To put this hypothesis to the test, I conducted a very unscientific Internet meme experiment.

I see this cat dancing clockwise. Result = right brain.

I scored a 71% “Right” in The Brain Test. Result = right brain.

I scored 25/75 on the Creativity Test. Result = right brain

Although my “methods” may be a bit unorthodox, I was still excited to find that I was right pun definitely intended — sorry).

To expand even more on this subject, Mindjet created a new infographic for its “Between Minds: An Ongoing Taxonomy of Team Dynamics” series that explores how Left Brain vs. Right Brain thinkers process information, engage in projects, perceive the world, and problem solve.

Click here to see if you use more of your left brain or right brain

You’re welcome to embed this image on your blog, the code is here:

<a title="Right Brain vs. Left Brain Thinkers" href="http://bit.ly/Jf0gGs"><img src="http://info.mindjet.com/rs/mindjet/images/JESS3_Mindjet_BetweenMinds_RBvLB_Names-final.jpg" alt="Creative Leader versus Do Leadership" /></a> Infographic from <a title="Collaboration Tools from Mindjet" href="http://www.mindjet.com">Mindjet</a>

Daniel H. Pink, author of several bestselling books about the changing work world, drew on international research regarding left brainers vs. right brainers and compiled it in his book A Whole New Mind.

“The left hemisphere controls the right side of the body, is sequential, specializes in text, and analyzes the details,” writes Pink. “The right hemisphere controls the left side of the body, is simultaneous, specializes in context, and synthesizes the big picture.”

Lead Life Institute’s founder and author of Right Brain/Left Brain Leadership and Right Brain/Left Brain President Dr. Mary Lou Décosterd further describes the differences between right and left brainers: “You could say that left brainers are more focused on the here and now.They are more verbal, tangible (need to see it to believe it), and pragmatic. Right brainers are visionaries and innovators, interested in what might or could be. They are more intuitive and emotional — they trust their gut.”

She further explains how this relates to leadership. “Left brain leaders excel in and target the sheer volume of a leader’s day-to-day tactical demands. Left brain leadership is about in-the-moment planning, communicating, stabilizing and driving,” she told us. “Right brain leaders excel in and target the development of a desired state. Right brain leaders look out at possibilities and from those possibilities identify opportunities for change.”

Andrea Learned, a sustainable business leadership and marketing to women expert, told us that gender has had a traditional role in what people perceive left and right brain thinking to be. “Women are thought to ‘tend’ to be guided by those right hemisphere characteristics. Meanwhile, men are thought to ‘tend’ to be guided by the more left hemisphere characteristics, because that is what they’ve traditionally been most rewarded for (making money, winning, thinking linearly…),” Learned said. “If you look at social media and social business today, it is pretty clear that the right hemisphere characteristics will find more of the reward in the 21st century.”

Is it possible to use your whole brain? Would doing so create some sort of superhuman? Dr. Décosterd says President Obama is a good example of someone who uses both. “His is a fully integrated right and left brain approach. While high level leaders can be adept at certain right  and left brain abilities, most leaders get caught up in their preferences…More to the point, a leader is less likely to shift style from right to left brain thinking or vice versa with the ease as Obama does.”

So can someone who tends to be more of a right brainer train themselves to develop their left brain and vice versa? Dr. Décosterd believes so. “The best way to encourage a shift in brain style is to make your brain more pliable. To do so you could introduce novel stimulus to your brain — new sights, tastes, scents for example, as well as being OPEN to new ways of thinking — listen to differing views without being dismissive,” she told us. “Another way to encourage a shift is through engaging in behaviors that are more alter-brain.”

What kind of thinker are you? Left brain, right brain, or both? Last week, we asked you to give us some examples of each. After receiving a ton of feedback via Twitter and Facebook (and after much deliberation), we’ve selected a few of the many great examples you gave us to create this updated version of the infographic.

You’re welcome to embed this image on your blog, the code is here:

<a title="Right Brain vs. Left Brain Thinkers" href="http://bit.ly/Jf0gGs"><img src="http://info.mindjet.com/rs/mindjet/images/JESS3_Mindjet_BetweenMinds_RBvLB_Names-final.jpg" alt="Creative Leader versus Do Leadership" /></a> Infographic from <a title="Collaboration Tools from Mindjet" href="http://www.mindjet.com">Mindjet</a>

Also, be sure to take a look at some of the explorations of how the infographic came to be below.

It’s an intimidating fate for any organization, but nonetheless sealed: take action now, or someone will do it for you.

