Great post in Michel Hyatt's blog - Working Smart. Michel writes about how to do a better PowerPoint presentation and I'm sure you can easily apply those ideas to any presentation, for instance, created with mind mapping technique (probably our Mind Pad tool.

The question is: when we should use professional presentation software (such as PowerPoint) or when it's a good idea to use mind map program. My answer is: you should think about information you are going to represent. If you wish to highlight a features/comparative analysis, then it's better to use mind map.

How can we integrate mind map into presentation? It's now simple, as most mapping programs allows to export map as an image and you can insert this image into your presentation.

Any thoughts about mind mapping and presentations?

 

Post in MindJet blog about using mind mapping techniques in education. I do personally think that mind mapping is a must-have technique for students and other people. It's the way people can collaborate with each other, it's the way people can represent information.

 

More over, it's not necessary to be a student. People can use mind mapping for .. life management or for some other information-related activities.

Introduction:

People use mind mapping widely in different business processes. In this article we will discuss two very important actions in any business – creating contracts and negotiating. Sometimes your business success depends on unsuccessful talks and incorrectly created contract. You can control both of these things using mind maps.

Talks and contracts with mind mapping

You are afraid of signing incorrect contract? Do you need to be sure that all questions, disagreements and topics have been discussed during negotiations? Use mind mapping to be sure. You can create clear picture of these important business things with mind maps.

By Jane Smorodnikova

 

Mind mapping can be used to increase effectiveness of almost all business tasks. This article is pointed to describe mind mapping for creating contracts and preparing negotiations. What is the common point of these two subjects? Of course, business partners. When you have a deal with your employee, you can spend some time for talking by means of persuasion or you can just order him something. But when you are talking with another organization’ official representative, you can be confronted by several difficulties, such us:

-          He does not owe to listen to you;

-          He can find only limited time for you;

-          Often he does not really need you or your organization and

-          He always has his own interests in talking with you.

There are many professional books about successful negotiations and many professional legal experts, but we will discuss simple and intuitive methods, which could help you with these non-trivial questions. Even non-professional can create correct contract or to give a resulting talk with business partner. First of all, he need to have a common view of the final goal and then, he need an easy way to keep all needed points clear and transparent, and to avoid forgetting some small and important point. Below we will tell you, how to use mind mapping for this, while working with contract creating and talk preparing and carrying out.

Contracts. From simple to difficult.

What parts does contract consist of?

First of all, you know the sides of the contract and its subject. Also you will often find such parts as:

-          settlement order;

-          sides’ rights and responsibilitys;

-          confidenciality;

-          act of God part;

-          resolution of case order;

-          special conditions, etc.

Then, of course, you should have a typical contract, according to activity of your organization. So, now you have a set of contract’ required parameters. It will help us in creating a template of a contract as a mind map. Main topic – is a briaf contract subject. Branches – are above-listed parts of the contract. It is very simple, isn’t it?

Now you can use this map to think about this contract. You see the whole structure, so, create subtopics for the main points, use comments to create a reminder about important things.

Then it is very useful during concordance – you are always have all things you want to concord, discuss and so on. But this is already about negotiations. We will talk about it in the next part.

Negotiations and talks with mind maps

Here you can use mind maps for two different tasks – work organization before meeting and work during negotiations.

Create a template map, which can be used for meeting preparations. Example structure for the template:

1.       Meeting

1.1.    Before meeting

1.1.1.       Define the subject

1.1.2.       Prepare discussion topic

1.1.3.       Reorganize and range topic list for order of the day creating

1.1.4.       Create day order

1.1.5.       Distribute day order for participants

1.1.6.       Create reminders for the meeting, for example “it is very important to end at the concrete time”.

1.2.    During meeting

1.2.1.       For each topic

1.2.1.1.             Bring into correlation with day order

1.2.1.2.             Define goal

1.2.1.3.             Focus on the main things

1.2.2.       Collect your ideas on the day order map (we will talk about this map later)

1.2.2.1.             Note ALL opinions

1.2.2.2.             Add new branches to talk about this another time

1.2.3.       Note common decisions and concordances

1.3.    After meeting

1.3.1.       Edit day order map

1.3.1.1.             Reorganize it

1.3.1.2.             Keep it up to date

1.3.1.3.             Mark out common points and contradictions

1.3.1.4.             Mark up dependencies and correlations

This template is a map of your steps – mark the steps you have done.

