Point or Shoot — or Map?
Michael Schrage, a codirector of the MIT Media Lab’s e-Markets Initiative, discusses the pro’s and con’s of using PowerPoint and 2x2 matrices for the representation of business ideas and information in his fascinating article Point or Shoot, published in the most recent Strategy + Business Resilience Report (log-in required).
Schrage states “If you’ve conceived a brilliant business idea or devised a strategic initiative you’re confident will excite your colleagues, contemporary corporate culture demands you distill it into one of two things: 1) a high-impact 2x2 matrix; 2) a killer PowerPoint presentation.” Analysis and persuasion seem to be opposite ends, but they come together in PowerPoint presentations as “leaders don’t win arguments; they win commitment and support” as Schrage points out. Consequently, most of business communicators believe that every business proposal can be captured and conveyed in a multimedia slide show that makes the case as it entertains with special effects.
Persuasion by the means of entertainment: James Gilmore and Joseph Pine, authors of The Experience Economy: Work Is Theatre and Every Business a Stage, would certainly back this requirement in the business world, and so would Jeremy Rifkin whose catch phrase states: “There is no business without show business.” Seth Godin, the marketing guru, put it more provocatively: “If you’re not trying to persuade, why are you here?”
Fine, but what if persuasion occurs at the expense of precision and sharpness in thinking? According to Schrage, organizations such as Sun Microsystems and the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the U.S. Armed Forces have banned PowerPoint from their meetings, assuming that the software is a “poorly tailored cognitive straitjacket” rather than a solid analytical tool.
One of the sharpest and crankiest critics of the PowerPoint way of thinking is Edward Tufte, a veteran among the thought leaders in the realm of visualizing complex information and ideas. In his essay The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint, Tufte argues that PowerPoint simplifies thinking, turning a manager’s world into a sequence of bullet-points. Tufte’s case study of the PowerPoint slides NASA used during the Columbia disaster is frightening and indeed demonstrates how PowerPoint can seriously hamper decision-making processes.
Schrage argues that the challenge is in using it correctly, and tries to mediate between both camps. Acknowledging that PowerPoint is often abused as a medium for the presenter’s self-delight, he also sees its potential for engaging the audience as active participant in the discussion, if done well. To learn how to use PowerPoint more effectively for a real dialogue that does not simplify thinking, he refers to Sociablemedia, which is the firm of Cliff Atkinson, a PowerPoint presentation consultant who wrote “Beyond Bullets”.
Note what Schrage has to say about PowerPoint vis-à-vis 2x2 matrices: “2x2s generally evoke a more favorable response than bullet-point builds. For one, they’re inherently more visual; for another, they figuratively invite viewers to project themselves into one of the quadrants on the screen. You don’t just read a 2x2; you locate yourself — or your idea or your business or your product — within the schema it provides.”
Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Does Michael Schrage know about MindManager? While PowerPoint and 2x2 charts are formats that have benefits for either analysis or presentation, MindManager maps reconcile this classic tension and provide business leaders with both: clear thinking and persuasive presentation. Maps are a meta-format; they tell the story of an idea and capture the history of the thought process behind it at the same time. Surface, interface, and a rich body of background information and data become one. Edward Tufte and Cliff Atkinson should love it. And perhaps Michael Schrage, too. I have sent him an email with a link to this blog and to our web site, inviting him to learn more about MindManager. I look forward to his response.
Tim Leberecht, Corporate Communications Manager
Director of Global Communications
Trackbacks/Pingbacks
TrackBack URL:
http://blog.mindjet.com/2005/04/point-or-shoot-or-map/trackback/
Reader Comments
-
Posted April 16th, 2005, 4:18 pm by Cliff Atkinson
Hi Tim - an interesting post.
I had been aware of mindmapping, and could see its usefulness as a brainstorming tool, but it hadn’t “clicked” with me as a tool that could help with clearer presentations.
