How Sketchnoting became the key to unlock a whole new way of working

 Case Study - Sketchnoting in Use in the Chemical Industry

Background

• Janet Greenwood runs a specialist consultancy, TT Environmental Ltd, helping high hazard industries such as heavy industry and manufacturing understand and comply with chemical regulations. They provide environmental consultancy services and GHS Classification Courses, which provide introductions to CLP, and also CLP mastery, which is all about ensuring that organisations are able to communicate clearly to customers and staff the hazards of chemicals.

How Sketchnoting is being used

Janet has been using Sketchnoting in her work since she did an introductory virtual workshop to Sketchnoting facilitated by Rachel Burnham in the summer of 2021. There are two main ways in which she is using Sketchnoting:

• Firstly, as a way of communicating urgent news to customers and contacts in a quick and easy to digest format. This has enabled Janet’s consultancy to get breaking information out rapidly to her client base and industry to inform and reassure.  Eg  a problem with the law underpinning CLP was identified and it was important to provide professionals dealing with this with timely advice on how to respond. Here is the simple but effective Sketchnote used to do this: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/janet-greenwood_state-of-play-with-annex-viii-to-clp-as-we-activity-6900757098003517440-W51n/
• Secondly, Janet and her team are now making extensive use of a variety of Sketchnotes within their training courses to summarise complex and detailed information on a single sheet.  She describes Sketchnotes ‘as a way of getting across years or even decades of experience concisely and in an easily understandable form, both to beginners and more experienced professionals.’ They had previously make use of flowcharts and infographics - one of the advantages of Sketchnotes is their flexibility, so that you can vary the approach used to present the content most effectively and also combine a number of approaches within a single Sketchnote such as flowcharts, words, diagrams, arrows, structure and pictures. Some of their Sketchnotes are more word based and some more visual eg setting out the hazards of particular chemicals. With a Sketchnote you can both get the big picture, the context and also specific details.

The impact of using Sketchnoting

• Janet and her team have had a very positive response to their use of Sketchnotes both as a communication tool and also as a learning aid from their customers and contacts.  Communications using Sketchnotes shared on social media have had an excellent response with people commenting on the usefulness of the information contained.
• Participants in their training courses undertake a series of tests covering each of the course modules and since the introduction of the Sketchnotes pass rates have improved. As other improvements to the courses were made at the same time this cannot be wholly attributed to the introduction of Sketchnotes. However, the trainer’s view is that participants understand the information presented more quickly and easily when a Sketchnote is used. In addition, individual participants have commented on the ease of understanding the Sketchnotes in discussions. This feedback from trainer and participants. when coupled with the test results, indicates a positive impact from using Sketchnotes.
• Clients have responded very positively to the use of Sketchnotes in their work – in this field of work, clarity is highly important – the risks of getting information wrong are high. So any tool which leads to great transparency of information is valued.
• Janet was so impressed with the impact of Sketchnotes for her business that other team members have now been on the online Introduction to Sketchnoting workshop and are now using Sketchnoting in their work.

Key Learning

A Sketchnote doesn’t have to be perfectly drawn to be highly effective as a communication tool. This is not about producing art.

In Janet’s and her colleague’s experience they have found that they can create one in about half an hour – providing they fully understand the topic. What the process shows up is where your own gaps in understanding are and so it helps you to pinpoint where you need to do more research.

The only downsides are that you go through a lot of pens and sometimes end up with ink all over your fingers!

‘It is like turning a key in a lock and opening up a completely new way of working’ says Janet.

Rachel Burnham

25/4/2023

How can Sketchnoting make a difference to the way you work?

Here is a case study looking at how Sketchnoting has been used in a business to work with customers and help the team become even more effective at communicating complex and technical information in easy to understand ways. It shows the value that visual thinking can bring and how it is a highly effective way of working, rather than just a fun activity.

Sketchnotes make use of a combination of words and simple graphics to communicate information. They can combine pictures, diagrams, flowcharts with words and so are a very flexible tool for use in learning, thinking and working. I offer workshops introducing professionals and students to using Sketchnoting for note taking, planning, reflection, sense-making and communicating.

With many thanks to @JanetGreenwook of TT Environmental Ltd for telling her story. It is great to be able to share this experience of Sketchnoting from the chemical regulations and health & safety field.