Attention Spans for Online Meetings are Getting Shorter. Here are the Questions I’m Asking to Make Sure Groups are Engaged

How do you hold the space for groups to do deep, meaningful work while tolerance for long virtual meetings wanes? Taking time before the meeting to craft the questions that are imperative for the group to explore together means they will feel deeply that this couldn’t have just been an email. 

I’ve been doing quite a bit of virtual graphic facilitation lately – from microbiologists to educators to socio-agro ecosystem researchers.

Inspired by my friend and colleague Janine at idea-360, who asks the best questions, here are some questions you can use to facilitate intentional time together, whether it’s 20 minutes or four hours. 

Before the meeting:

• What does success look like walking out of this meeting?

• Knowing this, what do we need to design/plan to do? 

During – This varies depending on your purpose – here are a few to spark your creativity:

• What is the unique value we provide? To whom?

• What is our grand challenge? 

• What demands our attention?

• How might we…in order to…

After:

• Plus - What did we like?

• Delta - What would we do differently next time?

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Head’s Up! I’ll be out of the office October 28 through November 22 without phone or email. With a 1 in 2,500 chance, we got a follow-up lottery permit to raft the Grand Canyon! Sound familiar? This will be our third time rafting the canyon - here’s a shot of me rowing Upset Rapid in 2019. Thanks for your patience, and if you want to explore the Grand, you can click through Google’s “street view” down the river. 

Aspen Colorado: For the Tech Policy Institute’s annual Forum. It was amazing to get to work on paper with people in the room, and I applaud the TPI for their intentional and rigorous safety measures for an in-person gathering. 

Upcoming Announcement: I have some very exciting news to share, but not quite ready yet! Stay tuned – I’ll be announcing this mystery in the newsletter on September 8th!

How to Co-Create a High Engagement Virtual Event: Best Practices from the ShapingEDU Community

Every time I get to work with the ShapingEDU community, I’m blown away by the creativity and passion of the team at ASU to positively “shape the future of learning in the digital age” as they say. 

Even in a world of remote meetings, ShapingEDU walks the talk to convene for meaningful work driven by the community, which means it’s then carried on afterward? 

So, what best practices can be transferred to YOUR organization? 

For highly engaged virtual or in-person events, let participants guide content. This was done through crowd-sourcing then voting on nine wicked problems facing education in the weeks leading up to the Unconference. 

Minimize talking at, maximize talking with. Most of the three days was spent in working groups focused on the content participants upvoted. There was a framing plenary panel, then off folks went to share their insights and cross-pollinate ideas. 

Provide some structure. These hours-long working groups were guided by community members who volunteered to facilitate them ahead of time, who had knowledge, expertise, and the ability to step back to let the group do the work when it made sense. Each had their own zoom meeting, and participants were encouraged to work together across Slack.

Infuse creativity and play. The opening reception was a ridiculously well-curated Wicked Mystery Party where participants discovered there were self-guided and team-oriented mysteries to solve by talking with characters in different breakouts, exploring clues in different settings online, and working together. Not to mention a graphic recording “ghost” who floated around to capture snippets of the process and offer sometimes helpful hints. 

The base map for the Wicked Mystery Party opening reception. Participants could click on yellow buttons to explore different rooms, looking for clues!

Finally, each day was facilitated with reconvening the groups to share ideas and look for connections, patterns, and insights together. These report outs were graphically recorded in real-time and reflected back to the participants visually and verbally for comprehension, memory boosting, and looking for new ideas together. 

Cheers ShapingEDU – you all are truly remarkable and I’m proud to be part of the community!

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

ASU ShapingEDU Unconference: As you may have read above, the Unconference is a lively event. This year, we created quite a few materials ahead of time, including this explainer video on what Black Swan Events are and why we should care!

Communication and Symbioses Workshop: I’m in the midst of graphic facilitating a two-day workshop for a team of researchers exploring connections between microbial symbioses and signaling and communication.

