Thank you so much for publishing an article about the field of graphic facilitation and for including my name in the first graph. It’s a good thing my SEO rocks because you didn’t mention the name of my business, Making Ideas Visible, or supply a link. But hey, that’s okay.
Seriously though, thanks. I come from a family of MBA’s (none of who have been in HBR) so this is a bragging right within my family that I’ll be able to milk for some time.
Here’s what you got right.
Yes, graphic facilitation is a great tool/process for engagement. It never fails to wow the participants because it’s powerful to see someone capture your ideas as they are occurring in real time. To feel like you’ve been heard.
The point you made about capturing the content so it can be used later is right on. Visual maps live on long after the meeting, guiding and directing the course of action, and can be shared with people who weren’t there which is incredibly useful.
Here’s what you got wrong.
I sent you to Prof. Martin Eppler because you wanted to quantify something that by its nature is a hard to quantify. (I have a lot more to say about this in a future post.) And he’s apparently doing research around retention and right-brained thinking.
But saying that expensive (and hard to learn) software programs that let people do their own drawing may be more effective? Wow, that’s a stretch.
I know from being a figure drawing teacher that giving people a tool and expecting them to take to it like a duck on water just doesn’t happen without a lot hand holding, instruction and cheerleading. There are huge emotional and psychological barriers in the way of adults doing art. I see this all the time.
I do agree that having people create their own pictures is powerful stuff. Read on for more on that point.
What we do in the room with these murals humanizes people’s experience of information. There is something so reassurring about seeing complexity depicted in simple, colorful shapes. To see words hand-written. It’s like poetry in action. In this world of technology, that’s deeply comforting and sustaining.
Call me a graphic facilitator not an artist.
I take issue with being called an artist in this context. And for calling my work, and that of my colleagues, “pricy artist’s handiwork.” Ouch!
When we talked I didn’t refer to myself as an artist. I get that this can be confusing because in my field of visual practioners, we have a variety of terms we call ourselves: graphic recorder, graphic facilitator, visual facilitator, visual mapper. We generally don’t call ourselves “artist.”
What makes it even more confusing is that some of us are hybrids. Some facilitators work graphically. A few, like me, are graphic facilitators who facilitate which means that we design the meeting, create the processes for the group and shepherd the meeting.
I apologize for the confusion this creates.
I don’t think of myself as an artist when I do graphic facilitation work. Yes, there are drawings that depict recognizable icons but art is about a tenth of what’s involved with this work. And plenty of people do this without art training.
When I graphically facilitate, I’m listening as a journalist would for the key themes and highlights in the story, organizing the information spatially, instinctually finding the structure, giving visual emphasis and hierarchy to the story as it emerges on the paper. And also paying attention to where the group needs to go next.
Like the cave drawings.
Yes, I do work with the artist materials of paper and markers, which aren’t far removed from the pigments used on cave walls in the earliest versions of my field’s depictions.
And like those cave painters who recorded the pertinent information for their tribe’s survival–where the hunts were good, the kinds of animals that were found, key details about the weather–me and my fellow graphic facilitators help our clients see the crucial elements of their terrain: the challenges, opportunities, strengths and weaknesses so they can plot their course ahead.
We are strategists. Truth-tellers. Visionaries. Interpreters. Mappers. And information organizers for our tribe.
Art—a definition.
So back to the term artist….and yes, it doesn’t help my case that my client at Accenture referred to my visual maps as artwork. I have an MFA (Masters in Fine Art) so I feel qualified to define what is and isn’t art, at least for myself.
Art—what we tend to think of as fine art—has original content. Creating visual maps from content that emerges from a group’s collective process and not from me, doesn’t qualify as art, in the original sense.
And I really cringe at the phrase “pricey artist’s handiwork” as if we’re selling our wares on Etsy along with potholders and hand puppets. (No offense to Etsy which I love.) I felt when talking to the writer that he had a bias against the fees we charge. It would appear he does.
My job won’t be outsourced.
I have no problem charging what I do because I offer a unique service that is highly valued by my clients. My expertise is grounded in all my previous work and life experience along with an advanced degree.
