visualize problem solving template

5 Hidden IQ Traits Every Student Must  Know

By Shruti Bansal

Here are five hidden signs of a high IQ that every student should know:

People with high IQs often have an insatiable curiosity. They constantly ask questions, seek out new information, and enjoy learning about a wide range of topics.

1. Curiosity and desire to learn

Individuals with high IQs are often highly adaptable. They can quickly understand and adjust to new situations and are skilled at finding creative solutions to complex problems.

2. Adaptability and problem-solving skills

A hidden sign of high intelligence is the ability to notice details that others might miss. These individuals are highly observant and can pick up on subtle cues in their environment.

3. Keen observation skills

While IQ primarily measures cognitive abilities, many people with high IQs also have strong emotional intelligence. They are good at understanding their own emotions and those of others, which helps them navigate social situations more effectively and build strong interpersonal relationships.

4. Emotional  intelligence

High-IQ individuals often exhibit strong self-discipline and perseverance. They can stay focused on long-term goals, work diligently to overcome obstacles, and are less likely to give up in the face of adversity.

5. Self-discipline and persistence

These signs can be beneficial for students to recognise, as they provide insights into not just traditional measures of intelligence but also traits that can help them succeed in various aspects of life.

Microsoft Power BI Blog

• Announcements
• Power BI Embedded

Power BI August 2024 Feature Summary

Welcome to the August 2024 update.

Here are a few, select highlights of the many we have for Power BI.  You can now ask Copilot questions against your semantic model. Updated Save and Upload to OneDrive Flow in Power BI and Narrative visual with Copilot is available in SaaS embed. There is much more to explore, please continue to read on!

European Fabric Community Conference

Join us at Europe’s first  Fabric Community Conference , the ultimate  Power BI,   Fabric, SQL & AI  learning event in  Stockholm, Sweden  from  September 24 -27, 2024 .

With 120 sessions, daily keynotes, 10 pre-conference workshops, an expo hall with community lounge, and “ask the expert” area, the conference offers a rich learning experience you don’t want to miss. This is a unique opportunity to meet the Microsoft teams building these products, customers betting their business on them, and partners at the forefront of deployment and adoption.

Register today  using code MSCUST for an  exclusive discount!

Fabric Sticker Challenge Winners Announced!

The Fabric Community Sticker Challenge launched August 1-23 and winners are in! All Fabric Community members were invited to create unique stickers showcasing their enthusiasm and creativity under the following categories: Community Enthusiasm, Inspirational, “Inside Joke” for developers and data, and Super Users. To see winning designs, check out our Community News . Thank you all who participated in this challenge; it was great to see so much involvement!

Fabric Influencers Spotlight

Check out our latest initiative, the  Fabric Influencers Spotlight .   Each month, we’ll be highlighting some of the great blog, videos presentations and other contributions submitted by members of Microsoft MVP & Fabric Super User communities that cover the Fabric Platform, Data Engineering & Data Science in Fabric, Data Warehousing, Power BI, Real-Time Intelligence, Data Integration, Fabric Administration & Governance, Databases and Learning.

Attention Power BI users! 

If you are accessing Power BI on a web browser version older than Chrome 94, Edge 94, Safari 16.4, Firefox 93, or equivalent, you need upgrade your web browser to a newer version by  August 31, 2024 . Using an outdated browser version after this date, may prevent you from accessing features in Power BI.

• Version number: v:  2.132.908.0
• Date published: 8/19/24
• Ask Copilot questions against your semantic model (preview) 

Visual level format strings (preview)

• Dynamic per recipient subscriptions (Generally Available) 

Deliver subscriptions to OneDrive and SharePoint (Generally Available)

• Updated Save and Upload to OneDrive Flow in Power BI 
• Visuals, shapes and line enhancements 
• DAX query view in the web 
• Narrative visual with Copilot available in SaaS embed 

Editor’s pick of the quarter

New visuals in appsource, filter by powerviz, pie of pie by jta, drill down pie pro by zoomcharts, hierarchical bar chart, deneb: declarative visualization in power bi.

• Paginated Reports: Sharing of reports connecting to Get Data data sources made easy 

Copilot and AI

Ask copilot questions against your semantic model (preview).

We are pleased to announce that you can now ask Copilot for data from your entire semantic model in Desktop ! Just tell Copilot what you’re looking for, and Copilot will query your model to answer your question with a visual.

To use this new capability, you need to have the Preview feature for “ Copilot chat pane in report view” turned on. If you already have done this there is nothing else that you to need to utilize this new capability.  

To find out more about how this feature works and the types of questions that are supported check out our previous blog post and documentation page .

Visual level format strings are here, providing you with more options to configure formatting. Originally built for visual calculations, the core ability that visual-level format strings provide is the ability to format visual calculations. Since visual calculations are not in the model, you could not format them, unless you were using them in data labels or in specific parts of the new card and new slicer visuals. With visual level format strings, you can!

Visual level format strings, however, are useful even without using visual calculations.

With the introduction of visual-level format strings, Power BI now has three levels for format strings:

• Model. You can set a format string for columns and measures in the model. Anywhere you use that column or measure the format string will be applied, unless it’s overridden by a visual or element level format string.
• Visual. This is what we’re introducing today. You can set format strings on any column, measure or visual calculation that is on your visual, even if they already had a format string. In that case the model level format string will be overridden, and the visual level format string is used.
• Element. You can set a format string for data labels and for specific elements of the new card and the new slicer visuals. This level will be expanded to include much more in the future. Any format string you set here will override the format string set on the visual and model level.

These levels are hierarchical, with the model level being the lowest level and the element level the highest. A format string defined on a column, measure or visual calculation on a higher-level override what was defined on a lower level.

Since visual calculations are not in the model, they cannot have a format string set on the model level but can on the visual or element level. Measures and columns can have format strings on all three levels:

The image below summarizes this and shows that higher level format strings override lower-level format strings:

Let’s look at an example using a measure.

I have a Profit measure in my model, which is set to a decimal number format. To do this, you might have set the formatting for this measure using the ribbon:

Alternatively, you could have made the same selections in the properties pane for the measure in the model view or entered the following custom formatting code:

If you put this measure on a visual it now returns a decimal number, as expected:

However, on a particular visual you want that measure to be formatted as a whole number. You can now do that by setting the format code on the visual level by opening the format pane for that visual and the Data format options found there under General:

Now that same measure shows as a whole number, but just on that visual:

On top of that, you might want to use a scientific notation for that measure but only in the data label on a particular visual. No problem, you set the format code on the data label for that measure:

So now the total shows in scientific notation, but only in the data label and not in other places (such as the tooltip as shown below). Notice how the element level format is used in the data label but the visual or model level format string is still used for the other elements in the same visual.

For visual calculations the same principle applies but of course without the model level. For example, if you have a visual calculation that returns a percentage, you can now format it as such using the Data Format options in the General on the visual in the format pane:

The ability to set visual level format strings makes it much easier to get the exact formatting you need for your visualizations. However, this is only the first iteration of the visual level format strings. We are planning to add the settings you’re used to for the model level format strings to the visual level soon.

Since visual level format strings are introduced as part of the visual calculations preview, you will need to turn on the visual calculations preview to use them. To do that, go to Options and Settings  >  Options  >  Preview features . Select  Visual calculations  and select  OK . Visual calculations and visual level format strings are enabled after Power BI Desktop is restarted.

Please refer to our docs to read more about format strings or visual calculations .

Dynamic per recipient subscriptions (Generally Available)

We are excited to announce the general availability of Dynamic per recipient subscriptions for Power BI and paginated reports. Dynamic per recipient subscriptions is designed to simplify distributing a personalized copy of a report to each recipient of an email subscription. You define which view of the report an individual receives by specifying which filters are applied to their version of the report. The feature is now available in Sov. Clouds as well.

Connect to data that has recipient email, names or report parameters.

Then, select and filter data that you want in your subscription. You probably only want to send emails conditionally. To do that, you can filter the data in the “Filter” pane.

You can select the recipient email addresses and the email subject from the dataset that you connected to by selecting “Get Data”.

You can then map your data to the subscription.

Then schedule the subscription and save it.

The subscriptions will be triggered based on the schedule that you have set up. Personalized reports can be sent to up to a thousand recipients! Learn more about Dynamic per recipient subscriptions for Power BI reports, and paginated reports .

Do you have reports that are too large to be delivered by email? Do you have reports that are eating into your email in just a few weeks, or do you need you to move it to a different location? You can now deliver Power BI and paginated report subscriptions to OneDrive or SharePoint. With this capability, you can schedule and send full report attachments to a OneDrive or SharePoint location. Learn more about how to deliver report subscriptions to OneDrive or SharePoint .

Updated Save and Upload to OneDrive Flow in Power BI

Beginning the first week of August, desktop users should see a preview switch starting in SU8 to turn on the updated Save and Upload to OneDrive experience in Power BI. To enable this, navigate to the Preview features section of Options in Power BI. Users will then need to select “Saving to OneDrive and SharePoint uploads the file in the background”.

With these updates, we’ve improved the experience of uploading new Power BI files to OneDrive, and easily upload new changes in the background.

For uploading new files, after navigating to the correct location in the OneDrive file picker and saving, a dialog box appears while the file is being uploaded. The option to cancel the upload is there if needed. This dialog will only show up the first time a new file is uploaded to OneDrive.

Dialog for saving a new file to OneDrive.

When new changes are saved to a file uploaded to OneDrive, the top of the toolbar indicates that the new changes are also being uploaded to OneDrive.

Additional changes being uploaded in the background to the existing file.

If you click on the title bar flyout in the toolbar, you can also now access more information about the file. Clicking “View your file in OneDrive” will provide a direct link to where the file is stored in OneDrive.

Drop down including the link to the file in OneDrive.

We are introducing the data limit capability to help you manage performance issues. This feature allows you to set the maximum data load for a single session per visual displaying only the rows of data in an ascending order by default.

To use this feature: 

• Go to the ‘Filters on this visual’ menu in the filter pane.

• Set your desired data limit value.

