Creating a Constructive Feedback Loop with Jono Hey, Chief Product Officer at Zen Educate

Jono Hey is the Chief Product Officer of Zen Educate, an online staffing platform and social enterprise that directly connects schools and teachers. Jono is a product leader, startup veteran, and all-around guru when it comes to user experience research, design, business strategy, and product management. His invigorating and user-focused approach to the user experience has helped companies like Nutmeg.com (and many more!) establish and transform their brand.

Jono earned his Ph.D. in Design from the University of California, Berkeley. When Jono isn’t revolutionizing the way we consider design, he shares one sketch a week on his website sketchplanations.com.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

Jono Hey shares his love for illustrations and recalls the birth of Sketchplanations, where he posts one drawing per week to explain a concept or idea.
What happens to your work when you post on social media consistently?
Jono shares his weekly process for creating sketches and his beneficial feedback loop for improvement.
Analyzing the tension between what you do and your reason why.
How do you improve your skill with intentional progress?
External and internal feedback loops, and how you can create something better for yourself.
Jono shares his thoughts on the power of visual communication and the evolution of explaining complex ideas online.
How can you find your creative style?
Jono shares his book recommendations and who inspires him as a designer.
Jono reveals why he structures his creative process into three stages.
Jono’s advice on writing and drawing with a purpose.
Where to learn more about Jono Hey.

In this episode…

What daily or weekly habits have you kept up with for years? This could be anything: journaling, afternoon napping, listening to music while you make your daily schedule. Jono Hey, Chief Product Officer at Zen Educate, has created one sketch every week for seven years to deconstruct abstract scenarios into simple ideas—and sharpen his user experience skills.

Jono Hey uses his eye for user experience (UX) design and creating stellar product management processes to take abstract ideas and simplify them into weekly sketches. Over the last seven years, he has fine-tuned his approach for creating an idea feedback loop and redefining the bounds of what it means to be creative.

In this week’s episode of The Michael Simmons Show, host Michael Simmons sits down with Jono Hey, Chief Product Officer at Zen Educate. They discuss what it means to be a creator and how to create a positive internal and external feedback loop for constructive work from ideation to application. Jono talks about his process for creating sketches and staying consistent when considering quality over quantity. He also shares his thoughts on the power of visual communication and its evolution online.

Resources Mentioned in this episode

Sponsor for this episode…

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Episode Transcript

Intro 0:02

Welcome to The Michael Simmons Show where we help you create blockbuster content that changes the world and builds your business. We dive deep into the habits and hacks of today’s top thought leaders. Now, here’s the show.

Michael Simmons 0:14

Today, we have another awesome guest, his name is Jono Hey, he has a site called Sketchplanations, where once a week, he takes a complicated idea, often a mental model and turns it into a visual. I have shared literally dozens of his images in the different Facebook groups, I’ve embedded in the content that we have. And it’s always on the best performing content. And I always admire people who take a complex idea, turn it into a visual or with a little bit of text, and make it something that people would understand and something that’s viral. And that’s what Jono has really done well. And so in this interview, we really break down his whole process for his routine throughout the week, and his advice on how you too can create visuals just like he does. I think you’ll really enjoy it. Welcome to the podcast. Jono.

Jono Hey 1:11

Thanks. Thank you very much. Pleasure to be here.

Michael Simmons 1:14

We’ve spoken one once before, but I’ve long been an admirer of your work and shared it a lot across our channels and people that follow us really appreciate it as well. So I’m excited to dive in and just learn more about your story and how you think about visuals and communicating complex ideas through them. Yeah, super. And so from I understand you got a PhD in design, you’re focused on user experience product. But in 2012, just about eight years ago, you made the decision to do one sketch per day. What caused you besides just getting the sketchbook that had the space for one sketch per day? What made you want to do that experiment?

Jono Hey 1:58

Yeah, I guess it came, I guess it came from two things. Fundamentally, one was that, yeah, I was given a thing to do a drawing a day. And I did that for a year, just just personal things. And it was just nice. It’s just nice to have something to keep you focused each day and just to work on something. And I got to the end of that. And I just felt like it was going to be a bit of a shame to stop.

Michael Simmons 2:23

Did you have any experience doing illustration before that? I know you’re experiencing design, but about drawing illustration.

Jono Hey 2:30

Yeah, to some degree, I’ve I think I’ve always been a visual person. I remember being back at school, I was always I was always good at the science and the math side of things. But the bit I enjoyed the most was always the the drawing over members, memories of drawing while I’m on holidays, and and I remember, I remember having a really lovely poster on my wall, it was actually like an airbrushed Lamborghini, I think but it had this cutaway motor. And I remember it was so impressive how they done all the components of the motor as well as it’s been a beautiful drawing. So I’ve done some drawing before, but it was always drawn in service of something, you know, which is why I went the sort of product design route. But then I got to the end of these these sketches for the for the year. And I was going to like what I want to still be doing doing something useful. And I thought that, you know, my job as a, as a designer, was always about communicating and explaining what’s going on to people. So could I practice that at the same time? And so I said, Okay, well, I’ll try and explain something with a sketch. And and so, yeah, so instead of just the straight drawing, I was like, let’s let’s do something where I get some get some more value out of it, and just a pretty picture.

Michael Simmons 3:43

And so that was the birth of Sketchplanations.

Jono Hey 3:47

That was it. That was it. And it was very much a personal project at the beginning. You know, I was only doing it for myself. And then I started sort of posting them on Facebook and somebody, some point somebody said, you know, you should you should put these online somewhere. So I started doing that. And here I am,

Michael Simmons 4:02

you’re enjoying one post, but were you doing one post verse Sketchplanations per day, and you kept it up for a year or two as well.

Jono Hey 4:09

So I did I did it a year of doing one a day, which is quite intense. And how

Michael Simmons 4:17

many hours? How long did it take you to do one sketch? You have to find the idea? brainstorming?