There is no one else on the planet with my particular combination of skills: public policy background + non-profit management + journalism + conceptual art + stock trading + politics + teaching + facilitation. I know I’m not in danger of having my job outsourced to India as we enter what Daniel Pink calls the conceptual age because my work of structuring the complexity is needed now more than ever.
When I first came across the field of graphic facilitation, it was thru a visual map I found online. The caption said:
They will be teaching this in business school five years from now.
So Harvard, heads up.
Whoever has the best picture wins.
Indeed, I’m counting on that happening because my hope for the field, and many of my colleagues including Dan Roam share this, is that we aren’t seen as “the artist,” the person in the room owning the creative process for the group.
It is my hope that we will be the enablers of everyone else’s creativity. That we will teach people to make their own pictures so that we aren’t seen as “the artist” but the person able to bring the artistry out of the people we work with who are hungry to express themselves creatively.
I believe there is artistry in everyone. As Ellen Dissanayake writes in Homo Aestheticus, this used to be an accepted fact. Our culture has taken the ownership of creativity out of the hands of many and put it into the hands of a few. I would like to return it to the many.
Because as Dan explains, whoever has the best picture wins. They get the funding, they grab the power. Reagonomics was born on the back of a napkin. Did you know that? We all need to be able to compete.
{ 38 comments… read them below or add one }
Julie, thanks for this clear description of what makes visual practice different from art. Like you, I find the phrase “pricey artist’s handiwork” to be an uninformed dismissal of most of what visual practice is about. I doubt the author of the article would refer to skilled facilitation without the use of graphics as a “pricey dance performance,” so why does it make the accomplishment less valuable to add a visual element? Great post.
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Fascinating post! I did not know that is what you do and I think it is a powerful process indeed. Glad to be learning more about it.
Julie – well said, in every way! Having just finished my first (!!) visioning session with you, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that there is not a software program in the world that would have gotten me from where I was when I walked into our meeting (STUCK!) to where I was when I left two hours later (READY FOR ACTION!). You pulled information out of me without me even knowing it was happening – it was organic, easy, conversational, healing and energizing. I went back to my corner of the world ready to tackle the goals you helped me set today with a clear vision of what I’m trying to build and accomplish. I am confident that the resulting mural now hanging on my office wall will serve a key role in getting me to where I want to be. THANK YOU!!
Rock on! You nailed this one, and thank you a member of the community of visual practitioners. I was very pleased to see HBR include our work in their publication, and I see this as a critical leap towards grounding the work of Visual Facilitation in its deep impact and value, while clarifying the distinction between something that looks artful, yet isn’t art. You have captured many points here and I hope HBR hears it!
Visual Facilitation is not alone in its struggle to distinguish and quantify its value. This is something that many organization development practitioners and consultants, dialogue & deliberation facilitators and group process facilitators are continually asked to do: Quantify the value of the qualitative experience. This is a microcosm of the larger challenge that we all face, bridging the worlds or art and business, science and spirituality, left and right brain. Together we are moving towards a holistic, integrated way of being that one day, they will look back at all of our work as being early, visionary pioneers in something that will eventually be a given. Until then, we continue to do the work, and chip away at the old paradigms and structures that continue to crumble around us. Yes!
Julie, you are my new hero. Thank you for taking the time to tackle this huge issue, and to take on an institution I had hoped would have had a handle on this, not to mention be one of the frontrunners in this Conceptual Age. Quel disappointment.
You are what Seth Godin refers to as a “Linchpin”, and he, along with Dan Pink, and Sir Ken Robinson offer you the validation to counter the rude and uninformed dismissal of HBR.
What would the interviewer have called the work if it were only WORDS on flipcharts rather than images? “Pricey writer’s transcription”?
I am a great admirer of graphic facilitation, and of the effectiveness this method has in engaging the whole brain of the participants, while having someone NOT part of the group do the recording. A truly great facilitator is at the core, not the skill in drawing. The group must agree that the imaging is a true representation of their ideas and process, just as they must with words-based charting.
As one who knows how difficult it is to get past the internal critic when my own had puts pencil to paper, the idea that I could draw my own images, even using software, and still have unedited access to my creative ideas is laughable.
