Hey, it looks like this...

In a meeting with a client team this week, we were strugglig to understand the crux of a project, the keystone of a piece of work.

Then one of the managers jumped to his feet.

"It looks like this!" he said. His energy and enthusiasm shifted up a level. He stepped to the whiteboard, picked up a marker and drew a circle with two lines leading to it... he finished off with some smaller circles around the edge of the larger circle.

With this quick image, the talk and questioning of the previous 20 minutes were crystallised. So little effort yet with such a huge impact. The power of helping people see what you're thinking.

You've stepped up to a white board or flip chart before, but when you do, there are problems lurking.

My new whitepaper 5 Ways to more engaging flip charts and whiteboards explains how to avoid the problems and make your visual solution more engaging.

Download the whitepaper here and this week, step up, jump up and help people really see what you're thinking.

What's your story?

I've just returned from some travels in far north Australia, to the 'pointy bit', the most northerly tip of the country - Cape York.

The main image above I took at the Split Rock Aboriginal Art Galleries near the town of Laura in far north Australia. The history in the area goes back 40,000 years and there are many stories and milestones recorded in these rock art galleries. It's an important way for the culture to survive. The images capture information, convey ideas and tell significant stories. They're like a storyboard of what was happening at the time.

Last century, Walt Disney used storyboards to capture his innovative thoughts and map out the flow of his productions. In current day, it's mainly the advertising industry that makes use of this tool.

What delierate tools do you use to engage and connect with others - to capture your thinking, to convey information, to collaborate? 

A rough storyboard can map out the stages of a project, the desired outcomes, the key people involved, the timelines. A corporate product team I recently worked with created this storyboard and many others around the room. The team was highly engaged, transfixed on the images, contributing throughout the day. 

Help people see the possibilities, identify opportunities and collaborate. I believe we all have 'visual mojo'; we had it when we were younger children, happy to bring our thoughts, stories and ideas to life and put them on show for passers by. 
Where did it go? Get your visual mojo back.  For trainers, speakers, facilitators and project leaders who need to unite a team to a vision or gather group input, storyboarding is engaging and captivating - and it need only last a few weeks or months - not 40,000 years.  

Referrals and Degrees of Separation

You know the now shrinking 'six degrees of separation' where you're only a few connections away from everyone on earth? How that applies to referrals and recommendations can be an interesting experience.

Recently a colleague referred me to a colleague who referred me to another colleague. Thanks to my colleague's recommendation, I started out on the conversation journey with the next two layers of colleagues!

The odds that this referral or transference of trust was going to work was lower than if

a. my colleague had worked directly with me on more than just a project or two ie; if we had a longer, deeper relationship

b. there were only one or two degrees of separation between me and the prospect - rather than this three or four levels.

The further removed the referral, the more weakened the trust, the more likely it's not going to be a match. A match on values, philosophy, ways of working...

For sure, connections and meeting up with people out of the blue can create some of the most wonderful and serendipitous relationships - business or otherwise.

But as Robyn Henderson networking guru explains in many of her books, workshops and presentations, networking is about the transference of trust. People like to work with people they know and trust.

While I built rapport and a good connection with the colleague of my colleague, the next layer can be more difficult. Now we're at the colleague of the colleague of the colleague. The trust and connection is weaker, the transference of trust is hanging on the recommendation of my original colleague and our ability to build rapport, understand each other's ways of working, seeing a way to possibility.

Confused? Don't be. Just continue to focus on building relationships with the people you know and trust. That circle or group of people closest to you. And they'll be more able to refer and recommend you to people they know and trust.

The next layer - the people who don't know who you are, who don't know the colleague of yours, may not be your best bet for business right now.

Keep focused on those closest. And let the ripples of connection flow from there, gently.