Jono Hey 4:23

Yeah, it really varies. I used to strain I used to try and set it down and so that I could do them in a lunchtime. And I managed to get a bit ahead, which was nice. And so some days if if you had a busy day, you know, I had I had one that I’d done when I’d done three in a day, at a weekend sometime. Typically. Sometimes you just have sometimes you just see a really clear way to just do something or a nice, nice format for something and you just sit down and 25 minutes I go Okay, brilliant. I’ve done it other times. I’m like, is that really is that really how it works? I have to go do my research or read some article. I try a few different things, then. Then there’s maybe take me several hours, even if they look really small at the end and simple, just

Michael Simmons 5:07

so the main bottleneck wasn’t actually the drawing. It’s really the ideation of how you capture the essence of this idea.

Jono Hey 5:14

Yeah, and then offer an idea. Experiment with a few different like variations first, before I put my pen to paper.

Michael Simmons 5:22

And you want to hear I have and then you switch Well, before I even go into that. So you did that for a while, then as a parent, you have a job on the side, you went to once a week, make it more manageable. And you’ve been doing that for five years or so.

Jono Hey 5:39

Yeah, maybe a bit more. Maybe every six, six years, I think. I actually went to two a week. I was like, okay, like, if I can do one a day, clearly, I could do two a week. And I found this interesting thing that two a week is just like too vague. You know, you’re like, you can always do one tomorrow. Tomorrow, and actually, I was much worse at hitting two week than I when I said like, hey, like if I just do one a week. So really clear and simple target and I stuck with that. So that’s Yeah, that’s worked. You can always say, Hey,

Michael Simmons 6:09

I haven’t done one for this week. Let me do one right now. And it just feels manageable. To do.

Jono Hey 6:14

Yeah, where’s where’s two is ambiguous. Well, I can do it on Tuesday. But I could also do it on Wednesday, I’d say what Seth Godin has the thing about the power of one a day. And I think that’s true, just doing one thing a day, just as a really clear target. But if you’re not doing that, Oh, that’s too much. one a week is much better than two week. Yeah, experience.

Michael Simmons 6:35

One thing I’ve been processing and just trying to think about what it means is this idea of one a day. So the first person I interviewed was Nicolas Cole. And he started off on Quora just answering one question per day, 2014 ish. Now his content has been seen by over 100 million people. And she’s gotten to that like hardcore rhythm of just producing one per day. And it is kind of crazy that if you keep that up, it’s super intense harder when you have children, that somebody doing one of those per day versus one per week. You know, it’s not only 7x the output, but it might be 15x, the momentum of just how things are scrunched up, you might hit that elbow of the exponential curve faster or something like that. What are your thoughts on just sheer output and whether going from one to a day, the seven a day shifted thing?

Jono Hey 7:32

Um, yeah, it’s interesting, I certainly just the volume makes you improve. Although I have to say the, if you’re trying to produce a really quality output in some ways, everybody is better off than I’m doing one a week than one a day. Now they depend depends how much time you can make, you know, making your day in order to do this stuff. And I’m sure if I could spend the morning each day, I would do a really good one each day. But actually, I think there’d be so many times I’d be like, I just need to get one done this day, that it would be mediocre compared to when I’ve actually had a few days to sort of ruminate on it during the week, right? Probably the the output as a result is better. But I mean, yeah, definitely remember, I remember really interesting speech by Arnold Schwarzenegger. And he was like, you know, what, if you just spend one hour a day trying to learn something, you know, every year, you’ll you’ll be almost an expert, you’ve done 360 hours of it. So there really is there is something to like finding that one a day goal. And there’s something so simple about you just once you’ve once you’ve settled in, you’ve committed to it. You don’t have to think you just have to do it. You know,

Michael Simmons 8:43

do you spend more time per post Now, you mentioned kind of your ruminating on it? Is it? Is that informal during the week? Or would you say your that has helped you to it has one post per day been just as effective for you as seven posts because you’re spending more time per post? You’re letting it ruminate, and it’s higher quality.

Jono Hey 9:03

Yeah, I think they’re better I think I tackle a tackle slightly harder things. I do them in a, in a, I execute them, the better. And and I do my I do more research beforehand. I’ve realized you know, if you’re just doing a picture of yourself, it doesn’t matter. Actually, whether or not it’s right or wrong. If you’re going to send something out to 10s of 1000s of people, you better do your homework first.

Michael Simmons 9:29

Right, right.

Jono Hey 9:30

Yeah. So even if even if they think something is is this way, or I think this is this theory or this model, you need to go do your research before you, you know, spread spread false content, you know, so, so yeah, I think I think it’s better and actually I did notice that when I’m organized enough if I if I do some early variations, I actually have like a little sort of circle of people that I’ll send a couple of options to and say, hey, did this make sense to you? And actually, that always makes sense. Better. Interesting.

Michael Simmons 10:01

So can you tell me a little bit more about your weekly process to you? What is it the steps that go into making a sketch? And then I love how you explain the feedback loop there with multiple people? What are the steps like that, that go into an output?

Jono Hey 10:16

Question. So first off, I think I have it’s the idea. I suppose I might have been trained over the last near nearly a decade, just to keep an eye out all the time for things that would be interesting to explain, or something that I find is interesting. That could benefit with being shared. So I have a huge list of potential topics. So sometimes Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

Michael Simmons 10:40

What makes it what makes something interesting? I know you have the tastes now it’s by a lot unconscious. But what jumps out to you?

Jono Hey 10:49

Yeah, it’s an intriguing thing. I think that one thing I found is I can’t always tell what people will find interesting. So my, my goal, and I remember, somebody was like, I use Pull, pull your readers and find out what they’re interested in and just do that. And then I was like, well, this is not a job. And this is something I want to do for my interests. So I should do things that I find interesting. But I don’t know, I think the things that I think the things that work best, or most interesting, in a way are the ones where there’s kind of a model, or some theory, which is the sort of thing you might be reading like Thinking Fast and Slow by Dan Kahneman. And there’s a chapter on this thing, and there’s some paragraphs and, and you read all that, and you just kind of gently absorb this idea. But it’s easy to forget, and it doesn’t stick. And so to take some some concept like that, like Prospect Theory, or whatever, whatever they are, and just go, you know, can I make this? Can I boil this down into a sketch that those, those are the ones that are a bit more interesting. But sometimes I think things that just have a, you know, have a nice visual aspect to them. Did a kind of dumb one, and you know, this, like, what’s the fruit? What’s the vegetable? And you know, it’s tomato, fruit? And

Michael Simmons 12:11

yeah, sometimes the border ones that are hard to?

