VizThink09: Kinesthetic Modeling Workshop

I had the great pleasure of attending the VizThink North America conference last week in San Jose and just like the inaugural conference in San Francisco last year I was very impressed with the passion and skills not just of the workshop facilitators but the attendees. Having facilitated a workshop last year I can say that I learned a tremendous amount from the attendees both during the workshop and in the conversations after. I was chatting with people from 8am until midnight on all sorts of topics to do with visualization, collaboration and brain science. There were too many awesome people to name individually, but Tom Crawford, Ryan Coleman and Chris Pascucci planned and executed the event so they get special mention.

One of the more intriguing workshops that I attended was by John Ward on the topic of Kinesthetic Modeling (KM). In short, KM is a process by which people attempt to communicate a particular issue and solutions by creating metaphor out of physical objects. John’s attempts to elicit “pre-conscious” information is impressive and I actually had a bit of a breakthrough moment in the first five minutes of the workshop.

John asked each of us in the workshop to select four or five objects to which we were attracted from the big pile in the middle of the table. Without even realizing it I selected four objects that were all circles. It took me one second to realize the significance of this and it’s that I see my whole series of personal and professional relationships as a series of concentric and overlapping circles. I’m attracted to the circles that are part of Open Space methodology. The fact that I subconsciously selected a few parts that were all circles was quite a moment for me.

In short, the methodology for going through one of these exercises goes a little something like this:

1. Define the problem. For example, “The economic crisis threatens our entire business model.”
2. Identify key words or phrases from the group that come to mind when that problem is described.
3. Model silently. Everyone at the table creates a common model using the pieces at the table but does so silently. This is an important aspect of the process because it taps into the “pre-verbal” intelligence that rarely gets used.
4. Identify the literal pieces in the model, such as “that piece looks like a bridge” versus conceptual ideas such as “that piece looks like a threat”.
5. From there you can extrapolate to the conceptual ideas in the model but it’s important to start with the literal.
6. Each table comes up with a few solutions to the problem based on insights gleaned from creating the model.
7. Map the solutions versus the work of other groups and see what insights emerge.

It seems as though John equates KM to three dimensional modeling. In a broader sense kinesthetic exercises are ones where people are learning/creating by doing, not by listening or reading. So I would put the act of modeling on a whiteboard as a further extension of kinesthetic modeling. Doing the exercise with physical objects in three dimensions is a more powerful exercise, to be sure, but both exercises are on the same continuum of activities.

One of the benefits of making models is that it allows for relatively inexpensive hypothesis generation and testing. Models can be easy to scrap and redo. But one of the traps of models is that the more polished you make a model the harder it is to redo it. Think of the difference between a sketch of a new car and a clay model or a full blown concept car. The concept car contains much more detail but is harder to change while the napkin sketch contains very little information but is easy to change. Obviously both types of models are useful in the right circumstances.

Whether working with tangible ideas such as a car or conceptual models such as a business plan it’s always best to incorporate visual, auditory and kinesthetic experiences to fully maximize a group’s creative potential.