Thinkery - Open Visual Thinkery

Here is the archive of open visual thinkery in chronological order.

Breaking down the problem

A few months ago, I had the pleasure of working through new Gallery features to the Fabulous Remixer Machine with my 10-year-old. It was so invaluable: having a child ask you straightforward questions about the problem, and the solution you’re proposing helps you to see things that otherwise you might have missed. We drew out…
MVP vs MLP

Minimum Viable Product (MVP) you’ve probably heard of. But Minimum Lovable Product (MLP)? Put simply, it’s the minimum set of features required for your users to love your product (as opposed to just tolerating it…) This Thinkery was captured live during a series of workshops by We Are Open, for Catalyst.
Do-My-Users-Care-O-Meter

Wouldn’t it be like crazy silly if you built something and then your users didn’t really care about the thing you built? Well take it from me, buster, it happens all the time. So it’s probably best – before you build your new features – to find out if your users will care about it.…
Empty Shelf Syndrome

Empty shelf syndrome is when those things we’ve been looking forward to – have become attached to – are suddenly made uncertain. I need a holiday. It feels like we’re in uncharted territory, and decisions are hard to make. Did I mention I need a holiday? But come on now, Bryan, you’ve got this –…
Content is not just King…

…but King, Queen and everything inbetween. Following on from this post, the motives behind how you play your hand come through in the content itself. Open hand anyone? Here’s a blog post all about it… This Thinkery was captured live during a series of workshops by We Are Open, for Catalyst.
Content

Content to fill an empty page. Is that all I am to you? Just an image for someone to notice? Just a paragraph to draw someone in? The words and pictures have become the product… Having said that – when we talk about what we’re up to in an open way, others can really benefit.…
A slip of the tongue

Sometimes, a slip of the tongue presents itself as an opportunity to join things together that should never be joined together. You’re welcome. This Thinkery was captured live during a series of workshops by We Are Open, for Catalyst.
What you don’t know you don’t know.

In any problem space, there’s the stuff you know you know (I know the parts we need to make this work). Then there’s the stuff you know you don’t know (hey – let’s find out about that and work it into our plans before we start building!). But the reason why a tech project is…
Some systems are bigger than others.

As the Smiths once sang, “Some systems are bigger than others, some systems’ mothers are bigger than other systems’ mothers”. Ok maybe not, but following on from this and that it’s worthwhile showing that some parts dominate the ecosystem. In my experience, the more embedded a component is, the more difficult it is to change…
Mapping out your Eco-system

Following on from the need to draw out an ecosystem, it’s sometimes helpful to think about the different categories of elements. So for a technology solution there might be elements to the client facing, elements that are stand alone tools, and then internal communications to join the two together… This Thinkery was captured live during…
The Big Ecosystem

“It isn’t that they can’t see the solution. It is that they can’t see the problem…” wrote G.K. Chesterton. An ecosystem is a tricky thing to draw because every ecosystem is different. I guess it’s a borrowed term that points to a bunch of things that are related to each other and therefore impact each…
Wading through Treacle

Do your projects ever feel like you’re wading through treacle? One problem just leads to another problem and that you’re slowly sinking? You’re not alone! (And did anyone else in the days of their youth enjoy Shredded Wheat with treacle and hot milk? Maybe that was just a rural Irish thing…) This Thinkery was captured…