Crackerjack Visual Thinking

Category: Learning and Development

  • Crackerjack ‘Scribble Labs™’ coming soon! #visualthinking #communication #creativity

    Crackerjack’s ‘Scribble Labs™‘ are designed to help you explore and develop the skills you need to use the power of Visual Thinking in your work (and outside of work too)!

    Scribble Labs™ Logo

     

    So if you would like to:

    • Develop your drawing skills…
    • Capture ideas, conversations and concepts visually as they happen (often referred to as scribing or graphic recording)…
    • Use visual thinking approaches to increase creativity and collaboration in your meetings and events…

    …then do contact us or visit www.crackerjackvisualthinking.com

    More information to follow shortly…

  • Small details = Big Conversations #visualthinking #engagement

    I’ve just completed a rich picture for a client to help them communicate some important ideas to one of their key customers. As with all of our visual thinking work, the images we create are there to facilitate the right conversations between people.

    To do this we ensure each element of the image serves a purpose and communicates a key message. It’s often the small details included in the images that can create the biggest conversations!

    The example below shows just a few small elements of a much larger image we created for the client:

    To find out how Crackerjack Visual Thinking can help you visualise the small details you need to facilitate the ‘big conversations’ in your organisation, visit www.crackerjackvisualthinking.com or email info@crackerjackvisualthinking.com

  • Seeing the ‘big picture’ #visualthinking #engagement

    One of Crackerjack’s clients sent through a picture of the rich picture we created of their organisations past and future journey. It was great to see it in pride of place in their office!

    A Crackerjack rich picture
    A Crackerjack rich picture visualising an organisations journey in one of our clients offices

    We created the rich picture using a collaborative approach with the organisations team members, using their initial thoughts and ideas as the basis for the final image.

    The rich picture is used to by existing team members to keep the organisations mission and objectives at the front of their minds in the work they are doing. The rich picture is also used as part of the induction process for new team members and as an introduction for visitors to the organisation and its work.

    To find our more about our work visit http://www.crackerjackvisualthinking.com or email info@crackerjackvisualthinking.com

  • These organisations have one thing in common: #visual #thinking

    What do Macmillan Cancer Support, the NHS and Westmill Foods all have in common?

    The answer is that they all want to use visual thinking tools to help communicate information to people (including in these cases staff, patients and strategic business partners) and start or continue important conversations in their organisations.

    They have recognised how incorporating visual approaches increases the understanding and engagement their target audiences have with their work.

    Crackerjack Visual Thinking will be creating solutions including rich pictures and an interactive improvement guide to support the above organisations in their work.

    Find out more about how we can help you by phoning us on +44 (0)775 282 6227, emailing us or completing our contact form.

    John Ashton
    Crackerjack Visual Thinking

    #visualthinking #collaboration #communication #engagement

  • Crackerjack featured in Research to Action article on Visual Note Taking at Conferences

    Very pleased to be featured in an article by Laura french-Constant of Research to Action about Visual Note Taking at Conferences. You can read the article by clicking here.

    To find out more about how Crackerjack Visual Thinking creates images that start a conversation, contact us at info@crackerjackvisualthinking.com or call us on +44 (0)775 282 6227.

  • ‘Picture’ your organisational story to engage your people… #visualthinking #engagement #storytelling #e4s

    Telling a clear story can be the key helping your people engage with your organisations vision and purpose.

    Being able to ‘see’ the story as a picture can further enhance their understanding, helping them both see the ‘big picture’ and well as better understand where their role fits into what can sometimes be large and complex organisations.

    Find out more about how visual thinking can support engagement in your organisation by listening to John Ashton from Crackerjack Visual Thinking on Engage for Success Radio:

  • Engage for Success Radio: Crackerjack discusses the links between #visualthinking and employee engagement #e4s #engagement #communication

    Earlier this week I had the pleasure of discussing the links between visual thinking and employee engagement on the Engage for Success Radio Show.

    E4S Radio Show

    As a supporter of the Engage for Success movement, it was great to share thinking on how using visual thinking tools and techniques in an organisation can help people have better conversations and enable an organisation to tell its story (often referred to as its strategic narrative) more effectively.

    Here’s the link to the interview: Engage for Success Radio Show #132

    Hope you find it interesting and please do share your feedback and thoughts!

    Visit www.crackerjackvisualthinking.com to find out more about how visual thinking can enable employee engagement and better conversations within your organisation.

  • How pictures can help people engage for success #engageforsuccess #visualthinking #engagement #strategicnarrative

    Helping people throughout an organisation have a shared understanding the organisations story (often referred to as its strategic narrative) is a key part of any engagement strategy. The story can detail the history of the organisation, its current state and its future vision amongst other important information. For maximum impact, the story should detail the ‘what’ (i.e. what happened and when?), the ‘how’ (i.e. how were the things achieved?) and the ‘impact’ (i.e. how did people feel?). This combination of hard facts and emotion can provide a powerful tool in helping people understand the organisation, their feelings towards it, the role they have played and the role they can play in the future.

    Now imagine that rather than just reading the story, people can see it mapped out visually on a large poster.

    Weetabix
    An operational storymap produced by Crackerjack Visual Thinking for Weetabix…

    They can gather around the poster and use it (either ‘freeform’ or as part of a structured meeting or event) to stimulate thinking and discussion and engage with the organisations story on a deeper level. Imagine if this activity was repeated across the whole organisation so that everybody understood its strategic narrative. Powerful eh?

    Visit www.crackerjackvisualthinking.com or contact us to find out more about how our visual thinking work can help you tell your organisations story.

  • Graphic recording at Derby and Notts CIPD Annual Meeting #letsENGAGE @DerbyNottsCIPD @davidtmacleod @macs_JamesT

    Had a interesting couple of hours last night graphic recording Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire’s CIPD annual meeting. Both David MacLeod (Engage for Success) and James Taylor (Macildowie) spoke about the need for engagement in the workplace. David stressed the importance of having a clear strategic narrative in an organisation and I was struck by the role visual thinking (both in terms of graphic recording and graphic facilitation) can play in helping to tell an organisations story.

    Here’s the graphic I produced during the meeting:

    Derby and Notts Annual Meeting 2015