The Idea Mapping Blog Has Moved

You can now find us at http://ideamapping.ideamappingsuccess.com along with many idea mapping and mind mapping examples! Come join the fun and keep up with the latest information surrounding this space.

Mind Mapping or Idea Mapping?

(See the Idea Mapping Blog, the squidoo idea mapping group and main squidoo lenses, and flickr photos for more idea mapping examples.)

I frequently am asked the question, “What is the difference between idea mapping and mind mapping?” Although Idea Mapping has a rich heritage in mind mapping, I use the description “Idea Mapping” because:

1. Over the past 17 years some of my clients have reacted unfavorably to the term mind mapping. The "weird factor" was a bit much for them and I think idea mapping better describes the tool and the process.
2. To respect those who map by the mind mapping laws. (Mind mappers often don't know they are breaking the mind mapping laws anyway.) Although there is some value in the laws when applied appropriately, some people feel their creativity is restricted by them. Some clients nearly abandoned the tool because of this (especially by the one-word-per-line law).
3. When and where the laws should be applied should be determined by the purpose for which the map is being created.

These laws are shared with my workshop participants, but in the form of guidelines. Here are a couple examples of where it made sense to break the mind mapping laws:

The idea map above is titled, "The 4-Poster Question", and was created by the Cheif Engineer and her 12 engineering managers (plus 3 facilitators) of a large automotive company in southeastern Michigan. I won't go into detail about the application, but you can read the full story here. Suffice it to say that not all information radiated from the central point, but it was still important to visually be able to see everything on one page. The second broken mind mapping law is the use of one word per line. That didn't make sense in this case based on the purpose. The successful results speak for themselves.


Steve Rothwell from the UK created this map above. Full story is here. Again, not all words are on a line, he does some fishboning, and a few other law-breaking items. But it worked for him. Most importantly he was experimenting with color (colour if you're reading this, Steve) and he had a breakthrough.

The Idea Mapping Blog Has Moved

For the July 2, 2008 Mindjet Newsletter article, all of the migrated content in this blog, and all future postings, go to the NEW Idea Mapping Blog.

Movin' On Up!

I'm happy to announce that I've launched a new blog farm. Blogger has been outstanding and I want to thank Google for an awesome product!

The purpose of this blog is to share idea mapping examples and related learning from my Idea Mapping, Memory, Speed Reading, and Certification Workshops. This blog is dedicated to my Certified Idea Mapping Instructors, my clients, and Mind Mapping and Idea Mapping practitioners around the globe.

Please visit us at http://ideamapping.ideamappingsuccess.com/IdeaMappingBlogs/ from this point forward.

Kind Regards,

Jamie Nast

Web-Based Mind Map - Chuck Frey

Welcome to Chuck Frey's newest mind map resource! He just published an extensive comparison chart of 5 of the major web-based mind mapping applications - MindMeister, Mindomo, Mind42, Comapping and Mead Map. He covers over 60 features and capabilities of these applications including:

- Overview (versions, pricing)
- Map formats supported
- Map level features
- Topic-level features
- Import options
- Export options
- Publishing options
- Collaboration
- Other features

This comparison chart is available as a free download from his blog.

Idea Map #109 - Live Map Creation

Michael Panebianco is a captain with Southwest Airlines and has contributed several idea maps to this blog. This particular map was created "in the moment", so I call that a real-time idea map. I'll let Michael explain in his own words.

This real-time map was created during a phone conversation with a colleague who is interested in developing a stand alone self-defense class, and our guided discussion ended up looking like this. It is not a complete course, but did cover a large amount of relevant material. It starts with Maslows pyramid and works clockwise. It becomes apparent it was done real-time as I left some gaps, and overlapped a few times. I will be refining a final curriculum map that will include the vast majority of the info in this map!

Search for Michael Panebianco to see more of his maps within this blog.

Idea Map #108 - 8 Request Elements

I met Pete Wilkins in May of 2005 when I taught a Buzan Licensed Instructor Certification Course in Vancouver. Pete is the founder of the Kosmos Group a consulting company focused on leadership development and team performance. He works with leaders and teams to achieve their goals by bringing awareness to 3 domains of the human observer -- Language, Body, and Moods/Emotions. This awareness is important because "You can't change what you don't see".

Pete explains that a "Request" is in the domain of Language. There are 5 main acts in this domain. These speech acts are important because we are linguistic beings. From the time we learn how to talk until we die we live in language. Just as a fish lives in water, we are always living in language. So why is this important according to Pete? Too often we think of language as a passive or descriptive tool. But another more powerful view is language as a generative and creative tool. Too often we aren't making proper requests of others. Being more conscious of how you are making requests allows a greater possibility of you to influence your future.