The filter card features include: 

• Removing, locking, or clearing filters.  
• Hiding or showing filters.
• Expanding or collapsing filter cards.
• Applying filters.
• Renaming and reordering filters.

Report consumers can see any data limits applied to a visual in the filter visual header, even if the filter pane is hidden.

Visuals, shapes and line enhancements

Over the past few months, we have been fine-tuning the visual elements of your reports, including columns, bars, ribbons, and lines. We have given you the ability to craft these Cartesians with precision. However, we noticed that the legends and tooltips were not quite accurate .  

With the latest update, the legend and tooltip icons will now automatically and accurately reflect per-series formatting settings, such as border colors, shapes, and line styles. This makes it easier to match series to their visual representations. Additionally, we have added consistency to how per-series formatting is applied to line charts, column/bar charts, scatter charts, and other Cartesian formatting options for common items like error bars and anomalies.  

Check out the Reporting demos here:

DAX query view in the web

Write DAX queries on your published semantic models with DAX query view in the web. DAX query view, already available in Power BI Desktop, is now also available when you are in the workspace.

Look for Write DAX queries on your published semantic model.

• Right-click on the semantic model and choose Write DAX queries .
• Click on the semantic model to open the details page, then click Write DAX queries at the top of the page.

This will launch DAX query view in the web, where you can write DAX queries, use quick queries to have DAX queries written for you on tables, columns, or measures, or use Fabric Copilot to not only write DAX queries but explain DAX queries, functions, or topics. DAX queries work on semantic models in import, DirectQuery, and Direct Lake storage mode.

Write permission, that is permission to make changes to the semantic model, is currently needed to write DAX queries in the web. And, the workspace setting, User can edit data models in the Power BI service (preview) , needs to be enabled.

DAX query view in the web includes DAX query view’s way to author measures. Define measures with references, edit any of them, and try out changes across multiple measures by running the DAX query, then update the model with all the changes in a single click of a button. DAX query view in web brings this functionality for the first time to semantic models in Direct Lake mode!

If you do not have write permission, you can still live connect to the semantic model in Power BI Desktop and run DAX queries there.

Try out DAX query view in web today and learn more about how DAX queries can help you in Power BI and Fabric.

• Deep dive into DAX query view in web
• DAX queries
• Work with DAX query view
• Deep dive into DAX query view and writing DAX queries
• Write DAX queries with Copilot
• Deep dive into DAX query view with Copilot
• Overview of Copilot for Power BI
• Direct Lake

Check out a Modeling demo here:

Embedded Analytics

Narrative visual with copilot available in saas embed.

We are excited to announce that the Narrative visual with Copilot is available for user owns data scenarios (SaaS) and secure embed. This means when a user embeds a report containing the narrative visual in a solution where users must sign in – they will now be able to the visual refresh with their data. The first step on our Copilot embed journey!

When you embed a Power BI report in an application in the “embed for your organization” scenario, it allows organizations to integrate rich, interactive data visualizations seamlessly into their internal tools and workflows. Now this solution supports the Copilot visual. A sales team might want to embed a Power BI report in their internal CRM application to streamline their workflow. By integrating sales performance dashboards directly into the CRM, team members can easily monitor key metrics like monthly sales targets, pipeline status, and individual performance, without switching between different tools. This integration enables quicker access to actionable insights, helping the team make informed decisions, identify trends, and react swiftly to market changes, all within the secure environment of their organization’s data infrastructure.

Supported Scenarios:

• Embed a report in a secure portal or website  Power BI.
• User owns data : A user embeds a report containing the narrative visual in a solution where users must sign in. They need a license to do so. This action is also known as  embed for your organization . It includes when users want to embed visuals in solutions like PowerPoint as well.

Unsupported Scenario:

• App owns data:  A customer embeds a narrative visual on a website where users visit, and don’t need to sign in. Also known as  embed for your customer’s application .

To get this set up, there are a few steps to follow – so make sure to check out the documentation . Embed a Power BI report with a Copilot narrative visual – Power BI | Microsoft Learn

You will need to Edit your Microsoft Entra app permissions to enable the embedded scenario to work.

From here you’ll need to add the MLModel.Execute.All permission.

Check out the documentation for additional details.

Check out an Embedded Analytics demo here:

Visualizations

Icon Map Pro hi-chart Reporting Studio Water Cup Performance Flow – xViz Sunburst by Powerviz Zebra BI Tables 7.0 Enlighten Storyteller Inforiver Writeback Matrix Drill Down Pie PRO (Filter) by ZoomCharts (microsoft.com) Spiral Plot By Office Solution Polar Scatter Plot By Office Solution Hanging Rootogram Chart for Power BI Bar Chart Run Time Convertible Scatter Plot Circular Dendrogram Chart for Power BI Barley Trellis Plot By Office Solution Connected Scatter Plot Chart For Power BI Dot Plot Chart by Office Solution Voronoi Diagram By Office Solution Fish Bone Chart for Power BI Icon Array Chart for Power BI

Image Skyline StackedTrends Visual Bubble Diagram Chord Diagram Non-Ribbon Chord Diagram

Powerviz Filter is an advanced Power BI slicer (Free Visual) that applies a page-level filter to the data. It stands out for its user-friendly design and customization flexibility, with developer-friendly wizard.

Key Features:

• Hierarchy Control : Support multiple hierarchies with expand/collapse and by-level formatting
• Ragged Hierarchy Support: Hide BLANK category/values, or both, and display child as parent.
• Keep selected items at Top : enable this to show your selected items at top.
• Display Mode : Seamlessly switch between pop-up/canvas modes.
• Default Selection: Select default categories/values that automatically get filtered on refresh.
• Selection Mode: Single-select, multiple-select, or select-all with only single-selection.
• Image: Add images alongside the filter. HTML Links/Base-64 URLs Support.
• Title-Bar Options: Search Bar, Clear Icon, Ranking, Filter, Sorting, Expand/Collapse.
• Conditional Formatting: Highlight font and row background color based on specific rules.
• Template: Choose from professionally created light/dark templates, and easily customize them using the Global styling option.

Other features included are Import/Export Themes, Interactivity, Filter Style, and more.

Business Use-Cases:

Sales Analysis, Marketing Performance tracking, Financial Monitoring

🔗 Try Filter Visual for FREE from AppSource

📊 Check out all features of the visual: Demo_file

📃 Step-by-step instructions: Documentation

💡 YouTube Video: Video_Link

📍 Learn more about visuals: https://powerviz.ai/

✅ Follow Powerviz : https://lnkd.in/gN_9Sa6U

Slice to Spice: Transform your Pie Chart by Clicking! Dive deeper with a click, creating a new pie!

Pie of Pie by JTA – a Data Scientist’s Visualization Tool

Slice, Click, Reveal: Explore Deeper Insights with Our Interactive Pie Chart Visual for Power BI!

A Power BI custom visual that enables the creation of a hierarchical representation within a Pie Chart. With a simple click, you can effortlessly delve into detailed categories, offering a seamless and visually intuitive way to unveil multi-level insights in a single view.

Experience the convenience of interactive data analysis, where each slice of the initial pie chart acts as a gateway to deeper layers of information. Whether you’re dissecting population demographics, dissecting sales performance, or analysing product distribution, Pie of Pie offers a seamless and visually intuitive solution.

• Interactive hierarchical representation within a Pie Chart: Dive into detailed categories with ease, exploring multi-level insights seamlessly.
• Effortlessly explore multi-level insights with a single click: Click on a slice to reveal deeper layers of information, enhancing your data analysis experience.
• Customizable colours, labels, and legend: Tailor the visual to match your branding or personal preferences, ensuring clarity and consistency in your reports.
• Choose where to display always both pies and just show the second upon click: Optimize your visual presentation by selecting the most suitable display mode for your data storytelling needs.
• Animate the visual: Bring your data to life with smooth animations, captivating your audience and enhancing engagement with your insights.
• Personalize the spacing: Fine-tune the spacing between elements to achieve the perfect balance of aesthetics and readability in your visualizations.

Download Pie of Pie by JTA for free: AppSource

Try Pie of Pie by JTA: Demo

Youtube video: Youtube

Learn more about us: JTA The Data Scientists

Everyone knows what a pie chart is – for centuries, it has been the most popular way to visualize data. But what makes Drill Down Pie PRO special is the incredible amount of flexibility it offers to creators. Enjoy a wide range of customization features (colors, fonts, legends, labels, and more), create up to nine levels of drill down hierarchy, and declutter the chart with an interactive ‘Others’ slice that users can expand with just a click.

What’s more, this visual can be more than just a pie chart – it can be an interactive navigation tool for the entire report. When the user selects a slice or drills down, it will cross-filter other visuals on the report, instantly revealing focused insights. Create faster, more intuitive, and more insightful reports with ZoomCharts!

Main Features:

• On-chart drill down
• Cross-chart filtering
• Up to 9 levels of hierarchy
• Adjustable ‘Others’ slice
• Color, label, and legend customization
• Custom tooltip fields
• Touch support

🌐 Get Drill Down Pie PRO on AppSource

Product Page | Documentation | Follow ZoomCharts on LinkedIn

Hierarchical bar chart displays hierarchical data (different fields having parent/child relationship) in the form a bar/column chart with +/- signs to view/hide details or child elements.

A new feature was added to the visual in Jun 24 whereby the users can display CAGR between the 2 values by clicking the bars one after another (after turning on “CAGR” from format pane).

This visual has the following key features.

1) Expand/ Collapse bars using (+/-) buttons

2) Show variance between bars

3) Show CAGR between bars

4) Drag the bars for custom sorting

5) Click on legends to drill down/up to any level

6) Show targets

Watch a demo of these features in short video below

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOcs5RNY-Zs

Download this visual from APPSOURCE

Download demo file from APPSOURCE

For more information visit https://www.excelnaccess.com/hierarchical-barchart/

or contact [email protected]

Deneb is a free and open-source certified custom visual that allows developers to create their own highly bespoke data visualizations directly inside Power BI using the declarative JSON syntax of the Vega or Vega-Lite languages.