The fundamental problem I had seen was the same problem underlying virtually all PowerPoint presentations - the use of a “categorical outline” approach which defines our collective thinking today. Look at the mind maps on your site in “Outline” view and you’ll see the same structure you see underlying PowerPoint slides, which consistently includes a “category heading” and a list of its members below, which goes something like this:
Strategic Plan
A. The competitive landscape
B. Market research
C. Operations
D. ForecastThis is great for brainstorming and capturing information, which both mindmapping and PowerPoint slides do.
But the next thinking problem that arises is: “Out of all of the information I have collected here in my mindmap or my PowerPoint deck, which information is the most important to help me take my next action to accomplish my goal?”
When I look at the examples of mindmaps on your site, or at PowerPoint decks, it is often difficult to tell. And in fact, it is easy for viewers to experience “map shock” - a documented sense of being overwhelmed by a map which shuts down the ability of people to understand it.
I didn’t see a solution to the problem until a reader sent me the script of his presentation he had written based on my new book “Beyond Bullet Points.” He had written it in MindManager instead of using the story template I have created in Word.
I was skeptical at first that MindManager would be helpful, because I designed into the Word document a “logic tree” methodology that distills information to 3 or 4 top-level points, and then places them in a storyboard sequence to support a singular point. The methodology also incorporates the powerful alternative to “categorical outlines” - an “action outline” approach that uses complete sentences instead of sentence fragments. (This is inspired by the pioneering work of Barbara Minto at McKinsey consulting and by the STOP proposal-writing method at Hughes Aircraft in the 1960s.)
Lo and behold, what he had done in MindManager worked. The dramatic difference between his two presentations was viewable in Outline view in MindManager. The “before” version was a series of categorical lists, as described above. But the “after” version was a series of complete sentences that followed one another in a specific sequence that presented a clear case for a specific action.
The transformation was due to the application of a critical thinking process that can turn any existing brainstorming mindmap into a persuasive storyboard.
Tim, in order to demonstrate a “next level application” of your tool, what do you think if we invite your readers to take the Beyond Bullet Points challenge and we’ll post the results on our websites and blogs, for everyone to see?
-
Posted April 18th, 2005, 10:05 am by Tim Leberecht
Cliff,
Thanks for your feedback. You raise a couple of good points.
You question MindManager’s ability to prioritize information and refer to the “map shock” that some users may experience as they are overwhelmed by the wealth and depth of information you can capture in a MindManager map. This is certainly a phenomenon we are aware of, but MindManager in fact offers features to avoid it and accomplish exactly what you describe: creating the missing link between the information display and “acting upon the data.”
First, the toolbar on the right allows you to interpret map topics as tasks and to assign priorities, due dates, resources, and status information. You can also flag certain topics or add comments in form of icons. Second, once you have defined map topics and built a hierarchy of topics, you can use the filter function to view the map from a specific angle. For example, if you want to focus on all comments from one specific team member, you are able to zoom in to just his comments. If you look for an overview of all tasks due next week, you can filter the map to show just those tasks. That’s what makes MindManager so special: it is both hierarchical and non-hierarchical, both linear and non-linear, both analytical and non-analytical, or simply – both left- and right-brain.
This task- and filter-functionality helps you to handle the high amount of data that at times must be captured in a map. And this certainly allows you to identify the information “that is the most important to help me take my next action to accomplish my goal,” as you write. Of course it is fair to say that the ability to take action based on MindManager progresses with your familiarity with the program’s full functionality – not unlike PowerPoint.
The big idea of MindManager is: YOU control the information, it does not control you. And that allows you to shift to action faster than if you have to struggle with many different formats and databases. You’re always on top of things and never loose sight of your key goals.
Why don’t you send me the word template of your presentation you were talking about and the MindManager map with the same content – it would be interesting to publish them and see the difference.
Best,
Tim -
Posted April 18th, 2005, 11:41 am by Cliff Atkinson
Hi Tim - the story template and mindmap were from a reader who said they’re proprietary and wouldn’t be able to share them publicly. I’ll post something in my blog soon to see if there are other readers who might be interested in sharing their storyboards.