What is day order map? It is a working map with meeting subject as the main topic, discussion topics as branches and so on. This map is used on the meeting and after meeting. If you can use software tool for mapping – you can add date and time marks and use your map as a real day order. For example, it is easily possible with Mind Pad. Also you can use icons for marking and text on links for correlation definition.

Fast text generation with mind map: “Mind map is a strategy for making notes on a topic, prior to writing. It is a structured strategy, which shows the (hierarchical) relationship of ideas, as opposed to an unstructured strategy, such as brainstorming, in which you produce notes at random on paper. Having an organized display of information from the outset of the writing process may help you, as it is more easily converted into a draft, whereas in brainstorming, the random recording of ideas might lead to problems with the structure of your texts”.

 

By Jane Smorodnikova

Mind maps can be used for a multitude of purposes. This article outlines how they can effectively be used to help support and develop your writing skills and makes text generation faster and easier.

Making a mind map should be a spontaneous pre-writing activity. You can start with a topic at the center and then generate a web of ideas from that, developing and relating these ideas as their mind makes associations.

Mind maps work well as their visual design enables people to see the relationship between ideas, and encourages them to group certain ideas together as they proceed.

As usually, article or any other piece of text begins from a topic definition or finding main idea of the text.

The mind map strategy can be used to explore almost any topic, though discursive essays and narrative work particularly well as they front ideas. But you should remember that there are only two ways to create an interesting text:

-         explore an unusual or a new topic (writing news, innovation introductions and something else in this way);

-         find some interesting facts about existing topic or describe in a new way.

Start by writing the topic in the center.

Creativity with mind maps

Once the topic has been introduced, you can try to close your eyes and think about it for a minute or two, in silence. And then just note down your ideas. If your topic is complicated, group your notes into branches, for example, divide arguments, advantages, facts or thoughts. Don’t forget to accompany your map with symbols, comments, images. Visual thinking is effective, when it is illustrative. To reach clearness and comfortable mind map creating – use special software, for example Mind Pad. For such activity as text generating software should support different types of frames, hot linking and writing text on links, like Mind Pad.

Then, working with your map, you can go over again your ideas, perhaps adding to your mind map as they go.

The map is fluid and changeable, and new connections or subgroups can be made, or branches added, as the you have any suggestions. The end result should be an organised display of information, showing the central topic, and a number of subtopics and further points that stem from it.

Another advantage of Mind Pad – is different frame types using feature. Use different frame types for end text, comments and so on. Use texts on links to define connections between suptopica and points. The best practice is to use quastions for it. For example, if the main theme is smoking, you can create such branches as harm, reasons and so on. In this case you can write on links such quastion as “Why is it so dangerous?”, “What are common reasons of smoking?”. Creating connections with quastions will help you to support logical structure of your text.

Writing a text from mind map

In the next stage you should organize your mind map into a linear format to decide the best way in which to present your points. You should first think about the overall structure, i.e. the order in which to relay the information, and then focus on the precise function each paragraph will have in their final text, as this helps to clarify your writing. If you use Mind Pad, you can just avail yourself of Mind Pad report function. Reporting allows transforming your map in a linear structure for further working, including all subtopics and comments.

However it is carried out, it is important to think about a context and audience. Having an audience in mind will helps you to decide which ideas are most important, and also helps to choose the appropriate style.

So, at this stage you should then begin to write your compositions.

Note, that at this moment because of mind mapping you already have:

-         sensible topic;

-         well-organized structure with headings, connected with the logical quastions;

-         finished pieces of text in comment format;

-         and the whole text structure with all this in one text file.

And now you just need to write additional sentences to describe you topic in details.

Mind mapping is a useful technique and often improves the clarity and organization of texts.

"Almost every day we find new ways to study languages. We examine methods of words remembering, grammar explanation and so on. Many professional teachers of different languages nowadays tall us about importance of having a complex view on the language. One of the ways is using mind maps for studying."

By Jane Smorodnikova

If you need to know several languages or you just like it – you will find out many different study methods. But one of the main things is to learn thinking linguistically. This article is about mind mapping as a tool for support understanding languages’ structure.

What means thinking linguistically?

If you want to study languages easily, you should understand connections between them.

Comparing two languages (for example, your native and foreign) can help you in studying other languages – because you will understand the main thing – language structure, methods of naming objects and different ways of sentence forming.

