VISUALISATION

CHALLENGE AND SELECTION   The first tool I used was the tool of Visualization, or Visual Thinking,  to achieve a shared understanding of a problem space among a diverse group of stakeholders before  attempting to identify and define possible solutions to the problem. I use this approach often with  our customers, who are government agencies working to apply technology innovations to modernize  their mission or the delivery of their services to their customer, which may be U.S. citizens,  businesses, and non-citizens.

APPLICATION   I start the process by creating a straw man graphic of the problem domain. To  develop the straw man graphic, I will draw from any existing material available to understand the  environment. The existing material may be operational or procedural documents, training materials,  marketing materials, GAO or other auditing reports. If materials are not available, then I conduct  informal interviews with one-three of the stakeholders who serve as my main points of contact on  the initiative.

If appropriate to the situation, I will borrow the concept to “front-stage/back-stage” from previous  research, and discussed in David Gray’s book, “The Connected Company”. The front-stage/back- stage approach helps to reinforce the notion that every service – even an internal service – has  customers with whom the service provider interacts and internal processes that enable the  organization to provide the service. The straw man graphic is simple, using simple shapes and icons  available in Visio or on the Internet. If the front-stage/back-stage view doesn’t work, then I will  create a different type of visual, either based on a high-level process flow with swim lanes for  different stakeholders, or another format.

For the activity, I will divide the stakeholders into groups of 5-6 participants each representing a  different organization or area of interest. Each group receives a poster-size copy of the straw man  graphic that they can write on directly, or use sticky notes to make comments. I give them two-three  questions to answer, such as:

1) What key elements are missing from the graphic?

2) What would you change about the graphic to make it more accurately reflect your problem  space?

3) What key insights do you have about the relationships between the entities in your problem  space?

I give them approximately 20 minutes to discuss the questions and mark up the graphic. Then I have  each group report out on their answers to those three questions while pointing to the mark-ups on  their poster. As each group reports out, I record commonalities in the insights of each group, and  then additional insights that come from the group discussion on an additional copy of the graphic.  After the session, I digitize each group’s poster as an artifact, create a view that combines the shared  and new insights from the group discussion, and then create a revised graphic that incorporates  their feedback and proposed changes that they agreed to as a group.

INSIGHT AND APPROACH    What I have learned from conducting this exercise with several groups is  that while the graphic – especially the revised graphic that incorporates their feedback – is  important for reinforcing their understanding of the problem they are working to solve, the more  valuable aspect of the activity is the shared insights and shared learning that occurs while they are

working to define their problem space. The graphic gives the diverse group of stakeholders a focal  point for discussion that allows them to share their perspectives and develop insights into potential  root causes of their problems. While they could create the graphic from a blank slate in a  collaborative manner, starting with a straw man jump starts the conversation for them. They can  quickly identify where they are in the graphic – or if they are missing – and can more quickly gain  new insights about relationships between key entities instead of taking time to identify them. They  can also identify variables in the problem space – that is, it helps them to identify what they don’t  know, in what areas they need to obtain information or data to provide the values for the variables.

