Search Results for: post up

Posted on by — 2 Comments

Card Sort

Grouping

Object of Play
Card sorting is a practice used frequently by information architects and designers to gather and structure inputs for a variety of purposes. In a common use of card sorting, information for a website is put onto the cards, and the sorting helps create categories for navigation and the overall architecture. The method works just as well for creating slides for presentations, or at any point where information needs to be sorted and organized in a sensible way.

The applications of card sorting are numerous, and in use it works similarly to Post-Up and affinity mapping. Card sorting can differ from these methods, however. First, the cards are generally prepared in advance, although participants should be allowed to create their own while sorting. Second, the cards are a semi-permanent artifact and can be used as a control over several exercises with different participants to find patterns among them.

Number of Players: Small groups or individuals

Duration of Play: 30 minutes or more, depending on the number of cards and participants

How to Play
Use 3×5 index cards or similar. For a typical sorting exercise, aim for 30–100 cards in total; more than this range will likely overwhelm the participants, and fewer may not be meaningful enough to be worth the effort. On each card should be a succinct bit of information; enough to tell the participants what it is and no more. Putting too much information on a card will slow down the sorting; not enough will cause confusion and will slow down the process even more.

Give the group the shuffled deck and a stack of blank cards. Describe the overall organization challenge, and ask them to sort the cards into groups that go together. If they think something is unclear or missing, they may alter a card or create a new one. Once they have created the groups, ask them to name them and describe them.

There are variations of sorting—including asking the group to rank the items from most to least desirable or to organize the cards into two categories such as “must have” and “nice to have.” You may also ask the group to sort cards into a predefined set of categories, to test their validity.

Strategy
Although the Card Sort game won’t tell you everything you need to know about a set of information, it will help reveal the thought process of participants. In this sense, it’s more about people than information. Only after a number of sorting exercises with a number of groups will larger patterns appear.

Card sorting is a common practice of information architects and designers of complex systems. Its actual source is unknown.

Posted on by — 4 Comments

Affinity Map

a four column table with post-it notes sorted by theme

Affinity mapping, originally uploaded by dgray_xplane.

Object of Play

Most of us are familiar with brainstorming—a method by which a group generates as many ideas around a topic as possible in a limited amount of time. Brainstorming works to get a high quantity of information on the table. But it begs the follow-up question of how to gather meaning from all the data. Using a simple Affinity Diagram technique can help you discover embedded patterns in your data (and sometimes break old patterns) of thinking by sorting and clustering language-based information into relationships. It can also give us a sense of where most people’s thinking is focused. Use an affinity diagram when you want to find categories and meta-categories within a cluster of ideas and when you want to see which ideas are most common within the group.

Number of Players: Up to 20

Duration of Play: Depends on the number of players, but a maximum of 1.5 hours

How to Play

1. On a sheet of flip-chart paper, write a question the players will respond to along with a visual that complements it. Conduct this game only when you have a question for the players that you know will generate at least 20 pieces of information to sort.

2. Ask each player to take 10 minutes to generate sticky notes in response to the question. Use index cards on a table if you have a group of four or less. Conduct this part of the process silently.

3. Collect the ideas from the group and post them on a flat working surface visible to everyone. It should end up resembling the following figure.

4. Based on guidance from the players, sort the ideas into columns (or clusters) based on relationships. Involve the group in the process as much as possible. Have the players approach the wall to post their notes—it saves time—and allow them to do an initial, general sorting in columns or clusters.

5. Create a sticky-note “parking lot” close to the display for ideas that don’t appear to fall into a natural category. Redundancy in ideas is OK; don’t discard sticky notes because they’re already represented. It’s helpful to leave repeated ideas posted since it indicates to the group how many people are thinking the same thing. At this stage, ask the players to try to avoid searching for higher categories and simply to focus on grouping the information based on the affinities.

6. Once the content is sorted, ask the group to suggest categories that represent the columns you’ve created and write the categories they agree on at the top of the column (or near a cluster if you chose a cluster rather than a column display). Don’t let the players spend an inordinate amount of time agreeing on a name for a category. If there’s disagreement over “Facilities” versus “Infrastructure,” write them both. If the players produce categories that are significantly different, pay attention to which category gets the most approval from the group and write that one. Your visual may end up looking like the one below.