For example, almost all languages can be divided on analytic languages and synthetic languages. First variant means that word meaning is created by word combination, word order in a sentence, using secondary words (like articles in English). Second variant allows changing word value by changing the word itself (using declensional and other endings).

Example:

English: “The young cook has cooked the tasty porridge.”

German: “Der junge Koch hat den schmackhaften Brei gekocht.”

Let’s analyze these sentences:

How can we understand – what noun is a subject?

In German subject (“der Koch”) is in subjective case. Object («der Brei») is in accusative case.

But there are no cases in English! So, how can we be sure, that “the cook” is the subject? Because of the word order. So, German is a synthetic language in defining the subject and English – analytic. But in defining predicate – both of these languages are analytic. Interesting, isn’t it? For example, Russian – is a completely synthetic language. There are no articles in Russian; you do not need to remember about word order, there are no compound verbs. But such languages are very difficult for studying, because most of grammar phenomena in Russian can not be explained and only wide experience can help you speak Russian correctly.

How to use mind mapping for learning?

We have found out that understanding language’ structure is one of the most important things in learning. So, how can you do this easier?  Create a mind map using special software, like a Mind Pad. Main topic is your language. Then create several branches like words order, time organization, and word forms. Fill out your map while learning new grammar structures. For example, it is word position in a sentence (see an example upper) – how to recognize a subject? Then explain how it happens in your native language and in your new language. Example map branches will look like this:

1.      Main topic – German

2.      Next level – German->words order, German->times, German->words forms… etc.

3.      Words order -> subject

4.      Subject->Subject in German (“der Koch” is in subjective case), Subject->Subject in English – “cook” is on the first place in the sentence.

If you use Mind Pad – you can create comments for each topic – with examples.

While studying language, do not forget to fill your map, add comments (you can specify – is this particular grammar method - analytic or synthetic), examples of illustrative sentences.

Don’t be afraid of rebuilding your map, changing lines and branches, reconfiguring it. After full grammar course you will have a system of language studying. Understanding connections between native and foreign languages, differences and analogies will help you in finding more easy way for learning any language you want.

Creating language mind map with Mind Pad

For language mind mapping Mind Pad is most comfortable softtool for using. Mind Pad 2.0 suggest new techniques for managing frames and links. So you can easily change the grammar structure as you see it. Frames 'Hot Linking' is now available. Instead of moving single frames you can now move whole branches and link it to another frame by just drag-and-dropping.

Also it allows writing text on links and you can specify, what is this example about and so on. Just double click on link between two frames and put some comments into the text box.

The main tip is – try to create a common map, find connections and explore internal structure of the language you learn. After you have understood the methods of sentence generation on the basic of your native language, you will need just word remembering and talking practice.

If you browse mind-pad.com for a while then you can surely learn what is “frames” and “object-orinted” mind mapping. But we have to explain is to our prospect as there is probably no good analogy in a paper and pen world. But if it were… read Hobart's Mindjet Weblog. The general idea is that if we have a metaphor for something (computer mind mapiing is just like a paper and pen mind mapping) it wodn’t be easier to sell these new things.

 

We do our best to positionate “frames” metaphor. For now we call it “Custom Frames” meaning topics (frames) that can be designed to have custom fields… If one have more ideas about positioning frame approach? It would be great to have a comments about this.

Consider using mind map technique when writing e-mail.

I’ve just found some useful tips about writing sensible e-mail in 43Folders blog. It summarizes some well-known productivity and “make it clear” tips and explains how to stay clear-minded when writing e-mail.

My first idea was that I do already do this! Wow! I use about the same principles when writing articles, when preparing large todo list, when writing e-mail.

What I usually do (with our Mind Pad off course is putting some e-mail/article topic in the center of the map and then create a corresponding topics – my goals, my key ideas, what results I wish to have.

It sometime a time-consuming process and take about few days to write an article or e-mail, so I collect all information in a single map, attaching corresponding files and so on.

Two great posts about innovations and how to be innovative.

 

The first one by David Pollard is about selling innovations, it’s a good idea to think about same problems when you try to convince one to buy an innovative tool for your company.

 

Renee Hopkins Callahan refers David’s post but share her ideas about how to stay productive and open minded.

