This page provides a quick introduction to the ActionMap Toolkit for participants at the start of a workshop. For additional information please visit our website at actionmap.com.
Contents of This Page
- What Is the ActionMap Toolkit?
- Where Has ActionMap Been Used?
- What Has ActionMap Been Used For?
- What Results Does ActionMap Produce?
- What Are ActionMap Process Maps?
- What is Evaluating?
- The Combination of Mapping and Evaluation
- How Does ActionMap Produce Value?
What Is the ActionMap Toolkit?
The ActionMap Toolkit is an online tool for knowledge sharing, problem solving, consensus building and decision making.
It focuses on process development and improvement.
It can be used for individual work or for group meetings, both online or in-person.
It uses a single page format to lead a group through a compact improvement cycle, called the Main Cycle.
Where Has ActionMap Been Used?
The ActionMap Toolkit method has been used in over 100 workshops, with organizations including these:
What Has ActionMap Been Used For?
ActionMap workshops have been used in broad range of situations.
ActionMap supports a broad range of methods, tools and purposes.
What Results Does ActionMap Produce?
The ActionMap Toolkit is designed to produce two types of results:
- Collaboration Results
- Work Product Results
The Collaboration results are strong shared understanding, agreement and commitment to take action.
The Work Product results are high quality process maps, evaluations and action plans, that support and distribute the collaboration results.
What Are ActionMap Process Maps?
ActionMap Process Maps all use the same basic format, shown below. This makes them fast and easy to build and look at.
Maps provide an overview of the entire value producing process.
At the same time, Maps show “flow of stuff” at a level of detail that can be easily recognized and related to.
Maps can show a large amount of detail (they can extend over multiple pages in length).
Mapping can cover large areas and small details.
Most ActionMap sessions will have only one map.
What is Evaluating?
The key to Evaluating is to capture people's feelings, intuitions and experience-based judgement, and to link them to the activities on the Map.
Evaluations can be:
- Goals (what we want to go toward)
- Issues (what we want to go away from)
- Change Ideas (how to get from the issues to the goals)
Notes can be any additional information that helps with understanding the process, including detailed measurements and qualities such as size and location.
Why do we want to Map and Evaluate at this "transaction" level of detail?
The closer the evaluations are to specific, tangible parts of the map, the more useful the evaluations will be for changing the parts of the map.
- We want to share the detailed knowledge of the activity
- tasks, values, ideas and plans
- The transaction level of detail is where:
- The labor takes place
- The work can be delegated
- The value is produced
- The issues, goals and ideas are experienced
- The opportunities for improvement and change can be made real
The Combination of Mapping and Evaluating
- The Maps provide focus and structure to the Evaluations.
- The Evaluations create energy and engagement for the Mapping.
- Team members and other stakeholders get clear views of each other's activities, interests and priorities.
Mapping and evaluating typically captures about one piece of information per minute.
Most ActionMap Sessions will produce all of the value needed using just the Map and Evaluate Activities.
How Does ActionMap Produce Value?
ActionMap shifts stakeholders' perspectives from a "Performance View" to a "Process View".
In the process view, the focus is on the big picture of how value is produced in addition to doing specific tasks.
ActionMap Sessions convert personal tacit knowledge into explicit shared knowledge.
ActionMap Sessions lead meeting participants through a compact process improvement cycle all the way to action items and assignments.
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