As we have seen with the use of Powerpoint software, although anyone can use it, its structure often overwhelms both the message and the presenter. Software is a tool, but can be a weapon in the wrong hands!
Hi Julie!
Firstly, congratulations on being written about–along with graphic recording–in HBR! That’s fantastic, and a great opportunity for people to learn more about the value and benefits (heck, even the existence!) of what we do.
Secondly, more power to you with this blog post! I love this open letter to HBR, and would suggest that it be included as a response to HBR’s actual article so that others may gain a better understanding of graphic recording.
http://hbr.org/2010/09/vision-statement-tired-of-powerpoint-try-this-instead/ar/1
Lastly, I truly appreciate your discussion about being referred to as an artist when doing this work. As you know, I’ve been referring to myself as a “process artist” because, frankly, people in my area haven’t known what I’m talking about when I refer to graphic recording. In my view, the “process” is the art form, not the product. That’s what I’ve been meaning through this term…and now I’m worried that it may detract from the depth and power of what goes into the process itself. (As you know, It’s not something that just anyone can get up and do!) I’ll be contacting you for a visioning appointment on that one…
So Julie, keep on Rockin’ that Casbah and inspiring people to embrace graphic recording in all it’s applications. You do for me!
Thanks,
Jeannel
Hi Julie,
Great post.
‘Pricey Artist’s Handiwork” seems like such a dismissal of the complex and amazing work that graphic facilitator’s do. I really like what you said about ownership and creativity, and the way you acknowledge the creativity of everyone who takes part in the process. I hope someone from HBR reads your response.
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Julie,
Thank you for clarifying for the brightest :-* what graphic facilitation is as well as what it can do. While ppt and other online & digital visual tools help to access both sides of our brain, it is through the real time graphic capture (which includes development through the drawing of conceptual ideas with image, words, and color) that helps the brain to see patterns and combine ideas, images and context for breakthrough thinking. The act of drawing of ideas – real time – helps the brain process and then leap to produce new and diverse configurations aka “new ideas.”
Many powerful things happen in a room where a graphic facilitator is guiding & capturing the conversation whether it be on vision, strategy, idea generation, or problem resolution. One of the most effective visioning processes I have experienced happened when I invited the executive leadership team of Hoffman-LaRoche from the Pharma division to draw and conceptualize their own metaphors for their vision map. Once over their initial resistance to drawing, they worked together to create a powerful metaphor.
Subsequently, there was high ownership of the vision and an effective rollout to a 4,000 person team. Post vision visual survey results showed 96% understanding of Pharma’s vision and strategy (prior to this it was less than 50%). There are many, many more success stories just like this from sessions which involved graphic facilitation.
Thank you for your insight and comprehensive response. I am grateful to Dan Roam, Daniel Pink, David Rock and others for their writings that help the brightest ;-* click on another light.
Julie, thank you for articulating so clearly and sympathetically the difference between visual facilitation and art! I too have had the experience of being ‘dismissed’ as ‘the artist’ (and the very fact that art is dismissed is in itself is kind of tragic, don’t you think?) and have struggled to explain that while the process looks artistic, that’s not what it’s about. You’ve hit every nail of the argument on the head in your letter and have done a great service to the whole field by sharing it with the rest of us. Kudos to you, lady!
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Beautifully said! (Though it coulda used some graphic facilitation like “Blond Girl” + kicking + donkey wearing Harvard crimson!”)
They got it wrong in more ways than you name, and your correction had far more journalistic integrity than your interviewer’s notes. As if you’d called them “Typists on Pedestals.”
Yeesh. A really good reminder to all your readers who interview, post, and have to make something understandable (even if they don’t take the time to research it carefully first) — get it right. At the very least. I won’t mind if the post critiqued your style with examples, or quoted unhappy clients, or found current research to support their bias. At least that’s reporting. But they didn’t, couldn’t, and just seem so much more out of touch with a growing field that services so well — by any name or style — and out of touch with the groups, firms, gatherings and educators that benefit from your work (and TALENT! They left out TALENT!) long after the meeting is over.
Oy. But you’re good when you’re riled up ~ keep it comin’ hon~!
