Thinking in Patterns

Alan was a business analyst of a management consulting firm. His boss, Melina, has tasked him to conduct an analysis on the industry trend for a client and provide recommendations. Alan was a hardworking guy. He spent days and nights researching the related information and complied a report. However, Melina was not impressed when he gave a verbal presentation of his findings. Her facial expression signaled impatience and annoyance. Half way through the presentation, Melina asked Alan to stop and come back when he has “revised” the report and presentation. She quickly went off to another meeting. Left alone in the meeting room, Alan was scratching his head – What went wrong? What did his boss want?

Alan’s case is hardly uncommon in the workplace. When we were in Alan’s shoe, we tried to provide a lot of seemingly valuable information to others only to receive a puzzling face. When we assumed Melina’s role and tried to digest a sea of data and facts, we had a hard time distilling it into something meaningful. More often than not, it has to do with how the information is organized. Let’s face it – we are all busy at work. When we are at the receiver end (Melina), we want to receive information in digestible and easy-to-understand formats. We simply don’t have the patience or the extra cognitive power to make sense of a large amount of information. That explains Melina’s frustration – Alan provided a lot of details, valuable or not, but not in a way that can be easily absorbed. In other words, the presenter, Alan, must be able to organize the information in a way that can be understood by the receivers. In this article, I want to talk about how to organize information in patterns.

Patterns are information organized in a regular, predictable, and universally understandable formats. For examples, kids at a young age have played sorting games in which they are given a bunch of different shapes: triangles, circles, squares. They need to sort them into categories – putting all triangles in one pile, circles in another pile, and so on. That’s an activity that trains the pattern recognition power of the kids’ brains. As our brains get developed, adults are able to recognize patterns that are more complicated and conceptual. In fact, many IQ tests are based on pattern recognition abilities.

Human brains love patterns. When we are able to find structure in the information coming to our brains, “near-magical results ensue. We no longer need to remember a mountain of data; we need to only recall one simple law”[1] . Put simply, our brains work better in patterns. For the presenter, thinking in patterns organizes our thoughts. It facilitates logical reasoning and helps us think more clearly. It also helps us communicate in a memorable and understandable manner. Patterns, by definition, divide information into buckets. It helps the receivers better able to grasp the ideas and increase the possibility of buy-in.

It looks like Alan can use patterns to organize his findings and make it easy for his boss to understand. I will introduce a few common patterns and use Alan as a case study to illustrate.

Pattern #1: Internal and External

This is one of the most common patterns in business. Information can be divided into factors internal and external to the company. For example, Alan could bucket the findings of his research into factors that are internal to the client’s firm (profit margin, human capital, product turnover, stock price) and external to the company (industry trend, economic situation, competitors’ offerings). The famous SWOT analysis tool is essentially an extension of the Internal VS. External pattern. The Strengths and Weaknesses are internal factors, while the Opportunities and Threats represent external factors. When data is presented this way, it instantly gets easier to digest.

Pattern #2: Past, Present, Future

While the Internal VS. External pattern is related to the “space”, this pattern is concerned about the “time”. Information can be organized across different time horizons. For example, Alan could compare his client’s performance in relation to the industry in the past, present and expected future. When data is presented along the time horizon and augmented by visual graphs, we can often discover trends that might be indicative to the future. When you have data points that stretch different time horizons, consider using this pattern.

Pattern #3: Level 1, 2, 3

Another way to bucket information is to invent layers by which you sort the data. Generally, you may call it Level 1, 2, and 3, but in reality, you would tailor it to the context of your situation. For instance, Alan wanted to recommend a training course in blockchain technology to the client’s Finance department. Staff members of the Finance department will attend a series of self-pace E-learning course on a proprietary platform. When he stated the benefits of this learning program, he might say:

????????????For the individual staff, this program is a much-needed professional development opportunity that enhances their expertise.

????????????For the Finance department, this program levels the playing field and ensures everyone speaks the same language.

????????????For the company, this program is a critical first step to being a blockchain-ready organization.

Basically, Alan bucketed the benefits of his recommendation into three layers, which in this case, pertains to the individuals, department, and organization. You can customize the three layers to suit your needs. For example: Local, Regional, Global; Family, City, Country; Teenagers, Adults, Elderly; Body, Mind, Spirit. The possibility is endless. However, keep the number of layers at three. It is a magic number and people can easily remember buckets of three.

Pattern 4: Why, How, What

In his bestseller “Start with Why[2] ”, Simon Sinek argued that the best leaders in the world all communicated with the same pattern. They started by telling the Why – Why we do what we do. “Why” is the cause and the fuel that drive what we do. Then they told the “How” – by what means do they achieve the Why. The “What” – product and service offerings come at last. This is a powerful pattern. Not only did Sinek offer us with the actual buckets (Why, How, What) but he also told us the sequence the buckets should be presented. Alan can leverage on Sinek’s proposition by categorizing his recommendation in Why/How/What buckets. For instance:

????????????(Why) Cryptocurrency is gaining traction in the industry. Our competitors are already on the move. We are falling behind in this arena. We stand to lose some market share if we don’t catch up.

????????????(How) We must first beef up the blockchain and cryptocurrency knowledge of our Finance staffs. Then we need to prototype small projects to test the water.

????????????(What) To get started, I recommend that the Finance staffs attend a self-pace “Blockchain 101” training program.

By presenting information in this manner, Sinek argued that we speak directly to the part of the brain that makes decisions. The clearly labelled buckets help the receiver digest your information in bite-size chunks.?

If Alan’s proposal contains a plan of action, he could add the “When” and “Who” to the bucket list, outlining who will be involved and by when things ought to get done.

We have seen a few typical patterns to organize information and I believe we are only scratching the surface. The number of patterns you can use is endless. However, if you struggle to begin, there is a “Master Key” of patterns that almost work in any circumstances:?

????????????1. xxx

????????????2. xxx

????????????3. xxx

Bucket your information in bullet points can help divide it in bite-size chunks, even if there are no clear relationship between each bullet points. This is less than ideal but better than not bucketing information at all. If Alan had organized his report and presentation in some kinds of patterns, his ideas may have been better received by his busy and impatient boss.

This article was published by the Macau Manager Issue 91.

[1] ?Bor, Daniel. (2012). The Ravenous Brain: How the New Science of Consciousness Explains Our Insatiable Search for Meaning. New York: Basic Books.

[2] ?Sinek, Simon. (2009). Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action. Portfolio.?