The Speedy S-Curve

Every business is familiar with the s-curve cycle. It essentially assumes that after a start-up phase, a rapid increase in revenue occurs, and is then followed by an eventual decline. Best-case scenario, successive curves will follow to continue the growth of the business in an upward direction. History tells us that these cycles take a considerable amount of time to complete, but like most other areas of business, today’s fast-paced and collaborative world has altered the norm considerably.

Let’s take cars for example. In 2000, Zipcar’s debut was a pretty radical move in the American transportation industry. By appealing to native travelers rather than out-of-towners, they managed to offer a more convenient and cost-effective option than traditional rental agencies. In 2010, RelayRides went a step further with peer-to-peer car sharing, allowing individual owners to rent out their vehicles on their own pricing terms. What an environmentally friendly solution for getting someone else to pay off your car.

Then again, it’s not all about saving money. Consider how Uber, a 2011 venture-funded start-up, rattled the longstanding taxicab industry — a service that can be traced back to carriages for hire in 1640 — by connecting consumers to luxury cars via mobile application. Uber’s prices are currently twice what conventional cabs charge, and yet the demand is so high that the company plans to add 25 cities (all outside of the U.S.) to its service list by the close of this year.

What’s next for the vehicular landscape, I don’t know. What I do know is that each offering decreased the legacy companies’ consumer bases, and that instead of seeing successive s-curves, they are more likely to find themselves at a dead end.

No Exception to the Rule

If you think you might be exempt from this shift, think again. Between 2000 and 2005 the music industry went from a global marketplace of $40 billion, to $28 billion and digital sales went from zero to $700 million. That’s major disruption in an enormous marketplace.

Or how about Kodak, Polaroid and Borders, which, despite their popularity, were also nonetheless affected by digitization. Instead of embracing the movement they attempted to maintain their normal ways of operating, and in the end completely lost control of distribution, pricing and marketing. Eventually, each company relegated itself to a specialized and dwindling niche, if not a complete shuttering.

Wanting to hold tight to what made you successful from the start is understandable, but not practical and, as you can see, potentially fatal.

Forgiveness is Achievable

The good news is that disruption doesn’t have to be one-shot type of deal. Should the path you choose lead you astray, there’s a good chance you can course correct in time.

When Netflix inflated its pricing model to reflect the switch from discs to streaming, their stock dropped 20 percent and they lost a whopping 800,000 U.S. subscribers in Q3, 2011. When the company realized they’d made a mistake, they released the following statement:

The last few months…have been difficult for shareholders, employees, and most unfortunately, many members of Netflix. While we dramatically improved our $7.99 unlimited streaming service by embracing new platforms, simplifying our user-interface, and more than doubling domestic spending on streaming content over 2010, we greatly upset many domestic Netflix members with our significant DVD-related pricing changes, and to a lesser degree, with the proposed-and-now-cancelled rebranding of our DVD service. In doing so, we’ve hurt our hard-earned reputation, and stalled our domestic growth. But our long-term streaming opportunity is as compelling as ever and we are moving forward as quickly as we can to repair our reputation and return to growth.

Netflix’s stock, which traded as low as U.S. $63.85 in 2011, rose 80% at the beginning of this year, and they currently hold a record number of subscribers. It’s not a complete recovery, and I can’t say how the looming competition (Redbox, Hulu, etc.) will ultimately affect business, but it’s clear that their apology has been accepted.

Disrupt When You’re Ahead

In light of companies that have been disrupted, failed at disrupting and ultimately been forgiven for disrupting badly, it makes sense to say the best time to take action is when you’re ahead. With that mindset, perhaps car rental agencies would have thought of Zipcar’s idea, or Yellow Cab would have thought of adding luxury and mobile functionality like Uber. Maybe Kodak would have survived, and maybe Blockbuster wouldn’t have been ousted by Netflix.

As a CEO it’s in my job description to seek out opportunities for healthy risk taking, but as employees of the 21st century we could all benefit from this mentality. A good dose of paranoia goes a long way by keeping us on our toes, thinking differently and prepared to pivot when need be. In time I think we’ll all see that it’s this kind of momentum that truly allows course correction as well as successful business agility.

One of the most important new guides to DIY data design is The Data Journalism Handbook. The first of its kind, the handbook is an open-source, seven-part compendium that outlines best practices for collecting, analyzing and finally presenting data in an engaging visual form. The Handbook also provides real-world case studies, step-by-step examples and a variety of perspectives by different authors. The information is presented in a format accessible to newcomers, but even veterans of data visualization will find useful tips and tricks. Plus, the open-source version online is free.

