Welcome to theWorking Virtual Guide. Want to know what microphone I use, how I switch my camera from forward facing to drawing from above, to showing my iPad? Watch this week's FREE video lesson from the Center for Visual Facilitation and you will learn about it ALL!!

In today's lesson, I'm going to share with you my pro-tips for setting up your lighting, your camera and your microphone. Your virtual background has the ability to bring 80% of your energy when you are working online. So let's make it AWESOME!

Looking good on ZOOM is essential to your businesses success and a necessity to stand out as a leader. The graduates of the 8 Week Intensive who have mastered their studio set-up have had the most success this years not only maintaining their clients but growing their businesses.

Click this video link to watch the virtual tour of the exact set-up I have in my studio right now.

In a world inundated with information and tasks, finding effective ways to organize your thoughts, analyze situations, and gather feedback is essential. Visual tools can be your secret weapon in tackling complexity and improving productivity. In this week's lunch & learn, we'll delve into three powerful visual techniques: Mind Maps, SWOT Analysis, and Feedback Walls.

Mind Maps: Navigating Your Ideas

Mind mapping is a versatile technique that helps you visually organize thoughts, ideas, and information. It's like creating a roadmap for your brain's thoughts, making connections and relationships clearer. To get started:

• Choose a Central Idea: Begin by placing your central idea or topic in the center of a blank page. This could be anything from project planning to brainstorming new business ideas.
• Branch Out: From the central idea, create branches that represent different aspects or subtopics related to the main concept. These branches can be further extended with secondary br
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Coaching is a powerful tool that can help people make positive changes in their lives. However, one of the biggest challenges for coaches is helping their clients take action on the insights and strategies they develop during coaching sessions. Many clients can struggle with implementing the changes they want to make, either due to fear, self-doubt, or a lack of motivation.

Fortunately, there are many strategies coaches can use to help their clients take action and achieve their goals. In this blog post, we will explore some effective ways coaches can support their clients in taking action.

1. Set Clear Goals

One of the most important steps to helping clients take action is to establish clear, measurable goals. When clients have a specific target in mind, they are more likely to take action towards achieving it. Coaches can work with their clients to set SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. By setting clear objectives that are aligned with their v...

 Today we are talking about brainstorming and how to host a successful ideation session with your leadership and team. Here are 5 of my pro tips of how to make sure all your team walks away from the session feeling inspired, encouraged and connected.

1. Encourage Wild Ideas - Let your participants be creative and expansive in their thinking. 
   
   
2. Go for Quantity - Give your participants lots of post-it notes so they can keep writing down as many ideas as possible.
   
   
3. Create Space for Individual & Group Activities - Allow an opportunity for participants to brainstorm on their own and as a team.
   
   
4. Make Time for Play - Your role as the facilitator is to set the tone for participants to have fun.
   
   
5. Allow for Reflections - At the end of your event, make sure you plan for time for participants to step away from their ideas and then come back to them.

BONUS: Follow-Up - How will you share the results of your brainstorming session with the participants and your leadership team?

...and don't for...

 I love using visuals for coaching. The past two weeks I have opened my calendar for mini Private Coaching Sessions and the conversations have been amazing. I wanted to highlight one specifically around how to use visuals when coaching clients.

"How do you use visuals when your client is deflated?"

This was such a good question and a perfect opportunity to use visuals to facilitate a deeper conversation about how to help your clients get their good ideas off the ground. And why it is important for your client to separate themselves from their ideas.

Whenever you are ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:

✏️ 1. The Visual Facilitation Online Course + Playbook: Unlock an engaging toolbox filled easy-to-use visuals. You will learn how to create memorable visuals for your coaching calls, in-person events or even your online course.
LEARN MORE

✏️ 2. Private Coaching Sessions: Are you feeling stuck in your business? Do you feel like you have hit a plateau or can't seem to grow? Or may...

I love the app Mural & the book Business Model Generation. To me they like are like peanut butter and chocolate. Two great things that have come together to create something AWESOME!