Strategy

The value of the Affinity Diagram game increases when two conditions are met. The first is that the players generate multiple data points, ideally with good information. The second relates to the quality of the sorting. The cleaner the players’ insights when they form relationships within the content, the better the categories will be; only then can you discover embedded patters in your data.

Fun, optional activity: Run through the Affinity Diagram game once, complete with categorizations. Then ask the group to reshuffle the sticky

notes and recombine the ideas based on affinities they didn’t notice in the first round.

Sometimes affinities within content are crystal clear, so the sorting becomes less pivotal, but when those relationships are more nuanced, it’s more important that the sorting process is done well. In a situation in which there are many ways to affinitize information, assume a stronger facilitative role. Ask questions about the columns or clusters to clarify the group’s thinking and steer them toward an appropriate number of categories. If there are too many, the data gets watered down. If there are too few, the analysis gets watered down. Help the players find the sweet spot.

The affinity diagram was devised by Jiro Kawakita in the 1960s. It is also referred to as the KJ Method.

Posted on by

Lo-Tech Social_Network…Explored

Inspired by GameStorming and looking for a new content piece for a 2 day workshop I was facilitating I decided to facilitate Lo-Tech Social_Network.

And for some reason I called it Social-Network-UN_Plugged…so both are used interchangeably. Why?  Because I forgot the name when I introduced the activity.

Below is a write-up created with Lo-Teach Social_Network in mind and I am calling

Social-Network Un_Plugged 

Purpose

  • Team process of creating connections.
  • Getting to know others while finding similarities and developing common strengths.
  • Visual Representation of known and un-known connections, dependencies, and accountabilities within teams

Materials:

  • Flip Chart Paper or Large Roll of paper
  • Post-its (multi-colored preferably)
  • Markers or pens (the more colors the better!)

Group Size:

  • Can be accomplished with groups of 3 – 1000’s
  • For smaller groups use flip chart paper, for larger groups you are going to need a MUCH larger space and sufficient amounts of paper.

team building & leadership www.create-learning.com

Objective:

Social-Network-Un-Plugged is effective with groups of people who know each other well as well as those who do not know each other well.

The objective is to find connections, then to continue to explore how people in the team are connected. By graphically illustrating connections people begin to feel and understand that the similarities and accountabilities are more alike than they at first thought.

Preparation:

Prior to beginning this activity with small teams; ensure that you have at least one sheet of flip chat paper/per team of 10 or less.

For team of 10 or greater I recommend using another sheet of flip chart paper for every 10 people.

If the group is large for example 100+ there are 2 variations;

1. Break the group into teams of 10 people and each team sits with their own piece of flip chart paper. Teams can be Heterogeneous (do not know each other) or Homogenous (know each-other well) the facilitator and decision maker determines this based upon the program objectives.clip_image006

2. The team stays one large organizational group and a large roll of paper is rolled across an available wall. With this variation everyone is finding connections with everyone else.

Additionally you will need at least one Post-it per/person and each person will need a marker, or something to write with.

Instructions and Facilitator Script:

Hand out the flip chart paper and ensure that everyone has a post-it and a marker or pen.

If using the large group method have the paper secured to a wall.

Below is how I generally explain the initiative;

clip_image008“Within this room today we all share connections, connections of managerial authority, accountabilities, backgrounds, futures, trainings, families, hobbies, etc…

It is vital that these connections grow and we see that the similarities are greater than the differences. Once we explore how similar and inter-connected we all are then we can grow and develop solutions to enhance what we are doing.

Please in the top portion on your post-it write your name, below that you are going to draw a picture of your face. Below your picture write two ‘tags’ about yourself (one word skills you possess, sometime I have them write where they were born and if they work together number of years with the agency.)

clip_image010Great now place you post-its randomly on the paper. Using the markers draw lines connecting you, to other people. Label these lines what the connection is. For example one line may connect 2 people who were hired together, another may connect people who worked in the same office, and another may connect people who like to eat chocolate ice-cream. The connections do not and should not be all work related, look for hobbies, personal preferences, vacation spots, sports teams, etc…”

 

Allow 20-30 minutes depending upon how interactive the groups are being, with larger groups you will have to allow more time. Some people walk away and come back; it is alright if everyone is not into the activity. Once the action has calmed down lead the group in some processing and reflection.