Jono Hey 12:14

Yeah. And so, you know, I was trying to just get clear on this for myself. And I was like, You know what, I should just just try and sketch this out. And so, so I made that my sketch this week, and just something where I find myself, you know, noodling on what’s, what’s the real answer here?

Michael Simmons 12:30

Well, one thing that I think it’s interesting that I heard you address a little bit is there’s a tension between why we do it, is it for ourselves, you know, of just learning, or we want to obviously have things that are for ourselves, but also resonate with other people. My personal belief is that soul market fit that doing for ourselves is the most important part, because that’s what keeps you going, or that’s one of the core things that keeps you going. So if you’re on a topic that you’re just bored by or not excited to share, you’re just not going to be as good or convincing, authentic, have as much runway. But of course, if you don’t get any traction or things like that, it’s easy to Alright, why am I even doing this? How do you think about the tension between those two? And do you have any counterintuitive approaches have a unique way of doing it? You think?

Jono Hey 13:24

Yeah, it’s good. It’s a good question. So I definitely think there’s a tension there. Because I think like there is some satisfaction in doing something which has value to other people. So it’s important to pay attention to, you know, if nobody’s doing it, I might as well just be doing these sketches and hanging them in my garage. Right, right. And then, and then you go, Okay, well, I it enriches my life, that’s fine. But but maybe I could, I could have a wider impact. But that said, I definitely feel like like you like, it’s not a sort of job, I’m not being paid to do this. So I think it really is important that they’re there things that I think are interesting. And also I have learned a bit, I think to trust to trust my instincts in the sense that to me, like you know, you people don’t necessarily the whole like, if you ask people what they wanted there to set a faster horse kind of thing, you know, right once until you see it and so, in some ways, if I get if I feel confident that something could be worth explaining, or it’s gonna be good, you know what, I should give that a go because even if somebody would ask me for it, maybe they will when they see it, they will.

Michael Simmons 14:42

And also had anybody asked you to do a sketch on the vegetable versus a fruit yet.

Jono Hey 14:47

Nobody asked me that one. Although I did, I think I did receive a response if somebody can explain berries. Berries are immensely complicated

Michael Simmons 14:58

There you go.

Jono Hey 15:00

But yeah, I think I think you have to be interested in it to, to want to put the effort in, and to do a really good job, like you have to be, like, be passionate about it. So yeah, so I think there’s maybe a bit of a balance, but I decided with Sketchplanations, I would, I would trust my own instincts and go, you know, I want to, I want to draw stuff that I find interesting. And I hope that that’s interesting to others.

Michael Simmons 15:24

And when I think about improving at a skill, in my mind, I break it down to two fundamental components. Number one is the number of repetitions, and just the doing over and over. And then number two is improvement. And a lot of times people fail because they don’t do any repetitions. So they just give up stop doing it. Or they’re doing it over and over, but they’re not improving at all. And so, sometimes the improvement can just happen on its own, but sometimes getting outside feedback. And so what have you created in place to make sure that you improve over these seven years? Well, I guess what do you feel like you have improved and what things have made you improve? You mentioned, you get feet you send out for feedback to people? Yeah, things like that.

Jono Hey 16:12

Yeah, is a good question. I have noticed, and I don’t know if you know, if you if you post things online, I have noticed you get very different degrees of feedback, depending on the medium that you post stuff. So if you post something on Twitter, you get likes, and so you go, okay, lots of people like this one. So maybe that was a good one. But if you if you send something out by email, you might get even no responses, one, but then you might get one response, which is this big, long, thoughtful message about how something touched them, you know, or how this was relevant for them. And, and so I think there’s, there’s something about like you, you don’t necessarily get great feedback, or you get very different types of feedback, depending on how you share things. I think, for me, probably, you know, when you when you’re posting these things, they’re out there publicly, forever, and I see them, I come back to them, and you put you put something out, and you make a mistake, and you’re like, I wish I hadn’t made that mistake. And so, you know, when I look back, I can see which ones I think have really worked and see which ones I think really didn’t. I sort of, I feel like you bear that in mind all the time in the in the subsequent ones that you’re doing. And so

Michael Simmons 17:34

analyzing the winners and losers, do you do that? Based off? When you say didn’t work? Or work? Do you mean that you’re looking at the likes, the comments the external? Or do you mean, internal, you look at it, you’re just like, I don’t really get this one. And I would have done this.

Jono Hey 17:47

Yeah, that is actually I mean, it’s there is that external feedback, but there’s also just my my viewpoint on it. So you know, I ones where I look back and go, I did a really good job, there are ones I look back and go, you know, I could have done better. I remember, just to give one example. We take a lot of photographs before we had kids. And so we would go on a trip for a weekend and we come back and we and we’d have all our photographs, and we do some sorting. And we used to be the point where like harddrive space mattered. So used to delete some. And I just remember that process of sifting through all your photographs and saying, Is this a good one? This one and you got three similar photographs. And you go well, what’s better about this one than that one? And that process of just continually looking at things again? This one’s better. Why is that one better? Oh, it’s because of that. And so I think I think I kind of get that when when you accumulate this big body of work, you can sort of look back at them and go, these ones were really good. That one, not so much.

Michael Simmons 18:44

Yeah, it’s interesting, the comparison between internal and external feedback loops, and how that drives our decision. So let’s say there’s externally how you measure your success and what what you do. And then externally, you can measure by likes and feedbacks. And then internally, there’s that soul market fit as a motivation source, and then as a feedback, loop your own taste. And one thing I think about interesting about taste, is that there’s studies done for people with deliberate practice. And experts could identify like 10 times more mistakes than novices. Though, let’s say it’s a musical instrument, they could listen to an old performance they did. And an expert could be able to notice the errors and therefore self correct better, versus a novice couldn’t. And so it sounds like there’s a way that you build up your tastes somehow developed over time, such that when you reflect on it, you could see how it’s better. Do you feel like the effect of being able to give your own feedback loop is just the separation of time and some you have a fresh perspective? Or it’s about taste, and if so, how did you develop that taste to be able to self correct better?

