Visualization

Background about me:

Completed my Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and joined IT /IT services industry from start of my  career, I am used to deliver different roles related to technology sales, pre-sales and consulting. During  my maternity break from full time work, I did some freelancing assignments.

Challenge about the new role:

In my last freelancing assignment, I was working with brain training and development organization, as  Marketing and Sales manager. This role was very different and challenging as it required to sell and  promote a concept which in India (my region of sales), where lot of myths acted as road blocks. These  myths varied from perception to interpretation. For e.g.: Brain does not need any development, it is an  inborn talent people born with, Mindfulness is same as meditation, few hours of training will make  permanent changes, why spend money on something which can not be quantified in terms of monetary  gain or short-term benefit, etc.

Other than these road blocks, my biggest challenge was to sell this concept to IT heads and CIOs of the  company, since my network comprised only technology folks. They would be my entry point to refer me  to their HR head, if they like the concept and would want their team to be trained.

Application:

Being in technology sales for long, one thing I realized during my orientation of concept itself, this concept  cannot be explained with presentations and verbal communication. Technology folks only believe in  demo’s and visual shown things only register in their brain. The importance of Visualization tool as explain  in Video of Visualization tool Week 1, reconfirms the need for same.

Firstly, I had to think of something which will grab their attention at very first instance, secondly it must  be engaging more than mere watching, thirdly they need to have firsthand experience or proof of concept  with case studies. Most of all the new method must be truly innovative for them to believe the brain  training is truly working for me and I am able to think out of the box.

After, doing multiple rounds of iteration, I designed a brain puzzle. This puzzle is given to the CIO’s to solve  and put the pieces together. On completion of puzzle it will form a human brain and explain what part of  brain develops and how it benefits to the Humans. There is a second set of puzzles which I put together  to explain the method in which brain training works.

Attached is the image of Adult brain and its benefits after training. (The Prefrontal cortex of the brain  increases physically after the training which helps enhance the primary and secondary skills sets which in  turn helps to develop complex skill sets like leadership and out-of-the-box thinking)

Attached is the image of 4-R strategy which is used to train the brain. (Realize what you are in be in present  moment, create Anchors be in present moment on demand, rewire your new pathways (thought patterns)  and redesign your new automations to succeed)

Learning & Benefits:

This helped me to grab the attention and easily get the next level of meeting to their HR managers. Also,  it helped them to take a break from their routine automation of looking at presentations and videos, by  physically engaging in the presentation and giving inputs. It is very much necessary for us to ensure the

listener gets the message which we want to deliver and at same time do validation whether our offering  will help them.

While making many people solve the simple puzzle more than 50% of people took more than 10mins, and  35% could finish only by giving some assistance. Only 5% of people could solve the puzzle with in 5mins  by themselves.

This clearly shows even with 20+ years of experience, brain does need some training to think out-of-the- box and routine to solve new problems.

Alternate method:

After, going through the course of Design thinking innovation, it has helped me to open up new ways of  methodologically thinking new and different methods for being more effective in my work. With  visualization tool, Story telling tool also needs to be very effective and need to concentrate on both well.  Launch Learn method can help me to start small pilots for sample groups, create success stories and then  expand to overall organizations.

Assignment submitted by,

Bunga Abbas