Though it’s tailored to journalists, a lot of the information is applicable to anyone interested in collating and graphically representing information. After all, reporting is little more than compiling information and then using it to tell a story. Many companies already do this, either for internal or external communications, or for their own management purposes.

The editors of the handbook are Jonathan Gray, Liliana Bounegru and Lucy Chambers, who work for the Open Knowledge Foundation in the UK—a sort of think tank for open source information. In a blog post about the handbook, Gray called it a “collaborative effort involving dozens of data journalism’s leading advocates and best practitioners.”

Stephen Doig, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and Arizona State professor specializing in computer-assisted journalism, was one of the many contributors to the handbook.

Doig noted that one reason the handbook is important to journalists is because their field is often leading the way in data visualization. Although the skill set is applicable to a wide range of industries, many companies keep their communications and data internal and have less incentive to present the information to the public.

But the ability to build graphical databases or interactive charts has a broad appeal because it puts the information into the hands of the user. “This ability gives us the opportunity for readers to go beyond what we tell them and explore the information themselves,” he said.

There are also tools available that can assist novices with taking data and turning it into something that’s understandable and visual. In the past, data visualization has required advanced skills in information management and graphic design. Today, desktop applications can make it easier for the layperson to build charts, graphs and scatter plots without having to rely on proprietary programs—or worse yet build their own.

Tableau is perhaps the best example. Considered the “Excel for millennials,” the program allows users to drag and drop various datasets to create real-time visualizations. Excel files can be dropped directly into Tableau to create graphical representations of the information. Doig also points to other easy-to-use programs such as Ruby on Rails and Django that also allow users to rather easily manage and present data.

Geoff McGhee, another contributor to the handbook, is also an academic and Pulitzer Prize winner. A communications professor at Stanford University, McGhee produced a video report on data visualization a couple of years back that got him noticed by the editors of the Data Journalism Handbook.

McGhee’s interest in data visualization stems from what he sees as a changing landscape for storytelling and the ease with which people can now present very specific data visually, including variable arch data sets.

“Virtually every discipline is grappling with the fact that they are coming into contact with vast amounts of data” he said.

In the past, this deluge of information was overwhelming, and many companies lacked servers large enough to process such large files in graphic form. But McGhee argues that data visualization has become more popular and accessible in recent years because of the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud, which provides extra capacity. Complicated visualizations no longer crash systems.

The Data Journalism Handbook is one handy resource, also providing a blueprint for transforming these large data sets into engaging graphics readers and consumers can wrap their heads around.

Know of any other instructional resources for data visualization? Let us know in the comments section.

We all know that effective project management can mean the difference between success and failure. However, what is often overlooked is the simple fact that most projects are won and lost through execution. In today’s fast-paced and flexible business culture, managing the vast amount of information projects create can be a daunting task. How then, does one keep track of all the sub-tasks that projects generate?

Talk to Team members

With the recent proliferation of task management tools now available, it’s a bit intimidating. Much like collaborative tools, task management tools are only as good as their weakest link: the people who use them. So, it’s very important – I can’t stress this enough – to try to get a pulse on what team members are already using. Odds are, there are small enclaves that already exist of those who’ve already adopted a tool and strategy to help them with projects. Talk to them. Try to understand what problems they are facing are and what tools they are using to help overcome those problems, because they are going to be the ones using it.

Majority Rules

While I believe these tools are great at helping streamline projects while at the same time increasing team communication and success, this is only achieved if people actually embrace the tool. The good news is that while adding another place to update information Is usually viewed as an annoyance by employees, the designs of these tools makes being brought up to speed a pretty easy task. Unlike some of the more complicated collaboration tools out there, these task management solutions are much more intuitive incorporating news streams and simple, clean interfaces. This makes adoption a lot easier. The problems most users end up facing is not how to use the tool, but instead they are about setting up procedures to help route the right information to the right place. While difficult, given a little bit of time and some experimentation this can be overcome. So, if you’re struggling and you’re sick of having your projects manage you, give some of the new task management tools a try. You won’t be sorry you did.

How are your teams managing the information that comes out of projects? Have any tips you’d like to share, let us know.

Office layout is typically one of those things that is hardly thought about. Usually, employees learn to live within their office’s constraints. Part of the reason why most take office layout for granted is because a redesign is so costly. While yes anytime you embark on a redesign is will cost money, it more than pays for itself with increased employee productivity, morale, and collaboration.