4 Steps to Great Stories (Even if You’re Not Good at Storytelling)

Have you ever nailed a pitch? I mean, really crushed it? You saw that person you were talking to light up? 

Chances are, you told a great story, quickly, in a way that resonated with your audience.

I get to work with incredible clients with important stories to tell. And…it can be hard. When you’re working with complex stuff, it takes skill to tell a great story in a minute or less (stoichiometry and microbial symbioses, anyone?). 

Almost without fail, “communicating to the public!” is an outcome I hear regularly at workshops I’m facilitating.  Those groups have spent a lot of time getting really, exceptionally good at what they do, which isn’t communicating to the public. Why do those same people expect to suddenly be great at something they’ve never practiced? 

If you’re not partnering with a professional storyteller or communications firm, and you’re ready to level up your storytelling, here’s a technique I taught last year at IFVP’s online conference to help my peers simplify and get confident with their science communication skills. 

The Feynman Technique

Richard Feynman was a physicist and voracious learner. He also seems pretty humble and down to earth. Gotta love those folks. He developed this strategy to improve his own learning, and it’s a killer way to outline your story. 

• Choose your topic. What’s your story about? I suggest making a mind map of everything you know about it, then…

• Teach it to a kid.  Three hot tips to help them understand:  

  • Use plain terms, no jargon.

  • Be quick about it, you (probably) aren’t working with a long attention span.

  • Before you start teaching, clarify and write down exactly what you want them to learn. If that’s hard for you to do, you know you can improve. According to the medium article I linked above, “This is also where the power of creativity can help you reach new heights in learning.” Boom.

• Fill in the gaps and keep learning. Not knowing everything doesn’t mean you’re dumb, it means you’re human. 

• Organize, simplify, and use analogies. Try teaching that kid again and get their feedback. Make a new mind map. Draw a picture. And keep iterating until it feels simple, clear, and your audience gets that sparkle in their eye that means they GET it!

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Adobe Creative Campus Collaboration - Summer 2021: Where campuses from around the continent reflect on what’s working, where they want to focus, and how to support creativity in learning for all!

Facilitating Microbiologists: Working on a grant proposal for microbial symbioses in the environment. Here’s a snapshot of the Miro board we worked in over two days to brainstorm, make decisions, and outline a writing plan.

In the Studio: Working on several videos. Here’s a sneak peek of one I just filmed as a trailer for a virtual field trip for the Park Service in Alaska. It’s about climate change, brown bears, and what they eat!

Arizona HIV Leadership Academy: Supporting the closing of a program reflecting on what they’ve learned and want to carry with them as leaders in the community.

What Seeds Are You Planting? A Custom Reflection for You!

The seasons are changing.

It feels miraculous every year when we see small shoots of bright green poking up through the soil. 

It also feels like we can see the light at the end of the covid tunnel here in Colorado with more and more folks getting vaccinated.

As things return to more normal, it may feel like the pace of life will pick up (or maybe it already feels fast to you as we’ve adapted to remote work and the new patterns that has brought). 

As we’re shifting seasonally, this can be a moment to think intentionally about what’s next for you. Here’s a visual template to take a few minutes to reflect, which I’ve found to be incredibly powerful as a business owner, especially when things feel like they’re moving quickly.

RIGHT CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO DOWNLOAD

Right click to download and print!

Right click to download and print!

If this doesn’t serve you – that’s okay too! You do you. Here are the questions:

• What seeds do you want to plant now that will sprout and grow this year? 

• What have your roots quietly been up to beneath the soil and frost of the winter? What are things that aren’t visible yet, but are forming who you are and want to be? What keeps you nourished or gives you strength?

• What does it look like to nurture those roots so that as they wake up, you can bloom this year? What do you need to do for yourself?

Together, we have weathered some big storms this year. And you already know, weather patterns in spring are anything but stable – there’s bound to be another snow or cold snap this season. And as more of us are getting vaccinated and feeling more confident to see those we care about, there’s almost certainly something unexpected in our future we’ll need to shift around. 