This is like the approaches used for creating R and Python visuals in Power BI, with the following additional benefits:

• Everything in-visual —no additional dependencies on local libraries or gateways for your end-users when publishing reports.
• Microsoft certified runtime —any visual you create receives the same benefits of a certified custom visual, meaning your design will work anywhere Power BI works, including Publish to Web, mobile, PowerPoint, and PDF exports.
• Performance —your designs are rendered directly inside Power BI rather than being delegated to another location, keeping data inside your workbook and typically resulting in faster render times for end-users.
• Interactivity —You can integrate Power BI’s interactivity features (tooltips, Drillthrough, cross-filtering, and cross-highlighting with some additional setup.

📢Our latest version brings many of our top requested new features to the development experience, including:

• Dark mode —toggle between the traditional light theme and dark theme to reduce eye strain.

• Commenting —you can now add comments to your JSON for documentation and debugging purposes.

• Auto-completion improvements —suggestions will now be recommended based on the details in the Vega and Vega-Lite schemas.
• Inline language documentation (for Vega-Lite)—the documentation the Vega team makes available for Vega-Lite in its language schema is now available when you hover your mouse over an appropriate location in your JSON. This will help you discover more language features within Deneb itself, and any hyperlinks will navigate you to the correct location on the Vega-Lite documentation site for further reading.
• Auto unit formatting —a new format type that applies the same logic as Power BI format numbers in K, M, Bn, etc., with less effort than the existing Power BI value formatter.
• Advanced cross-filtering (for Vega)—new expression functions to help generate cross-filtering of report items based on a filter against the original dataset sent to Deneb before any transformations may have been applied.

We have many other enhancements in this release, and you can find out more about how these can help you and your readers by:

• Visting the Change Log on Deneb’s website
• Checking out our YouTube spotlight videos on key new features
• Downloading Deneb from AppSource
• Getting inspired by examples from our community or the sample workbook
• Following Deneb

Paginated Reports: Sharing of reports connecting to Get Data data sources made easy

We announced the ability to create paginated reports from Power BI Report Builder by connecting to over 100 data sources with the Get Data experience. You can learn more about Connect paginated reports to data sources using Power Query (Preview) – Power BI | Microsoft Learn. You no longer need to share the shareable cloud connection. You only need to share the report and ensure that those consuming the report have access to view the report. This update will be rolling out in the coming weeks.

That is all for this month!

We hope that you enjoy the update! If you installed Power BI Desktop from the Microsoft Store,  please leave us a review .

As always, keep voting on  Ideas  to help us determine what to build next. We are looking forward to hearing from you!

• embedded analytics
• Microsoft Fabric
• paginated reports
• semantic model

Problem-solving flowchart: A visual method to find perfect solutions

Reading time: about 7 min

“People ask me questions Lost in confusion Well, I tell them there's no problem Only solutions” —John Lennon, “Watching the Wheels”

Despite John Lennon’s lyrics, nobody is free from problems, and that’s especially true in business. Chances are that you encounter some kind of problem at work nearly every day, and maybe you’ve had to “put out a fire” before lunchtime once or twice in your career.

But perhaps what Lennon’s saying is that, no matter what comes our way, we can find solutions. How do you approach problems? Do you have a process in place to ensure that you and your co-workers come to the right solution?

In this article, we will give you some tips on how to find solutions visually through a problem-solving flowchart and other methods.

What is visual problem-solving?

If you are a literal thinker, you may think that visual problem-solving is something that your ophthalmologist does when your vision is blurry. For the rest of us, visual problem-solving involves executing the following steps in a visual way:

• Define the problem.
• Brainstorm solutions.
• Pick a solution.
• Implement solutions.
• Review the results.

How to make your problem-solving process more visual

Words pack a lot of power and are very important to how we communicate on a daily basis. Using words alone, you can brainstorm, organize data, identify problems, and come up with possible solutions. The way you write your ideas may make sense to you, but it may not be as easy for other team members to follow.

When you use flowcharts, diagrams, mind maps, and other visuals, the information is easier to digest. Your eyes dart around the page quickly gathering information, more fully engaging your brain to find patterns and make sense of the data.

Identify the problem with mind maps

So you know there is a problem that needs to be solved. Do you know what that problem is? Is there only one problem? Is the problem sum total of a bunch of smaller problems?

You need to ask these kinds of questions to be sure that you are working on the root of the issue. You don’t want to spend too much time and energy solving the wrong problem.

To help you identify the problem, use a mind map. Mind maps can help you visually brainstorm and collect ideas without a strict organization or structure. A mind map more closely aligns with the way a lot of our brains work—participants can bounce from one thought to the next defining the relationships as they go.

Mind mapping to solve a problem includes, but is not limited to, these relatively easy steps:

• In the center of the page, add your main idea or concept (in this case, the problem).
• Branch out from the center with possible root causes of the issue. Connect each cause to the central idea.
• Branch out from each of the subtopics with examples or additional details about the possible cause. As you add more information, make sure you are keeping the most important ideas closer to the main idea in the center.
• Use Collaborative AI to generate or expand on your ideas, so your mind map is as complete as possible.

Alternatively, you could use mind maps to brainstorm solutions once you discover the root cause. Try our free mind map template  or add the mind map shape library to quickly start your own mind map.

Create a problem-solving flowchart

A mind map is generally a good tool for non-linear thinkers. However, if you are a linear thinker—a person who thinks in terms of step-by-step progression making a flowchart may work better for your problem-solving strategy. A flowchart is a graphical representation of a workflow or process with various shapes connected by arrows representing each step.

Whether you are trying to solve a simple or complex problem, the steps you take to solve that problem with a flowchart are easy and straightforward. Using boxes and other shapes to represent steps, you connect the shapes with arrows that will take you down different paths until you find the logical solution at the end.

Flowcharts or decision trees are best used to solve problems or answer questions that are likely to come up multiple times. For example, Yoder Lumber , a family-owned hardwood manufacturer, built decision trees in Lucidchart to demonstrate what employees should do in the case of an injury.

To start your problem-solving flowchart, follow these steps:

• Draw a starting shape to state your problem.
• Draw a decision shape where you can ask questions that will give you yes-or-no answers.
• Based on the yes-or-no answers, draw arrows connecting the possible paths you can take to work through the steps and individual processes.
• Continue following paths and asking questions until you reach a logical solution to the stated problem.
• Try the solution. If it works, you’re done. If it doesn’t work, review the flowchart to analyze what may have gone wrong and rework the flowchart until you find the solution that works.

If your problem involves a process or workflow , you can also use flowcharts to visualize the current state of your process to find the bottleneck or problem that’s costing your company time and money.

Lucidchart has a large library of flowchart templates to help you analyze, design, and document problem-solving processes or any other type of procedure you can think of.

Draw a cause-and-effect diagram

A cause-and-effect diagram is used to analyze the relationship between an event or problem and the reason it happened. There is not always just one underlying cause of a problem, so this visual method can help you think through different potential causes and pinpoint the actual cause of a stated problem.

Cause-and-effect diagrams, created by Kaoru Ishikawa, are also known as Ishikawa diagrams, fishbone diagrams , or herringbone diagrams (because they resemble a fishbone when completed). By organizing causes and effects into smaller categories, these diagrams can be used to examine why things went wrong or might go wrong.

To perform a cause-and-effect analysis, follow these steps.

1. Start with a problem statement.

The problem statement is usually placed in a box or another shape at the far right of your page. Draw a horizontal line, called a “spine” or “backbone,” along the center of the page pointing to your problem statement.

2. Add the categories that represent possible causes.

For example, the category “Materials” may contain causes such as “poor quality,” “too expensive,” and “low inventory.” Draw angled lines (or “bones”) that branch out from the spine to these categories.

3. Add causes to each category.

Draw as many branches as you need to brainstorm the causes that belong in each category.

Like all visuals and diagrams, a cause-and-effect diagram can be as simple or as complex as you need it to be to help you analyze operations and other factors to identify causes related to undesired effects.

Collaborate with Lucidchart

You may have superior problem-solving skills, but that does not mean that you have to solve problems alone. The visual strategies above can help you engage the rest of your team. The more involved the team is in the creation of your visual problem-solving narrative, the more willing they will be to take ownership of the process and the more invested they will be in its outcome.

In Lucidchart, you can simply share the documents with the team members you want to be involved in the problem-solving process. It doesn’t matter where these people are located because Lucidchart documents can be accessed at any time from anywhere in the world.

Whatever method you decide to use to solve problems, work with Lucidchart to create the documents you need. Sign up for a free account today and start diagramming in minutes.

About Lucidchart

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Visual problem solving with flowcharts and mind maps

What’s life without problems? Probably a little boring, if we’re being honest. If everything were perfect all the time, there would be no challenges, and things would get pretty monotonous. This is a rather optimistic view on what many believe to be an aggravating part of life. No matter how you feel about problems, one thing is true: problems are inevitable . You can’t always control how many problems you encounter in your life, but you can learn better ways to solve them. So, what can we do for those really complex issues that aren’t easily solved? Visual problem solving is the perfect way to see solutions and break down complex issues.

Make your own flowchart with Gleek .

What is visual problem solving?

Visual problem solving is the process of using aids like charts or diagrams to display all the aspects of a problem in order to find viable solutions. When problem solving, sometimes it’s hard to see what’s causing the problem, or other relationships and correlations that are affecting whatever it is you’re working on. Two common methods for problem solving include mind maps and flowcharts . A mind map is a non-linear diagram, used for making new ideas or breaking down complex issues. A flowchart is a linear diagram, used for making action plans and describing processes.

5 steps to solve problems

Identify the true problem

Maybe you know what the issue is in clear terms, or perhaps it’s still a little confusing. A good way to get a concrete vision of the problem you need to solve is to pose it as a question, or a short statement. You might come up with something like ‘our sales have dropped’, or, as a question ‘what can we do to increase sales?’.

