Is the employee who DOODLES at office meetings a goof-off who's
neglecting his or her responsibilities? Or is he or she actually
exercising something that could be called "Doodle Diligence"? A question
this morning for our Lee Cowan:
How many of us, when we let our
minds drift, find that our pencils drift right along with it?
To the doodler, the canvas can be
anything -- a napkin, a margin, a soon-to-be-discarded envelope.
Yet for all its ubiquity, the doodle
seems to be the artistic equivalent of Rodney Dangerfield -- it just gets no
respect.
Even the Oxford English
Dictionary reduces the doodle to a "drawing made absentmindedly."
And boy, does that upset doodler
Sunni Brown: "I don't like the definition! I'm not pleased with the
definition, that is correct!"
What's wrong with it, Cowan
asked? "It's totally inaccurate," said Brown. "It's not an
accurate representation of what's happening for a doodler."
Brown is convinced that doodling isn't
a mindless activity, but instead engages the mind in a way that helps us think.
So much so she's written a manifesto
of sorts, called "The Doodle Revolution," that lays out her
case.
"I want to flip the entire
conversation and be like, okay, let's actually acknowledge this as a valuable
tool and as a valuable technique. What, then, can we do with it?" she said.
For her, drawing what she calls "Info-doodles"
can help in problem-solving, and aid in memory retention, by creating a visual
language that she insists is more powerful than most people know.
"I've seen people tackling
serious challenges, and they inevitably go straight to the white board or
straight to the wall and start mapping it to have a more effective conversation,"
Brown said. "And then you have that visual explanation to help people understand what's really happening."
Her Austin-based consultancy, SB
Ink, now offers doodling workshops. Her clients are major retailers and media
companies . . . who are starting to catch on.
But the doodle, she says, still has
doubters.
"There are skeptics everywhere,
and I encounter them all the time -- and I love them," Brown said.
"They say all the usual stuff: 'Oh,
it's a waste of time.' 'Oh, it's mindless scratching.' They say everything that
you would expect them to say when you misunderstand and you underestimate
something."
