Visualization

CHALLENGE  Just a couple of weeks ago I had a meeting with the board of the local retailers’ association. They  have been recently appointed and are keen to define a strategy to improve business opportunities  and services for their members. The local contest is suffering general crises but, particularly  downtown where there are only small shops, the situation is difficult due to shopping malls in the  suburbs and, recently, e-commerce. Moreover, the city center is affected by unsuccessful choices  made by local authorities mainly regarding urban mobility. The creation of a pedestrian area has  been strongly opposed by shopkeepers but the recent decision to cancel it has been judged bad.  Local politics are still considered the root causes of the wretched condition.

The association’s mission is to promote economic growth of its members and of the local  community. But how to pursue it in this difficult condition? The first thought of the association’s  president has been to apply for EU funds but how, when and, especially, with which project and  goals?

According to the course (Module 1), design thinking was what we needed.

Why?

-  The problem is human-centered, and a deep understanding of the actual customers is  needed;

-  We need to explore the problem;

-  The level of uncertainty is high and past data are not very useful;

-  There are not many data to analyze (or better, meaningful data).

SELECTION  To answer to the president’s question I asked for pen and paper. I thought that the right tool was  VISUALIZATION to easily design a program roadmap showing the main concepts and steps and  identifying risks.

APPLICATION  What I draft was a simple circular journey starting with the description and analysis of the current  situation, following with the problems identification and then the goals setting. The loop, obviously,  got back to the start position to go on and improve results. With this easy map right in front of us  the discussion started and we could list and cluster causes behind the problems. Actions, and so  projects, to carry on came up effortless.

Achieved the method, my little tip was to engage members and push them to put their heads  together to repeat the logical journey and to think about new and attractive strategy to improve the  appeal of their business. A little brainstorming went out from the first meeting and the main decided  action point was “We have to shake our minds and first engage operators themselves to disrupt and  find a new value proposition”. But how to do it? True engagement is difficult to obtain. All  participant agreed on the need for a wow event for a good start and for “quick wins” to keep the  members motivated.  The resulting idea was to contact the local university to organize a business

game with teams formed by entrepreneurs and students with some professors as facilitators, new  and old school together to discover new value proposition for downtown merchants.

INSIGHT  Visualization gave the participant a tool to put order in their thought and logically structure an  analysis process. The roadmap set the path where testing all ideas keeping an eye to results. Even  if an easy way, visualization broke barriers in communication and speeded up ideas.

I am used to use visualization and especially mind mapping as a describing and analyzing tool and I  find it very effective now in remote meeting too.

APPROACH   The approach, even not revolutionary, set a clear scenario where develop the discussion and gave  a map to place reasonings and evaluate solutions. If we have followed a narrative approach in no  way we could end in a valuable output in such a short time. Maybe we couldn’t achieve anything  due to the difficult to catch the attention of entrepreneurs for more than few minutes.