And we know we can! 

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

If this reflection resonates for you, let’s connect to talk about designing custom processes and visuals for you or your team.

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Pacific Northwest Fire Science Symposium: Helping co-design and co-facilitate a 3-day symposium for Burn Bosses and other Fire Science professionals across the US Forest Service and partner organizations. We used Mural to collectively share and reflect resources and ideas throughout the week. 

Community Outreach: With a non-profit client looking to redevelop an outdated building to better serve their own community, and the folks in the neighborhood. We used Jamboards to explore options, concerns, and build consensus around what makes sense as the project moves forward!

Head’s Up: Time Out of the Office in Late April. I’ll be out from April 19-30 spending time in nature on rivers and will not be checking my email or phone regularly during that time. Thanks in advance for your patience on communication!

3 Tips for Getting the Most out of Your Virtual Whiteboard

By now, most of us have experienced more video conferences than we can count (why, in the name of all that is holy, would we ever have the desire to count?). 

Which means over the past year, as a graphic facilitator in the digital sphere, I’ve collaborated with clients to create custom templates for virtual whiteboard platforms for events where participants say things like: 

This was the best zoom meeting I’ve been to!

- Participant at the 2021 Zero Landfill Initiative Retreat

And…

I had the Miro board up throughout the entire 3-day conference!

- Participant at the 2021 Zusman Neuroregeneration Symposium

So, how can we get these same exclamations at your virtual event? 

Let’s go ahead and take some work right off your plate and share what I’ve learned through trial, error, and following discoveries of others experimenting in this space. 

Hot tips: 

• Include important logistics such as the agenda, zoom links, survey links, etc. I create a custom layout with visual elements for specific sessions or for general feedback. In addition, I’ve learned it’s helpful for participants to be able to easily navigate the multiple links, web pages, and documents if they’re all linked into the board you’re using.

• Build time to engage with it into your agenda. This is KEY to successfully using a virtual whiteboard. To make the most of this tool you’ve invested in using, BE SURE to include time(s) each day to engage with the whiteboard. Whether it’s an activity, or just time to network, 10 minute blocks of time can make a huge difference to help participants connect. BONUS: Remind people where to find it – drop the link in to the chat box regularly.

• Add a new element each day. In a multi-day virtual event, once participants start to get the hang of navigating your whiteboard space, create new elements for them to interact with each day. Make them delightful and useful – asking specific questions about content or simply providing a space for a morning/afternoon reflection creates a reason to draw people back in, and more opportunities to connect with each other.

Curious which virtual collaboration platform is right for you? This post contains a brief pros and cons of a few popular ones here. Have a tool you love? Please share it with me, I always enjoy learning from the Brain Trust (all y’all).  

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Houston Methodist Neuroregeneration Symposium: Capturing key ideas from heady talks about how to repair neural function after spinal cord injury. My favorite thing about this workshop is how focused it is on creating space for collaborations between labs and fields of study!

Friends of Refuges Annual Meeting: For the Suwannee and Cedar Key Friends of Refuges, covid didn’t keep these folks from sharing updates and anthropological research from the area in a virtual setting! Did you know that Swallow-Tailed Kites migrate 5,000 miles over 2 months to get to Brazil each winter? 

Ready to create a unique and engaging virtual whiteboard for your event?

How to Help Participants Cocreate, Connect, and Inspire at Your Multi-Day Event

The full synthesis map from five days of the virtual GCSE+Drawdown conference.

Once again for the people in the back, you CAN have an interactive and participatory virtual conference with over 3,000 participants from all over the world! 

In early January (let’s talk about how these folks know how to start a new year!), the Global Council for Science and the Environment (GCSE), and Project Drawdown brought together researchers, leaders, and community members to learn, share, and create solutions for people and planet.  

As a visual thought partner for the virtual event, I wanted create ways that graphics could support meaningful work with the huge number of participants and volume of content. There were eight Thematic Pathways with concurrent sessions, and more than 50 simultaneous Collaborative Action Groups which emerged from brainstorming sessions over the course of the week. 