I’ve previously talked about the roll office layout plays in fostering collaboration. Today, it seems that it’s finally catching on. More and more companies are realizing that the way we work is changing. Traditional work methods are no longer sufficient. According to research compiled by famed architecture firm, Naramore, Bain, Brady and Johnson (NBBJ), “two-thirds of American office space is now configured in some sort of open arrangement.” In a recent New York Times article, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation chief administrative officer, Ms. Martha Choe believes that today we are seeing “a recognition that we work in different modes.” According to Choe, one of the lessons today’s executives must learn is to understand their business, and what your people need to do their best work.

The recent remodels of the Gates Foundation, Citrix Systems’ San Jose, California office or Seattle based, Russell Investments proves that organizations are listening to Choe’s message. Yes, new designs are fun, but what’s really interesting is that these changes are having results. For example, the recent remodel of the Gates Foundation has established different areas, catering how certain types of people work. One of the most interesting design features is that they have designed high traffic areas to flow into collaboration zones. According to Siri Oswald, a senior program officer at the Gates Foundation, this allows employees to “hear people talking about something and you realize it’s relevant to you…and then you just seamlessly integrate into it without having to schedule a meeting.” The focus of a lot of these newer layouts is based on the philosophy that chance encounters yield creative energy.

Not only do most of these new collaboration-centric office layouts help spur creativity and discussion, they also help foster a feeling of comradery. Ron Bundy, CEO of the Russel Index Group, believes that their new collaboration-focused layout really helps foster teamwork. “Because of all the buzz, people feel more like they’re part of the broad success of the organization.” Bundy also believes that by eliminating the offices as a status symbol, employees “have an opportunity to shine and have more of an impact…open[ing] up opportunities for people without formal titles.”

The recent move towards free form offices is an interesting trend. Do you work in one of these new collaboration-focused workplaces? If so, what do you like/dislike about them?

And so, to clarify: the purpose of traditional storytelling is to create engagement by conveying events and messages through words, images or sounds. I’d argue that the same goes for the so-called “business of storytelling” (hat tip to @goonth for that one), but with a strategic twist: engagement, ultimately, as a means of building brand affinity.

We Like You! We Really Like You!

People like brands they feel connected to, and lately cultural relevance seems to be the key to that connection. Whole Foods has found success through campaigns that tap into community efforts for healthier lifestyles, for example. And Pepsi, which — let’s be real — has nothing even remotely healthy going for it, is using modern celebrities like Nicki Minaj and Joe Jonas to breathe life into their newest message: Live for Now.

“[It encourages] people out there to go to this cool page where they can understand a little more about what’s going on with pop culture and get them connected a little easier,” explained Jonas in a recent interview with Mike Ragogna.

Written in the Stars

We’ve all heard the claim that the rise of social media is responsible for the current emphasis on storytelling, but if the purpose of storytelling is to engage and be engaged, then our fondness for it runs much deeper than Facebook or Twitter.

In response to TIME magazine’s question, “What is the most astounding fact you can share with us about the Universe?” astrophysicist Dr. Neil Degrasse Tyson said, “There’s a level of connectivity– that’s really what you want in life. You want to feel connected, you want to feel relevant, you want to feel like you’re a participant in the goings on of activities and events around you. That’s precisely what we are just by being alive.” (Max Schlickenmeyer made a really beautiful video representation of this section of the interview. View here.)

In other words: storytelling answers a primordial need. Brands that meaningfully engage consumers with stories that resonate succeed because they employ the feeling of having a fundamental experience.

Tell a Good One

Story has always been a key part of business communication because humans are hardwired to make sense of the world through narratives. A business that relegates ‘storytelling’ to the umbrella term boneyard means a business forgotten.

Be it with a blog post, a single video or a full-fledged campaign, every day is an opportunity to create an experience around your content; to give your customers a chance to make sense out of you.

Image credit: iStockphoto.com

Our first entry was “Thought Leader vs. Do Leader.” While we acknowledged that the split was as much situational as personality-driven, and that few people fall exclusively into one camp or the other, we postulated that some people people really do work best in one role or the other. And the enormous feedback we received suggested that many of you agree.

This week we highlight: “Left Brain vs. Right Brain.”

