How learning maps became popular purveyors of strategic information.

By Bill Hinsch

I'll kick off my first blog post in bad form.

I've earned the right I figure.

Allow me to explain.

Recently I was sent a bullying letter from the lawyer

at the firm I helped found—Root Learning (now re-

branded "Root Inc"). They are the formerly great 

company that released the wonderful learning map

 form—in America. And trademarked that term. More

on that in a bit.

I mention "in America" because the learning map was

with us way before a RootMap existed—going back to 

the early 1980s in Sweden.  It variously was called

 the ARBETSDUK, meaning Work-sheet or Work

 cloth or Lärduk—a term which was coined by the

Foresight Group much later in 1995 or so.

Klas Melander is generally thought of as the originator 

of the Work Cloth. He started his learning map work at 

SAS Airlines forming a group there called SAS

 Business Consultants and in 1983.  The first learning 

map practitoning was born. Jan Carlzon, the visionary 

leader at SAS, amy have fired the first shot across the

learning map bow with his interesting “Little Red 

Book” which had an airplane amorphized as a 

customer who was instructing employees Mellander 

then took the idea and formed a company called LMI

—for Learning Methods International—and began 

expanding the concept to adjacent methodologies in 

gaming. 

The learning map first landed in America in a joint 

venture with Tom Peters Group, SAS Business 

Consulting Group, and Mellander’s LMI on something 

called “Value for The Customer”. Mellander, along 

with Göran Johanson and Micahel Pieschewski, 

developed this seminal learning map launched in 

America in 1990. 

Meanwhile in Sweden, learning map work started to 

come of age with great maps produced not only for 

SAS but Volvo where the  “Dialog Program “ was first 

employed —giving a start to the dialogue techniques 

later adopted at Root and others in the modern 

versions of learning maps.

In 1991 along came Randy Root where he learned of the 

Work Mat from the Foresighters—

misunderstanding the translation of the word Lärduk 

he termed it “learning map” because he thought, 

mistakenly, that Lärduk meant “learning matte”. He 

then trademarked this around 1993. 

Before that,  Randy had shoe-horned his way into 

Goran Johanson’s project with Preston Trucking 

which had brought him to America where Preston had 

been impressed with the SAS “The Challenge” project 

under Mellander’s guidance. With Göran’s

participation, Randy was awarded the visualization 

(only) part of the work, and later took over the entire 

project from Goran who went back to Sweden to

practice the form up until the present day. Presto—

Root Learning was born with the Preston 

implementation and a second project with Conrail. 

They then went onto create many more hundreds of

modules using the tools and techniques that the 

Swedes had invented and Root had adopted nicely. 

After the learning map was introduced here, in quick

succession Paradigm Learning came out with 

Discovery Maps as a spinoff (and interestingly owns 

the www.learniningmap.com domain) , and Applied 

Learning Labs came up with the Knowledge Map and 

later the Conversation Map that its sister company, 

Healthy Interactions,  practices learning map 

methodology with customers and end consumers

alike in the important Diabetes awareness area of

health care.

The technology then was re-adopted again in Europe, 

only with the American overlay (where they refer to it 

as lernen Karte in Germany, and learning map or Big 

Picture Map in UK).

So this brings me back to the trademarking of the 

term.

Root trademarked “learning map” in 1993 as best I 

can remember. The term got so popular, that it has 

passed into the public consciousness describing the 

very thing it is—a learning map. Axel Meierhoefer 

owner of the domain thelearningmap.com turned to 

me to design the site, and was launched as an 

informative place for promoting the general subject on 

all things having to do with the learning map artform. 

Dr. Meierhoefer has a wonderful pdf there that 

explains many of the uses of the maps, including his 

own invention, the Innovation Map which he co-

developed with Dr. Charles Savage around 2008-10. 

In 1993 Root tried to trademark the term in Europe—

unsuccessfully since already it was recognized there 

as being a mashup of common words in useage, not 

distinctive enough to be trademarked. Score 1 for the

rest of us wanting to further enoble the form.

Root, ever conscious of perceived stealing of “their” 

technology which they stole from the Swedes, 

promptly fired off a threatening letter to me—not 

knowing that Axel Meierhoefer owns the site and I am 

just a fan!  Shoot the messenger maybe?

I responded by stating the obvious—that the learning

map has become embedded in the language, and is 

now a general term for all the various learning map 

lookalikes out there, including mine, the Learning

Visuals learning map. 

There is now the Collaborative learning map, the 

Dynamic learning map, and Trainiac’s learning map—

all trademarked, eroding the ability to any longer 

monopolize the term. In fact if you Google “learning 

map” you’ll see Dynamic learning map before the 

RootMap. It is interesting that Root, in some 

foreshadowing, decided themselves to turn away from 

the term they trademarked and toward the more 

specific, and defensible—”RootMap”. 