Processing & Reflection:

Here are some ideas;

Active Processing;

Ask each person to find their post-it and count the amount of connections that off-shoot their name.

Once they find their post-it and count connections ask people to read the connections and reflect on how the connections were;

  • formed
  • broken
  • strengthened
  • changed

Following the personal reflection ask the people to forms groups of 2-3. Ask each person to share one connection for each of the following terms above (formed, broken, strengthened, changed) with the group.

clip_image012

Possible questions for the group;

What was your initial reaction to the challenge?

How many connections were formed?

What surprised you about the connections?

In what ways did you form connections?

Who are you connected with that you did not know you shared that connection?

What can we learn from this?

How can these ideas be brought to the office, home, community, classroom?

Reference:

Original idea from the book; GameStorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers: Lo Tech Social Network game; p. 105

And reminded of the excellence of this activity from the GameStorming Blog 

 

michael cardus is create-learning

Posted on by

Graphic Jam sparks high-school imaginations

Graphic Jam!

Katie Koch of Project: Interaction is Gamestorming with high-school students. Here’s an excerpt from her blog post where she explains how she used Graphic Jam (page 96) to get students thinking visually and to get their creative juices flowing:

Looking for a fun way to brainstorm, we decided to adapt a game called Graphic Jam, from the book, Gamestorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers by Dave Gray, Sunni Brown and James Macanufo. The game challenges participants to visualize words that often seem too abstract to imagine in a tangible way. Participants are given two minutes to sketch as many ideas as they can to represent the chosen word.

We thought this would be a great assignment for our class for a few reasons. Many of our girls keep saying to us that they’re not any good at drawing, and we are determined to break that mindset and get them comfortable with thinking visually. And, we want them to know that having lots of ideas is critical to finding the right idea. We also wanted them to know that brainstorming can be more alive than just writing words on paper.

The Graphic Jam was a huge success! Each word generated tons of tiny sketches. When time was up and the alarm rang, the girls rushed out of their seats to post their sketches to the chalkboard, with over half the group eagerly volunteer to explain their sketches in front of the class.

You can read the full post here.

Project:Interaction is a ten-week after-school program that teaches high-schoolers how they can use design to help improve their communities. They could use your help to buy materials for their classes. If you like what they’re doing please consider helping them with their Kickstarter campaign: They have five days left and need another $2,000 or so to reach their $7,500 goal, even after the funds were taken out of the line of credit provided by Sambla Norway’s forbrukslån financial initiative. It’s a great program. Why not lend a hand?

Posted on by — 1 Comment

American Marketing Association interviews Dave Gray about Gamestorming

Summary: According to Dave Gray in his new book, Gamestorming, playing with office supplies is not a waste of time. Whipping out a stack of post-its in a meeting and jotting down notes or sketching ideas is actually helpful; otherwise all those ideas have to stay inside your head, getting lost and confused. Writing out ideas, moving them around like pieces in a game, and collaborating with others makes for faster meetings and more creativity. Every company needs those creative ideas to reach the top even just stay there.

Listen to the podcast here.

Posted on by — 1 Comment

Party Invitations

This game is credited to Cyd Harrell and has been used by Bolt Peters in several client brainstorming meetings.

Objective of play: Improve the onboarding process of a product or service.

Number of players: 5-30
Duration of play: 30-60 minutes

How to play:

  1. Everyone is handed a piece of paper and a marker.
  2. Participants are asked to imagine that the product/service being designed is a party or event and to create an invitation.
  3. Invitations should be as detailed and realistic as possible — they might include an inviting statement (“Join us for…”), what to bring, what the host (company) will provide, time, dress code, directions, RSVP info, and any other information guests might need to enjoy the party. It could also be done in the form of a Who, What, Where, When, Why invitation.
  4. Participants are encouraged to refine their invitations in multiple iterations. Allow at least 10-15 minutes for invitation writing.
  5. Once everyone has completed their invitations, the facilitator calls for ideas on each element of an invitation in turn:
    • What did you call the party?
    • Did anybody have a dress code?
    • What did you say about refreshments?
    • What do guests need to bring?
    • What is the party actually for?
    • How will guests get there?
  6. Next, participants read through their invitations in turn. The facilitator takes notes and posts the themes on a white board.
  7. After everyone has presented, participants jointly narrow and refine the ideas, keeping in mind things like:
    • What metaphors have emerged? How might they contribute to ideas for the onboarding experience?
    • Which elements are crucial to the invitation?
    • Which ideas represent the right feel for the brand and offering?
  8. Finally, the facilitator engages the group in sketching or another idea generation process to implement the refined invitation as a draft of the onboarding process.
An example party invitation.

