The power of clarity
Dan Roam, the author of the book The Back of the Napkin, is speaking now at the opening general session of Great Ideas. He argues that pictures have the power to solve problems--and we all have the power to solve problems using pictures.
He shared some examples of "napkin pictures" that have solved problems: a sketch of the intial routes flown by Southwest Airlines, some presidential sketches, and the "Lafferty Curve" that launched supply-side economics. One thing jumped out at me: In nearly every case, the problem-solving sketches were simple ones. Not complicated, not pages of data, but very simple sketches of at most a few lines.
To me, this demonstrates the power of the simple. More complicated pictures wouldn't be as persuasive or as powerful.
As I was typing the sentence above, Roam quoted Bill Gates, saying, “The barrier to change is not too little caring, it is too much complexity.” Is complexity a barrier to getting things done at your association?
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Comments
A couple of great points that were made on Twitter during this session could also be helpful to consider here: Maddie Grant pointed out that people might be afraid to be completely clear because they can then be held accountable. Jeff De Cagna argued that simple images that describe problems incompletely could end up doing more harm than good by leaving out critical details.
Posted by: Lisa Junker | February 21, 2009 2:22 PM
I thought Dan did a good job pointing out the need to include the nonvisual interpreters among the integrators and the drawers. Too often I've been in meetings where it seems to be a challenge to bring all three types onto the same page. I can see how it is important to consider the communication methods being used during the meeting.
As an aside, I sat through the Social Media lab where Lindy and Scott did a good job talking about how Twitter and blogging are impacting how we communicate. Folks both in and outside the room were tweeting, allowing some questions to be asked by nonattendees. This is a very interesting concept, as a neophyte I found it a bit overwhelming yet fascinating to see it happening real time.
Posted by: Arthur Hsieh | February 21, 2009 6:51 PM