I hope I don’t get further threatened here for typing 

the term RootMap. 

***DISCLAIMER: This is an informational article on 

the subject of learning maps and is not intended to 

win business for myself away from Root Learning

whom think they own the concept and no one else 

shall practice it without retribution.***

In fact I honor Root. Anyone out there still wanting the 

original secret sauce should contact them. On the 

other hand if you want more innovative work contact 

Helathyi (or me if you like). Milo Paitch (Globethink)

also does a mean learning map and I urge you to call 

him. Ben Garrison is the best artist in the field, and

turns out learning map visuals like they are candy 

when really that candy is pure gold produced on a 

cost basis that  Root can only dream about. Ben’s 

company is called Grrr-aphics. (love that name).

But one thing that Root can hold it’s head up high—

they were the ones that really popularized the artform 

and applied it as an organ of communicating strategy 

to companies around the world—not merely Discovery 

learning —but also directive learning. Discovery 

Learning fell into tatters as companies wanted to 

push agendas rather than utilize a Socratic approach 

with open ended questions that elicit thinking, 

rather than just planting dogma. 

Sadly, much of learning map work today has devolved

to this lower standard away from the superior

approach of objectively achieving analytic critical 

thinking via open ended questions and dialogue, 

instead of rotely forcing changed behavior just tell 

them to (albeit in a creative manner cynically 

employing  learning maps which only SEEM 

objective). 

Edventures still practices the socratic method nicely—

and their education sector maps are excellent—I’d

recommend them to school systems wanting to up 

their games. As does Axel (AMC consulting) with an 

additional benefit of  PhD chops infusing the learning 

he creates and imparting an extra value added

technique of active facilitating his maps—rather than 

the Root stricture on that with merely passive 

facilitation by amateurs.

Meanwhile, back in Sweden...

Klas Mellander went on to form Celemi, and their 

learning map activities morphed into an exclusive 

gaming concept that in turn was then copied by 

Paradigm, BlueLine Solutions (later Blue Line 

Simulations), and a few others. Paradigm has 

become an American master at the gaming game. 

They do maps as well but not quite as well recognized 

as Root but cheaper to hire.

The true learning map companies now in existence 

include Paradigm, Applied, Healthy Interactions 

(Healthyi), Learning Visuals, Edventures, Xallax, 

Dialogbild,  Big Picture Learning, and of course the 

original American company, Root inc. (apologies to 

Tom Peters who never used the technique again).

With that, I close my first blog article with a thought

taken from an LMI circular back in 1990, nicely 

expressed by Mr. Mellander—the true father of the 

learning map:

John Naisbitt said: “Better information is rarely the 

same thing as more information. We are drowning in 

information, but starving for knowledge.” 

Learning is discovery, and learning requires thinking. 

The increased need for communication in business is 

easy to understand. And investments certainly are 

being made! The engineering industry in Sweden, for 

example, currently spends the equivalent of 10% of its 

wage costs on training. And in the USA, companies 

invest more than 30 billion dollars per year in people 

development. The goal is the same everywhere: to 

create competitive advantages, through people. And 

the medium is the message. The forms of training we 

choose are themselves bearers of the message. If 

only managers are sent to courses, this suggests that 

training is not something for the staff. If, on the other 

hand, an entire work group is asked to participate, it 

suggests that this is important for that group. 

Traditional lectern-style teaching often sends out the 

message that “we’re in the know”. Any list of needs 

should therefore also include some reflection on what 

other messages the company wishes to disseminate. 

The conditions for success—in integrating knowledge 

into company operations—are also important. There 

must be a simple and realistic method to reach that 

goal”.

That was relevant then and is relevant now. And a 

nice rationale for the learning map as a valuable tool 

in businesses. The pioneers in creating learning maps 

—myself included—should always remember what it’s 

all about—and not worry so much if someone else is 

using the term “learning map”. It’s a wonderful and still 

vital artform that is owned by the world now and as 

such should be employed to its highest purposes. 

That’s where Mellander started and it’s where I want 

to be today.

If you’d like to see examples of the first learning maps 

in Sweden—which were excellent by the way—much 

better than the ones I originally designed—please log 

into this dropbbox folder and take a look.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/f4dmqimbcjtg1i8/edpppIYirz

The LMI brochure is also there for anyone to read, and 

learn where learning maps began and what they looked

 like originally.