Strategy:
This is essentially a metaphor-generation game that allows participants to imagine how they want to engage their audience. Detail is good, and players who go whole-hog with imagining their party as anything from a white-tie gala to a potluck are likely to be successful as long as they carry it through. Interesting discussions will ensue when participants go for different versions — are we a come as you are party or do we have a festive dress code? Must you RSVP or can you just show up?

Why invitations?
At Bolt Peters, we often think of successful technology products as being more than just friendly. They are literally inviting — asking their audience to use them, rewarding them when they do, and asking again for higher levels of use and engagement. When deploying a conversion funnel, especially for gradual engagement, an enticing and escalating invitation is a critical piece of the puzzle.

Posted on by — 2 Comments

Video Card Family Game

Video capture

Object of Play:  Co-create products or services using design insights gained from collaborative analysis of key frames of peoples’ activities from video clips recorded during ethnographic field work.

 Number of Players: 6 – 12

 Duration of Play: 7 – 8 hours

Required Resources: The Video Card Family Game requires use of a video camera (perhaps a smartphone), video editing software, graphics software, desktop publishing software, index card printing stock paper, and a printer (preferably color).

 Preparing to Play: The Video Card Family Game is a research technique useful in promoting collaboration among design team members and people engaged in the front-end design process. It uses video recording as a visualization resource for ethnographic fieldwork, especially participant observation among stakeholders (typically a product innovation team) and people who will use the product or service. The preparation time depends on the nature of the project as well as the logistics of the field work.

Ethnographic field work, in the simplest terms, means going to where the people of interest gather to share in their experience and analyze it. Designers use participant observation to co-create insights for product and service design by experiencing the peoples’ activities involved, such as working in their own context, or staging an environment in which people perform the activities of interest using mock-ups or prototypes.

1. To prepare for the Video Card Family Game, the facilitator edits the video into segments of no more than two minutes each. The importance of participant observation comes into play during the selection of video segments. Participant observers select video segments using insights about what is significant that they gained during the field work.

Note: It is important to select video segments in which actions, rather than conversations, are primarily occurring. You want, predominantly, to see what people do rather than hear what they say they do. In other words, focus on video where people are involved in physical action.

2. Save each video segment with a unique file name.

 3. Select a key frame from each video segment and give it a unique identifier.

 4. Create a video card by copying the key frame for each segment and pasting it into two corresponding index cards in your stock paper template. Give both cards the same title. Number both cards with the same unique identifier. Leave a comment area either below, or beside, the picture depending on how you layout the index cards.

Note: The image from the key frame may need resizing in a graphics editor before pasting it onto the index card stock paper template. You paste the image on two index cards to produce duplicate video cards.

5. Print  the duplicate video cards and place each in a separate stack.

 6. Repeat steps 2-5 for each video segment.

Note: The number of video cards created from the two-minute segments provides a degree of objectivity in the selection process. Ideally, each game player receives a stack of 10 video cards.

How to Play:

 (Allocate one hour for Steps 1 – 5 of playing the game)

1. Explain the rules of the game by providing a synopsis of steps 2 – 10 in the game play.

2. Provide players with instructional guidance on the difference between observing action in video and interpreting action.

Note: Observations come from descriptions of who is engaged in the action, what they are doing, where they are doing it, when they do it, and how they do. Interpretations involve assertions about why particular people do what they do when and where they do it. At times though, how they do it applies to interpretation when it relates to why the action occurs.

3. Group the players into pairs and provide each group with duplicate stacks of video cards.

4. Play the video segments corresponding to each video card in the duplicate stacks provided to each pair of players.

Note: Instruct the game players in each group to review the video segments in their group but not to discuss them with their partner.

5. Ask players in each group to take observational notes regarding what happens in the video segment corresponding to a video card. The idea here is for each player to personalize their video cards through writing notes on them, making them tangible research artifacts to handle and use in design discussions.