Get information

Now that you have a clear objective to solve, the next step is to gather all the relevant information that pertains to the issue. This can look like statistics, comments from customers, employee feedback, and more. Once you’ve collected the data, you’ll need to analyze it from all angles to get a clear view on the topic.

Brainstorming session

Get any and all potential solution ideas out on the table. Doesn’t matter how silly an idea seems, just put anything that comes to mind on the drawing board. This is where your visual aids will really come in handy, especially mind maps. You might need more than one chart, depending on how complicated the issue is.

Choose the best idea(s)

Whether on your own or with a team, you’ll have to eliminate the potential solutions that just won’t work. To find the solution that’ll work best, it’s good to analyze it in the same way you did the problem – by looking at potential outcomes, and all facets involved.

Make an action plan

So you think you’ve found the perfect solution! Now what? If your problem is complicated, usually the solution will be too. Here is where another visual aid, like a flowchart, will be helpful. Map out the specific steps you need in order to implement your solution. Then, it’s time to put your plan into action.

These are just the basic steps you can use to start problem solving. You may find that other actions are needed during your own journey.

Common mistakes when problem solving

Mistakes? We all make them from time to time. Here are some common mistakes we are prone to when trying to fix problems.

Undefined problem – When identifying the problem, it’s possible that the problem is too big, multi-faceted, or too complex to tackle all at once. A way to avoid this is to break the problem down into chunks, following common themes.

More problems arise – This isn’t always a direct result of anything we do, but it can happen nonetheless. The best way to deal with more problems that arise when you’re trying to solve the original one is to think of the possible things that could go wrong during the solution stage. When you’re prepared for any situation, you’ll rarely have any setbacks.

No action plan – Finding a way to solve your problem doesn’t mean that the planning is over. On the contrary, you need to create a strategy to properly execute your solution so you won’t end up with a half-solved problem and even more issues than you started with.

When to use flowcharts

One way to chart your problems and progress is through flowcharts. For those who like to think in a step-by-step or linear fashion, flowcharts are the best way to visualize things. Let’s have a look at some situations that are best suited to flowcharts.

Big problems – Flowcharts can help break down a large problem or solution into specific steps or stages from start to finish.

Decision trees – This type of flowchart is helpful when diagramming actions that will happen as a result of other actions, whether they be in a software system or actions taken by people.

Cause and effect – Similar to a decision tree, a cause and effect flowchart is where you can analyze the potential results of various actions, past or present.

Check out our 20 flowchart templates that you can also easily edit !

When to use mind maps

Mind maps are great for brainstorming sessions, and non-linear problem solving. Here are some situations that are best visualized through a mind map.

Finding the problem – So, what is the problem exactly? Sometimes it’s hard to see. Making a mind map offers you the opportunity to see all the moving parts involved with a situation, and how they relate to one another, and can help you suss out the true problem.

Core and branching ideas – You start with a core idea, such as ‘online sales’, then add related ideas or issues branching off from that, like maybe ‘ad revenue’, or ‘social media campaigns’. Then those ideas can have their own branches. This is an easy way to analyze all aspects of a problem.

Source: Problem Solving with Mind Maps (Tutorial)

Looking to create your own flowchart? Gleek has the solution for you. With Gleek, you can create your own flowcharts using a text-based command center, without ever using your mouse. Not only can you create flowcharts, you can create many other UML-based diagrams that will wow your colleagues and bring new life to your presentations. Get started for free today .

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A guide to problem framing: best practices & templates

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When creating solutions and products, it’s critical to correctly frame the problem you’re attempting to solve. 

Remember the Google Glass? What about the Segway? Taken on their own account, these were groundbreaking products with cutting-edge technology. No one had seen anything like them before. Yet they failed for a simple reason: They were solutions in search of a problem.

Now imagine if their creators had spent more time trying to understand the problem their customers faced. Imagine they had actually tried to identify a real challenge and properly define how it could be addressed. The result would have likely been closer to a Tesla or even an iPhone — at the very least, we wouldn’t be talking about them in nearly the same way.

This shows just how important it is to frame a problem before trying to solve it. Let’s go over in detail how you can apply problem framing to your next project.

What is problem framing?

Problem framing is a process for analyzing, understanding, and ultimately defining a problem or challenge in order to develop an effective solution. While it can be done on an individual level, it is typically practiced across teams so that you can achieve alignment and work more cohesively toward an agreed-upon outcome. 

In short, problem framing is an opportunity to take a step back, assess the landscape of your problem and break down its root causes, then focus on a solution that is most likely to lead to the outcome you want.

Why problem framing is critical for better outcomes

Framing the problem is important because it sets the direction and scope of the solution design process, ensuring that efforts are focused on addressing the core issues. It helps avoid wasted time and resources on irrelevant or superficial solutions.

Good design and effective iteration can help improve a product, but they won’t tell you if you’re addressing the right problem — only problem framing can do that. Here are some ways this process can ensure your solution achieves better results:

• It provides clarity. Whether your team isn’t sure what problem they’re facing or can’t reach an agreement, taking the time to break the problem apart can ensure everyone understands it. And that is crucial to developing a solution that actually works.
• It narrows the scope. With a better understanding of the problem, you can eliminate everything but the most essential aspects that need to be addressed. That means only addressing underlying issues instead of just their symptoms.
• It achieves alignment. By having a clear definition in hand, you can ensure that all team members and stakeholders share a common understanding of the problem and how to address it. This will help reduce misunderstandings and conflict.
• It increases efficiency. While some may think problem framing is an extra step, it can actually help keep you from wasting resources and time by preventing you from focusing on irrelevant or ineffective solutions.

How to frame a problem

Whether you think you have a good idea of your problem or have no clue where to begin, learning how to properly frame it can give you new insights into how to solve it. Here’s a process for doing just that.

Create a problem statement

A good first step is to make sure that everyone can agree on what exactly the problem is. This is a great opportunity to write out a problem statement, or a clear and concise explanation of the problem or challenge you intend to solve.

The goal behind writing a problem statement is to describe the problem as comprehensively as possible, while also spurring your team into action. If your team can’t even reach an agreement on what the problem is, then try to discuss the problem from multiple angles to ensure you’re incorporating multiple perspectives. This will help you achieve alignment. 

Even when everyone already has a good idea of the problem, this step can still help ensure complete clarity by taking the simple but effective step of making your team write it down. Learn more about what goes into creating a good problem statement in our full guide .

Identify and understand the problem's root cause

Although identifying your problem’s root cause or causes should be a part of writing out your problem statement , it’s important enough to deserve a discussion on its own. After all, if you are just focusing on the symptoms of your problem, then any solution you develop will ultimately fail.

The key to uncovering a problem’s root cause is to ask why it is happening, rather than what. Typically, there will be multiple answers to this. One way to start organizing and categorizing these different causes and their various effects is by using a fishbone diagram . Start out by writing down your problem, then come up with different categories that could be contributing to it. From there, start brainstorming different causes.

Once you have everything laid out cleanly, you can vote on what you think are the most significant contributors — or, if necessary, even rethink the problem itself.

Empathize with the end-users of the problem

Once you have a good idea of your problem and can articulate it, you also need to ensure that this is a problem your stakeholders face. That means being able to properly understand and empathize with their needs.

To accomplish this, consider organizing an empathy mapping session . Start out by gathering a diverse range of stakeholders in order to reduce biases and leverage different perspectives. Ask them to share their opinion regarding the product, service, or situation, encouraging open-ended responses. As you gather this feedback, divide it into four different categories: thoughts, feelings, actions, and observations —then start looking for areas of improvement. This is where your highest priority problems will be.

The act of interviewing your stakeholders, writing down their responses, and organizing them across different categories should give you a much deeper understanding of the user’s point of view and their needs. 

Frame the problem to brainstorm solutions

With your user research in hand and your problem statement honed, it’s time to start framing the problem in order to come up with effective solutions.

During this process, your goal should be to get your team to rethink the problem in creative ways to help you find new ways to solve it. While there are many ways to do this, the Mural problem framing template provides a simple three-step procedure that can help you explore your challenge in new ways to get the right answer. Each person must transform the problem into four different questions that invite deeper, more nuanced thinking. These questions are then discussed, voted on, and narrowed down to the most promising, providing you with a clear frame for future work.

Tips to effectively frame the problem

Thinking through problems in new ways and effectively framing them involves outside-the-box creativity , a healthy dose of empathy, and a willingness to take risks. This can be intimidating for some people. So here are some quick tips to help make this process more effective.

Start with asynchronous collaboration

Focused sessions are the most effective sessions — and what you probably want to focus on the most while problem framing is coming up with possible solutions. That’s why encouraging stakeholders, end-users, and other participants to start collaborating asynchronously on ways to reframe and rethink your problem can be so beneficial. 

Plus, getting participants to work on their own can help avoid groupthink, or the tendency to come up with ideas people will agree with rather than ideas that are actually useful. This will ultimately lead to better decisions and more effective solutions.

In-person sessions aren’t the only way to collaborate!  Learn how async collaboration can solve your meeting problem .

Map out the context of the problem

Helping your team understand the drivers and impacts of the issue you are trying to solve will help them gain a more nuanced view on why this issue exists, as well as how best to solve it. This is why bringing in end users and empathizing with their needs is so important — but there’s no reason you have to stop there. By creating a customer journey map , you can identify vital pain points in the customer experience, locate areas for improvement, and create solutions that are personalized to the customer.

Mural offers several customer journey templates to get you started. For instance, our map template lets you break down the journey across five separate components for a more granular view, while our experience diagramming template is great for examining individual customer’s experiences. 

Don't be afraid to dig deeper with stakeholders and the end-users

Fully understanding an issue and how it affects your stakeholders can take time. For some, this can be frustrating. After all, your objective is to come up with a solution, which will likely require a fair amount of design and iteration itself. 

Try to resist the urge to jump ahead. Instead, embrace the problem-framing process as much as possible by digging in deep with your stakeholders and end users. Really try to explore and understand why their problem exists in the first place so you can find a better potential solution.

Even if all this takes extra time, just remember that it’s better to properly identify and understand the problem you aim to solve rather than solving the wrong problem.