Bill Hinsch is the original learning map artist and 

developed many of the visual techniques used today 

in delivering strategic visualization. He is president of 

Learning Viasuals and can be contacted at 

bill@learningvisuals.com

“Born to Buy”

By William D. Hinsch

I’ve spent a lifetime intrigued by sales, salesmen and the process of inducing another human being to make a buying decision. Yet, I am not a salesman.
I wish I had the ability to inspire a buyer to reach into their pocket and accept my offering, and thereby change their world for the better while allowing me to live another day. This process is one of the most important forces in our society, yet it is under-recognized and often misunderstood.
As my friend Chris Anderson says, "Nothing happens until there's a sale." That quote sums up why so much effort, expense and emphasis is placed upon the selling function in every office in every corporation in the land, whether it's the recruiting department at Harvard or the telemarketing room at Hewlett-Packard. All need to persuade someone else to embrace what they have in a scarce world of potential customers.
Today, a sea change is occurring in the advertising world, one that is shaking the foundations of commerce. It is bound up with the Internet and the non-acceptance of old modes of advertising. A rising class of buyers -- variously referred to as Generation Y, Millennials, Generation Next , the Net Generation -- have concluded that the old models do not work, and they actively bypass, thwart, ignore and supplant those aging sales strategies. To wit, the death of newspapers and the ascendancy of TiVo. If you are contemplating a $3 million, 30-second ad on Superbowl XLlll, think again.
These Echo Boomers -- raised on video games and suckled on free downloads, free software, free news and yes, free advertising -- don't respond to the "normal" impetus to buy that their forebears of only a generation or two ago embraced. Most of us are now more sophisticated, and many companies are left wondering "who moved my customers?"
That’s the bad news. Now for the good news.
I remember stealing a book from the library when I was a kid called “Hidden Persuaders,” by Vance Packard, who saw malevolence all around him from his Madison Avenue suite. What he described in his book shocked a naive public. They found they were being manipulated by crafty ad men with practices cribbed from the research papers of psychologists and re-purposed to disarm the natural defenses of the buying public, triggering them to part with their money, usually without thinking.
Marketers were tapping into our collective monkey brains. That was a scary thought in 1957, a time when dangers large and small seemed to lurk everywhere. The publishers of “Hidden Persuaders” sold this as a grand conspiracy, which was a clever marketing tactic in itself. To sell the book, the publishers shot across the bow employing the very methods the book sought to reveal.
Machiavelli would have chuckled. And I was smitten.
I didn't see anything wrong with what the whiz-kid promoters were doing. Instead, it fascinated me that people had “buttons” that could be punched like an automaton to impel them to take an action they secretly wanted but would be aghast at if they found that their psyches were being manipulated, much like a virus lurking in the background ready to wreak economic havoc.
I was vigilant in noting the effects promised in the book, and I immensely enjoyed understanding what was at play even as my mother ordered useless stuff from late-night infomercials that were the brainchild of Ed Valenti, inventor of the infamous Ginseng Knife, whose dummy Ron Popeil was Charlie McCarthy to Valenti's Edgar Bergen. Popeil made famous such Valenti aphorisms as "But wait, there's more!" and "Now … how much would you pay?"
Each phrase followed the addition of another item or feature to the catalog of a product's advantages or attachments. The advertisements frequently answered the "how much?" question with pseudo prices, followed by a dramatically lower actual price, which was also a Valenti creation.
This was an early example of utilizing the Contrast Principle, whose ultimate expression in marketing is the Perceptual Contrast, which takes advantage of a human trait of noticing differences among things, not absolute measures. We are shown a poor product first, then made to feel exultant upon discovering a better product on its heels. Consumers are prompted to embrace a service that is “half-price” from its quoted pseudo value, feeling they have landed a real deal. In fact, they have been manipulated to buy when they otherwise would not have considered parting with their money.
Fast-forward 50 years. On one level, everything has seemingly changed. But not really. The terms are just different, as redefined by a new generation. On the most fundamental level, the old rules still apply. But opportunity now lies in creating unique and sustainable ways to position the few things that have changed in such as way that marketers are able to leverage the things that haven’t.
Webification of the market has merely repositioned the process. The product is now out there for everyone to see immediately, which on one hand means that if you develop a unique approach and it’s a good one, it can go virally successful overnight – light years faster than before. At the same time, it means copycats will be on your scent as soon as they detect your success.
The success of the Internet means that you have to create sustainable ways to perpetually nuance your message while at the same time sustaining a consistent look and feel in the way you present your product or service merely to stay even with the wolves.

The Internet age forces companies to take a fresh marketing approach to keep their competition at bay.

Ten years ago, I became the founding artist at Root Learning (www.rootlearning.com). It grew into a global business solutions leader by streamlining how corporations communicate strategies to their organizations by using a unique application of graphics combined with narrative learning technologies.

At Root, core research showed that people remember only 10% of what they read, but 50% of what they see or hear. Leveraging that truth, we were able to adapt our graphically-based learning tools to meet specific customer needs in such a way that communicated messages cleaner and faster--and with significantly higher retention.

Since then, I’ve gone on to found my own firm, LearningVisuals.com. I've developed methodologies to help companies streamline their sales messaging similarly.

After attending The White Paper Success Summit of 2010, I will gain powerful, cutting-edge insights. My intention is then to midwife "Born to Buy" solutions for my customers and deliver new business into their hands