(Allocate 30 minutes for Step 6)

6. Ask each pair of players to discuss what they saw in the video segments and arrange their video cards into “families” that share a theme, before placing them on a table. Any theme is appropriate as long as it makes sense for the design focus of the game.

(Allow 1 hour for Steps 7 – 8 )

7. Ask each player to choose a favorite “family” of video cards from those they identified with the other player in their group. Doing so makes that player responsible for relating the design focus to user input as exhibited in the resulting “family” of video cards.

8. Attach each favorite “family” of video cards to a poster and write a heading for the theme it represents. Organize the video segments corresponding to each “family” for easy review.

(Allow 3 – 4 hours for Step 9)

9. Bring all the players from all the pair groups back together with their posters. Ask each player to describe and show their favorite “family” of video cards and invite other players who think their video cards fit, or resemble, the theme to add them to that family.

Note: The game property of the play comes to bear at this step, since the idea of the game is to pass as many cards from your stack to others as possible. The player describing their favorite “family” attempts to avoid further additions to their theme by playing the relevant video segment and explaining why the proposal to add another video card does not fit. No single player has seen all the video segments. Therefore, accepting or rejecting a video card for each theme depends on all the players reviewing the video segment from which the video card proposed for addition is drawn.

 (Allow 1 hour for Step 10)

10.  Document the themes by having members of each group write a structured description using the following format:

  • Describe the theme
  • Describe why it belongs in the family you assigned it to
  •  Provide at least two examples
  • Describe the way the action occurs in context
  • Describe the way people employ the action in the context

Strategy

Video of people’s activity is one of the most challenging resources used in design research. Playing and replaying video segments for review is time consuming and, depending on the number of people involved and the type of activity recorded, difficult to distill into agreed upon insights. The Video Card Game’s design provides a collaborative structure for interaction between designers and users to co-create insights for product and service design from video sources.

When playing the Video Card Family Game, facilitators need to remember that, even though the video cards give the video a tangible mode of expression, the images remain on relatively small cards, whether on the surface of a table or attached to a poster on the wall. One can imagine an interactive wall display like Microsoft’s Surface that minimizes the legibility problem. Short of such a solution however it is important to keep in mind the logistical limitations imposed by rendering video representations of action onto video cards.

Provenance

The Video Card Family Game draws from the “Happy Families” children’s card game, a game in which players collect families of four cards as they ask one another in turn for cards of a particular archetype. The goal of “Happy Families” is to collect a family of four cards, forming a stack. Collecting the most stacks makes you the winner.

Werner Sperschneider, a user-centered designer, at the Danish industrial manufacturer, Danfoss A/S, created the initial version of the Video Card Game as a method for combining ethnographic and visual research methods using video.  Design researchers, Margot Brereton, Jared Donovan, Stephen Viller, at the University of Queensland, as well as Jacob Buur and Astrid Soendergaard, of  the University of Southern Denmark, and the University of Aarhus, respectively, also provide case studies of its use.

The rendition of the game offered here refers to it as the Video Card Family Game for the explicit purpose of making it clear that Ludwig Wittgenstein’s concept of family resemblance is a key criteria in the gaming process for deciding to which themes a video card belongs.

Larry Irons is a Principal at Customer Clues, LLC. Larry practices Experience Design — translating strategic business goals, and the complex needs of people, into exceptional experiences for those who provide products and services, and those who consume them, whether the latter are customers, users, learners, or just plain people. He writes the blog, Skilful Minds, which blogs.com listed as one of the top ten Customer Experience blogs in 2009. Skilful Minds is also listed in the top 99 Workplace eLearning blogs by eLearning Technology.

Posted on by — 1 Comment

Homepage Bingo

VTS Madrid

Object of play

Ranking selections can be quite boring sometimes. In this game, participants have to create the homepage of a product, service or organization’s website as if it was a bingo card – everyone needs to make quick decisions about what comes top, what comes last.

Number of players: Small groups

Duration of play: 30  minutes – 60 minutes

How to play

Prior to the game, prepare a sheet, like the one below.

1.  Before starting the game with the group, prepare a set of cards (post it notes are brilliant for this) with the attributes or features you want to rank. Give each participant a homepage frame and an identical set of cards – and keep one for yourself.

2. It is better if participants are seating around a table or another surface, but not too close to each other – they shouldn’t be seeing what is going on with their neighbor’s homepage.

