Reflection - Visualization

Challenge

I'm a lawyer in a bank. My expertise is corporate and bankruptcy law. In one of the  cases I dealt with, a customer of the bank was given a loan while his house was  supposed to be the guarantee for the debt. The customer told the banker that the  house is a big private house in one of the richest cities in the country, and so it is worth  a lot more than the loan that he was asking for. In the worst case, if he won't be able  to pay the loan, the house can be sold and his debt will be paid.

After the loan was not paid on time, we demanded the customer to follow his  commitment and sell his house in order to pay his debt. Only then we found out that  the house was not his house at all. Unfortunately, although there is a special  procedure in the bank, describing all the things the bankers must check in order to  relay on the customers assets as a guarantee, the banker, in this case, did not follow  the procedure as he should have been.

In order to prevent this event from happening again, my challenge was to guide the  bankers to work according to the bank special procedure, regarding customers assets  as a guarantee, in a series of lectures that were organized by their supervisors.

Selection

The tool I selected to use was the Visualization Tool (Module 1 - video number 5). By  using this tool, you use visuals like photographs, videos, diagrams, colors, symbols,  images, logos etc. instead of using words. By doing so it is more likely that your  audience will understand your message better and remember it.

I selected this tool to my challenge since the procedure I had to talk about in my  lectures was long (over 30 pages) and complex procedure. Moreover, it was important  to me that the bankers remember as much as possible from the lectures and I figured  that by using visuals (photographs and symbols) the important details in my lectures  will be more rememberable.

Application & Insight

I applied the Visualization Tool in my lectures by creating a slide show including a lot  of symbols in it. I divided the procedure into separated steps and decided to give each  of them an individual symbol to represent them (For example, to describe the step in  which the banker should check the value of the asset I used a scale symbol). In each  slide there were the symbol and a short explanation of the procedure step described  by the symbol. At the end of the slide show there was a diagram which only contained  the symbols with arrows in between them showing the direction from one step to the  other.

My insight from applying the Visualization Tool to my challenge was how effectively  visuals deliver the message and making it easier to remember, especially when the  topic is long and complex (like 30 pages bank procedure). Apparently, the symbols I

used were so rememberable that I didn't even had to explain them when I presented  the final diagram. The bankers, already know what they mean and remembered which  of the symbols, representing the next step in the procedure, comes next.

These days, with so much information and so many distractions around us, it is  important to be able to deliver a short and rememberable message effectively. As I  discovered, by using the Visualization Tool, using visuals can help you do that  effectively.

Approach

Although the Visualization Tool proved itself and helped the bankers remember all the  procedure steps, it was important to me that they will also understand the importance  of this procedure so their work will not only be technical work. Therefore, in my next  lectures I decided to also use the Storytelling Tool. I began the lectures by telling the  bankers the story about the customer house (that turned out that wasn't his house),  so they can understand the importance of the procedure and only after they did, I  began my slide show with all the visual steps (the symbols) of the procedure, making  them easier to remember it.

