Connect; at the core people want to belong, to network and develop shared experiences. What are you trying to express? Can you say it with simple shapes on the back of a napkin?
Ishita Gupta has a great post at SAMBA “Graphics and such.” Ishita notes “You're either inside the box or on the outside. You either fill the space or you don't.”She concludes with “Sometimes it takes a shape to help you see what you already know. A box or triangle or line that helps you come 'full circle.'” I agree with Ishita. We live in a complicated world, and creating environments for tribes can be complicated. Who are we serving? What who is in and who is out of the tribe? Where do we fit? Sometimes a detailed plan is the answer, sometimes it may be a few simple shapes.
This reminds me of Scott Leib's article “You Oughta Plea in Pictures” for CFO Magazine. Scott interviews Dan Roam, author of The back of the Napkin. Scott notes Roam condensed a massive report with a 60 page executive summary into a single chart. Data and research can only take you so far. “In truth, "art" is overstating it, which should come as a relief to anyone who wants to duplicate the success of Roam and his colleagues. "Visualization" is more accurate: if you can draw basic geometric shapes, lines, arrows, and stick figures, you have all the skill you need to put Roam's ideas into practice and produce a vast array of concept and network models, diagrams, schematics, flow charts, tables, and other representations.”
What are you trying to
express? Can you say it with simple shapes on the back of a napkin?