3.  Like in a bingo, start calling out the cards in random order. You can give a brief explanation of what the card is, so there is a shared understanding, but be careful for not over-explaining some cards and accidentally attributing your own value to it!

4.  As you call out the cards, participants must decide where to place them on the homepage frame. The decision about what goes on top and what goes on the bottom is made on the fly.

Strategy

It will look messy in the beginning, as participants start pushing down – or out – cards they had given a lot of value in principle. Ask them to keep pushed out cards in a separate pile, so you can talk about it when the game is finished. The whole point is to make quick judgements about features. Illustrated cards are also fantastic for this game, as they take away the prejudice words can bring to concepts and leave more room for participants’ interpretation. After the bingo is over, you should have an ‘exhibition of homepages’ attaching the sheets to the wall and opening for discussion.

About

photo

 

WHAT IS GAMESTORMING?

Think back to the last time you played a game. What was the game? Why did you choose to play? Was it a simple game like tic-tac-toe, or something more complex, like Monopoly, Scrabble or Chess? Or maybe it was a game of basketball? Did you play with friends? With family? Try to recapture the feeling you had as you played the game. How did it feel? Would you like to have more of that feeling at work?

Games come naturally to human beings. Playing a game is a way of exploring the world, a form of structured play, a natural learning activity that’s deeply tied to growth. Games can be fun and entertaining, but games can have practical benefits too.

This blog is about games designed to help you get more innovative, creative results in your work. We’ll show you not only how to play them but how to design them so they fit your own specific work goals.

 

REVIEWS

Chris Brogan video review of Gamestorming:

“Most organizations would welcome more innovation, a greater ability to change and a more fulfilling and fun culture for their employees. This book is probably the fastest and easiest – and most economical – way to make that happen.” Read the review at Research 2.0.

“If you are a business owner or manager who wants to look at things in a new way and sharpen innovation in your company or on your team, Gamestorming is an excellent resource for you.” Read the review in CanadaOne Magazine.

“If you’re a facilitator, corporate trainer, a team leader or in a creative role within a company, I’d say that this book will be valuable to you and that’s it’s worth checking out. A definite 8/10 and recommended.” Read the review at Broadcasting Brain.

“Gamestorming… teaches you how to fish, so to speak, instead of just giving you a formulaic set of rules and procedures. Best approach to game design writing I’ve ever read on the subject, flat out, this is really good stuff.” Read the review by Gregg Fraley.

“As I put the book down I find my mind racing, filled with a sense of excitement, eager to “play” the games that’ll create new ideas, solve problems and improve our business.” Read the review by Adam Davidson.

“Considering the actual “instruction” part of Gamestorming is only 52 pages, I took a crazy amount of notes as I read through it. Perhaps this speaks to the uniqueness of this book. Perhaps it’s a reflection of how many ideas it sparked for my own life and business. Regardless, I can comfortably say that it’s been a while since I so enjoyed reading a business book.” Read the review by Chris Taylor of Actionable Books.

“This is a really smart book. Buy it and it is going to come in handy for that next workshop you need to run. Just don’t forget to leave PowerPoint behind and bring pens and paper instead!” Read the review on Just a Tech blog.

“This is an unprecedented collection of tools and strategies that anyone can use to examine challenges deeply, explore new ideas, for performing experiments and testing hypotheses, and for generating new and creative insights and results.” Read the review on Innovation Tools.

 

ABOUT THE GAMESTORMERS

Dave Gray is the founder and chairman of XPLANE Corp., an information design consultancy serving Fortune 100, NGO and government clients around the world, and co-founder of Vizthink, a global community dedicated to the use of visualization in all forms of learning and communication. An artist, journalist and information designer, he is passionate about applied creativity.

Sunni (Sun) Brown is a social entrepreneur, best-selling author, keynote speaker, and expert meeting facilitator. She and her team have designed and led hundreds of multi-sensory group problem-solving sessions and she’s delivered countless interactive “playnotes” in environments around the world. She’s the author of Gamestorming and The Doodle Revolution and is currently authoring a book on collaboration as a force to unlock potential, strengthen relationships, and soften resistance to change. Her TED talk on doodling has drawn more than 1.6 million views on and her work has been featured in every major U.S. publication including The New York Times, The New York Post, The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, WIRED, and Entrepreneur, as well as being featured twice on CBS Sunday Morning and on The TODAY Show. She was named one of the “100 Most Creative People in Business” and one of the “10 Most Creative People on Twitter” by Fast Company ands she served as the Innovator-in-Residence for MURAL. Sunni has trained for thousands of hours in inner sciences including meditation, Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, Right Use of Power, and a potent mind-body practice called Internal Family Systems.