-
Posted April 18th, 2005, 12:27 pm by Tim Leberecht
Excellent, I’ll keep an eye on your blog.
-
Posted April 19th, 2005, 3:23 am by Hobart Swan
Cliff,
A bit more on “map shock.” We at Mindjet have discussed this issue for a couple of years: Is the map a better way to convey information, or to capture a process. I think many of us tend to lean to the latter.It can be hard to suddenly be presented a large map if you haven’t had any part in creating it. If you have, there is really no limit to how big the maps can be. As Tim says, there is something very cmmpelling about being able to store a ton of ideas, tasks, information and data in one place—and then slice and dice the information so that you see only what you want to see.
I personally think MindManager is much more compelling as a way to manage a process. When you work alone or with a team to build the map up, it is one of the better ways to manage the changes and continual aggregation of information that happens with most business initiatives.
-
Posted April 19th, 2005, 8:14 am by Cliff Atkinson
Hi Hobart,
Yes, it’s a tough issue, especially when it relates to the presentation of information to people who have no prior knowledge of it.
The research behind map shock relates to the limited capacity of working memory to process information. Solutions generally relate to the sequential presentation of chunks of information, similar to the linear sequence of a storyboard.
Is there any research that has measured the results of audience understanding using mindmapping, as compared to a range of other methods?
-
Posted April 21st, 2005, 4:25 pm by Mike Bean
Help me, a novice, get started on the 2x2 Matrix. Where do I get the basic tutorial level understanding of this?
-
Posted April 21st, 2005, 4:29 pm by Tim Leberecht
Mike,
This is a helpful site on 2x2 matrices:
http://www.ifm.eng.cam.ac.uk/dstools/represent/2x2.htmlAlso check the book “The Power of the 2x2 matrix:
http://www.managementmag.com/index.cfm/ci_id/2071/la_id/1.htm -
Posted April 21st, 2005, 9:54 pm by Jay Cross
If you want to get Michael Schrage’s attention on MindManager, write him. He’s quite accessible. Given his beat, I imagine he’ll be quite attentive.
jay
P.S. I like the blog!
-
Posted April 22nd, 2005, 7:05 am by Tim Leberecht
Jay,
I did and he was indeed quite attentive! He said he would check out MindManager and then get back to us.
-
Posted April 22nd, 2005, 11:38 am by Stefan Funk
I’d like to add to the discussion where Tim said “Maps are a meta-format; they tell the story of an idea and capture the history of the thought process behind it at the same time”.
If we say the map tells the story, we assume it is static, complete and done from the moment we publish it. Its purpose now is to tell the story. In my opinion this is almost never true. Instead I think that the Map actually is the story.
Ever since I started using MindManager I understand more and more that the Maps that give me the most benefit are those which are “living Maps”. Do I often go back to maps I was working on a long time ago and which have become static? No. I use a Map for a period of time ( it can be a long time ), constantly change it and by doing so, I gain a better understanding.
This could lead to another assumption : “A Map is never done. It is supposed to change and thus it is the story”. (As opposed to a drawn map, which is the story only as long as you don’t run out of space). Once it is done, you can dump it.
If this is true, then any Map you send to a colleague, you present to an audience or you simply publish is nothing but a snapshot. Hence, there is a problem if you want your audience to simply consume it without any modifications.
Instead I think that by handing out a map, you make somebody else part of the story. When I get a Map, I usually take things apart, hide others and mark or annotate things I want to read again or don’t understand right away. MindManager makes this so easy for me to do. I’m actually doomed to react, to give a response and - if you will - to take on responsibility. Other document tools don’t put me into the same mindset.
So it appears to me that a Map is more about being in dialogue and accepting changes. I’m tempted to say a Map is about celebrating ideas, rather than selling fixed ones.
This I guess de-emphasizes read-only/view-only Maps. Yet it is what collaboration means to me.
RSS feed for comments on this post.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
Things To See
A couple of things today worth seeing. The first is this Fast Company article on change. I’m not one to read FC often, but was picking through it in the concierge lounge of the hotel tonight when I came across this attention-getting intro (which …