At the beginning of a new project there is a lot going on – especially in your head. You and your colleagues develop ideas, visions and many small parts from which a whole project can emerge. For this purpose there is a clever technique that supports you – mindmapping.
Let’s start with a little game
Mindmapping is a visual thought model that follows the natural flow of your thoughts. The ideas and links do not emerge in a linear way, but randomly. To prove it, here’s a quick exercise for you: think of a toothbrush and write down another word that comes to your mind about it. Starting from this word, write down a second and a third word in connection with the previous one, so that you end up with a total of ten words that can be linked together.
See? We can almost certainly guess that the second word on your list is toothpaste, tooth, or bathroom, but we can’t guess the last word. It could well be rainbow, gorilla or even the name of your first love. Why is it so? Because of non-linear thinking.
"With linear thinking, you first create boundaries,
and then ideas. With mind mapping you collect first
Organize and evaluate ideas later."
How to create a mind map?
Even though mindmapping is based on the random explosion of word connections, don’t confuse it with chaos. Every explosion is ultimately just a combination of atoms – a structure with a nucleus at its center. The core of your mind map is your central idea or the problem to be solved.
To understand the functionality in project management, here is another little exercise for you. Take a blank sheet of paper and in the middle write the name of something (project, problem) you need to solve – z. B. a new website, an event for business partners or increasing sales. Then use the remaining space on the sheet to write down everything you can think of on this topic. You can write it down, draw it or even stick it on the sheet. When you’re done, draw branches to connect notes that belong together. Then take a step back and look at your artwork – this is your mind map, your "big picture".
Mindmaps in Easy Project
"Mind mapping is often thought of as just a brainstorming technique
viewed. But there should also be a decisive
Be part of every new project."
When to use mind maps?
It’s not an exaggeration to say that you can use mind maps almost all the time and for almost all types of projects. At Easy Software, we often start our projects with good ideas that we visualize in a mind map. Before we share our top four examples, you can check out the mind-map we created before writing this article.
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Brainstorming
Since in brainstorming "the only bad idea is the one that goes unsaid," mindmapping is perfect for this phase of your project. Have no boundaries – just pull loose word associations and ideas out of a hat. (Don’t worry, you can sort them out later).)
Is there a catch?
Well, there are actually two:
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Exchange with your team
No matter how great and beautiful your mind-map may be, you need to share it with your team. This is impossible (or at least tedious) with a piece of paper. That’s why you need project management software that lets you create clear, easy-to-understand digital mind maps. You can then easily share these with your team members, who can also contribute their ideas.
What makes Easy Project’s mind maps so special??
Easy Project’s software lets you create handy mind maps. You can also add notes, links or check boxes to each node. However, what you’ll appreciate most is the ability to turn the nodes into new tasks without having to switch between tools in Easy Project. So rather than ending up as a collection of ideas, the mind map turns into a solid foundation for your project, which you can develop further with our WBS and the Gantt chart .
Summary
We advise you: start using mind maps. We also do exactly this at the beginning of many of our projects. It is a great tool for individuals and teams – for brainstorming, capturing project requirements and presentations. This will help you improve your project management by giving you a solid foundation and overview of all the deliverables needed for project success.