Ashley Arias  May 30, 2020

Mind Mapping

Challenge    I used mind mapping with employees to help understand their current state and future

needs to successfully transition to a new financial tool. During a summer internship, I worked at  a financial institution’s headquarters and helped with multiple projects, namely the transition  between an old retirement tool to a new alternative tool that would be better integrated in the  system with other preexisting financial tools. Before announcing a transition plan for fee based  planners, corporate wanted to know how much pushback there would be and how to combat  it; admittedly, that is a very broad question with many challenges.  Selection    The intern team decided to pull data from fee based planners with differing ages and

average yearly completed plans. After coming up with a list of 30 fee based planners, my team  created a list of question and tasks with mind mapping at the center of its creation. The goal  was to understand what employees felt would be the hardest part of the transition so that we  could come up with a helpful solution based on the struggle.   Application    The questions were ambiguous yet targeted relevant data that could help us categorize

the planners into different personas to understand their fears and motivations. We used  questions like “how would a new tool change your process with clients” to gain insight into  what a day in the field would look like and spot clear differences from an average client  appointment that we previously had asked employees to map out for us. These projective  techniques and questions led us to add an activity to our interviews. Four quadrants were  grouped into things that I like about the tool, things that I don’t like about the tool, things I am  concerned about and what help will need.    After sharing their results, we told them solutions other fee based planners had come

up with and some of their fears to think of more ideas and flesh out existing ones for solutions.  This form of mind mapping helped them to think of viable solutions from corporate’s end so it  would be less trial and error later for us. I believe one of the most important questions we  asked was “is there anything else you’d like to tell us”. This question sparked ideas, insights,  and a place to voice frustrations for clients that helped later on in the creation of solutions.    The pinwheel-like chart we asked employees to make along with additional data helped

to create a few personas coupled with their fears and solutions to those fears. I have created a  chart below to visualize these better.    Persona  Worries  Solutions

Well-versed and comfortable  with routine

• Transitioning will be a

pain because I already  know how to do it this  way

• Have corporate team

come up with an auto  transfer before launch

• I don’t want to waste

my time hand  transferring all my  cases into the new  system

• User friendly guide for

new tool with step by  step comparison to old  tool

Confidence in information  • I pride myself on

knowing this tool and  don’t want my clients  to realize I am not as  comfortable with the  new one

• How much time will it

take me to relearn the  tool

• Video demo plugging in

a case on new tool for  visual learners

• Customer conversation

pamphlet to explain  the change

• Bi-annual check in

Technologically challenged  • I don’t know how to

transfer cases

• It’s going to cost me

money to hire someone  to do it

• Previously mentioned

auto transfer

• Previously mentioned

video demo

Insight    The breadth of insight we received was far beyond what was expected. Some of the

solutions that employees came up with were right under our noses, but because of personal  biases we could not see them. Such an example is to combat the anxieties of simply reaching  out to corporate to ask questions for fear of scrutiny, set up 15-minute bi-annual calls with the  500 active planners to check in and “give them a pat on the back”.    When my team presented the solutions that the employees came up with, they were

impressed and excited. All of these solutions could be modified and concerns could be solved  within the month with little need for additional resources. What was most useful about mind  mapping was understanding the day to day tasks of a fee based planner. Many of the people  sitting in the corporate office had never been in their shoes, so having the planners verbally  walk us through their client process was useful for perspective. It was also helpful to have the  employees brainstorm and work off of each-others’ solutions because they know best of all  what would work and not work for them in their environments. My team learned the value of  mind mapping especially when “time constraints” was able to be broken down through  conversation and explanation to time it will take to understand the tool and time it will take to  transfer data files. Without the tools we used, we would have potentially missed half of the  problem.  Alternative Approach  Although I believe that mind mapping with the fee based planners was incredibly useful, if I  were to go back I would have incorporated more visualization tools into my approach with the  employees. I would have asked for drawing the first thing that comes to mind when we say  “change” and “corporate”, and take a more creative approach instead of relatively regimented

interviews. I think attitudes toward these topics that go beyond the scope of what my team was  assigned to uncover could have been found. These would have been useful insights for future  changes to delicately balance the fact that employees are people but that change is fast and  necessary.

