software.You will find all of our latest news, helpful hints and tips to make the most out of MindGenius and info on what other users are doing in Business and Education.

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