'Mind Mapping' or 'Idea Mapping'?

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'Mind Mapping' or 'Idea Mapping'?

I started Mind Mapping in 1992 and was the only Senior Master Trainer for the Buzan Centre until 2006. I've authored a book titled, "Idea Mapping" and have trained 17,000+ professionals world-wide.
I use the term Idea Mapping out of respect for our mappers who map strictly by the Mind Mapping laws. Idea Mapping encourages breaking those laws. Although they have a time and place, I've had many a frustrated client who nearly threw out the tool because they felt their creativity was hampered (especially the one-word-per-branch law). I share these guidelines, but leave it to the mapper to determine if and when these guidelines are necessary based on the purpose of their map.

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		1 Busch Lean (six) Sigma Master Black Belt, Netherlands
	Starting with Mindmapping I started using mind mapping after recommendation of Michael Bennett (four powers of greatness) when taking notes at a training or with conversation with clients. After that I started using mind mapping at brainstorm sessions with teams. The result was that I could easily catch all what was said and was able with teams to analyze and discuss ideas at depth. For me this tool is an efficiency and reflectivity booster. It took me 2- 4 weeks to get used to this way of working.

		1 Rocio Dextre, Perú
	What Matters is what Proceeds the Mind Mapping It depend on how you will perform the analysis. If you have first a rich data gathering - for instance through interviews and workshops in which you can identify and set current problems - your mind can easily figure out and organize how the mapping should be, thinking as a system, putting in track some processes, tools or activities to adjust the problems. And complementary actions like for instance improve information system, or perform trainings depending on what kind of corrective actions the processes need inside the mapping.

		1 Richard Hendricks, USA
	The Name 'Mind Mapping' I already began using mind mapping during the 1970s, except it wasn't called mind mapping then. It's one of the best tools available to garner a "big picture" of a situation, and is quite useful for planning an entrepreneurial venture.

		0 Essau Motloung, South Africa
	Mind Mapping is powerful Concising the manuals in mind mapping leads the way of maximizing understanding the material better than heavy text manuals and it opens ways of creativity in it. Teams involved tend to open channels of improvement by brainstorming while presenting. Having being involved in the same field of work understanding the organizational or departmental objectives, Mind Mapping is so powerful that you reach the untapped multiply performance outcomes. This is the best method to be used across complex materials and can be dealt with easily.

		1 Maurice Hogarth Consultant, United Kingdom
	From Brain Patterns to Bio-Logical Writing I was trained by Tony Buzan while at Littlewoods (c1974) and became an authorized trainer. The term used then was "Brain Patterns". I was never happy with either Brain Patterns or Mind Maps as titles and have come to refer to this form of information mapping as "Bio-Logical Writing". As are all of the processes within the Organic Study, 'Speed' Reading and 'Speed' Memory methods and processes advocated by Tony, this info-mapping form is based in the biological/organic working processes of our brain. So, for me describing these processes from this basis, led to Bio-Logical Reading, Bio-Logical Writing, Bio-Logical Memorising, Bio-Logical Studying. They are the logical outcomes of applying the biology foundation of our working brain to these applications. This form of mapping is as much about working with known information (correlating and comparing, laying-it-out to particular sequences, clarifying fact from fancy, etcetera), as it is about 'idea', or options generation and capturing. So to give it a title that restricts it to only one aspect of its use can limit its appeal or apparent usefulness to those who are seeing it for the first time. My first view of it was found in a desk drawer where it was written in yellow crayon on blue lined paper, virtually unreadable and indecipherable. So when I went on the training programme I had peppered myself to be against it. It took conscious effort and a fortuitous circumstance to come to accept its potential. For me the form works at two levels. 1. The strict classic (according to the 'rules': 1 word per branch etc.) form. 2. Combining it with other mapping processes such as Meta Mapping, Concept Mapping, Conversational Algorithms, Flowcharts, Process Mapping etc. as required for the nature of the topic that I am working at. Like many aspects of life; there is no one right approach (or answer).