Let’s back up and talk about how I got there...

How did I get introduced to Sketchnoting? 

Back in 2018 I was in Prague, CZ consulting on a Design Thinking Facilitator’s training program. A leader in the company wanted to train a small army of design thinking facilitators and called me in to help fine-tune the program. I also got the added benefit of becoming a Certified Design Thinking Facilitator myself - bonus! 

Fast forward to the last session of the program — a surprise off-site Sketchnoting workshop. The intention was to continue “thinking outside of the box” and adding visual thinking to our Design Thinking toolkit.

As a person who never considered herself very “artsy,” I was *blown away* by how simple our facilitators made sketchnoting. Once we got through the theory of what visual thinking is and the significant benefits, we dove into the how-to and learned how to draw just about anything by using basic shapes. 

I was hooked. 
Absolutely, positively hooked. 

I wasn’t shy about showing my immediate love for the practice and thanked the facilitators and the leader who arranged the workshop a million times over. 

But while I enjoyed sketchnoting, I wasn’t consistent about practicing or adding it into my daily life. 
That was until I was tossed a “stretch” project that changed everything. 

That same company needed someone to create sketchnote summaries of their monthly all-staff meetings. They did this to make the information more engaging and accessible. So folks actually took notice of the meeting’s content and important announcements. 
You know how exciting those kinds of meetings can be. 

They approached me to take on the running project, knowing I had just participated in this sketchnoting workshop.

You can ask Pavel, my husband, and he’ll tell you about how I considered backing out. A million times. 
The excuses were plenty: 
“I just got started with sketchnoting.”
“Other people are so much better than me.”
“I have no idea what I’m doing!” 

He gently encouraged me to go ahead with it. What’s the worst that could happen? Some people won’t like it? Who cares! 
He knew this would pressure me just enough to actually go do the thing instead of just talking about how much I loved sketchnoting. 
He knows me so well. 

So I pressed forward, prepped my canvas with the title and section headers, and took tons of notes during the event. 
So nervous. 

I went to a quiet meeting room afterwards and ended up creating multiple different versions of this flip-chart graphic recording (think large-scale sketchnote). 

I didn’t really like it at the time. I thought it looked so elementary. I knew there were “way better” sketchnotes out there. 
But I was missing the whole point of sketchnoting. 

It’s not about art — it’s about ideas. 

I used the tools I had to document ideas from the meeting with a combination of words and images. I put my own touch on documenting a meeting summary. 

As I look back on this first sketchnote, I beam with pride. 

This is where I got started. 
This is what pushed me out of my comfort zone.

And I’ve never looked back. 

I ended up doing loads more graphic recordings for this company. 
And each one was a bit better than the last. 

I hope this helps show you that no one is perfect. 
We all have to start somewhere, and everyone’s style is perfect in its own way. 
Truly!

So bring your own unique style to the visual thinking world. 
Whether that’s doodling in your personal notes, sketchnoting some meeting minutes, or graphic recording a major event. 

We need **your** unique style added to the mix.

To this beautiful rainbow that is visual thinking 🌈