Jono Hey 20:00

Yeah, I think maybe maybe another key aspect of the learning process and doing these is, is actually as I’m doing them. So it’s actually also interesting with the mediums I used to do them all. pen and paper, like I was, I would carry these one these beautiful little moleskine notebooks around and fill them out with pens. lovely little. Oh, those are nice. Yeah. And so they’re actually like, lovely, lovely little artifacts to look at.

Michael Simmons 20:26

Wow, that looks like it’s really? I mean, it looks really good. Like you almost like, Yeah, I don’t know, it’s on a sticker or something.

Jono Hey 20:35

Yes, exactly. So that was that was a good challenge, but I switched to doing it digitally. And one thing you get with digitally, you know, obviously, is you can you can undo, you can erase, you can take a layer, you can sometimes copy it, you can, you know, I can do different versions of it. And this is also like the process of during doing a sketch through the week is led, let’s say I do a version of it on Tuesday. And then two days later, I look back at it again. I’m like I you know what, it’s not really as clear as I thought it was at the time. Maybe I should bring me I should change the colors of these. Maybe it needs to be all on the left, maybe you know. And I think that that iterative process on each, each sketch itself, I definitely learned some principles of making stuff better, which I’m then applying to the next ones every time.

Michael Simmons 21:19

So that so how many how many loops? Would you say you do on your own iterations?

Jono Hey 21:26

Yeah, it depends quite a lot. As I said, Sometimes I would, I would just have a really clear idea in my head and just go do it. Other times, I’ve probably done eight to ten variations where I’ve like, done this, and then I’ve been like, no, that’s not right, I’ve done that. And then I could have tighten up that language, and then I change it again. So I learned that, you know, sometimes I’ll end up with quite a lot. But normally, normally, it’s probably like three or four.

Michael Simmons 21:55

And, you know, one thing I think about is Edward de Bono has six hats, you know, different perspectives that you could have on your own work to create a better feedback loop. And so I think about wearing different hats when I go into reviewing my own work. So let’s say I’m reviewing an article, and I’m reviewing for comprehensiveness, I’ll notice things to improve differently than if I’m reviewing it for conciseness. We’re at that point, I’ll just take out words and noticing different things for you. Are you mainly just going back to each one and just going with a gut feel of this looks good? That doesn’t matter? Here’s what’s off? Or do you have a lens that you’re looking back on it with?

Jono Hey 22:35

Yeah, that’s it. That’s a really good point. I’ve never I’ve never like consciously sat and done like a different hat review of sketches. But But I think there are different different things that sometimes. Sometimes you might just look at it, and like, you know, even if you’d like blur your eyes, or just remember what you did you go like did it did it have like visual impact, as a sketch or like a really sort of broad brush sort of thing. Other times you might be going in and going, you know what, this this? These, these words are too long? Can I shorten this by half the time just like, you know, layout, does it? If you’re following through a drawing? Is it clear where I’m expecting you to go? next process? This is a little story. And so I think there are there are like different things that I’m checking in that in those reviews. Yeah, thinking hats. probably try that.

Michael Simmons 23:29

Are there any, those are great, to kind of widen the visual impact. And you can kind of see that by blurring your eyes, that maybe it’s one of the finer details go away, and you just see the visual conciseness. And the sequence of it. Anything else that you look for in your own images? Or patterns? And

Jono Hey 23:48

yeah, maybe one? It’s not It’s not for every sketch, but some of them at I think maybe you have I say did it did it like grabbed me emotionally in a way? Like obviously that doesn’t, that doesn’t apply to everything. But somewhere I’ve got like a story or a scenario or a character saying something? I think there’s a like a, you know, did you did you capture the emotion of that moment? Is there going to, they’re going to stick with you give an example. I did one recently about hope. And there’s a nice model for hope, which I’ve never really thought about before. Whereas is like, you’re more likely to be hopeful if you have clear goals, if you can see pathways to get to those goals. And if you have the willpower and belief that you can do it

Michael Simmons 24:35

I like that.

Jono Hey 24:36

Yeah. And so this is just the sort of thing I think we should finish actually made a really good sketch because you read this in a book and it’s you know, it’s a page or two of text. Just doesn’t, you may might stick with you, but but actually just capturing that in one little sketch in a way that you could share really quickly. It was much better, but I had I had this sort of abstract picture of like a gentle hill with a goal at the top and a character and a line towards it. And I just like it just didn’t, just didn’t grab me. And I remember, I changed in the next iteration to a pitch at this amazing picture of a mountain in in Pakistan from a climber I like, which is just this really super impressive picture. And you just imagine this guy with the backpack on trying to get to the top of that peak, and in some ways that just grabbed me much more emotionally. So that I think that’s one of the things that Yeah, I’m also it’s kind of kind of checking for like, Can you relate to this?

Michael Simmons 25:32

Interesting, can you relate? Well, you know that the emotion is one thing, but then when you say, Can you relate to that? Like, can you you’re thinking about that, too? Can the reader see themselves? They’re like, Oh, yeah, I can relate. That makes sense. So

Jono Hey 25:47

yeah, in many scenarios, I mean, it totally depends what I’m sketching. Here is like, you know, how to tell if an egg is off? I don’t know if you ever relate to that, you know, it’s totally different. But in some cases, how to tell if an egg is still fresh. Oh, interesting. Yeah,

Michael Simmons 26:05

I haven’t really well, I guess I look at the crack. But I would be interested in you

Jono Hey 26:10

had something on that deal on afterwards.

Michael Simmons 26:14

And so when you’re sending for feedback, you just send it to people and say, Hey, what do you think about this? Or do you have a specific survey? You have them fill out a question that you find is really helpful.