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Whatever it is that you do, and whatever anyone calls it, it is magic. I have no idea how you do it, I could never do it myself, and it changes everything. I can still see in my mind’s eye exactly where “fun collaborations with cool and interesting people” is on the visual map you did for me last year. That map guided me through all kinds of kooky business decisions so I didn’t get lost in my own brain gunk. No, me doing it myself would not have helped at all. I have spent days creating mindmaps and going nowhere. There’s something beyond all that which you are able to capture, and that is why this is not “handiwork.” It’s clarity and insights and knowing exactly why something is important to me, and where I need to go next. I agree with GirlPie, though, I like seeing you get riled up! More!
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In regards to “What they got wrong” – tell the article author to read Gladwell’s book “Outliers”. To say that a software can replace the 10,000 hours that created your domain mastery is equivalent to recommending a podcast series that enables the music novice to become the next Beatles.
I applaud you for taking to task HBR. What they said was wrong in so many ways. You beautifully stated the role of a facilitator above as having so many facets. People think that b/c its a meeting, it can be mechanical, but to elicit true opinions and worth and work in a group takes a great deal of skill. NOW combined with that is the idea that you are actually reflecting their meeting notes to them in ” real time ” and in words and images is truly truly a feat.
What the article said to me is that we need to do more explaining of how to elicit the ideas, consensus of individuals, teams and groups so that ppl understand how INNOVATION really works.
Thanks ( a words only facilitator),
Ericka
So glad you responded the way you did! Your comments help others to know what this field is about and they gave those of us who are new to it a little more clarity about the benefits of it.
Glad that HBR is bringing more awareness about this work and glad that we have you to be one of the many powerful voices to sing about it’s rewards!
Thanks for the thoughtful & thought provoking response to the HBR article – the mistaken understanding of our practice and the huge service it provides turned into an opportunity to educate and inform.
Rock on.
Mariah
This brings up the bigger questions of how to build a discipline/field. Building a discipline includes academic pillars in the ground upon which different people can hang their experiences. The academic pillars are formed by actual quality research performed by researchers and shared in academic peer-reviewed journal articles that demonstrate how the stuff works and how it relates to other fields, such as, for instance, management. Once the tent is constructed and the language shared, it can be shaped and further developed from there, and students can be attracted to the discipline. Julie Gieseke and I are co-teaching the first graduate class that’s solely dedicated to Visual Facilitation. We need more of all this to build the field.
I did my doctoral research on the co-creation of meaning in polycultural groups using visual mapping as the vehicle and found astonishing results about group dynamics and how it was replicated in the gestalt of the maps that the participants had created. The work is published as a book by Lambert (German Publisher). Nobody in their right mind would want to read a dissertation for fun, but this one is a pillar in the ground where there were none to start with. When I did my lit review in 2007, I found little to no academic articles to list about any of the names we give visual facilitation (except for my own that I wrote with fellow facilitators in 2005 published in the Journal of Applied Behavioral Science). I believe this may still be the case, and that is a real problem for building the discipline. The importance of having a discipline (in addition to the practice) is that the discourse makes wider circles and builds respect in other disciplines (showing up as better conditions for negotiations and a shared culture). So in a way this HRB blurb is a really important opening to the place where the discipline is built. Now, the discourse can begin. There is a protocol for research and this type of peer-reviewed journal article writing to follow in order to get published in the ranked journal system. How do you all want to participate in moving forward with this opportunity? Thanks, Regina
Hi Everyone!
Here is a direct link to the Harvard Business Review article highlighting graphic recording for those who would like to reference the article for their business and promotional purposes:
http://hbr.org/2010/09/vision-statement-tired-of-powerpoint-try-this-instead/ar/1
I for one am over the moon about the article! HBR gave me the great honor of having me create a custom graphic recording chart that was published with the article to represent the field – to show readers what graphic recording can look like versus trying to describe it solely in the article. While I don’t necessarily agree with all of the phraseology utilized in the article, it can be all too easy for us to focus on what we feel is incorrect. If HBR’s only opinion of graphic recording is that it’s “pricey artist’s handiwork”, then the article wouldn’t have been published in HBR. The big picture result is HBR is endorsing the field of graphic recording and this gives us a tremendous amount of immediate credibility with those who may not be familiar with the medium. This is a huge coup for the field and we should celebrate!
