Today’s blog post focuses on mind maps and how to use these in the planning process. The mind map in this article was designed around a large-scale event which attracts more than 10,000 people.
In the communications sector planning often is anchored around stakeholders. The mind map here shows this as each stakeholder needs to receive some form of communication.
In addition, we tend to use the mind map to also give us an overview of workload against time. It is not a timeline, but it helps us to group clusters of work into time segments.
When planning out event communication, for example, we split out the following three (main) phases:
1. Pre-event communication
2. During event communication
3. Post event communication.
We do this before putting the finer detail of the event onto an event project management tool. It is extremely helpful to map out the broad communication steps against key audiences via a mind map and to split this map out against these three stages.
The mind map will serve as a visual aid to create a full picture of the various steps needed to communicate. Moving along through the planning process treat the mind map not as a finished document, bur rather as a work in progress and add items you might have forgotten initially.
Once the mind map is comprehensive, transfer items to a project management tool and assign roles, subtasks and timelines against each task. For event mangement agencies: this approach allows you to give both both your team as well as your client a visual map of all that is involved in ensuring an event is marketed well, the actual on stage and peripheral communication and post event PR will be successful.
To illustrate what this type of mind map might look like, we have captured typical pre-event communication steps in this image.
Planning an event or a large project can be daunting, but mind-mapping can help break down what seems like an insurmountable task and provide an eagle’s eye perspective, which, at the outset of any major project is key.
We produce mind maps on our computers. You can do the same or simply create them by hand. Here, at Zeitgeist Communication, we prefer digital formats as we can share these more easily across remote work places. If you are thinking of using mind mapping for your planning you might also enjoy this article.
For more information on how Zeitgeist Communication can help you develop the right communications strategies and planning process contact us at info@zeitgeistcomms.com or call us on 07824 897976. Or contact us via the form below.