Jono Hey 26:24

I mean, I mean, it’s all entirely voluntary for people to send feedback. So I’m always mindful not to, not to ask too much. But I guess, I guess one thing I’ve learned, and this is, partly from being a designer, is that I like to keep things open ended. Because, you know, sometimes the feedback you need is like, I just don’t get this at all. Right, right. Rather than, you know, that writing is a bit too small. I’d much rather they told me they just didn’t get it at all. And so I tried to keep stuff pretty broad. And the other way I think you get better feedback is if you give two options, two or more even. And that way, it sort of reduces the feeling of like, I have to tell this guy, I just don’t really like it. They can just say I’d much prefer the other one,

Michael Simmons 27:10

you know, two options for work. Which one do you like? More? Oh, interesting.

Jono Hey 27:12

Exactly. And then you also learn what about one version was actually good? Is that they say this one jumps out at me much more, I don’t know. And then you go, Yeah, you’re right. That that is that is better. So so so that’s, that’s what I’ve learned when I gathering feedback is I try where possible to always send to different variations. Even if I’ve got a favorite. I try and go, Well, you know, what, can I just can I just think of some other way that this could be done. And just put it out there just as a as a check. I’m on the right track.

Michael Simmons 27:42

Yeah, I like that. And also, I, that’s a really good point about big picture versus little picture that I think somebody says as a comma here, it’s helpful, but you got a comma on visual, that’s just not good. It’s, that’s not helping that much, versus if they really help you save your time, or that could be really good. Exactly. And then

Jono Hey 28:01

that, that sort of big picture feedback is sometimes quite hard to get. And maybe you need to either like to be really separated from that person. So they just didn’t care about your feelings or where or they need to, like be just, you know, have a good relationship with them and be really honest.

Michael Simmons 28:17

I feel like in the past few years, communicating ideas visually of abstract ideas has become more popular. First time I really saw it was Wait, but Why with Tim Urban and doing that, like, wow, this is really cool. And it helps me understand a better at your work and Amber Ray. I’ve also one person, Jessica Hagy. She has an indexing artist, you know, her work?

Jono Hey 28:41

I have come across Jessica No, I haven’t looked for a while. But yeah,

Michael Simmons 28:44

Jack Butcher with Visualize Value. So it feels like there’s I’m noticing more people doing this. What are your thoughts on where the power of visual communication and how you see it evolving online with complex ideas? Yeah, I

Jono Hey 29:00

mean, yeah, mine’s this kind of sort of random story to get into this. But I definitely think that I see that there are a lot of people out there producing some really great stuff. And I think, I think a lot of it is the medium that things are shared in, you know, sometimes you want to, you know, sit down and read a long article, and really get into something and sometimes, you know, you have formats like Instagram and Twitter where just like, something you throw up quickly, just to just to get the message across something that’s easily shareable something that sticks with you, even if there’s a link to go read more helps.

Jono Hey 29:42

Yeah, I always, I always remember for me, I took some education courses at university and the format of the classes was generally that you go do the reading and you come and sit around a table and then you discuss the questions and for me, it was always this sort of I don’t know stream of words in the air. And at the end of it, you’re like, I think I think I changed my understanding through that, but I don’t have anything concrete or tangible to, to hang my ideas off. And I think whenever you get that sort of clarity by turning something, which is a bit more abstract into something visual, just helps ideas stick and I think, yeah, I couldn’t say exactly why there seems to be more of it right now. But be you know, that perhaps it is actually, you know, just general things like the you know, the internet deals with images much better. Now, the tools we’re producing them, I are genuinely much better, like, I can actually do a digital one on on an iPad with the pencil, and it’s pretty good. And it didn’t used to be, you know, yeah. Yeah.

Michael Simmons 30:43

So the main tool that you use right now is Apple Pencil and an iPad. And you first you started with more, doing it non digitally, but now, digitally, is the way to go, do you feel for someone just starting off with wanting to get the illustrations?

Jono Hey 30:59

I wouldn’t say that there is it is the way to go. necessarily, I think there was just something lovely about having a small notebook and a couple of really nice pens, that’s really satisfying. And if you’re just getting started, that’s plenty good enough. And, you know, I’ve got a whiteboard and a whiteboard pen, that’s, that’s good in outside to feel like, you know, a lot of the a lot of the sketches that I do a simple, you know, there’s like a black, maybe there’s a red, and there’s a line drawing, it doesn’t it doesn’t have to be fancy or complicated. So I don’t think you need any, any fancy tools to get started. And in fact, in fact, sometimes I think like the technology, or you have to learn it, and it will be a little barrier to getting going. So I I probably say the nicest thing is take a little sketchbook and a couple of pens, something that fits in your pocket and your bag, and you can always have

Michael Simmons 31:51

practice. Yeah, I like that. And you’re one thing I’ve noticed, too, is that a lot of designers that I followed, like the ones that I mentioned, they get a style, and then they stay with it. The you know, with you, all of your ones at the same yellow background, uses maybe three colors, like say, green, orange, slash red or blue one very rarely. And it’s handwriting style. And Jessica Hagy’s, all of hers are, she actually uses like a marker of black and white on an index card, then she scans it in. So for me, I’ve never found I’ve used different tools and very beginner, but I always find it hard to commit to one thing. You feel like finding your thing is more of an iterative thing that don’t try to look for in the beginning. It’ll just find you and then you’ll just kind of do it naturally. Or would you encourage people to figure that out sooner to make it simpler for them?

Jono Hey 32:49

Yeah, no, I think I think it’s unless you’re about to turn into a business straightaway. I would. I’d say it’s a very, like evolving thing. And I’d let it just evolve. Yeah, like def definitely I feel like I’ve I’ve got a style that I’ve decided to stick with. Um,

Michael Simmons 33:08

How long did it take you to find that?

Jono Hey 33:11

Yeah, it’s funny. It’s funny to look back at the early ones. And they’re they’re much more scattered and more varied. Sometimes still quite nice. To price is probably like a year or so. Before I was I was sticking to like a

Michael Simmons 33:23

store like 100,000 images, then. Yeah, that

Jono Hey 33:26

isn’t that is hundreds. Yeah.

Michael Simmons 33:28

Yeah.