How could we work together to look for patterns and themes across multiple, very full days? 

How could we make sure participants could see their ideas emerging throughout the week? 

And how do this as just one recorder? 

We needed a plan!

The organizing team and I collaborated before and during the conference to develop communication systems, like a designated note-taker in each Pathway with access to a shared Google Doc template for key ideas. I could then distill and illustrate these notes, and combine them with insights from real-time graphics of plenary panels and keynotes (these drawings were included in the final piece as well). 

Communication of key ideas? Check. 

We decided to use Miro as a virtual platform to host the emerging map. Similar to shared Google Docs or Slides, with a shared link we dropped into the chat each day, participants could view the Synthesis from start to finish throughout the week. They could zoom in to see details in graphics I had drawn real-time in plenaries, or zoom out for the overall flow, and could share it with others they thought would be interested.

Participant observation? Check!

The result was a massive Synthesis Illustration mapping how research feeds action for climate solutions, which participants could SEE AS IT GREW throughout the week on the conference website’s gallery, as well as via the link shared frequently in the chat box throughout the conference. 

So, what emerged as key themes for science and solutions for people and planet? Explore for yourself! For me, a theme I’ve hear not only at GCSE+Drawdown, is that for these solutions to work, it comes down to one thing: people working together. 

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Adobe Creative Campus Collaboration: Learning from creative educators and students how to nurture the “magician” in each potentially creative student. 

Filming a New Drawing Connections Video: Did you know that mosquitos are not native to Hawai’i? In the newest video with the NPS, I can’t wait to take you through a journey of endangered birds, avian malaria, and climate change. 

Natural Areas Strategic Vision: I’m delighted to finally be able to share this studio illustration created last year in partnership with the City of Greeley’s Natural Areas program, showing the history of the land, input from the community, and vision for the future.

A Gentle New Year’s Reflections and Visioning Practice

Happy New Year!

In such a monumentally symbolic time of year, especially THIS year, making time to reflect and visualize feels…a little overwhelming. 

What if I don’t have time to do a deep dive? Taking 15 minutes could be exactly what you need.

What if I don’t ask myself all the right questions? The questions you do ask yourself will be exactly right.

What if I’m not creating something deserving of the gravitas of this moment as we depart from 2020? Sometimes simple is the most elegant. 

Which is why I’ve decided to ask myself the same questions I have for the past few years – and share them with you in a fresh design to fill in:

• What have I accomplished this year? 

• What am I grateful for?

• What am I letting go of? 

• What am I opening up to?

• What do I want to attract in my life this year?

For me, taking any amount of time, whether it’s a few minutes or a few hours, around each new year to reflect and focus my energy for the coming calendar year feels powerful and uplifting. Energy flows where attention goes. 

It’s an opportunity to create clarity for myself among a world of unknowns. It’s creating space to center – that center we can all return to and tap into during the moments of cray cray. 

If you’d like more ConverSketch ideas for New Years visioning, here’s the archive from 2020, 2019, and 2017. If a template feels too prescriptive, check out my favorite tips for creating your own custom vision board.

If you’re ready for a deeper dive, Sarah Firth has created a gorgeous digital download or printed workbook to fill in throughout the whole year. There are even two different covers to choose from and color!

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Resting  Happy Winter!

Getting ready for the virtual National Council on Science and the Environment + Drawdown next week. The theme is Research to Action and I’m looking forward to seeing researchers and practitioners connecting! 

Ready for 2021? Let’s explore how graphic recording can help make meetings better - even virtual ones!

Chaos Clarified: Visualizing Systems Cycles

As I was floating in a river canyon last week, thinking those sorts of nebulous thoughts, a memory clicked into place while gazing at the ancient stone and water around us. 

