Quote of the week

"If you want to make a stand, help others make a stand, and if you want to reach your goal, help others reach their goal."
- Confucius

Wow, there's a lesson for managers. You want employees to push towards organizational goals? Show them how it meets their goals as well.

And there's an additional lesson for all of us - you cannot do it alone. Help others and you'll find the help you need.

Do you know the goals of those closest to you?

Storyboarding for Success

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I'm rewriting one of our workshop manuals in manga/comic book format.

While I was in Cabo San Lucas last week, I continued work on the project.

Storyboarding is the easiest way for me to do this. It triggers my right brain by forcing me to think visually. It also forces me to simplify my concepts.
So, I sat by the pool with a pad of post-it notes and sketched out my ideas.

The workbook opens with a quote from Confucius - "If you must play a game, know the stakes, the rules, and the quitting time" - so you can see here that I sketched some ideas around that.

The post-it notes are great, because I can move them around, insert or delete ideas and images, or redraw one without wasting the other pictures.

Once I drew the storyboard, I went to Microsoft Clip Art and grabbed some images that matched my storyboards. Eventually, I'll acquire some more exclusive images or shoot my own, but the Microsoft art is free and represents a good start.

Here is my 'manga' version of the Confucius quote.

Had I started at the computer, it would have probably taken more time, been less clear, and less creative.

The next time you create a presentation or document, try storyboarding first. You might be surprised by the results.

One other way to utilize your storyboards, is to just import them directly into your document or presentation.

This image that depicts "Stereotypes vs. Generalizations"

could be cleaned up in Photoshop and easily dropped into my presentation.