Minds in a fog

If you had to get a lot of information across to someone... how would you do it? If you had to explain a complex thing or a detailed project or the purpose of something, how would you do that?

We usually start with words, the verbals. Now that many more of us are in online training, meetings and workshops more frequently, it’s becoming clear we need to use tools that go beyond the ‘blah blah’ of talk.

Many of us are experiencing a kind of brain fog. It’s not a normal communication situation. Many people have already done my 90-minute online workshop, where I show you plenty of options and ideas for bringing more visuals to help convey information.

It’s available as a tailored session with your work team too. ‘How to use visuals in workshops and meetings’ doesn’t require you to be an artist, but it does get you doing something a little new.

The impact, engagement and influence you’ll gain will be worth it.

Why the rush to simplicity

When things are messy, challenging or difficult, we can be impatient to make it all simple so we can tick it off and move on. It happens in meetings and workshops when the leader - meaning well, doing their best - takes what someone has said and simplifies it down to one big simple word.

The leader responds, ‘oh right, so what you’re talking about is < simple, big category word like productivity, strategy, collaboration>‘.

’No’, the person may say, that’s not quite what they were saying. Their contribution or explanation gets distilled so far ... pushed ahead to a single word, for the sake of simplicity.

But it could be too simple.

It’s like that exercise some people run in workshops: ‘What’s ONE WORD to describe today’s workshop/conference/meeting?’

Why the limit to one? One word may be easy, quick and controlling for you to put on people but it’s less effective for engagement, sensemaking and meaning making.

We may distill so far that the deeper (and intended) meaning vanishes, evaporates and is lost. Beware that by stripping things away to make it easier for you, may make contributions so vanilla... there’s no vanilla left.

Participants and observers

As well as being participants in times of change, we can also be observers. We can watch what is happening, spot trends, notice change and join the dots of these observations and experiences. 

There is hindsight (working out what happened) and there is foresight (suggesting what might happen in the future). 

We can also be more tuned in to the now. This is the place of insight. 

It’s where and when insights come to us. We can take notice of these cues or let them fly by, remaining oblivious to them. 

Observing and interpreting insights is a vital part of adapting to uncertain and changing times. It’s a part of the capability that is Sensemaking. 

How do we do this observation and Sensemaking thing better? 

-Listen 

-Write things down 

-Reflect and review at the end of a conversation or meeting 

-Review your notes again later on 

-Sleep on it 

-Notice what you think the next day. 

Your brain will have done some incredible sorting, decluttering and rearranging overnight. And that is some of the best Sensemaking we can be doing... without even knowing it! 

Listen, notes, review, sleep on it, response. It can help us make sense of the strangest things. 

Make sense of what you can

It’s not possible to understand or make sense of everything ... you know, not everything! When we are understanding, learning and ‘connecting the dots’ about a situation over a period of time, we are making sense ... sense making.

We do it naturally and instinctively but we can also learn and focus on how to do more sensemaking better, sooner, quicker.

There is value and calm for us focusing on the stuff we can make sense of and to not worry so much about the rest... the chaos. As more information comes to hand about a situation, our sense of the situation grows. We know more. We make more sense. The chaos can become a little less chaotic perhaps.

We can’t know everything all at once. It kind of doesn’t work that way. We will see more and differently as more things come to light for us. There's no need to battle all the chaos, all the time.

Join me as we just make sense of the things we can, progressively, bit by bit.

Lighten the online meeting load

After so many online meetings Urgh! We’re foggy, brain-fried ... like we’re in a continuous conference.

This is the human experience of cognitive overload. But it’s exacerbated and multiplied by the load that’s coming via one channel - online. Yes, its different to face to face, next to each other, same room or space.

Here are 3 COGNITIVE LOAD COPING habits:

☀️Change state and break.

Take a short break between every meeting. Yes every one. It ‘releases’ the mental load you’ve been carrying. Like emptying a truck’s load. Don’t do back-to-back. Bad. Just 30 seconds, get up, move and BREAK your state.

☀️Stop soaking information and start sensemaking.

In every meeting, WRITE some handwritten notes. Not typed. Hand written. This is ‘externalizing’ information. It actively relieves those fried feels.

☀️Write down more than a meeting’s end points, actions or decisions.

Catch a quotable quote, a smile moment, a PHRASE that sounded good. This helps retain some focus.

And it’s ok... you’re not failing.

We’re all carrying around a huge concrete slab of shock, change, worry and uncertainty. That’s already some heavy stuff.

Break your state

Write it down

Catch a phrase