 

Don’t think you can just download some mind map software and it will let you be innovative. It’s a good thing to read numerous GTD (get things done) and management sites and blogs. In Corante blog you will learn how to become open minded by just letting yourself a little longer weekend.

 

Looking for blogs about mind mapping!

Our blog is running now and we are going to fill it with interesting articles about mind mapping (such as using mind mapping to support blogs. But we also wish to find and comment some other great blogs about mind mapping.

Google might help in this case as it has a blog search function. Searching google for "mind map" blog gave some really interest results. 

If you know about good blog about mind mapping (or related) or you are an author, then please, comment this post.

Thank you!

Great post in Beyond crayons weblog. Author, Nick Duffill comments on MindManager's new browser-based software. It's now possible to browse MindManager map online. Find some sample map and how to instructions in this weblog. As for Mind Pad -- we are now thinking about on-line maps... Hope we will bring our object-oriented approach to mind map on-line too.

Find two directories that have a list of good mind mapping softwares, both free and commercial:

http://loosewire.typepad.com/blog/2004/08/directory_of_mi.html

http://www.peterussell.com/mindmaps/mmsoft.html

Note: when you compare Mind Pad to other software remember that it has a unique feature - it supports object-oriented approach to mapping.

I have just recieved newsletter about new Mind Manager! It's great product, it some way we do compete with it, but it's really great! Read more about release.

Why do mind maps work and why doesn't every one use mind maps? You can find answers in Between Seeing weblog. He has a 25 years experience in mind mapping and share his thoughts. Read details here.

I would add my question: why does mind map software work? Why doesn't every one use mind map software?

Probably, it's about usability or finding tasks where mind map can help, for instance, if mind mapping can help blogger? Read article in our blog and mind map for bloggers.

Do you want your blog to be really popular? Does blogging help you in your professional life? If it is so, you need to create an interesting relevent blog. Mind mapping can support your blogging.

By Jane Smorodnikova, www.mind-pad.com

What is the problem?

Blogging is the way to express yourself in a different way. You may write blog as a professional, as yourself, as the ultimate tool for personal embarrassment. Everyone has different personas they put on for life's multiple milieus. We will talk about those people, who want their personal or professional blog to be really popular.

And if you want your blog to be more interesting than others, you need to write in a regular manner. Every entry of your blog should be substantial and interesting. What are the main characteristics of a good blog? You entries should have main idea, facts, arguments and proof.

So, why is it difficult? You will find too main problems with writing an outstanding blog: quantity and quality. And it means that you must post something relevant. And you must keep posting even if you have a fear of the blank page.

Today many popular bloggers talk about this fear. They are afraid of writing something not such interesting as before, they have problems with ideas and arguments. It means, that there is a problem and you should find a way to solve it.

Possible solutions

So, what you can do with all this stuff? We see some different ways. First of all, to continue without changes and, possibly, without results you can just work harder to make your blog better. On the other hand, to conceal yourself from this problem you can pay somebody to write your blog. But all these ways are do not solve the problem, aren’t they? The only way to solve it yourself is to increase your own efficiency. You can do it using mind maps. What is this?

Mind map is a visual tool for capturing and organizing ideas and information. Mind maps visualizes your thoughts, organizes them, and puts them in context.  It is the perfect catalyst for writing a successful blog post.

What is the difference? You can view your posting as a picture, map or text, in different ways. So you will be the first, who will appreciate your posting at its true value. It is the "See what you think" solution. Further you can examine how it works.

The technique

So, what you should do?

1. Capture.

Start with your blog topic in the center of your map.

See what’s out there. Blogging is two-way communication and in order to say something relevant, you ought to listen first! So, browse through existing blogs, scan ideas and thoughts, and import relevant content in your map (quick summaries, RSS feeds, images, hyperlinks, trackbacks).

2. Organize

Now make connections and identify trends and potential opportunities for new ideas. Create a report of your thoughts and develop a logical progression of your points. If the flow doesn’t work, rearrange the order of your points. Make reports several times during working.

3. Share

Finally, formulate the text according to your ideas and map, and create the final blog post as a report. You can copy/paste it directly into your blog provider’s interface as a plain text or use the html format, if your blog supports it. Go back to where you started and make sure you trackback or link to those blogs that provide the context for yours.

See attached file for sample of using mind mapping for blogs.

Summary of the mind map benefits.