Hold a vote to prioritize solutions

If you’re fortunate, you’ll come to the end of your problem framing session with a wealth of possible solutions to choose from. But this can also be overwhelming. Which is the best course of action? How should you decide?

When faced with these questions, you could try creating a prioritization matrix . This simple tool allows you to quickly identify and weigh the most important factors when making a decision. These could include factors like risk, costs, benefits, and stakeholder interests. You can then place them on a matrix according to the criteria of your choosing, such as potential difficulty and potential impact.

Once you’ve narrowed down your solutions, you could hold a vote to further prioritize what you’ll work on next. Lucky for you, Mural comes with a built-in voting feature that makes this easy.

Hold better problem-framing sessions

Often used in the design thinking process , problem framing is an essential step for understanding the issues you need to solve and uncovering creative new solutions for addressing them. And it doesn’t have to be limited to the beginning of projects. As your projects change and evolve, problem framing can be a useful process for realigning your team and making sure they are staying focused on what matters most.

But you’re not doing it on your own. With its array of tools, templates, and features, the Mural platform is designed to help you at every step of the process: from the first sticky note, to the project’s last step in execution. 

Start designing with digital whiteboard platform or go ahead and dive into our library of templates . And don’t forget to let us know what you come up with!

Looking to level-up client engagements? Learn how to make client collaboration more engaging and personalized with this cheat-sheet.

Frequently asked questions on problem framing

What is the main focus of problem framing.

The main focus of problem framing is to define the problem accurately, understand its underlying causes, and identify its broader implications. It aims to provide a clear and comprehensive view of the problem, enabling teams to develop targeted and effective solutions.

What is the difference between problem statements and problem framing?

Problem statements simply state the issue at hand, while problem framing goes a step further by providing context, boundaries, and a deeper understanding of the problem's root causes and impact.

What are the main benefits of problem framing?

The benefits of problem framing include clear direction for the project, targeted and impactful solutions, user-centric design, fostering innovation and creativity, and improved problem-solving and decision-making. It ensures that organizations solve the right problems and achieve more successful outcomes.

Related blog posts

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Blog Business What is a Problem-Solving Flowchart & How to Make One

What is a Problem-Solving Flowchart & How to Make One

Written by: Danesh Ramuthi Aug 10, 2023

Problem-Solving Flowcharts, contrary to what many believe aren’t just aesthetic wonders — they’re almost like magical blueprints for troubleshooting those pesky problems that many of us face.

Flowcharts take business challenges and turn them into a navigable pathway. In this post, I will guide you on key aspects of problem-solving flowcharts such as what it is, the advantages of problem-solving flowcharts, how to create one and more.

Besides, you’ll also discover how to create problem-solving flowcharts with the help of Venngage’s Flowchart Maker.

And for those of you thinking, “I’m no designer, how can I create one?” worry not! I’ve got you covered. Just hop on Venggage’s Flowchart Templates and you’ll be charting your way to problem-solving glory in no time.

Click to jump ahead:

What are problem-solving flowcharts?

When to use problem-solving flowcharts, what are the advantages of flowcharts in problem-solving, what are the 7 steps of problem-solving flowcharts.

• 5 different types of problem-solving flowcharts

Best practices for designing effective problem-solving flowcharts

• How to make a flowch art using Venngage ?

Problem-solving flowcharts FAQs

• Final Thoughts

Problem-Solving Flowcharts is a graphical representation used to break down problem or process into smaller, manageable parts, identify the root causes and outline a step-by-step solution. 

It helps in visually organizing information and showing the relationships between various parts of the problem.

This type of flowcharts consists of different symbols and arrows, each representing different components or steps in the problem-solving process. 

By following the flow of the chart, individuals or teams can methodically approach problem, analyze different aspects of it and come to a well-informed solution.

Problem-Solving Flowcharts is a versatile tool that can be used in various scenarios. Here’s when to consider utilizing one:

• Complex Problems: When faced with a multifaceted issue that involves multiple steps or variables, flowcharts can help break down the complexity into digestible parts.
• Team Collaboration: If you’re working with a team and need a common understanding of problem and its potential solutions then a flowchart provides a visual that everyone can refer to.
• Analyzing Processes: In a situation where you need to understand a particular process, whether it’s within a project or a part of regular operations then mapping it out in a flowchart can offer clarity.
• Decision Making: When various paths or decisions might be taken, a flowchart can outline the potential outcomes of each aiding in making an informed choice.
• Training and Onboarding: Flowcharts can be used in training materials to help new employees understand complex processes or procedures which makes the learning curve smoother.
• Identifying Root Causes: If you’re looking to identify the underlying causes of problem then a flowchart can facilitate a systematic approach to reaching the root of the issue.

Related: How to Use Fishbone Diagrams to Solve Complex Problems

Problem-solving flowcharts can offer several benefits to the users who are looking to solve a particular problem. Few advantages of flowcharts in problem solving are: 

Visual Clarity

When you’re dealing with multifaceted problems or processes, words alone can make the situation seem even more tangled. Flowcharts distill these complexities into easily understandable visual elements. 

By mapping out each phase or component of problem, flowcharts offer a bird’s eye view enabling individuals to grasp the bigger picture and the finer details simultaneously.

Sequential Representation

Flowcharts excel in laying out the sequence of events or actions. By indicating a clear starting point and illustrating each subsequent step, they guide users through a process or solution path methodically. 

This linear representation ensures that no step is overlooked and each is executed in the right order.  

Collaboration

Problem-solving often requires team effort and flowcharts are instrumental in fostering collaborative environments. 

When a team is discussing potential solutions or trying to understand problem’s intricacies, a flowchart serves as a collective reference point. 

It aids in synchronizing everyone’s understanding, minimizing miscommunications and promoting constructive discussions. 

Read more about: Flowcharts Symbols and Meaning

1. Define the Problem  

Before anything else, it’s essential to articulate the problem or task you want to solve clearly and accurately. By understanding exactly what needs to be addressed you can ensure that subsequent steps align with the core issue.

2. Identify the Inputs and Outputs  

Determine what inputs (such as data, information or resources) will be required to solve the problem and what the desired outputs or outcomes are. Identifying these factors will guide you in structuring the steps needed to reach the end goal and ensure that all necessary resources are at hand.

3. Identify the Main Steps  

Break down the problem-solving process into its main steps or subtasks. This involves pinpointing the essential actions or stages necessary to reach the solution. Create a roadmap that helps in understanding how to approach the problem methodically.

4. Use Decision Symbols  

In problem-solving, decisions often lead to different paths or outcomes. Using standard symbols to represent these decision points in the flowcharts allows for a clear understanding of these critical junctures. It helps visually present various scenarios and their consequences.

5. Add Descriptions and Details  

A well-designed flowcharts is concise but clear in its labeling. Using arrows and short, descriptive phrases to explain what happens at each step or decision point ensures that the flowcharts communicates the process without unnecessary complexity. 

6. Revise and Refine  

Creating a flowcharts is not always a one-and-done process. It may require revisions to improve its clarity, accuracy or comprehensiveness. Necessary refinement ensures that the flowcharts precisely reflects the problem-solving process and is free from errors or ambiguities.

7. Use Flowchart Tool  

While it’s possible to draw a flowcharts manually, using a flowcharts tool like Venngage’s Flowchart Maker and Venngage’s Flowchart Templates can make the process more efficient and flexible. These tools come with pre-designed templates and intuitive interfaces that make it easy to create, modify and share flowcharts. 

5 different types of problem-solving flowcharts 

Let’s have a look at 5 most common types of flowcharts that individuals and organizations often use. 

1. Process Flowchart s

A process flowcharts is a visual representation of the sequence of steps and decisions involved in executing a particular process or procedure. 

It serves as a blueprint that showcases how different stages or functions are interconnected in a systematic flow and it highlights the direction of the process from its beginning to its end.

Process flowcharts are instrumental in training and onboarding, sales process , process optimization, documentation, recruitment and in any scenario where clear communication of a process is crucial.

2. Flowcharts Infographic 

A flowcharts infographic is a great way to showcase the process or a series of steps using a combination of graphics, icons, symbols and concise text. It aims to communicate complex information in a clear and easy-to-understand manner, making it a popular tool for conveying information, data and instructions in a visually engaging way.

For example, you can use this flowchart to illustrate a health insurance process that visually explains the steps involved from finding a provider to paying for your healthcare provider. 

3. Circular Flowcharts

A circular flowcharts is used to illustrate the flow of information, goods, services or money within a closed system or process. It gets its name from its circular shape, which emphasizes the continuous and cyclical nature of the flow. 

Circular flowcharts are widely used in various fields such as economics, business, engineering and process management to help visualize and understand complex systems.

In a circular flowcharts , elements are represented using various shapes and connected with arrows to indicate the direction of flow. The circular arrangement indicates that the process is ongoing and repeats itself over time.

4. Swimlane flowcharts

Swimlane flowcharts , also known as cross-functional flowcharts are a specific type of flowchart that organizes the process flow into lanes or “swimlanes.” 

Each lane represents a different participant or functional area involved in the process and the flowchart shows how activities or information move between these participants. 

Swimlane flowcharts are particularly useful for illustrating complex processes that involve multiple stakeholders or departments.

In a swimlane flowcharts, the process is divided horizontally into lanes and each lane is labeled with the name of the department, person or role responsible for that part of the process. Vertically, the flowchart displays the sequence of steps or actions taken in the process.

5. Decision Flowchart s

Decision flowcharts, also known as decision trees or flow diagrams are graphical representations that illustrate the process of making decisions or solving problems. 

They are widely used in various fields such as computer science, business mapping , engineering and problem-solving scenarios. 

Decision flowcharts help break down complex decision-making processes into simple, sequential steps, making it easier to understand and follow.

A decision tree is a specialized flowchart used to visually represent the process of decision-making. 

Businesses and other individuals can employ a decision tree analysis as a tool to aid in evaluating different options and the possible consequences associated with each choice.