Way back in 2018 (that was at least 15 years ago, right?), I partnered with the Environmental Defense Fund and Colorado State University to graphic record a series of systems thinking workshops looking at pollinator habitat in midwestern agricultural lands. Over several months, this thoughtful team took a deep dive into systems thinking and I visually mapped out the process and ideas as we went. 

With so many moving parts, mental models, things we can/cannot control, emotions, perspectives, and information to sort through, it felt overwhelming to make decisions or know what we could do to make a positive change.

As we leaned into the systems thinking tools, we began to practice and see how they were one way to help us clarify complexity, map out relationships, and illuminate patterns or points of leverage that had previously gone unrecognized.

So, this last week as I was wondering why it felt like so many complex and difficult things are colliding right now in my country, and why the heck can’t we think long-term and collaboratively to solve problems, a sketch from 2018 popped into my mind: 

This drawing shows the time cycles of different elements of the pollinator/ag system we were mapping, and how each element’s cycle is quite different than the others. 

For example – our political cycle is four years, while many ecological cycles are much longer (100+ years). And the agricultural cycle is much shorter – just one year. So, if each of these cycles is driven by a different time constraint, the patterns of misalignment start to become clear. And the motivation to create policy or strategies that wouldn’t come to fruition until 10, 20, 100 years later…those are less persuasive in an election year. 

Systems mapping also created a framework to being understanding where changes could be made, and where ripple effects might begin. 

I love this question from Hugh McLeod: Where can the smallest change make the biggest difference?

So, in times where challenges seem enormous, pick up a pencil and make a few marks – you might be surprised at what becomes clear and where YOU can make a difference.

I am delighted to get to share some Very Exciting News!

When I first found out about graphic recording back in 2010, I took a training in the Bay Area which shaped how I approach the work and gave me a strong foundation to build my practice on. Since then, I’ve had the delight to become friends with one of the instructors, Emily Shepard of The Graphic Distillery. Em is kind, funny, compassionate, extremely talented, and an exceptional teacher. 

Why am I telling you all this? Because she just launched her new online course, Draw It Out! If you’ve ever wondered if YOU could take better visual notes or become a graphic recorder, this is your moment. She created this course to help equip people with tools to better understand each other and communicate more easily. Check out her course overview and outcomes here!*

And if you want a MASSIVE discount of $100 off, be sure to register before Friday, October 9th at 8 pm Pacific using the code birdflightdio. 

This is an affiliate link, so if you register I get a kickback because that’s how Emily rolls. For the record, I’d promote the sh*t out of this class regardless because she’s amazing.

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers, 

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Children with Medical Complexity: In the last of a series of virtual reflections with universities and health campuses across the country, the graphics summarize lessons learned, accomplishments, and where these teams can focus in the future to support families and children in their health.

On Trails and the River: We snuck out for a small rafting trip in Western Colorado/Eastern Utah last week. Here’s a plein air watercolor I sketched at camp one evening. Spending time in nature fuels my creativity and soul, and I am feeling particularly privileged to have access to public lands, equipment, and time away. 

Water Research Vision 2050: Phase one of this project is also coming to a close this fall, and we are gearing up for the final Writing Workshop later this month to refine a framework for the Agricultural Research Service’s vision for water research in the coming decades.

My Favorite Ways to Harvest Ideas

It’s high summer, which means making the most of long days, and heaps of veggies coming from the garden. This weekend we hung garlic to dry, shelled peas, and stemmed gooseberries to freeze for making jam later.

Sometimes I look around and realize I’ve completely missed harvesting something before it’s gotten too old or overripe (How did all the cilantro bolt already?).

The same can happen in meetings or conferences – raise your hand if you’ve ever been on a call which was supposed to be interactive, then with 10 minutes left, the speakers finally relinquish the floor and you only have a few minutes to try to work together?

Without intention, the time can fly by without truly making the most of the opportunity to cross-pollinate ideas together.

Working with my clients as a virtual graphic facilitator, I delight in partnering together to harvest ideas, show systems, and create shared understanding for deeper, more effective, and long-lasting work.

