Can an AI-powered mind mapping tool help Change Managers and other project professionals?
When I use artificial intelligence applications, it feels like asking a smart kid their opinion. The response is quite an interesting mixed bag. Answers range from completely missing the mark to somewhat intriguing. The more complex the question, the further this smart kid we call artificial intelligence misses the mark. Yet when using various applications I stick at it in the same vague hope that someone trawling through a yard sale may have. We both hope to find hidden gems amidst a sea of banal, low-value items. If anything both of us end up mildly entertained, even if we wasted a little bit of time.
So far I have found Synthesia.io, Rytr and Grammarly.com as useful AI tools for my work on projects. The latter is brilliant in picking up many small mistakes in my articles and change communications. I have looked at various content generators beyond Rytr; each uses the same AI engine (GPT-3). If you opt for short-form content, you may find some hidden gems amongst what spits out. The longer the content, the more random or off the mark each generator gets.
One day I came across an AI tool for brainstorming. While many of the content generation tools can be helpful for brainstorming, this clever tool generates mind maps on the spot. As each node in the mind map is a discrete and short idea, the likelihood of quickly locating treasure seems to be quite high. Find a note with a good idea? This tall allows you to expand upon it with either an explanation question — or my favourite — further ideas.
Generate ideas.AI has been a fairly impressive experience so far. I logged in and got one months worth of credit in their seven-day free trial. I expended this for months worth of credit in about one hour flat. Like our friends at a yard or garage sale, I was curious to see what treasure could be generated from simple questions. I ended up with a stack of mind maps, having let my curiosity guide me through many topics that I found interesting.
As you can see this tool allows you to generate ideas through the lens of many problem-solving constructs. It’s not just about brainstorming but also looking at the pros and cons, or strengths weaknesses opportunities and threats. One of the more intriguing options is the “deep questioning” option.
I ended up buying another month’s worth of credits, and have been generating many mind maps. Given my work as an organisational change manager, I was interested to look at the intersection between artificial intelligence and better organisational change management. Here’s what spat out:
Having published an article about gamifying organisational change management, I wanted to see what my newfound “smart kid” would say. I asked generate ideas.AI For their take on gamifying organisational change communications. I used American spelling to see if this would make a difference:
Just like asking a smart child their opinion, AI misses crucial context. They haven’t worked in organisations for many years, nor would ever understand the context of the one that you currently work in. Their ideas trawl the Internet. The Internet is unlikely to have a lot of context-specific information given its generic audience. In contrast, books written by people with this context will still be valuable.
Even so, some of the responses can be thought-provoking. Many of the responses can form a checklist of the basics that we may need to cover, depending on our question. A child’s take on life can be astonishing; their unexpected insights are there if our minds are open to it.
When starting a Generate ideas.AI mind map, you can enter only 50 characters. This limitation is a positive as you really need to focus on the type of question to ask. You can then choose from many problem-solving lenses, your mind map’s aesthetics, then you get to watch the mind map generate. In seconds you can see what your AI friend has extracted for you. What was impressive about generate ideas.AI was the capacity to expand on interesting nodes in our mind map. This is where I tended to get lost down the rabbit hole — trying to find the treasure within the various nodes.
I didn’t come across ideas that knocked me off my seat. Yet I have to say it… some ideas did have me thinking about their applicability to both previous and future clients. Some of us are naturally disposed towards brainstorming, but for those of us who are it still does need some energy. Could this AI-driven brainstorming method be useful when we don’t have a team of smart and energetic people around us? Could brainstorming go on even after a huge dinner, where you are laid out flat on your back in a food coma?
It could, but it is then up to us to ensure that the ideas we take from AI are applied to our organisation’s context. We still have to do the hard work in turning a simple idea into tangible outcomes for our project or operational team. One day we may see that using AI tools is no longer like asking a smart child, but asking a switched-on young adult who asks probing questions to finally hit the mark.
Let me know if you enjoyed this article. I have no affiliation to any AI tool (like Generate ideas.AI) — I’m just curious about lazy, intelligent solutions to make my working life easier, and am happy to share my experiences with you.
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