First of all, did you know that the Mural app has a ton of great business model templates you can start using today?

Yes, they have a templates for S.W.O.T. Analysis, Mindmaps and more! And my absolute favorite template that I come back to year after year is the Business Model Canvas.

Click the video above for a quick tour of my own Business Model Canvas and see how I use the app Mural for my annual business planning.

Whenever you are ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:

✏️ 1. The Visual Facilitation Online Course + Playbook: Unlock an engaging toolbox filled easy-to-use visuals. You will learn how to create memorable visuals for your coaching calls, in-person events or even your online course.
LEARN MORE

✏️ 2. Private Coaching Sessions: Are you feeling stuck in your business? Do you feel like yo...

Carin Donald is a South African based management consultant, currently working for a leading Engineering Consulting and Advisory firm where she combines her technical expertise in risk management, human centered design and facilitation skills to assist teams in unteasing complex challenges. She’s married to her best friend and together they are raising two young boys in the sunny city of Johannesburg. She loves the rush of traveling to new and different places and when that cannot happen, she attempts to keep her garden alive.

When did your visual thinking first get activated?
During school, although obviously at the time I didn’t realize it; I was taught how to do a mindmap as a learning tool, which was quite some time ago. The change in mindset was quite the ‘thing’ about 25 years ago 

How are using your Visual Facilitation skills? 
It began while I facilitated what could be considered very ‘technical’ workshops using visual facilitation tools to identify risks in an engineering adviso...

 I am so excited to be a part of the launch team for this new business book perfect for Facilitators, Leaders and Trainers. Last week on LinkedIn I talked about the Wheel of Life and this week we are talking about how to achieve Work/Life balance.

I have been a student of Micheal Hyatt's for years and I am so excited to. share with you more about his new book as well as a sneak peek inside my #FullFocusPlanner and BONUS how I take visual notes on my iPad.

This book is jammed packed tips and tools to help you organize and prioritize your work and life.

- - - - - 

"Michael Hyatt & Megan Hyatt Miller have cracked the code to transform your productivity and relationships. If you're looking for that 'missing piece' to get your life and time back, run–don't walk–to this book!" - Julie Solomon

- - - - - 

Get the Book: https://amzn.to/32FSZeH

Get the Planner: https://amzn.to/3vdGtz9

(PLEASE NOTE: Affiliate links are included in this post.)

Whenever you are ready, there are 2...

Easy to use new tool Visual Thinkers. Ready to learn how you can create awesome visuals for your next meeting. In this video lesson, I will share with step-by-step how I created a simple visual to share my Zoom Tips for Pro.

This week I was invited to join the new DRAWIFY community as a Hero and I am absolutely loving how easy it is to use this tool for people to new Visual Thinking as well as Professional Visual Facilitators like me.

Whenever you are ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:

✏️ 1. The Visual Facilitation Online Course + Playbook: Unlock an engaging toolbox filled easy-to-use visuals. You will learn how to create memorable visuals for your coaching calls, in-person events or even your online course.
LEARN MORE

✏️ 2. Private Coaching Sessions: Are you feeling stuck in your business? Do you feel like you have hit a plateau or can't seem to grow? Or maybe you are just starting out and you're not sure how to get your business off the ground. Whatever your situatio...

What is Visual Facilitation and how might you use it in your career? Here at the Center for Visual Facilitation we offer a unique learning pathway for Facilitators, Trainers and Leaders who are ready to take their career to the next level as a Visual & Virtual Champion.

I had the wonderful privilege of speaking at the "Power of Visuals' weekathon. Here are some of the things I covered to explain the power of Visual Facilitation and how you might want to add this skill to your toolkit as your head into next year.

I started my talk by sharing some of the visual templates I use for Visual Facilitation. Visual Facilitation is a powerful tool for critical thinking, problem solving and strategic planning. 

We looked at some of the visual templates and how you can use them to add different kinds of meaning. For example this drawing of a four team members could be used for team building, identifying the strengths of different team members or this template could be used to represent your cus...