James Macanufo is a senior consultant who works with clients around the world using visualization to help them unravel complex challenges, develop solutions and implement change.

Posted on by — 9 Comments

Mapping Business Models

Business Model Workshop Netherlands

Globalization and the emergence of digital business have changed the playing field for everyone. New business models can now rapidly disrupt an entire industry by changing the way value is delivered to customers (Look how Apple’s iTunes strategy disrupted the music industry, for example). The Business Model Canvas, developed by Alex Osterwalder, is a tool that you can use to examine and rethink your company’s business model. We are very pleased to announce a knowledge game for examining your business model and exploring alternatives, developed by Alex himself, and shared here for the first time. Thanks Alex!

Objective of Play: Visualize a business model idea or an organization’s current and/or future business model in order to create a shared understanding and highlight key drivers.

Number of Players: 1-6 (depending on the objective). Works well individually to quickly sketch out and think through a business model idea or an interesting business portrayed in the press. To map an organization’s existing and/or future business model you should work in groups. The more diverse the group of players (marketing, operations, finance, IT, etc.), the more accurate the picture of the business model will be.

Duration of Play: Anywhere between 15 minutes for individual play (napkin sketch of a business model idea), half a day (to map an organization’s existing business model), and two days (to develop a future business model or start-up business model, including business case).

Material required: Mapping business models works best when players work on a poster on the wall. To run a good session you will need:

How to Play: There are several games and variations you can play with the Business Model Canvas Poster. Here we describe the most basic game, which is the mapping of an organization’s existing business model (steps 1-3), it’s assessment (step 4), and the formulation of improved or potential new business models (step 5). The game can easily be adapted to the objectives of the players.

  1. A good way to start mapping your business model is by letting players begin to describe the different customer segments your organization serves. Players should put up different color sticky notes on the Canvas Poster for each type of segment. A group of customers represents a distinct segment if they have distinct needs and you offer them distinct value propositions (e.g. a newspapers serves readers and advertisers), or if they require different channels, customer relationships, or revenue streams.
  2. Subsequently, players should map out the value propositions your organization offers each customer segment. Players should use same color sticky notes for value propositions and customer segments that go together. If a value proposition targets two very different customer segments, the sticky note colors of both segments should be used.
  3. Then players should map out all the remaining building blocks of your organization’s business model with sticky notes. They should always try to use the colors of the related customer segment.
  4. When the players mapped out the whole business model they can start assessing its strength and weaknesses by putting up green (strength) and red (weakness) sticky notes alongside the strong and weak elements of the mapped business model. Alternatively, sticky notes marked with a “+” and “-” can be used rather than colors.
  5. Based on the visualization of your organization’s business model, which players mapped out in steps 1-4, they can now either try to improve the existing business model or generate totally new alternative business models. Ideally players use one or several additional Business Model Canvas Posters to map out improved business models or new alternatives.

Strategy: This is a very powerful game to start discussing an organization’s or a department’s business model. Because the players visualize the business model together they develop a very strong shared understanding of what their business model really is about. One would think the business model is clear to most people in an organization. Yet, it is not uncommon that mapping out an organization’s business model leads to very intense and deep discussions among the players to arrive at a consensus on what an organization’s business model really is.

The mapping of an organization’s existing business model, including its strengths and weaknesses, is an essential starting point to improve the current business model and/or develop new future business models. At the very least the game leads to a refined and shared understanding of an organization’s business model. At its best it helps players develop strategic directions for the future by outlining new and/or improved business models for the organization.

Variations: The Business Model Canvas Tool can be the basis of several other games, such as games to:

  • generate a business model for a start-up organization
  • develop a business model for a new product and/or service
  • map out the business models of competitors, particularly insurgents with new business models
  • map out and understand innovative business models in other industries as a source of inspiration
  • communicate business models across an organization or to investors (e.g. for start-ups)