Jono Hey 33:30

But you know, like, the sort of yellow background just comes from the paper notebook that I was scanning. Oh, interesting.

Michael Simmons 33:37

That’s funny. I was kind of happenstance.

Jono Hey 33:40

Yeah, yeah. But actually, if you if you look at it, as a collection, they become quite distinctive that way. And I think it means that you can look at one and go, I know that this is a sketch pronation, I know what’s expected. And I also think, like you say about the different tools that Jessica might use, there’s something about having a limited set of means that you’re going to do it, that that helps, you know, it’s sort of constraints, your problem space, you put a few constraints, I’m going to use black and red, and nothing, nothing too fancy, and it’s just going to be a sketch thing. And sometimes that helps the ideas crystalize a bit more, you know, when you apply a few constraints, I think,

Michael Simmons 34:24

and you obviously, coming from a design world, you know, somebody like me or other people here, let’s just assume that people are not coming from a design world. And granted, you know, the work you’re doing, you’re not showing off all your design skills, you are keeping it simple. are same thing with Jessica Hagy, or Jack Butcher, or even Wait, but Why. But are there any books that you’d recommend that are really helpful or resources just to get some of the basics that one might be missing? If they’ve never had a course?

Jono Hey 34:53

Yeah, yeah, there are a couple actually. I mean, one of the classic ones was was Dan Roam’s Back of the Napkin. And I always remember like in that he says, you know, like, if you can draw squares, circles and lines, then you can draw enough to make, you know, decent drawings, useful, useful drawings. What what I like the other thing a lot of people probably don’t know, there’s a book called Rapid Viz. I’ve got it. Got it here by Kurt Hanks and Larry Belliston is quite old. And it’s really, really nice, obviously, that they are accomplished artists, I think they’re maybe they did a lot of architecture style drawings. I love architectural style drawings. But the you know, the purpose of it is to help you communicate with a drawing, which is I think what architects are trying to do rather than produce a pretty drawing is just to communicate something. And so they go through a lot of drawing techniques. But in the service of just getting your ideas across quickly, I think that’s a really nice one that I think a lot of people probably haven’t come across.

Michael Simmons 35:56

Thank you check that one out. And when it comes down to the nitty gritty of let’s say, you’re, you know, you you have an idea and for you might be natural to be like, Oh, I could use a mountain because a mountain means the journey. Or I could use these characters saying thought bubbles, is there a way that you break it down? Further, that you have a list of metaphors that you use? Or images that are like the your alphabet in a way?

Jono Hey 36:22

Yeah, yeah, good. Good question. I think it’s, I think it’s true that I do keep a note, I think it really helps to have a number of different sort of models in mind that you can draw on somebody, sometimes somebody has done all the work for you, right? Like if you’re doing Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, like it’s been drawn as a pyramid. And you know, the pyramid probably helps it sort of stick.

Michael Simmons 36:46

Right? Although you’re Simon Sinek Golden Circle one already has that.

Jono Hey 36:51

Yeah, exactly. So I’m not I’m not reinventing it. I’m just sort of sharing sharing one there. But you know, if you if you keep a number of models, like you know, what you see out there, like Venn diagrams, or charts or tables, sometimes it might be like, Oh, you want to do a before and after? Or you want to compare on a number of attributes? The ladders, pyramids, sometimes it’s nice just to be literal, I don’t know. That’s an old sketch. It was knowing your Bactrian from your dromedary camels. And this is a really nice little way of doing it. You know, Bactrian camel is the one with two humps, which is like a B on its side. dromedaries, a D was just the one hump, you know. And so you’ve got like a really visual

Michael Simmons 37:31

Ray, right? Yeah.

Jono Hey 37:34

But I think Yeah, so I do, I do keep in mind when there’s an abstract sort of concept that I’m trying to explain, like a, you’ve got all those kind of models that you could lean on, like, you know, whether it’s a ladder or a hierarchy or something like that. And these things can help. And sometimes, as I say, it’s just like, you probably read the Made to Stick. Yeah. And yeah, just the things that tap into an emotion or a story or some surprising situation. I think sometimes if you if you pick the right, I think what led you recently, one around the RACI, responsibility, accountability, consulted and informed. And I did I came up with this idea of scenario, you’re at the beach and you’re building a sea sandcastle. I wanted to take take this, like really sort of slightly boring Business Management idea. Put it somewhere really concrete. Where the kid is, kid is the one responsible for building the sandcastle on, the dad’s gonna make sure it’s staying up and the mums reading a book and saying, how’s it going on? You know, and I feel like, there’s another one where you’re just trying to trying to find the right scenario. And there’s lots of different scenarios you could do. But I do find sometimes if I stay too abstract, they just don’t, they just don’t resonate. They’re just not interesting.

Michael Simmons 38:49

So putting it with characters and having some sort of interaction with them, to make it more relatable,

Jono Hey 38:56

I think so. So I try. And the feedback I often get when I ask, ask for feedback is for examples. And interesting. The challenge is often, you know, if you’re going to do like a SWOT analysis or something, it’s one thing to like, just write out, here are the things you should look for. But if you’ve, if you find a good example, to use that on A it makes it visual and B, it makes it stick and C it makes it like interesting as a as a drawing as well. So I just spent some time there thinking actually, what would be a better example of this?

Michael Simmons 39:30

Yeah, I like your cost of being late one of just, it’s very simple. But the person walking through the door, there’s a 10 over them for 10 minutes late. But then there’s a whole table of people sitting there and there’s tons of tents around there, just for whatever clicks in your mind a different way of just how down or you know, make the normally would they go, I’m just late, that’s fine. They just really see the cost of it.

Jono Hey 39:55

Yeah, I think in that sort of scenario, you’re going what it’s an invisible All Costs normally, because you don’t see this time that there’s been wasted. And so visually, you need to make the one person who thinks it’s just 10 minutes. And then a whole other thing, which is now big, because you’ve written 10 all these times, and says this big thing were you suddenly made that was sort of intangible and invisible and abstract you made of now comparable, you know, a big thing versus a small thing. I don’t wanna say that’s the best the best example. But I think that’s, that’s where the visual helps, right? Because you suddenly go, Oh, I see it. Where around a table in a meeting, you didn’t see that 10 minutes of waste of everybody’s time now.

