Influential Communications, Inc.

Modeling - The Art & Science of Useful Knowledge Acquisition

Modeling is the heart of NLP, a core competence and the methodology that created "the trail of techniques." A model is not a copy, just like a map is not the territory. A model is a representation; a picture, a description, or physical object that highlights essential features of the original including key elements, relations, properties and dynamics. Whether it's a scale model car, a biological diagram, or the description of a business process, it's a model.

Model making is world making. A map or model highlights some features and hides others. This increases the significance and sense of order of what is highlighted. We like order, significance and certainty so much we that create models and use them to make sense of other situations. Games simplify the world into winners and losers. Sports have special fields, roles, equipment, rules and time limits. Novels, movies and television episodes have defined characters and fulfilling plots. Models all.

We much more readily see what we already know; what we already have a model of. We make analogies with our models to gain insights into new situations. So why not simply seek the right/best model and use it everywhere? Well, by way of analogy, imagine a tropical fish tank. One fish is long and cylindrical and darts through the water with ease - it's a model for speed. Another is a thin vertical foil and spins around a small space - the epitome of maneuverability. A third is round and naturally floats. Each is a model of one way of moving through a liquid. Most fish are some combination of these three. Which model is the right, best or true? It all depends on their needs and environment. For you, it depends on your outcomes. So, keep all your models and combine them to your advantage.

Some Principles of Maps & Models -

• Highlight some things and hide others
• Have an author, a point of view, a subject and a theme
• Are made for purposes - sometimes hidden
• Are in the history they help to create
• Work through codes, icons and words
• Create worlds, not copy them

From Maps to Mental Models
If our maps of the physical world are so necessarily selective and approximant, how much more so are the mental maps or models we bring to everyday situations?

Map Making is World Making
For a map to work - to fulfill its purpose - it highlights some things and hides others if only to make it easier to read. Maps utilize natural processes known as:

• Deletion
• Distortion, and
• Generalization
  

Deletion, distortion, and generalization increase the significance of particular information and with it a sense of order and certainty; while the sensory rich experience with all of its ambiguity and multiple meanings is forgotten.

We like order and certainty so much we create multiple models of it in different aspects of our lives and then use these models to make sense of other situations. For example:

• "Marketing needs a new game plan."
• "Send in Ted. He's our MVP."
• "You just have to take a chance."
• "What have you got to lose?"
• "I don't see a happy ending here."
• "It's your time to shine."

More Facts About Models:

• Mental models are incomplete
• Our ability to utilize them is very limited
• Mental models are unstable
• Mental models are not well defined
• Mental models are unscientific, even superstitious
• Mental models are parsimonious. That is, mental complexity is avoided even for more physical work

Human decision-making works by pattern recognition. We see something we already know ,something we already have a mental model of. We make analogies with the mental models we have to gain insights into the new situation to take action. We need to make sure we are making accurate analogies and taking worthwhile actions.

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