SEARCH project

I was in London for an action learning group around evaluating cultural and organisational change. It was quite useful, i was reminded that i need to think about the starting point of the journey and how its important to get closer to the thing that switches people on, that motivates people to change. i also realised that this is not the kind of thing people will necessarily say in a group, but they might tell you 1 to 1 and when they do explore the pivotal event that drove them to do what they do, its usually an event that occurred in childhood.

The tool that i found the most useful (though it would help me to have the possibility of 'walking' through this kind of a map) was Transformap.
(i will have to scan in the image)

It could be combined with something like the 'hero's journey' as a way to plan in real-time what you need to put in place in order to drive change, and face fears to achieve a vision or goal.

Quite apart from anything in real life, combining these two tools, potentially gives an insight into what's lacking in the visualisation of the traditional narrative arc, which looks something like the middle image at the beginning of this post.

But the thing about this is that it doesn't visualise the transitional states encapsulated by fear and avoidance behaviour that exists around those turning points. Nor does it depict the sense of loss associated with leaving something behind e.g. habits, like cigarettes, alchohol etc. Indeed there is usually a point of depression (downward movement) associated, particularly with the the final turning point around the climax and resolution, where there's a culmination of the tension between moving on to a new life and new ways and the pull of the old life comes seriously into play. An audience will relate to this, because everyone has experienced change of some sort, the fear and sense of loss associated with leaving an old ways and the sense of elation at moving on and the possibilites that offers.