Decision trees Infographics can be used to create a more nuanced type of flowchart that is more informative and visually appealing by combining a decision flowchart and the flowchart infographic. 

Decision flowcharts are valuable tools for visualizing decision-making processes, analyzing complex problems and communicating them effectively to others.

Designing effective problem-solving flowcharts involves careful consideration of various factors to ensure clarity, accuracy and usability. Here are some best practices to create efficient and useful problem-solving flowcharts:

• Understand the problem first & clearly define it
• Keep it simple
• Use standard & recognizable symbols
• Ensure that the flowchart follows a logical and sequential order
• Clearly label each decision point, action and outcome
• Verify the flowchart’s accuracy by testing it
• Clearly state the decision criteria that lead to different branches
• Provide context when the flowchart is part of a larger process or system
• Review and revise the flowchart

How to make a flowchart using Venngage ?

Creating problem-solving flowchart on Venngage is incredibly simple. All you have to do is:

• Start by Signing Up and Creating an Account with Venngage
• Choose a flowchart template that best suits your needs from our library.
• Start editing your flowchart by choosing the desired shapes, labels and colors.
• You can also enhance your flowchart by incorporating icons, illustrations or backgrounds all of which are readily available in our library.
• Once done, you will have 2 options to choose from, either sharing it online for free or downloading your flowchart to your desktop by subscribing to the Premium or Business Plan. 

Is flowchart the representation of problem solutions?

Flowcharts are not the representation of problem solutions per se; rather, they are a visual representation of processes, decision-making steps and actions taken to arrive at a solution to problem.

What are the 3 basic structures of flowcharts?

3 Basic Structures of Flowcharts are:

• Sequence: Simplify Complexity
• Selection (Decision): Embrace Choices
• Repetition (Loop): Emphasize Iteration

What are the elements of a good flowchart?

A good flowchart should exhibit clarity and simplicity, using consistent symbols and labels to depict a logical sequence of steps. It should be readable, with appropriate white space to avoid clutter while eliminating ambiguity through well-defined decision criteria and paths.

Can flowcharts be used for both simple and complex problem-solving?

Yes, flowcharts can be used for both simple and complex problem-solving scenarios. Flowcharts are versatile visual tools that can effectively represent various processes, decision-making steps and problem-solving approaches regardless of their complexity.

In both cases, flowcharts offer a systematic and visual means of organizing information, identifying potential problems and facilitating collaboration among team members.

Can problem-solving flowcharts be used in any industry or domain?

Problem-solving flowcharts can be used in virtually any industry or domain. The versatility and effectiveness of flowcharts make them applicable to a wide range of fields such as Business and Management, Software Development and IT, Healthcare, Education, Finance, Marketing & Sales and a lot more other industries. 

Final thoughts

Problem-solving flowcharts are a valuable and versatile tool that empowers individuals and teams to tackle complex problems with clarity and efficiency.

By visually representing the step-by-step process of identifying, analyzing and resolving issues, flowcharts serve as navigational guides simplifying intricate challenges into digestible parts.

With the aid of modern tools like Venngage’s Flowchart Maker and Venngage’s Flowchart Templates , designing impactful flowcharts becomes accessible to all while revolutionizing the way problems are approached and solved.

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Elevate your thinking and accelerate your results with visual thinking tools

Solve problems faster with these 9 visual thinking techniques

By Chuck Frey

Not surprisingly, visual thinking tools like mind maps and diagrams can help you cut your challenges down to size, achieve clarity and generate high-value solutions to them.

Here are 9 mind maps and diagrams that can help you creatively define and solve your most vexing problems:

Mind mapping software can help, because it acts like a prism, separating a major task or challenge into its component parts and enabling you to see the relationships between them, so you can more effectively develop creative solutions to address it. To subdivide the components of your task or challenge, ask yourself questions that begin with the famous “5 W’s”: who, what, when, where and why.

Fishbone diagram

Fishbone diagrams, also known as cause and effect or Ishikawa diagrams, are useful for determining the root cause of a problem or challenge. They are especially useful during the problem definition segment of brainstorming sessions, where they helps individuals and teams to deconstruct problems and challenges.

Force field analysis

A “force field analysis” is a little-known but powerful creative problem-solving technique that can help you to deconstruct your current challenge into its strengths and weaknesses in – and to focus on those that will help you ensure a successful outcome. Force field analysis gives you a visual way to better understand your challenges and visualize these forces at work, so you can brainstorm ways to minimize your weaknesses, build upon your strengths – or add new positive skills or conditions to better counterbalance your weaknesses.

Deconstruct your challenge into its attributes

One skill you ought to cultivate if you want to be more creative is deconstructing challenges and situations into their elements. In so doing, you will inevitably reveal the bits and pieces that may be turned to creative advantage. A mind map is the perfect medium for breaking bigger elements down into smaller ones – while also revealing the relationships between them.

25 creative lenses for problem solving

To help us solve our biggest challenges, my friend Stephen Shapiro has written a marvelous book called Invisible Solutions. It outlines 25 mental filters or “lenses” that can help us systematically frame our problems, challenges and opportunities and release our best thinking. I’ve created a mind map that lists each of them, along with questions to help you think creatively about them.

Board of directors

Have you ever been stumped by a creative challenge? It seems like your muse has flown away. Your creative well is dry. Maybe you just need to whack yourself upside the head, figuratively speaking. Maybe you just need to look at your challenge from a new, creative perspective. This technique gives you permission to REALLY throw off your creative blinders and create a “board” of remarkable thinkers to help you whack YOUR thinking!

Ultimate SCAMPER map

During the last several decades, one of the most widely used and successful brainstorming techniques has been SCAMPER. Its name is a mnemonic for Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify/Magnify/Minify, Put to other uses, Eliminate and Reverse/Rearrange. The reason it is so popular is because it forces you to look at challenges or problems from a variety of creative perspectives. I’ve adapted it into a mind map – with over 200 creative prompts to jump-start your thinking in new directions!

5-step CPS process

A popular perception about creativity is that it’s random and uncontrollable. Terms like “a flash of insight,” “a bolt from the blue” and the iconic “A-ha!” support this notion. Writers and artists speak of a fickle creative “muse” that ebbs and flows unpredictably. A more reliable way to be consistently creative is to adopt a proven process for ideation and creative problem-solving, like this proven 5-step process – which I adapted into a mind map.

Personal problem-solving template

This mind map template contains 8 thought-provoking questions that you can use to help you with personal problem-solving – better defining problems and then brainstorming solutions for them. These questions have a lot of value for personal problem solving. And the mind map format is perfect for divergent thinking.

What problems will you solve?

Armed with this toolkit of visual creative problem-solving techniques, what challenges will you tackle?

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Problem Solving Presentation Templates

Present the problem-solving processes effectively with our premade problem solving powerpoint templates and google slides themes. crafted to guide you from problem identification to resolution, these free templates breathe life into complex strategies. they feature creative, fully editable infographics, like puzzles and light bulb designs..

• Analytical Thinking: Breaking down a problem into smaller parts to understand its nature.
• Creative Thinking: Thinking outside the box to find unique and effective solutions.
• Decision Making: Choosing the best course of action among different alternatives.
• Team Collaboration: Working together to generate diverse perspectives and solutions.
• Communicate the problem statement clearly to stakeholders.
• Exhibit potential solutions and their implications.
• Rally teams around a unified strategy.
• Track progress and outcomes.

In such scenarios, the design and layout of your presentation matter as much as its content. And this is where Slide Egg steps in!

• Diverse Designs: From representing problem identification, business solutions, problem-solving techniques, and strategies to process steps, our slides have it all.
• Creative Infographics: Our slides are adorned with multicolor infographics like puzzle pieces, human brains, ladders, bulbs, stars, magnifiers, locks, and keys to captivate your audience.
• User-Friendly: Our problem solution slides  offers 100% editable features, allowing you to tailor the content to fit your narrative seamlessly.
• Cost-Efficient: For those on a budget, we provide free problem and solution slides so you can experience the quality of our offerings.

Become an expert with SlideEgg

How To Build A Problem Solving PowerPoint

We're here to help you, what is problem solving presentation templates.

Problem Solving Presentation Templates is a set of pre-designed PowerPoint slides that you can use to present and explain problem-solving strategies. The templates provide visuals and text that you can use to describe the problem-solving process, from identifying the problem to finding a solution.

Where can we use these Problem Solving Slides?

You can use these Problem Solving Slides for corporate meetings, educational classes, team-building events, or workshops. You can also use them to help facilitate brainstorming sessions and critical thinking activities.

How can I make Problem Solving PPT Slides in a presentation?

Start by creating a slide that outlines the problem. This should include the problem statement and a brief description of the context. Including brainstorming, researching, listing potential solutions, analyzing the data, and finally arriving at a solution. Suppose you want to create slides by yourself. Visit Tips and tricks for detailed instructions.

Who can use Problem Solving Presentation Templates?

Anyone can use Problem Solving PPT Templates to present a problem-solving strategy or process visually engagingly. These templates can be used by professionals, educators, students, business owners, and anyone looking to share a problem-solving approach with an audience.

Why do we need Problem Solving Presentation Slides?

Presenting a problem-solving Presentation slide helps illustrate complex concepts and issues. It can also engage an audience, provide visual context and simplify data. Problem-solving slides can convey ideas and solutions effectively and explore different solutions and alternatives.

Where can I find free Problem Solving Presentation Templates?

Many websites offer free Problem Solving Presentation Templates. Slide egg is one of the best PowerPoint providers. Our websites have uniquely designed templates that allow you to share the problem and help to track progress towards a solution.

Unlock insights with root cause analysis tools

Solve complex issues and dive deeper into solutions with Miro’s suite of root cause analysis tools. Be better equipped to facilitate conversations to improve strategies in your organization.

Over 70M+ users love Miro.

Empower teams

With Miro's root cause analysis tools, everyone can bring their insights into a shared workspace, fostering a sense of unity and understanding. Dig deeper, highlight the root cause of problems in real time or async, and find solutions collaboratively.

