Draw a Better Business. Cara Holland
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hunt
Grab your camera or phone and have a
wander around your home, your office, or
outside in your community.
Keep a look out for visual communications:
instructions, messages, directions or simple
announcements that use visuals (sometimes
with words alongside) to communicate.
Now in this exercise I’m not looking for logos
that represent a brand, but for images or
icons that are trying to communicate, inform
or instruct us.
Once you start looking you’ll see they are
everywhere. On the cereal packet, on the
coffee machine, on the fire extinguisher, on
the USB cable, outside on the utility boxes and
telegraph poles on your street.
Take photos of the ones that you find effective.
Start to notice all the forms of visual
communication around you every day, and
when you see a good example take a snap
of it. What makes some more effective than
others? Is it the image they’ve used? The
words? The colour?
Also, and perhaps more importantly, have
a think about what makes some not work as
successfully.
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thinking
Visual thinking means using images, shapes and
colour, along with text, to help you think, process
and communicate more effectively.
Let me give you an example. I recently spent a day
with Hollywood screenwriting consultant, Bobette
Buster.
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She talked me through some story‑telling
universal truths script writers use.
I loved the idea of visualizing them to help people
better understand their own storyline.
I met with Emma, who was a consultant and had
spent three years delivering a multi‑million project
for a global client. She didn’t want to head into
another project, but was anxious about changing
direction. I asked Emma to tell me her story. As we
talked, I visually captured the plateaus, the times
of free‑fall such as redundancy, and the periods
in the wilderness where she had, in the past,
successfully worked out what to do next.
By the end, Emma felt confident about her ability to
change direction, and to map out her next steps.
The conversation we had was important, but it
was the visual that helped Emma’s brain make the
connections and have those “aha” moments.
after the session she said,
“Wow. I thought I knew everything
there was to know about my own
story, but seeing it drawn out
helped me notice patterns I just
hadn’t been aware of, and that
was unexpectedly powerful.”
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visual thinking is powerful
As well as spotting patterns and making
connections, working visually can help you:
generate more ideas
think more expansively (non‑linear)
retain information for longer
understand information more fully
get clarity from complexity
recall content more fully
solve problems
communicate more effectively
increase engagement / buy‑in
increase compliance
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Working visually gives you some serious cognitive
assistance. I’m not going to tell you how to think,
because that would be weird. What I hope
though, is that as you engage your visual thinking
brain and use the skills in this book, you’ll start to
see the benefits for yourself.
drawing
The whole of the next section focuses on drawing,
so I’m not going to say much more at this point,
except this: you can draw, but if you’re feeling
doubtful, don’t worry, I get it. For now, just trust me
when I tell you that by the end of this book you’ll
be drawing yourself solutions, plans and ideas that
are going to help your business. Remember I’m
not talking about ART, I’m talking about
FUNCTIONAL DRAWING.
If you’re thinking, “Yes, but do I really have to draw
this stuff? Can’t I just use image‑search tools on my
computer?” then I offer you this:
I’m going to give you some of the science, but
for me it boils down to one thing: drawing fires up
a part of your brain that tapping on a keyboard
never will, helping you think and work differently.
Oh, and it’s also a whole lot more fun, which I
guess makes two things...
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