My Problems with Virtual Whiteboarding
And a few ideas to how we might be able to overcome these problems
I still think about my early days of using Miro (and exploring other virtual whiteboarding tools). I'm not the most experienced with these kinds of tools--I've seen people do some incredible things on them-- but at this point I've gotten used to the tool and all of it's functions. Yet, when I think of those early days, my experiences of the tool were also entangled with confusion, and a bit of anxiety. These emotions aren't aimed at the tools though, instead more aimed at what they have enabled. I've walked into other's boards, where a collaborator would have sticky notes, wireframes, screens, and/or other multimedia on their boards, and I would have no idea where to collaborate with them. It has always felt, to me, to be an impenetrable visual communication logic whose rules I was never made privy too.
I have used the tools successfully many times. I've used it to facilitate for groups of up to a few dozen people all without incident. Why then, when it comes to individuals, do I feel so confused and out of place? This is when I came to the realization that visual collaboration platforms are relatively new and because they are new we are still working on a visual communication language that works for a broad array of people. In this way, I feel visual designers in all of their shapes and sizes, have a step up. Their entire profession is centered on this point. But now, we are communicating visually with each other globally and instantly. This isn't to say everyone now needs to become a visual designer, but rather now, everyone has to keep in mind some of the things that visual designers have long been keeping in mind.
I've mostly accepted this confusion as a part of growing pains caused by the emergence of this idea. But now that I have moved to a new job where I am expected to collaborate with my fellow designers on Miro, I'm once again thrusted head deep into confusion. And they tend to use Miro for everything (not a statement of judgement, simply a statement). I'm working on drafting an article in a Miro board, something that I thought I'd never do. There were projects that I understood all the details but could not make heads or tails of the Miro board.
What is there to do about it?
The problem isn't with the tools themselves. I'm satisfied with them on the whole. The problem is with learning how to navigate other people's visual communication logic. There are at least two potential solutions to this problem that I can think of (and I'm excited for the inevitability of more).
1.) Play dumb. Honestly this is my favorite approach with most things I don't understand or feel like I'm not getting the full picture of. The goal is to ask the most obvious seeming question you can about whatever might be on the board. "What is this component", "How are things organized here?" These questions cut to the heart of the problem, but open up the confused individual to seeming stupid. This work for me because I've either been fortunate enough to be in organizations with high psychological safety, or (in more extreme scenarios) that I had so little care for how I was perceived that it didn't matter (this belies it's own set of privileges).
2.) Rules. Before entering into any collaboration, try coming to a set of rule to operate by visually. This idea operates on the same idea that made my facilitated events using these tools successful. When you make the first and subsequent options obvious, there is no room to get confused. I think this is what a expert in UX was talking about when I mentioned my problems with people's Miro boards; there is a lack of information architecture.
I don't have all the answers here. But the two solutions above at least point me in the right direction to better understand those I'm supposed to cooperate with. If you've had this problem or something similar, I would love to hear about it.