Strategic Thinking for Leaders – The Easy Visual Method

posted in: Vision 0

There are a number of ways and software methods out there to help you get visual with strategic thinking.

Personally, I’m a fan of posting up colored sticky notes on the wall and/or on scratch paper.

I also recommend the sticky notes method if you have projects with multiple members of your team that are too simple for a project manager, but complex enough that visualizing will help.

Take project elements and arrange them as a timeline or flow chart on the wall. You could use a different color for each owner, or maybe for their level of contingency on other events.

Then, take a picture of it. No need to type it up or get fancy. If your handwriting is legible enough, just take a picture. Done.

If the visual you create needs to be more permanent, simply transfer the notes to pieces of paper.

The photo examples below are all about a small project I undertook about a month ago:

Develop blog posts around four specific topics, enough to last through September, but make sure the topics rotate.

As I brainstormed blog post ideas, I used different colors for each topic. Posting them on the wall helped me ensure that they were balanced.

Then, I rearranged them into a more logical order within each topic.

Next, I pulled some scratch paper from the recycle bin, and labeled the pages with May, June, July, Aug, and Sept.

I added the dates for each Wednesday on the left sides of the pages.

Finally, I pulled the notes from the wall and assigned them to a day, then took a pic of each month to refer back to.

If you zoom in, you will see “sticky note wall” on the June sheet, next to 24. That’s today. 🙂

Simple and effective. And, it’s all in the recycle bin again now.

Thanks for reading,

Alan Feirer

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *