DavidSibbet.com

Visual Meetings at The Clearing

This last week I was at The Clearing in Washington DC , co-facilitating a workshop designing an interagency approach to logistics for crises like Haiti. At the conclusion The Clearing's founder,   Chris McGoff, introduced Visual Meetings and invited everyone to join staff and associates of The Clearing in a post-meeting reception and book signing. Chris's new company is making graphic facilitation a central part of their offering, since their mission is to tackle the most complex problems government faces. They don't believe they can do this without visualization, partnering with The Grove. It was impressive to be sharing about this work right inside a conference room filled with the evidence. Many a person in the meeting said they were so relieved not to have to go to a meeting full of PowerPoints. A couple of the participants got extras for their kids -- a request that made my day.

Visual Meetings Arrives at The Grove

Imagine holding the book you see here in your hands, and knowing that you wrote, illustrated and designed all 262 pages! I got that chance last Friday when Visual Meetings arrived from Wiley & Sons. The process began in December of last year when   Richard Narramore called and wondered if I would like to write a book about visualization for groups, following the success of Dan Roam’s book Back of the Napkin. Little did I realize then how fun it would be to deliver this sweeping review of 35 years of leading visual meetings all over the world. I’m writing here to share some of the process I went through for those who might be interested in how books like this come to be. If you want to skip this post and go right to getting the book, then click on this link to a special page on our web site at The Grove—About Visual Meetings. It has all the details. If you want to hear my personal story of this journey read on.