Michael Simmons 40:37

And you mentioned a few visual types, which I kind of think as an alphabet. You mentioned Venn diagram before and after. And even in there. What you just mentioned the cost of being late it really, I didn’t see it. But now when you explained it, I thought it’s kind of has a comparison. Not before and after, or side by side. I feel like those do really well. I’ve noticed that pyramid, ladder, mountain, are there ones that you feel like are the 8020? Here have most ideas? For example, Jessica Hagy, all of hers, almost all of them are Venn diagrams, and then a line, you know, dot chart.

Jono Hey 41:22

Yeah, I guess I don’t tend to do a lot of Venn diagrams. And I think part of that is that unless you unless you really grab people with like, what these topics are, it stays kind of this abstract thing. And it’s also not terribly interesting for me to draw in how to develop my skills doing it. I guess my 8020 would be it’s gonna sound really dumb, but just like a, like a 123, like a process you like, tell a little story in, in these in three in three scenarios, like you just you just walk people through it with like, three little separate images of three states. And then the other one is just like going, can you make it? Yeah, can you can you bring like an abstract concept into a sort of physical scenario, real world scenario, and just picture that scenario. And then, even if you don’t really quite remember the concept perfectly, you remember the scenario, and then it makes sense. It was done, I got to try and get give an example of from one a long way back, it was a really nice concept. I thought it was emotional hot potato. Which, which it’s not that so that’s a nice metaphor, it’s somebody else’s metaphor. And the idea is that, you know, like, dad’s at work, and he gets shouted out by the boss, and so he’s in a really bad mood. And then the dad shouts at his, his wife, because he’s pissed off, and then then the wife, like, gets angry at the kids. And then, and then eventually, kids get angry at the dog and kick the dog, and then the dog pees on the mat and runs out the door. And so, like, just just making that like a nice visual story, I think just makes it stick so much more so

Michael Simmons 43:12

interesting. And that kind of goes back to the visual, or the hidden costs of something, that you’re visualizing the thing that people wouldn’t normally see. You don’t realize on a day to day basis that how far your positive and negative emotions travel. You’re right. Yeah.

Jono Hey 43:27

And you see, you’re like, just you put it out visually, and you see it cascade down this thing? Yeah. Which, which otherwise, you don’t? Yeah. easy just to fade away. You don’t notice that show? You make it really tangible? visual. Yeah.

Michael Simmons 43:40

And you mentioned three stages, I would have thought that the 8020 would be two stages, just to keep it simple. Why three?

Jono Hey 43:51

Hmm, that’s a good question. I very often find that three is what I need.

Michael Simmons 44:01

Plays are often in three acts, you know? Yeah,

Jono Hey 44:05

I was gonna say like, if this is the sort of thesis, antithesis, synthesis, you know, like, you, you set up the status quo. Here’s the challenge to it. And here’s the resolution, I think maybe there’s maybe the three has that kind of element to it. You like, you’re starting from nowhere, whenever you’re looking at one of these sketches. So you have to set the scene, and then your sin is the problem. And then, is the solution. And they’re not they’re not all like that, by any means. But I feel like three comes up again and again. And maybe that’s why I have to think about that.

Michael Simmons 44:48

And I was just thinking about a random quote that I just done well, I that I got from a mentor 80% of communication is miscommunication. I don’t know if you’ve heard that before. A lot of times you think you’re talking about the same thing, because you’re using the same words, but you each attached very different meanings to it. So sometimes you could get, you know, you agree, you’re like, Oh, yeah, I agree, or somebody is nodding their head, because they don’t want to seem like they’re disagreeing, but they don’t really get what you’re saying, as you intended it. So okay, I’m thinking about. So for your, for your process, you start to think about a physical scenario of when did that when sometime that happened to you?

Jono Hey 45:29

Yeah, it’s trying to I’m trying to think about the miscommunication part. Because I, because I, I use a lot of words, in my sketches, that they’re often I mean, some of them are just like laying out words on a on a page. And I feel like isn’t

Michael Simmons 45:46

that surprising about your work to compared to other visual people? I feel like they really try to, they’re gonna try to minimize the number of words, and then you have a lot of words on yours.

Jono Hey 45:55

Yeah, yeah. Cuz I think it like words are so interesting, like you write you write a paragraph to try and explain something. And and you’re absolutely right. They can be interpreted in many different ways. And you think you’ve got the message across, but you haven’t necessarily. And so I think like, by combining the words and the visuals, I have like, these two chances to try and like, dial down on, this is what I mean by it. So you know, you take something quite abstract, like autonomy or two factor authentication, and you can explain it, but then you have a picture of it as well. And these two things go together. And now you’ve you’ve made it much clearer, and much less likely to be misunderstood. Do I do think, you know, when, when I talk about the feedback that I get, along with sketches, the main, the main thing I realized Is that something i thought was obvious and evident. And I’d assumed when I was doing this just clearly wasn’t. And so I think that that’s, that’s where the miscommunication is. So the more feedback I get along the way, the less likely I’m going to come out the end with too much miscommunication, I think,

Michael Simmons 47:06

is there a way I noticed putting you on the spot and you normally develop it? But for that one, is there a way you think about visualizing that one, it could be 80% of communication is miscommunication? Or what I think about a lot is the curse of knowledge that the expert has this idea that they it’s so obvious to them, you know, and then they explain it to someone else, then like isn’t this obvious? Like no idea what you just said?

Jono Hey 47:30

Yeah, no, that’s a really good idea. I just that was my thought process before that, like, I think it would be, it would be kind of interesting, wouldn’t it to think when you when you have like 8020, it’s interesting to have like a block of text, somebody saying something that has, it has a number of things to it, you know, at least 10 words to it, because then you’ve got like an eight and a two that you can sort of visualize like I don’t know, I can imagine some scenario where somebody is explaining something. And it seems, you know, saying, here’s what we’re going to do, and then somebody goes off and does something completely the opposite, because they’ve got completely the wrong end of the stick. And they decided to sit down and think, you know, what could you explain slightly ambiguously, that might also be an end up with a kind of funny outcome with somebody doing something.