Visualize to understand

Illustrate and connect the dots with Miro’s tools for root cause analysis. Sketch, draft, and pin your thoughts to understand how different factors relate to each other.

Templates to increase efficiency

Miro's ready-made templates pave the way to problem-solving. Create a fishbone diagram or use the 5 Whys framework simply by picking a template and letting your ideas flow into an organized structure.

Why Miro is the perfect tool for root cause analyses

Simplify issues.

Run a brainstorming session with your team and visualize all possible causes of your problem by breaking them down into more minor issues. Miro helps you to easily co-create an action plan using one of the many root cause analysis tools.

Include everyone

Make sure everyone is heard, allowing you to gain diverse perspectives. Invite the whole crew to join you on your board and work in real time or async, crafting the perfect root cause analysis.

Infinite canvas

Miro's online workspace allows you to map out complex problems and identify the root causes one by one. Enable teams to explore ideas without constraints, fostering creative and critical thinking.

Circulate your board

Share your board link with all relevant stakeholders, or download your root cause analysis as an image or PDF. With just a few clicks, export your work quickly, saving time and effort.

Related templates

5 Whys Template

Analyze and understand the root of a problem or issue with the 5 Whys Template.

Fishbone Diagram Templates

Visualize the potential causes of a problem, to solve it collaboratively using a Fishbone Ishikawa Diagram.

DMAIC Analysis Template

Use the DMAIC process (or Six Sigma Map) to solve problems using a structured approach.

FMEA Analysis Template

Identify risks so you can optimize and stabilize business processes.

Quick Retrospective Template

Look back at success and failures in order to improve everyday practices.

Affinity Diagram Template

Organize and cluster ideas and data in order to effectively develop solutions.

Problem-solving made easy

Explore complex issues, visualize problems, and uncover their root causes through effective collaboration. Miro’s range of root cause analysis tools and templates lets you systematically narrow down potential causes, allowing your team to run a complete analysis effectively.

Fishbone Diagram

Bring your team together around one problem and find all possible root causes with Miro’s fishbone diagram maker. Brainstorm possibilities, analyze the current situation, and gain insights, all in one tool.

Diagramming

Miro’s all-in-one diagram maker removes the hassle of switching between diagramming and collaboration tools while helping you check off all the essential steps of your diagramming process.

Process mapping

Map processes, strategies, and everything in between with Miro. Get ideas, develop plans and build concepts everyone understands, creating alignment and bringing agility to teams.

BPMN diagram

Stay on top of your business processes by mapping them out with an online BPMN diagram. Have a shared understanding of your business’ procedures and increase productivity across the whole organization.

How to perform a root cause analysis with Miro

Select a ready-made template

From Fishbone diagrams to 5 Whys, choose a template that fits your project.

Add it to the board

Drag and drop the template directly to your board.

Analyze your problem

Start breaking down your issue to better understand the root causes. Use the template to guide you in this process.

Share your findings

Invite others to your board and keep it as a living document, so people can comment, give feedback and uncover more insights!

Root cause analysis tools FAQs

What are the tools for root cause analysis.

Teams and managers use root cause analysis tools to identify the underlying causes of a problem or issue. There are many different ones that can be used for this purpose, including 5 Whys, Fishbone Diagrams, Fault Tree Analysis, and FMEA. The 5 Whys framework involves asking "why" questions repeatedly to drill down into the root cause of a problem. Fishbone Diagrams are visual tools that help identify all the possible causes of a problem. Fault Tree Analysis is a method of identifying the causes of a specific event or failure. FMEA is a systematic approach to identifying and preventing potential failures in a system or process. Understanding and using these tools improves problem-solving and helps prevent future issues.

Can any team in any industry use root cause analysis tools?

Absolutely. Teams across industries and sectors use root cause analysis tools, including manufacturing, healthcare, IT, logistics, finance, and more. The RCA framework is flexible and adaptable, allowing organizations to identify and address the root causes of problems regardless of the specific field or context.

Are root cause analysis tools suitable for both simple and complex issues?

Yes, root cause analysis tools are adaptable to both simple and complex issues. Many teams use it for straightforward problems, and it enables them to identify and address root causes quickly. RCA tools also bring more clarity and visibility when decoding relationships between multiple factors in complex issues, making it easier for teams to understand and flag underlying causes.

What is root cause analysis?

What's a fishbone diagram?

5 Whys: Examples, explanations, and how to find the causes of problems

FMEA: How to properly set up Failure Modes and Effects Analysis

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Harness the A3 problem solving template to effectively solve problems

We recently explored the way visual thinking can be used on Conceptboard , so now we’re taking it a step further and look at how visual thinking can be used to collaboratively solve problems using a methodology pioneered by Toyota and presently used worldwide by practitioners of lean sigma : the A3 problem solving template.

Visual thinking is a great way to unlock creative potential. Our brain’s capacity to hold visual elements is huge, so when you start thinking visually you are able to tap into an extensive resource that feels effortless. And dare we say it, fun! 

Discover visual collaboration

To explore alternative brainstorming techniques, check out these 15 brainstorming techniques and templates you can use collaboratively with your team. 

The A3 problem solving template to drive continuous improvement

There are hundreds of ways to problem solve, from mind mapping , to design thinking or customer journey mapping . But the simple effectiveness of the A3 template is hard to beat. 

The basis of the A3 problem solving template is collectively mapping out a flow chart to break down complex processes, and highlighting the flaws in the system. From there, teams need to re-do the chart, highlight the key changes they need to make to improve the system. Then, create a plan of attack to implement those changes. It is a simple way to get everyone on the same page to visually solve problems. Remote or co-located teams can easily collaborate in real time on an A3 template using Conceptboard’s simple template featuring a rectangular space broken into four quadrants.

Use template

To get started, book a meeting time (at least an hour) for your team and send them a link to the collaborative board. Then, conduct the problem solving session in four simple steps:

• Detail the problem you are trying to solve in the top left quadrant.
• In the next quadrant underneath, as a team, illustrate the problem as a system including steps and links. You can do this using the pen, sticky notes, graphics or images. Then talk about each step as a group and give each step a general rating as to how well it’s functioning. This should result in a frame of reference of the current state of the system.
• In the third quadrant, again as a team, draw a visual map of the target state: that is what the ideal system would look like. You can highlight areas of focus where you want to try and do things differently, and what the intended results will be.
• Comparing these two visual maps, you should now be able to assess what actions need to be taken to achieve the target state. List these in the final quadrant. To make sure the list is actionable, detail Who, will do WHAT, by WHEN.

Once you have completed the four quadrants and an actionable list, make sure you send the link to the shared file to all stakeholders or involved team members. You could also export it in PDF form and print it on an A3 sheet once you are done filling it out.

The A3 methodology is extremely powerful as it enables you to synthesize different points of view into one manageable approach. This will create a shared understanding of the problem, as well as the effects it has on different departments within the business. If you want to learn more about how collective visual thinking can be used, watch this great TED Talk by Tom Wujec.

Feel free to explore Conceptboard’s free library of templates that will save you time and money in the planning process, allowing you to focus on the bigger picture .

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23 mind map examples for brainstorming & planning

Whether you're designing a product, managing your strategy , or defining project goals, visually communicating an idea helps collaborators understand what you want to accomplish. If you're having trouble putting your idea on paper, a mind map can help get you started.

Mind maps are diagrams that start with a central concept or question, and branches into subtopics and related ideas. These maps help you visualize how ideas connect so you can find new solutions.

In this article, we share 23 mind map examples and templates to help you find the best one for your next project.

1. Simple mind map example

Best for: first-time mind mappers and ideas that need developing

The simple mind map template centers around a main topic, goal, or problem. This brainstorming tool offers a shared visual space to put your ideas on paper (or an online whiteboard ). This mind map illustrates how ideas flow and branch into subtopics.

The sky's the limit when it comes to how you can use and adapt this mind map template to your own needs. A project manager might use it to:

• Brainstorm project requirements: You can use a mind map to break a big project into smaller pieces or individual steps.
• Present ideas to stakeholders: Mind maps present complex ideas in a simple format, making it easy for big-picture thinkers to understand the project.

Design tip: Start with one central theme and collaborate with your team to collect new ideas and flesh out concepts during a brainstorming session.

2. Bubble map example

Best for: early-stage planning and collaborative brainstorming

Bubble maps are a popular mind map type. While the simple mind map template includes subcategories, not all bubble maps take that approach. Instead, use them in early-stage brainstorming to help your team lay out core ideas. Once everyone contributes their suggestions, you can assign roles or create a project plan .

Design tip: Color-code bubbles to categorize them or note who added them.

3. Flow chart example

Best for: proficient mind mappers tackling more complex projects

Flow charts create more dynamic connections between subtopics than other mind maps. While most mind maps revolve around a central idea, flow charts outline a series of steps and processes from beginning to end. Their branching structure can also map different routes to the same solution or workflows teams follow in parallel.

On the product side, creating a flow chart visualizes how you want to make a deliverable or how users will interact with it. The sequence of steps helps order your priorities and fine-tune processes.

Design tip: Use arrows to denote the flow of information or the order in a process.

4. Problem-solving mind map example

Best for: individuals or teams solving an issue

A problem-solving mind map drills down on a central issue, its causes, and solutions, detailing the complexity of a problem. Causes, effects, and any unintended consequences of your response all tie together. As a result, problem-solving maps frame a challenge from every angle.

This map plays a role when:

• Facing a complicated business problem
• Organizing a response to an issue
• Outlining the causes of a challenge you’re facing
• Weighing solutions to find one that’s the quickest or most cost-effective

Design tip: Color-code your responses based on who’s tackling each aspect of a problem.

5. Opportunity solution brainstorming example

Best for: managers and teams working toward a specific outcome

This mind map helps you brainstorm solutions to create a desired outcome. Unlike problem-solving templates, this map focuses on an end goal, not an obstacle in your way. It breaks comprehensive goals into more manageable stages and lets you note any resources needed along the way.

For a better collaboration, review the mind map with your team for their insight and revisions. After a project starts, teams can use the template to stay coordinated and on the right track.