Here are a handful of my favorite ways to harvest ideas in virtual meetings:

• Using the “rename” function to include first name and one-word response to a warm-up question such as “How are you feeling right now?” to “One word we should to carry forward from this meeting”

• Creating a visual template to guide report outs and upload to a shared platform for future use

• A facilitated go-round where each person shares their response to a prompt, giving air time to everyone

• Using a Google Doc template with tables and visuals to work synchronously and include more detailed notes

• Have everyone write down a word or phrase on a sticky note or paper on their desk and hold it up to the camera – then take a screen shot! These images can be incorporated into a report or summary web page

• Working with a graphic recorder or facilitator to synthesize key ideas and energy into a visual summary

What are your favorite ways to harvest ideas in virtual spaces?

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers,

Where in the Virtual World is ConverSketch?

Wild places are a blessing I am privileged to experience and enjoy – our trip on the Middle Fork of the Salmon was one for the books – here’s a watercolor I painted one evening while waiting for dinner.

Preparing for ShapingEDU’s Learning(Hu)Man -- a virtual hands-on summer “camp” for dreamers, doers, and drivers in higher education focusing on best practices in learning design, edtech tools and development, and the art of the possible to support students’ success.

Wrapping up a studio project for my local county department of health and environment I can’t quite reveal yet…stay tuned!

What's It Like to Work with a Remote Graphic Recorder?

Okay, so you’ve decided you want to partner with a remote graphic recorder for your online meeting. Does that mean you’ve signed yourself up for hours of extra prep and planning? The answer is a big, tall glass of “nope”!

Here’s a look at how easy it is to bring in a remote scribe.

The short version:

Send me your agenda, and I’ll prepare as needed. You research mycelium? I figure out how to draw mycelium. You lead an innovation team? I sketch ideas for how to visualize the intangible ideas.

Then I hop on the meeting platform about 20 minutes early to test screen sharing, and make sure we’re on the same page about transitions. You do your thing, I do mine, and you get a gorgeous summary of key content to share and leverage moving forward!

The more complex version:

If we’re collaborating on a series of meetings or a longer event, there’s typically at least two planning calls per meeting where we get clear about purpose, how the visuals will best serve your goals, and brainstorm creative ways to leverage the visuals.

Do you want to create a cohesive brand around a series of meetings and the visual outputs? Let’s design it!

Will custom templates support breakout groups’ discussions and facilitate a concise and focused report back? Let’s make them!

How will visuals be shared and used long-term? Let’s design a communication strategy to keep participants involved!

In addition, there’s often 1-2 hours of practicing tech and transitions before the event to make sure everything runs smoothly, and we have backup plans if Murphy’s Law strikes.

After an event, it’s also really useful to do a 15 minute debrief with the core planning team and make sure next steps and who’s responsible are clear, as well as how visuals will be shared and if there’s any follow-up drawing that needs to happen to achieve your goals.

What do you get in return? Here’s what Deborah Gilburg said this week:

“Karina is creating a lot of opportunity for people to think differently by creating these drawings.”

This is our time to think differently! To create opportunities for what we believe in, and to let go of what’s not serving us.

Once again, thank you from my heart and soul for your support, great senses of humor, brilliant minds, collaboration and what you're each doing to make the world a better place.

Cheers,

Where in the Digital World is ConverSketch?

Infrastructure Masons’ Global Member Summit: Industry leaders focused on sustainability and innovation in the world of data centers. I was honored to capture the keynotes with Kate Brandt; Chief Sustainability Officer at Google, and Noelle Walsh; Chief Sustainability Officer at Microsoft. Hearing their visions, backed by action, intelligent teams, and big hearts reinvigorated my hope for our planet’s future!

ShapingEDU: Applying AI to the Student Debt Crisis. This launch introduced the grassroots approach to leveraging AI to solve massively complex problems like convincing policymakers the need for solar infrastructure in Nigeria, and now focusing on student debt. Anyone is invited to join this global AI hackathon until June 30th!