Mind Mapping: Ideation made easy

Ideation is a very essential part of Design. But sometimes it can seem tasking and a little haphazard. There’s been a lot of techniques introduced that help make the process more fun. Yet it’s easy to get lost in the sauce of haphazard ideation. Luckily there is a technique that evades this uneasy situation, the Mind-map. Mind mapping introduces structure, direction, and clarity to ideation.

What is a Mind-Map? A mind-map is a visual artifact used in organizing data and conjuring ideas. It helps achieve association and location by providing structure to already gathered data. Mind mapping is also an effective Divergent thinking technique. It opens the user’s mind to new possibilities and gives the ability to mirror into the smallest details. While it is prevalently a Divergent method, it also utilizes convergent thinking when evaluating parts as a whole.

It also increases productivity by reducing time spent on converting drafts to deliverables. Because while the mind map is a technique it also is a deliverable and a research artifact. Once the mind map is completed all that’s left is a little cleanup to make more usable by others. This eliminates listing ideas by replacing it with an aesthetic, hierarchical, user-friendly visual artifact.

There is no specific regimen to follow while Mind mapping. Users can either go Linearly (concept idea to the features). Or start from features and sometimes even somewhere in the middle. Hence, it embodies good design itself because of its flexibility. While it can be performed individually or it can in groups. And there are products like Miro and Mural among others that allow for a virtual session.

Mind maps are also useful presentation artifacts. They help the audience visualize your thought process from ideation to concept. It gets more interesting because 65% of American adults are visual learners. And 85–95% of visual information is retained as opposed to 10–20% of written and oral information. Thus, you can keep your audience more interested and attentive in your presentations.

Finally, mind mapping is very helpful because it increases productivity and fosters collaboration. It makes meetings more interactive by opening room for contributions. It also makes identifying information easy because of its intuitive network. Users can easily find information by following the flow. As opposed to having to read pages worth of document to locate a simple piece of information.