As a follow up to the story, I offered to send the original chart I created for the article to the HBR team. The writer said that the HBR CEO, David Wan, is so excited to be receiving this and to have the chart published with the article (since it’s something very different from what they’ve done in the past) that he will be framing the original 4′x8′ chart and hanging it in HBR’s headquarters. How exciting for the graphic recording field! They LOVE us!
I imagine we’ll all be getting some additional calls from potential new clients soon as a result of HBR’s article!
Warmly,
Steph
Whatever, you bunch of doodlers.
Here’s the thing: MARKETING this kind of service is a really huge trick. It’s not really exactly easy. Those of you who do it (I’ve been a visual thinker since before that’s what they called it) know that it’s the only way to fly. I just put down my notebook full of drawings to type out this comment.
But when you’re trying to marketing and explain and build awareness outside of your own niche (and most of the people above are clearly visual thinking types as well), that’s when you have to get clever and do a lot of extra work in bridging the gap.
For the record, you can demean anyone’s job. I demeaned the graphics and logo artists community by paying $350 for my logo instead of the $5000 that they all wanted. I get demeaned all the time for being a blogger by more traditional business types. Never mind that I run two companies and have brought in over $2 mil in revenue at one of them already this year (which is small potatoes for some, but holy cow that’s a lot of work). ; )
My point is this: great for you to educate them. Better for you to continue to teach others how to better market this valuable and important service.
: )
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To make my comment and call clearer: The lack of people being able to see us in the way we would like to be seen is a branding problem. So, if we don’t like how we are “branded” it is up to us to communicate our intent and value to the world. I don’t think it’s helpful to point out how “they” get it wrong. It might be more helpful to reflect upon where we have missed shaping the field and what we want to do about it now. And this comes down to communicating a clear message to the public. Developing a common language would be a good place to start. Regina
Thanks Julie for your balanced and clear distinctions on the essence of the work of a visual facilitator. It’s very experiential, so the best way to explain is having people and journalist attend a meeting and see the mapping magic unfold.
I would like to add a different perspective on the “pricey artist’s handiwork”. It sounds depreciative, but I think this is not something to be defensive about. It’s what makes this work unique, what makes people appreciate it so much and what gives it the real connection in the moment, the bridge between the collaborative thinking process and the visual results on the wall. The quality of the graphic representation matches and mirrors the quality, clarity and skill of the graphic facilitator. Great artists and thinkers have recognized this obviously: ‘ Drawing is thinking’ – Milton Glaser. ” People should talk less and draw more” – Goethe.
The more accurate you are able to capture and represent in real-time (the star figure vs. the face with emotional expression, relationships etc. , the basic mindmap lay out vs. the aligned information design and display), the higher the value, the higher the price. That’s the shift in thinking, valueing, recognizing, pricing etc. this work! So yes pricey, that’s a good thing!
Blessings for your work and thanks for starring and advocating for this community!
I think it odd that HBR would confuse tools with people, but that’s not why I’m chiming in here. I think there are two questions that might be helpful to ask in addressing the branding problem Regina refers to: 1) How does the market understand you? And 2) Is that how you thought you were (or wish to be) understood?
If there is no gap revealed by the answer to the above questions, then wonderful! You’ve achieved a rare alignment of brand and market. Kudos. However, if there is a gap, and apparently there is, then you have choices: either embrace the market’s understanding of your brand and realign your offering, your process, your thinking to maximize the existing market momentum, OR prepare yourself for the hard work of moving the market expectations to better align with your desired brand.
Essentially these are the defining poles of all practical- vs. all principle- (or passion-) driven. Nudging a market’s brand expectation toward your ideal may take all the consistency and fierce execution of rowing a boat with butter knives instead of oars – you better have a clear idea of where you’re going because you’re only going to get there in tiny steps. On the other hand, for many of us who choose independent and creative modes of making a living, simply accommodating the expectations of an uneducated market may put us firmly in the terrain of “I wouldn’t have quit my day job to do that.”
