MindManager vs Microsoft Visio

• The ability to apply it to almost any situation that requires the organization of ideas, concepts and/or facts.
• The ease with which a map can be changed, almost totally if necessary, without the loss of any content.
• The ease with which the tool is implemented to its full conceptual power.
• The ease with which ideas are communicated to others who did not do the map building themselves.
• The potential for collaborative efforts in developing thoughts, plans, etc.

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• The templates for basic flowcharting are simple to use and cover most of the basic functions and touch points in a diagram.
• The variety of included icons and connectors means it's very easy to create floor plans and/or network diagrams.
• The ease at which you can customise connectors with different colours/thickness makes it very effective in overall presentation of a diagram.

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• I would like to be able to readily select groups of topics and apply formatting e.g. circle three topics and have them collectively outlined or colored
• Would be nice to have a small collection of the icons that I use most frequently in a group on the top bar so I can easily drag and drop
• Its a bit cumbersome to generate custom formats
• I've had trouble configuring this latest version to attach emails from Outlook which was a really useful feature for my dashboard

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• The shapes library can be a little daunting if you're unfamiliar. Unless you know what you're looking for and where to find it, you can spend a lot of time looking for a particular shape or icon. But once you find it, you can add it to your shapes menu for easy access.
• You can also spend a lot of time selecting your defaults for shapes, arrows, font size, etc. But like the shapes library, once you get it down, it's locked in.
• Be prepared to spend a few hours playing with Visio before figuring out all the nuances. But if you're a beginner and need to create a process flow or diagram, you can do it very quickly without a lot of effort or training. The fun stuff takes a little longer to master.

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• Most recent example: Initiated a committee to set direction on how to most effectively assist the working poor and at-risk populations within our five county region. Mind mapping allowed the team of 10 - 12 people to absorb the ALICE (Asset Limited Income Constrained Employed) data for the region and determine which groups were most at risk and which groups State and Federal funds my be able to most effectively assist. Three to five maps allowed adequate data absorption by the team to set the 1 to 3 year strategy within a relatively short period of time and start implementation.
• Have used the tool in the past for strategic planning for corporate business teams in areas of profit management, quality performance, business reliability, safety improvement with varying degrees of success. Typically the mapping process has contributed greatly to both defining the strategy and implementing.

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• Microsoft Visio helps improve communication which ensures increased alignment. This helps reduce costly rework on projects.
• Microsoft Visio is expensive to license the whole organization, so it takes some time to ensure your diagram is in a good format for publishing and there are only so many people who can edit the Visio files.

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