You’re welcome to embed this image on your blog, the code is here:

<a href="http://bit.ly/KVuWXe" title="Team Dynamics Infographic: Left Brain vs Right Brain"><img src="http://info.mindjet.com/rs/mindjet/images/JESS3_Mindjet_BetweenMinds_RBvLB-final.jpg" alt="Team Dynamics Infographic: Left Brain vs Right Brain" /></a> Infographic from <a href="http://www.mindjet.com" title="Collaboration Tools from Mindjet">Mindjet</a>

The brain is divided laterally into two hemispheres, left and right. As we know, the two hemispheres process information in different and complementary ways. The right brain processes information holistically; the left brain processes information in a linear manner. This split is one of the most widely recognized cognitive contrasts. That said, the distinction is a subtle one: not all functions commonly associated with the left brain are located exclusively in that side of the cortex, and not all so-called right-brain functions are exclusive to the right. Still, the left-right breakdown does usefully capture the different ways of thinking, planning and problem solving of a single person—and, we think, a team as a whole.

The right side of the brain is somewhat haphazard—but brilliantly so. As a result, right dominant thinkers often move from one task to another in a seemingly random pattern, focusing on whatever shiny object (or project) attracts their attention. The work gets done, but without an obvious concern for priorities. As a result, right thinkers tend to overdeliver on some projects, but scramble to finish others. Managers can mitigate for their drifting tendency with carefully plotted “to do” lists. When right thinkers do opt to leapfrog to a particular assignment, they should justify their reason for doing so.

The left side of the brain thinks in a linear, sequential order. The left-brained person is a list maker who enjoys doing daily planning and completing tasks in order. But sometimes it’s important for left-thinkers to pull back and reevaluate their prioritizations. There may be a good reason that all of the right-thinkers are focusing on a particular project.

Right side thinkers depend upon intuition—”gut feeling”—to solve problems and process information. Right thinkers reference their repositories of past experiences to help them contextualize situations and feel out a proper response. The left brain, in turn, processes information in a much more logical manner. Problems are equations that can be broken down and solved. Left thinkers draw upon rules and best practices when they engage with a new idea.

Brainstorming is a useful technique to spur creativity from both right and left thinkers.  Right-siders should feel liberated to throw out ideas and critiques. Left-siders can analyze the applicability of ideas and identify possible problems.

Do you recognize yourself as a left-or-right hemisphere thinker? (You can take this quiz to find out.) Do you make a plan, and follow it to the letter? Or do you let your gut lead the way? Is it lunchtime, yet? Could you spot us some cash for an Arby’s run? Let us know in the comments.

Today businesses are facing something that they have never faced before: a real-time, want-it-yesterday mentality. It’s this very mentality that has “thrown a wrench” into traditional approaches. They are proving to be too slow and too general to influence the demands of today’s ADD-riddled marketplace. The luster has rubbed off “well worn” marketing techniques. A new approach is required.

Hello, Agile Marketing

In his article, Jascha writes:

Realizing that change is the only constant in today’s business environment is a critical part of reaching today’s customer. Scratch that—it’s a critical part of reaching today’s human being.

The trick is for marketers to shift their view of marketing programs. It’s time to stop thinking of marketing programs as being about the long-term. Instead, it’s all about the here and now. Today’s fast, iterative and, quite frankly, ballsy marketing approaches aim to take advantage of this real-time shift. While this may sound a tad risky to some, it’s a very calculated and meaningful change to the way we work. No longer do marketers have one shot to get it right, and no longer do they have to be afraid of failure. Who wouldn’t want that?

Yet these “ballsy” moves are still way out of most marketers comfort zones – But they don’t have to be. The key is to embrace the process: complete with its flexible twists, turns. Because these very twists will end up yielding some surprising predictable outcomes and this should be comforting to all marketers.

Want to learn more?

Attending “Sprint Zero: They Physics of Agile Marketing” is a great place to learn from practitioners who are at the forefront of this new movement. This first-of-its-kind summit will be held in San Francisco on June 11th. Agile gurus will discuss the ins and outs of Agile Marketing, what works best, and most importantly what to do when it’s not working so well. You’ll learn how to get your Agile engine up and running so that your marketing team is delivering both near- and long-term success.

For more information or to get on the guest list click here:

http://info.mindjet.com/sprintzero.html

I came across a recent post by Lee Feinberg, where he brings up the idea of “decision visualization”. Decision visualization in a nutshell is creating a visualization that not only easily conveys complex data, but also assists individuals in their decision making process. In his post, Lee argues that while data visualizations help simplify data, it’s only half the equation: someone still is forced into using that data to make a decision. Lee illustrates this with an example. Imagine that a portfolio manager is asked to decide between three products to continue to invest in. “You deliver the numbers with a concise visual, and your job is done – but is it?” According to Lee, “You’ve actually done all the easy work and left the hard work to the portfolio manager. She has to look at all the data and figure out the possible actions to take.” So if the visualization can help simplify the data, can’t it help with the difficult part: making the decision? Of course it can!