I think the solution lies in seeking out and cultivating the community of clients that “get it” and tapping into their natural excitement, and yes mystification, to proselytize on your behalf. And hey Julie, if they want to call you an artist, let them – you and your peers perform a service that is by it’s very nature transformative, synthetic and creative. Is a conductor any less of a musician because she doesn’t hold an instrument? ☺
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Can I just say that I’m LOVING this conversation and all the perspectives it brings to bear on the issue? Each time I read a new comment I see it from a different angle, and taken all together it is creating a rich conversation indeed!
This is a terrific discussion even if images are absent! It’s a bit hard to jump in here into all this richness, but I’ll try…
I think the HBR has done us a great service by making us aware of certain issues. Clearly this still emerging field needs a common language, as Regina Rowland has emphasized here. Regina, I purchased and read your thesis and found it extremely valuable, although as I recall it involved co-creation by two different groups of a visual “map” as opposed to actual graphic facilitation by a facilitator. Perhaps we need to explore the “gestalt” concept more closely as a way to develop this common language and come up with an explanation of how what we do actually works, going beyond the right brain left brain discourse. Some recent research on how we perceive patterns apparently backs up gestalt theories. But this is unfortunately not my area of expertise although I’ve always been fascinated by Arnheim and the visual thinking crowd.
On another note, I’m also fascinated by the success Dan Roam has encountered in “branding” his “Back of the Napkin” approach. I think we need to study what he’s done. He seems to focus on the “better brain” arguments but going beyond the left-right hemisphere discourse (which needs to take into account more recent stuff from guys like Hellige). However, we as graphic facilitators are in a different space from Dan Roam, since we are selling ourselves as facilitators, i.e. people who can help others help themselves, whereas DR is teaching people to use his approach to solve their problems themselves, if I understand him correctly. I suppose what I’m saying here is we share something with the “artist” (I also have an MFA and am a practising artist, although I’ve had lots of other “day” jobs such as art direction, journalism, and interpreting!) in that we have to sell “ourselves” as individuals with a style and practice that is not something everyone can just start doing. We go to meetings and use our subjectivity and active listening skills to create a visual record that reinforces, changes, and traces what’s going on, ideally anyway. But there is a subjective element here that people connect with “art” and artistic expression which may explain part of the confusion. And let’s face it, we are producing (or co-producing) a hand-made piece of visual imagery, which as such can be seen as art or, alternatively, cartooning (happens to me all the time in France)… Perhaps we need to focus on this aspect and make it part of the “branding” of what we do. I plan to read up a bit on intersubjectivity to see if anything’s out there in research that could back us up and help us develop this common language and branding, going beyond pure “visual thinking” approaches (which of course are essential but don’t seem to be helping us sell ourselves as visual facilitators?).
A bit all over the place, I know, but I have a feeling something interesting is going to emerge from this discussion if we all keep throwing out ideas! I think I’ll try to record this discussion visually just for fun! Maybe we could all try that…
Making ideas visible used to be called graphic design.
Great discussion. For me, the surprise bonus (well, not so surprising really) is that Chris Brogan is into visual thinking.
It would be a great business school research project, examining the impact of Graphic Facilitation on businesses. Any MBA students out there?
Hi folks, let’s continue our fascinating sharing here.
I agree with Dan Roam that the tools need to be given to the people. It is time for people to maximize this “magic” so that the world can become a better place. This doesn’t necessarily mean we would loose our jobs, it means we could move on to becoming a conductor helping the orchestra play together in harmony with their context. What could be more beautiful than to democratize the mystery?
Thank you, Roberta, for buying my epic. I was interested in the co-creation of meaning read from visual maps co-created by diverse groups. This is the next level of evolution for visual facilitation, I believe.
Let’s hear more, Thanks, Regina
I agree with Regina. Personally I’ve worked with images and collage-based techniques to get people do do their own “mapping”. And the Dan Roam approach is great! But I’m sure there will always be a place for graphic recording/facilitation as well. For me it’s a case of expanding the use of visual tools by everyone, not cannibalizing an existing tight market! There’s a lot of room out there for improvement, eh!
Regina, your opus was certainly full of fascinating stuff. I was intriguted by the identity design issue, one I’m most familiar with since I’m an American married to a Malagasy guy living in France.