1. Mind map - is one if the best way of thinking. And you can use special tool for this. For example, this article was created with Mind Pad 2.0. I did not use any special opportunities - only those which are intuitively understandable for new user. For example – it is very useful to use text on links – you can creat connections between arguments.

2. You make sure that your topic is relevant and that those you refer to will refer back to you.

3. You easily organize your key points, link them to existing blogs using hyperlinking, and make your argumentation crystal-clear. You also can use images, manipulate them to decide - which of them give the best fit.

 

Hello, dear reader of this new weblog. 

We have a good experience running an RSS channel and now it's a time to run a fully-features web-log. We were reading a lot of great blogs for the last months and have learnt a lot. We wish to stay informative for both: Mind-Pad web-site visitors, blog readers and those who use RSS aggregators.

Here are our key ideas:

• We are going to run this weblog as a full-content. We will not cut our articles so you will not have to click "Read more..." links several times - just read post if you are interested;
• We worked to bring our Mind Pad brand identity closer to our readers, so we used Mind Pad logo at blog page. Also, you will find our logo in your RSS aggregator if it supports <image> tag.
• We are going to publish "html" content (not text), so the text will be easy readable;
• To bring some content to our weblog we have published some old posts here first;

To blog owners and active readers:

• You are welcome to visit our weblog and write your comments (good or bad, we like criticism if it's detailed and useful);
• Quote our posts and articles at your blog or web-site, use trackback urls. If you are running blog about mapping, then will be glad to add it to our "links" section;

Finally, few words about publish periodicity. We are going to publish new articles every week. If we have some news, we will publish them too.

Thank you!

Balanced Scorecard is a strategic planning approach that describes companies goals in four perspectives - "Customer", "Business Process", "Financial" perspective and "Learning and Growth" perspective. We created a Balanced Scorecard mind map to support creation of scorecard for personal or business needs.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/solutions/balanced-scorecard/balanced-scorecard-map.htm

It's now a time to change the way you manage your contacts. It's now easy to replace your old contact list with a new contact map. Mind-Pad object oriented mind mapping lets you visualize all your contacts and relation between them.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/solutions/contact-map/contact-mind-map.htm

Nowadays information security is a big challenge for most organizations. Threatening inside the company multiply outside threatening from hostile information environment. Developing information security policy is the first step of organization to manage its' risks and safety. Developing a policy is a difficult process and mind mapping can help.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/solutions/mind-map-security-policy.htm

Select group of CIOs from a variety of industries/sectors came in response to the challenge. As a consequence of this survey, I can draw a conclusion that most of them permanently using different mapping technologies. The most popular technique is process mapping, of course.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/support/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=55

Six Sigma is a highly structured program for improving business processes. It was created by Mikel Harry and Richard Schroeder at Motorola in the early 1980's. Support Six Sigma process with mind mapping and Mind Pad.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/solutions/quality-management/six-sigma-quality-management-mind-map.htm

Use Total Quality Management with mind mapping for managing quality process in your company. Quality assurance through statistical methods is a key component in a manufacturing organization where TQM generally starts by sampling a random selection of the product. The sample can then tested for things that matter most to the end users.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/solutions/quality-management/total-quality-management-mind-map.htm

A SWOT Analysis is a strategic planning tool used to evaluate the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats involved in a project or in a business venture. You can use Mind Pad to support your SWOT analysis with mind mapping or custom designed SWOT object.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/solutions/quality-management/swot-quality-management-mind-map.htm

As different researches show, 38% companies use Six Sigma process. You can use mind map to support Six Sigma processes. or example, if we want to create a map of Six Sigma, we will get something like this...

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/support/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=54

AKS-Labs has released v 2.0 of Mind Pad, a .NET mind mapping software for Windows. The new version is much more user-friendly, the new interface was designed, some new techniques were created for managing map topics. Also, Mind Pad 2.0 now has ability represent new custom-designed frame called Person.

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/solutions/new_in_mind_pad_2_0.htm 

TiddlyWiki is an experimental Micro Content WikiWikiWeb. It allows anyone to create personal Self-Contained hypertext documents that can be posted to any web server, sent by email or kept on a USB thumb drive.

 

It could be very interesting if mind map software could output and input into this approach, especially in producing simple wikiwebsites,

either for personal on desktop or even websites.

 

Read more: http://www.mind-pad.com/support/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=71