Where do you get your best ideas?

Where do you find you get your best ideas?  I’ll bet it’s not when you’re looking for them! 

I was  working with a client the other day on his marketing plan for the next 12 months.  He said something that made me realise he hadn’t read the notes from our previous meeting. 

So I did what any good coach would and asked him a couple of questions to find out why.  For me, it was one of those ‘duh’ moments (not as good as an ‘a-ha’ but often just as illuminating!).  This client does not like reading, so my carefully written notes had passed right by him.

Without saying anything, I started to use a Mindmap to illustrate the strategy we were discussing.

The difference was quite amazing.  My client became quite animated, asking lots of questions and making some suggestions of his own.  It was a very productive meeting.

Afterwards, when I came to put together the notes from our meeting, I drew a mindmap to summarise (using software from smartdraw.com). 

With written reports it can be easy to ramble on with too many words.  Mindmapping helps you get straight to the point!

How do you think?

Recently I’ve taken on several new projects that need to be created almost from scratch. Also, because the deadlines are either at least a couple of months away or not even specified, I’m having to be disciplined and set some imaginary completion dates.

I’ve always considered myself to be a good planner of projects, to be logical, pay attention to detail and, indeed, I’ve prided myself on completing ahead of time on many occasions. This was very useful during my corporate career.

Those experiences and skills have also served me well in my own small business, except in one rather important area.

When it came to creating a new product, my old ‘linear’ way of thinking didn’t seem to work too well. I found that my paper lists became very messy as I thought of new points to add in, and that logic wasn’t terribly helpful for new products that didn’t exist yet (except in my head!).

It was obvious that a new way of thinking was called for. Mindmapping, devised by Tony Buzan, has been a real revelation. It enables you to let your brain take a more circuitous route and capture more and different thoughts than if you were simply writing a list. One of my local networking contacts, Andrew Wilcox of Cabre, is using Mind Manager software in very innovative and effective ways in businesses.

Now, whenever I start a new project, I plan it out as a mindmap first. The lists come afterwards. More creative – and even more new ideas!

How do you think?

New Beginnings

Last week was both frustrating and rewarding. Frustrating because I had to spend a lot of it catching up after being unwell. Rewarding when my Selling Skills workshop on Friday was so well received.

This week is going to be very different.

I love developing new products, don’t you? It satisfies my creative leanings! But I do find that I need to have ‘cleared the decks’ first so that there are as few distractions and other tasks to do, as possible. This is one of those blissful weeks.

What have I got to show for my efforts so far? At the end of day 1 I have a rather messy looking Mindmap and am very pleased to have so much down on paper. What always surprises me is just how many ideas my subconscious has picked up over the last few weeks, since I decided to work on this project.

I’m going to leave the Mindmap overnight and return to it in the morning to see if I have anything to add, or if it needs changing.