Yeah to co-creation and sharing the magic! Mariah Howard, Mary Corrigan and I had a wonderful experience in July sharing the art-making with participants at a 3-day event aimed at discovering new ways of transforming education. We started off having people do individual collages (less intimidating than drawing for many people), moved to facilitated group sessions where folks mapped their own reflections on their experiences, and finally had them working on collaborative drawings in small groups. It was an absolute revelation, both for us and for them! You can see a short video about the experience at http://bit.ly/csIaKG — at about the 6-minute mark, participants spoke about what it meant to them.
We were so stoked by the whole experience that we’re keeping the conversation going about where else we can go with this. Would love to hear more voices!
I love these stories about “democratizing the mystery” as Regina so eloquently calls it. In the telling (and showing) of the outcomes is where we can demonstrate the value of our magical processes. We also need to harness, as David mentioned, the excitement of our clients and get them to proselytize on our behalf.
I have purposefully stayed out of the comments because there is such a rich discussion happening here and I wanted it to evolve organically rather than steering it one way or the other. These are important conversations for our field about where we are headed and how we are perceived. Please continue…
Julie,
This is a great response and good for you! It is easy to see that your clients get a great value from your expertise.
Academic Journal Article writing:
I’m starting to co-author an academic research article in response to the HBR blurb with Dr. Lynne Valek. Our audience will be management researchers. The article will include my own research and the work we’ve already published on the topic in 2004 in JABS, and then guide the discussion toward sustainability. It would be helpful to know who has done real research in the genre. Last time I researched the field was in 2007 and there was ZERO published research available. This means I am interested in actual data collected and published by researchers. Can you refer me to any? Thanks, Regina
Could you guys refer me to any?
Regina,
My phd research, while not specifically on graphic facilitation, looks at the ways that facilitators and practitioners make choices about the shaping of visual representations in combination with the service they’re providing to participants and clients. I’m particularly interested in the ways that ‘practice ethics’ and ‘practice aesthetics’ intertwine. I’m just writing up the detailed findings now, but the approach in general is laid out in this article: http://www.humantechnology.jyu.fi/current/abstracts/selvin_buckingham-shum_aakhus10.html.
Julie’s post and all the responses here are also very interesting to me as both a researcher and a practitioner. Some reflections in this blog post: http://knowledgeart.blogspot.com/2010/08/graphic-facilitation-from-practitioners.html
Al
Great going Julie.
It is so good to see graphic facilitation getting some notice in the larger world and I think Regina is correct if it is to take hold more research needs to be occur.
I love to follow the conversation and I also love to work with graphic facilitators.
great work yall.
emily
Regina, you may already know about this organization… here’s a link to Visual Literacy, they include some info on their research…a video plus a bibliography with articles by Eppler who appears to be doing research in the field…
I look forward to reading that article! I also look forward to contributing some research of my own at some point in the future… let’s all do this!
http://www.visual-literacy.org/pages/articles.htm
I read your response and HBR’s comments. I find points of agreement and disagreement in both pieces. Starting with art, to some degree the definition of art is in the eye of the beholder. However, one of the historic functions of art was to capture vision and nuance difficult to capture otherwise. Sadly, art has gotten away from that and has become a nihilistic celebration of destruction. That is probably the source fo HBR’s sneer at pricey artists. Moving to HBR’s contention that software is as good as a hand drawn sketch I say poppycock. I’ve used a lot of the software and the more flexible it is the harder it is to use and less spontaneous. Software packages also tend to force a person to think a certain way thus hindering creativity. I also find the ‘unfinished’ nature of many drawings appealing and open to further work.
Julie,
As a facilitator, I realize how important GF is as a practice based on a strong foundation of process, organizational planning principles and strategic thinking. I have experienced first hand, the resisitance to the use of graphics and visioning. I think both the HBR article AND your response are important. Your response and the subsequent dialogue in your blog puts GF “in view” for all to see!
Those who form an opinion about GF by simply “driving by” the idea miss the substance, power and impact of this practice.
Wow! I love that you and what you do exist in the world. I am a career and business coach and images are always popping into my head when I’m working with clients. It is so cool to see someone who can take information and represent it the way you do. Thanks for this excellent post.
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