Pete's map depicts the 8 request elements. Thanks for sharing Pete. If you want to see the idea map that Pete contributed to my Idea Mapping book go to Book Maps and click on Figure 6.8. It's a flip chart-sized idea map of Vanda North's book titled "Get Ahead".

Visiting San Francisco

Susi Watson developed this unique map for people who wanted want to visit the various tourist attractions in San Francisco. Unfortunately, non-Mindjet users can’t open the branches to see the details. Above are two versions of her map. One is the collapsed overview and the second map is expanded in a few places to show some of the map’s many details.

I suspect many of you would like to know how she created this map, so let me give you some background. I was introduced to Susi in the fall of 2007 through Gaelen O’Connell at Mindjet. We ended up co-facilitating two sessions at the VizThink Conference held in San Francisco in January 2008. I was immediately attracted to her mapping style and thought you would be intrigued as well.

To get the map of San Francisco dropped into the MindManager file, she inserted a picture of it into the background. To do this, open up a new file and right click anywhere on the background. Then select Background, Backgroud Properties, and then Select Image. Under Tile Options, Susi recommends Center or Stretch to Fit. You may need to play around with it a bit by:

1. Increasing the font size of the central image/words while shrinking the size of the map. I found this helpful when choosing Stretch to Fit under Tile Options.
2. Right click on the central topic and select Format Topic. Click on the Size and Margins tab. You may need to adjust the Left Margin.

The central image in this map was the circle labeled “Sample San Francisco Family Day.” The rest of the circles (or main topics) are floating text placed strategically on the map on top of the location being described. Each floating topic has sub branches that go into more detail about the attraction. Adding photos, hyperlinks, attachments for maps and travel documents, linking to sections of your travel budget, and how to link new contacts to Outlook are all demonstrated in this map. For instructions on all of these items, look for the text box within each topic called “How To.”

Flags were used to customize attractions into 7 categories: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Indoor Activity, Outdoor Activity, Evening Events, and Touristy. The idea was that you could filter this map based on your own travel plans and build a customized version of your own. This map isn’t 100% complete. As you could imagine, it could grow into infinity. But it does give you a nice picture of possibilities.

Susi Watson is and artist, consultant and facilitator. She helps conceptualize and create valuable customer experiences for both public and private sector clients. This map is featured in today’s Mindjet Monthly Newsletter. If you want to have the entire map in MindManager format, email me at info@ideamappingsuccess.com and I’ll send you the original file. To see this in a larger pdf format go to “Additional Maps” on my website. They are in alphabetical order by the title of the map.

To subscribe to this blog, click on the orange and white icon (in the toolbar above) just to the right of where you see http://ideamapping.blogspot.com/.

Idea Map #106 - Franklin Templeton Library Mid-Year Results

Larisa Brigevich is the Director of the Global Research Library at Franklin Templeton. In April 2008 she completed the 5-day Idea Mapping Certification workshop. Her first contribution to this blog was January 7, 2008. I'll let her explain this idea map in her own words. I know her map is quite large, so if you would like the original MindManager map, email me and I will send it to you. For those that don't have MindManager, the pdf version is available on my website. Thanks Larisa!

"This map is a visual summary of the library team's mid-year accomplishments. In the pre-idea mapping past, I'd put this summary in an Excel spreadsheet, ranging between 3 and 5 pages, with information organized by corporate objectives. This time, I've created an idea map instead. I enjoyed working on it more than working on a spreadsheet. Using images to substantiate key concepts such as "raising the bar" made the process more fun.

From the business view point, presenting our numerous accomplishments in a visual format on a single page makes it easier for both, the team and senior management to review (and admire our success :-)). In fact, when I showed the map to the team, the first reaction was "we had no idea how much we'd done during this period". Of course, with a map it is easier to draw connections b/w various activities and add supporting documentations as attachments.

At the top of the map I included corporate priorities, marking them with numbers from one to four. I wanted to attach these numbers or their combinations as images next to various activities/initiatives to link them to corporate priorities."

Idea Map #105 - Transportation in Singapore

Thum sent this example to many of us mappers and I was intrigued because it was a joint effort between father and son. Thum worked together with his 12-year old son for his Social Studies assignment using iMindMap and incorporating a graph. It may help you if you are trying to find your way around Singapore! Thanks Thum!