Michael Simmons 48:17

Right, right

Jono Hey 48:18

I intended

Michael Simmons 48:20

to narrow we have to, you know, so far it sounds like two layers, like one scene, a person explaining it. And then the other scene, is the person doing something very different. Yes, you want? Yeah. Was that? And then? Okay, what would be, you could clearly see that, like a day to day example of that.

Jono Hey 48:36

Yeah, I would. This is the sort of thing I would ruminate on during the week, I probably, you know, come up with one on the spot, and then come up with a better one on Thursday.

Michael Simmons 48:44

Yeah, yeah. Do you do a deliberate rumination on it during the week? Or is it just more natural back in your mind, like, on your commute, or you’re riding a bike or taking a dog for a walk?

Jono Hey 48:56

Yeah, it’s it’s, I sometimes found that one of my one of the things that works for me as a process, when I’m trying to do things for a week is actually as as mentioned, I have this big list that I might be picking from, sometimes the best thing I can do on Monday, is just choose which one I want to do. And then I’ll make a new sketch, I’ll call it what it’s going to be. And then even if that’s as far as I go, that means that sort of gets my mind working on this looking at for ideas through the week. So it’s not, it’s not that I’ll sit down necessarily, until it’s time to do it and go, how am I going to do this, but I think, you know, once I’ve, once I’ve settled on what I’m going to do, there is like a little thought process in the back of my mind, which is like, by the end of this week, I need to figure this out. So what is a good way to do this? And you know, I like that and along and I’m thinking about it, but I do find like if if I haven’t settled on what I’m gonna do at the beginning of the week, then none of that process is working. And

Michael Simmons 49:52

it’s not gonna end by doing one sketch, you kind of get the ball rolling of like, even on this call, we kind of you Identify to lay out a way it could be, then there’s a stuck point. And then we that’d be where you pause, they do almost do that we try to lay it out, get it out at a basic level and then ruminate on the hard part.

Jono Hey 50:11

Yeah, and I might just even take five minutes just to do a really rubbish sketch of that. And sometimes I’ll just save it, put it on my phone, and then periodically take a look at it and go, is that working? Or is that not working? And that that process helps me get get to a better place as well? Yeah.

Michael Simmons 50:33

Yeah, this is awesome. There’s just so many different ways on multiple levels here. If there is one thing you wanted to share with people that have everything we said, is the most important for someone who mainly used to writing with words and wants to get into visuals. What’s the main thing you suggest for them?

Jono Hey 50:54

Yeah, I

Jono Hey 50:54

think it gets to be a little bit of a cliche, but I do. I do a lot of things like triathlon, for example. And I always find that swimming is the one that people don’t like. And I think that all they absolutely love it. But this woman is like, I cannot I just can’t swim. I can’t do triathlons, I can’t swim. And I think drawing is one of those things where people are like, yeah, I can write stuff I can I can talk to somebody, of course, but I just can’t draw. And I just think it is wrong. Like in order to communicate usefully visually. You don’t have to be good at drawing. And there’s no question like, obviously, the more you practice, if you buy a book like Rapid Viz, and you give it a go, and you do one a day for two years, you’re going to get good. But I think that the biggest obstacle is that people just don’t try in the first place like Dan Roam saying, if you can draw a circle, and you can draw some lines, you can do something, I would say maybe one thing I would say, is people drawing people is the biggest obstacle. People can draw boxes and squares and like draw a process chart or whatever. But actually, where people get immediately stuck is Oh, ha, she can’t draw people. So there are actually I did a sketch of like, here’s some different ways, really simple ways to draw people. I remember the learning one, which was you can draw star people, you literally draw a star like this, they point for a head, and the arms are two stars. And your legs are Yeah, it’s literally a star. And it just looks like a person and it looks good enough to get a message across. It’s a person. And I think I think just getting slightly comfortable with going, I’m not going to chicken out of drawing a person. I’m just gonna do it. Because I’ve got this easy way, just the star. I think that really, really helps. But the main thing I think is just to get going and not think that you can’t do it because you can’t draw because it doesn’t need to be fancy.

Michael Simmons 52:49

Yeah, awesome. Great advice. And where can people learn more about you and follow you online?

Jono Hey 52:57

Yeah, good question. So who said most of the stuff is all at sketchplanations.com. Now, it’s a little bit of a mouthful. And then I do I do post things on Twitter and Instagram, if people prefer to do there. Even Facebook, I should start doing on LinkedIn, probably because some of them will go there. But basically sketchplanations.com. I’ve also got a personal site, but it basically says, sooner or later, everything I know will be on sketch permissions. So that’s, that’s a better place to go. Yeah,

Michael Simmons 53:25

yeah. Well, thank you so much for your time, and just want to acknowledge you you’ve created when you think about it, when it comes to illustrating complex ideas around like mental models or ideas like that. You’ve you’ve done more and better sketches than probably anyone on that, I don’t think so it’s kind of an amazing thing for humanity. And, and I really mean that. And on ours, they’ve gotten tons of shares, and we’ve shared them. So hopefully, it’s helping people remember and learn new ideas faster.

Jono Hey 53:56

But that’s, that’s a remarkable thought. Thank you. And I have to say, like, actually having people you know, when you’ve got a platform and people are listening, it’s a it’s a great motivation to keep doing it and not having any intention to stop. Yeah, you know, my list. My List of ideas is long, and it gets bigger, more than one idea per week, so hopefully, I’ll be doing it for some time. Yeah. Thank you.

Michael Simmons 54:19

You’re welcome. All right. Bye, Jono.

Jono Hey 54:22

Michael, It’s been a pleasure.

Outro 54:24

Thanks for listening to The Michael Simmons Show. We’ll see you again next time and be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes. If you found value. In today’s episode, we would greatly appreciate a five star rating on your favorite podcast player

Tags: Jono Hey, Michael Simmons, Sketchplanations, The Michael Simmons Show, Zen Educate

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