Design tip: Color-code boxes or lines for business objectives to note which teams handle which solutions.

6. Project management example

Best for: project managers looking to visualize complex projects

A project management mind map lets you focus on project specifics without losing sight of the big picture. Large projects can take coordination between departments. This map shows how teams work alongside each other to meet specific goals, and managers can use it to improve workflows and increase efficiency. You can also use this mind map to:

• Facilitate project meetings
• Split tasks among your team
• Define team goals and priorities
• Onboard new software
• Document problems and potential solutions
• Map out the steps to achieve project goals

Design tip: To limit the size of your mind map and stay organized, consider breaking off secondary processes into a new mind map.

7. Time management example

Best for: project managers assigning and prioritizing tasks

This time management template uses the mind map format to order tasks over a project lifecycle. You can consider the project the central topic for this chart. Arrows leading to a milestone contain steps in development. The template also gives space for requirements, team assignments, or tools needed to complete tasks.

Time management mind maps help teams and stakeholders gauge progress over a project lifecycle. If certain steps run under or over time, you can make changes to the timeline.

8. Product development mind map example

Best for: product managers, designers, and developers

This product map template breaks new initiatives into features, story points, and debts. For agile developers, this map outlines their process in clearly defined steps and sprints. Thanks to its nonlinear structure, teams can see how they work in tandem. It also encourages collaboration with a suggestion box in the corner.

Mapping developers' progress on a shared map makes tracking each team’s dev work easy. You can also use the map to check which devs have tackled a particular feature or story point. This mind map organizes fast-paced development into an easy-to-read format.

9. Business planning example

Best for: founders, investors, and business leaders who want to visualize their strategies

Business plans are documents listing a company’s objectives, identity, and processes. This mind map visually organizes and connects related parts of a business plan, which helps you brainstorm the steps to your goals, choose where to invest resources, and refine your strategic planning .

This holistic view of your business should include a few key elements:

• A high-level description of your company
• The products or services you offer
• Marketing strategies based on your competition
• Financial information
• Management summaries for your team and company leaders
• Operations information on your teams and processes

Design tip: Use the mind map at the center of this chart to lay out core business information. The surrounding diagrams help build out these initial ideas.

10. Organization structure example

Best for: HR and management teams

An organization structure mind map outlines the departments and teams within a company. You can use it to identify leaders who make decisions and employees who carry them out. Lines between roles also show who reports to whom.

Employee icons can list an individual’s role and other helpful information, like the time zone they work in. As a result, you can see who is responsible for what. New hires can also use this mind map to learn the company structure.

11. Logistics flow example

Best for: distributors and order fulfillment teams

A logistics flow mind map visualizes how you fulfill customer orders. The chart notes internal distribution to warehouses and customer deliveries, outlining the next step at every distribution stage.

When delivering items at a large scale, well-defined processes are key. This mind map charts a consistent process you can use for order fulfillment. It also visualizes the ramifications of changing your approach, reminding you how changes affect downstream steps.

12. Financial planning example

Best for: individuals setting a budget

A financial planning mind map tallies income, expenses, and financial goals. The map organizes short-term expenses like bills and long-term ones like retirement savings. It also tracks your current income and future earnings from a pension.

This template paints a holistic picture of your cash flow and income-to-expenses ratio. It also lets you weigh financial goals against your current financial position so, you can set attainable goals and avoid overspending.

13. Sales funnel example

Best for: sales managers and their teams

This sales funnel template maps the process of moving leads down the sales funnel. The subpoints related to each topic sit inside the funnel instead of in nodes. Under each topic, you can note problems, methods, and considerations for moving customers along.

Sales methods tend to change over time—documenting your approach can help improve your process or switch tactics if one strategy doesn't interest leads. Specifically, you might use this map when deciding how to approach a lead or collaborating on new sales strategies.

14. Human resources onboarding example

Best for: HR employees

This mind map lists your HR department’s tasks when onboarding a new hire. The mind map breaks up priorities based on time, so the tasks due before, during, and after the new hire’s first day appear in their own category.

This chart keeps HR teams organized during onboarding. HR leaders can also give it to new hires for reference or share it with managers to refine their processes as business needs change.

Design tip: Include a picture of the employee and some basic information to personalize the chart.

15. Job hiring example

Best for: managers and HR teams

This mind map charts the process of filling a job opening on your team. Unlike the onboarding template, this map follows a more high-level approach. It breaks the main hiring steps into subcategories and allows you to fill in company-specific information for your hiring strategy.

Job hiring templates help managers and HR teams design a hiring process where they can cooperate on strategic decisions and priorities. Listing job criteria and hiring best practices on this mind map also keeps them accessible.

16. Web design example

Best for: domain owners and Web designers

This Web design template gives a high-level overview of what will go onto your Web pages. This map paints a picture of your Website’s UX by including high-priority links in the header and footer, search functions, and images. While you can organize pages for blogs and features, that doesn’t come at the cost of mapping your core page structure.

You might use this template when:

• Working in the early stages of Web design
• Picking your Website’s core functions
• Designing your Website’s interface

17. Site map example

Best for: Web designers and developers

This site map template allows you to map out how pages connect on your Website. While the Web design template focuses on UX, this chart focuses more on subdomains and links connecting pages. Illustrating your site architecture helps optimize it and ensure pages link together intuitively. Managers and Web designers can also share suggestions and feedback on the map.

18. Blog structure example

Best for: content marketers and Web developers

Blog mind maps visualize the structure of an SEO-optimized blog page. They list the categories covering topics related to your business and the number of articles within them.

Developers can use this template to understand the full scope of a blog they'll build. It also allows marketers to hone in on keywords that capture the most traffic. Since blogging is an important marketing element, building an optimized blog can draw in new customers and help define your user personas .

Design tip: Include topic ideas underneath the lowest boxes to brainstorm the kinds of articles you want to write.

19. Meeting agenda example

Best for: meeting leaders or team members who want to contribute to an agenda

This meeting agenda template blurs the line between a mind map and an agenda. Like a mind map, it's built around a central topic—in this case, the meeting—and team members can add discussion points or additional notes. Your agenda outlines the points covered in your meeting, whether it's a regular get-together or preparation for a new project.

20. Transportation example

Best for: individuals and businesses planning transportation

Transportation mind maps outline the logistics of planning transport. They account for the cost, time, and resources that go into getting from point A to point B. You can also adjust these variables based on where you're going and when. This chart lets you organize transportation options in a central place your team can refer to at any time.

21. Event planning example

Best for: event organizers

An event planning mind map outlines the tasks needed to prepare for a special occasion. Instead of branching into nodes around a central topic, categories revolve around tasks due at different intervals. You can also enter event details and ideas into an overview section. This template helps event planners stay organized and share their schedules with vendors and other stakeholders.

22. Note-taking example

Best for: those taking meeting or class notes

Note-taking templates provide a visual alternative to writing bulleted notes on a page. With this template, you can note how broad concepts break off into smaller ideas and explain their differences.

This template shows visual learners how ideas connect, and conveys information more quickly than reading down lists of facts on a page making it one of the best mind map examples for students. Use it for:

• Listing crucial ideas during a lecture
• Sharing information with someone who couldn’t attend a meeting
• Summarizing the main points in a lesson

If you're looking for a more straightforward note-taking template, consider these:

• Meeting notes template
• Sticky notes template

23. Creative writing example

Best for: writers and editors who create story overviews

Creative writing mind maps visualize the most critical elements of a story—your plot, characters, themes, and setting all relate when writing a narrative. With this map, you can create a visual relationship between specific themes, chapters, and characters.

Mapping a story lets you hone in on its most essential qualities. Whether that means charting a central theme or the story's climax, you can highlight the story's main message. You can also use this template to pitch your story to agents and publishers.

5 key characteristics of mind maps

If you’re new to diagramming, you might not recognize mind maps on sight. Plenty of diagrams help with brainstorming, but mind maps play a key role in early-stage ideation and planning. Typically, a mind map has five elements:

• The chart revolves around a central image or idea.
• Themes branch out from the main idea.
• These branches include a keyword or image labeled on their lines.
• Less important topics typically only appear as "twigs" on these branches.
• The branches form a unified structure made up of individual nodes.

Mind mapping FAQ

We’ve answered a few common questions about mind maps below.

What is the best type of mind map?

The best mind map depends on the specific task you’re planning for. When you need to manage a project, design a Website, or make financial plans, there’s a mind map for it. If you’re in the early planning stages, a general template will likely suit you better. For that, we recommend the simple mind map , bubble map , or flow chart .

What mind-mapping best practices should I keep in mind?

On top of choosing the right template, here are a few tips to make the most of your mind map:

• Color-code related ideas to visually associate them.
• Use arrows and icons to show how ideas connect.
• Make sure your mind map branches out from one central topic or idea.
• Keep the text short and clear to let the visuals convey information.

Do I need mind map software?

You don't need a dedicated service to make or customize mind maps. However, platforms like FigJam offer the chance to collaborate on mind maps remotely via our online whiteboard tool. We also provide a library of over 300 templates to help kick-start your creativity.

Improve team collaboration with FigJam

Mind maps aren’t just places to list ideas. As you can see from the mind map examples above, these diagrams give you the space to think through solutions and explore ideas collaboratively.

The good news is, you don't have to create a mind map from scratch. Get started on your next project using our FigJam mind map template . We also provide a library of over 300 templates to help kick-start your creativity.

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Problem Solving Template

A Problem-Solving Diagram is a visual tool that illustrates the steps and processes involved in addressing and resolving a specific issue or challenge. It typically includes stages such as problem identification, analysis, solution generation, implementation, and evaluation. This diagram helps teams or individuals systematically approach problem-solving, fostering clarity and collaboration in finding effective solutions.

You can easily edit this template using Creately. You can export it in multiple formats like JPEG, PNG and SVG and easily add it to Word documents, Powerpoint (PPT) presentations, Excel or any other documents. You can export it as a PDF for high-quality printouts.

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Problem Solving Template

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