Having data visualizations help individuals arrive at a decision is an innate characteristic of all visuals –that’s why most are created to begin with. The challenge is that they are not normally designed with that specific objective in mind. Lee suggests that when creating visuals that will be used in a managers decision making processes, it’s important to understand the decisions being made. “You are not going to sit at your desk and dream up what decisions the manager care about. You are going to ask,” initiating the conversation between the designer and the recipient can’t be underestimated in decision visualization. Lee takes this a step further and offers up some questions to help kick start the conversation between designer and decision maker:

1. What else do you involve in making these decision?
2. What questions are you trying to answer from the reports?
3. What signals do you look for to take action?

This conversation will help you understand how to craft your visualization and shift from creating a data visualization to a decision visualization.

So you think you’re now successfully creating awesome decision visuals, but how do you know for sure? “To reinforce your shift to decision-driven thinking, your deliverables (i.e. visuals) must also reflect a different approach. Your visualizations will draw people in, get them interested, and get them asking questions.” If you don’t receive questions asking for clarification or for better understanding, then it’s probably because you haven’t produced true decision visualization yet. Below is a good example that Lee provides to help show the transition from simple data visualization to decision visualization.

The first graph does a good job of showing sales by product by month. Imagine that you have been asked to decide which of the three products (furniture, office supplies or technology) to invest in. With the first visualization that is not an easy task. However, after expressing that you are trying to decide which of the three to invest in you are given the second graph. Much easier decision. That’s the power of decision visualization.

It seems like an obvious shift for the workplace. We’ve always heard that a picture is worth a thousand words, so now that we’re virtually drowning in words (hey, information overload!) you’d think companies would be jumping at the chance to condense data using this well-known method. Unfortunately, one very stubborn obstacle keeps it largely at arm’s length.

Visual Gets a Bum Rap

Haven’t we always been taught that artistic renderings belong outside environments of work and learning? Test your own biases by imagining a person doodling in their notebook margins. What appears on the page? I’m going to guess it’s something similar to my own visualization, which I’m only mildly ashamed to admit is my name is swirly letters next to boys’ names in swirly letters, bulbous hearts and Dr. Seuss-style arrows pointing every which way.

Perhaps if I’d been encouraged from the start to accompany my notes with images, I would have pictured something more profound. But like most everyone else, my initial reaction to classroom sketching equates it with wasting time or, even worse, doing nothing at all.

In the wise words of Sunni Brown, leader of The Doodle Revolution: “No wonder people are averse to doodling at work. Doing nothing at work is akin to masturbating at work! It’s totally inappropriate!” (Check out her TED talk here for more fun quotes.)

Improving with Time

Journalist Eva Fernandes joins the conversation from the United Arab Emirates. “I don’t have high hopes for the success of ‘visual note taking’ in UAE offices,” she writes. “I still remember the look of disappointment a manager gave me when she looked at the notepad I was taking notes on; after a long meeting, my notepad read notes amidst a jungle of scribbles and doodles. I thought it looked beautiful, but turns out it was a reflection of my ‘inability to concentrate.’”

(Understandable) bummer.

We certainly can’t overcome cultural biases overnight, but we can and should continue to fight the good fight. Along with her crew, Brown works to prove that doodling doesn’t mean doing nothing; that it is in fact the only process that involves each of the four modalities by which we absorb information: visual, auditory, reading/writing and kinesthetic. And Austin Kleon (pictured in the image up top) pushes for what he calls cartoon journalism. ”I listen for the stories and ideas worth stealing, then I turn them into images that are fun, instantly digestible, and easily shared around the web.”

Circling Way Back Around

Scientific proof and data-related phrases like “instantly digestible” are way attractive, and contribute a great deal to my personal belief that the benefits of visualization will eventually gain better momentum in the workplace. It’s the one method of communication that is universally accessible, and as teams become even more virtual and geographically dispersed, so will grow the need to simplify the presentation of information. What better way to do that than by reinvigorating a style that dates all the way back to the earliest of times (cave drawings)?

And if that’s not enough to convince you, consider Albert Einstein. That guy’s notebooks are full of visuals, and nobody can say he was a time waster or a nothing doer.

If you’re currently finding any sort of visual process to be useful in your own work day, tell us about it in the comments below. This is a message that both needs and deserves to be spread.

Image credit: Austinkleon.com