How to Create an Effective

Book Summary Mind Map

By Chuck Frey, The Mind Mapping Software Blog

By now, I’m sure you’ve seen mind maps that are summaries of business books. They can be

valuable, visual learning aids for your own use, as well as for sharing with others. But like other

types of mind maps, book maps need to be created with clarity and brevity in mind. There’s an

art to extracting the key points and nuggets of knowledge from a book that may be several

hundred pages in length and still end up with a visual summary that is understandable.

Source: http://litemind.com/made-to-stick/

Book Summary Mind Map Page 2

In this report, we’ll take a closer look at the principles of creating an effective book mind map

that will be memorable and useful for you and anyone with whom you may share it.

Principle #1: Capture the key points of the book – with clarity

Ideally, a book summary mind map is a memory jogger – a reminder of what you’ve learned

from a business book that you enjoyed. In other cases, you may have enjoyed a book so much

that you want to be able to share it with others – by e-mailing a PDF of it to the members of your

team or uploading it to a mind map gallery such as BiggerPlate.com or MapsForThat.com. In

either case, a book summary map needs to follow the rules that we have already discussed in

many of these Mind Mapping Insider reports:

They need to be well organized

Words and phrases you use for topics need to be brief and clear

Other people need to be able to understand the content of your map without the context

of reading the book, to which you have access

There’s an art to summarizing a book so that others can understand it and be motivated by it. A

case in point is Luciano Passuelo’s excellent mind map of Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi,

below:

Source: http://www.biggerplate.com/mindmaps/d188199/never-eat-alone

Book Summary Mind Map Page 3

Note the way in which this mind map both intrigues and informs you as you drill down into it.

The topic “the genius of audacity” is so compelling that I can’t help but click to expand that

branch. I want to know what it contains:

Principle #2: Decide upon the scope of your mind map

The mind maps we’ve just explored cover entire business books. But if you want to capture

more detail, you can also create a mind map that covers only one chapter of a book. I can think

of two occasions when you may want to do this:

1. When a book contains so much useful information that placing all of its salient points in a

single mind map would result in a huge, overly cluttered visual summary.

2. When a book contains only a chapter or two that is relevant to your needs. That’s OK –

just focus on the knowledge you need, and ignore the rest.

In the first case, you could create a mind map for each chapter of an excellent business book,

and then join them together using a master map that links to each of the chapter maps.

A great example of a chapter map follows on the next page. It’s taken from Chris Griffith’s latest

book, GRASP the Solution.

Book Summary Mind Map Page 4

Source: http://www.biggerplate.com/mindmaps/ogvlsWhV/grasp-the-solution-by-chris-griffiths-chapter-3-generative-thinking

Principle #3: Capture your thoughts and reactions, too

Don’t just capture the key points from the book in your mind maps – be sure to add your own

thoughts and reactions to what the author is teaching you, and how you plan to apply what

you’ve learned. In the example below, I added a task to the Never Eat Alone mind map to depict

how this could work:

Remember: If you’re sharing a book summary with members of your work team, many mind

mapping programs enable you to share tasks with them. In other words, this could become a

useful tool for sharing new knowledge with your team, and could serve as an excellent

foundation for group discussion during your next team meeting.

Book Summary Mind Map Page 5

Principle #4: Capture memorable quotes, too

As an avid blogger and user of social media, I’m constantly on the look-out for interesting

content I can share with my readers. One key type of content that fits in with many social

channels and which also shares useful wisdom with others is quotes. As you read through a

business book and formulate a visual summary of it, be sure to capture any relevant and

memorable quotes, too.

Some authors are very quotable, while others tend to stick to a plain, no-nonsense “just the

facts” style of writing. Just keep in mind that this is another type of book content you should

consider adding to your book summary maps.

Principle #5: Don’t be a slave to the radial map format

Many book mind maps follow the standard radial format – with topics sticking out in all

directions. But keep in mind that other formats may prove to be equally useful. For example,

top-down and right-facing maps can also be very useful, because they enable you to arrange

your book summary in a convenient left-to-right and top-to-bottom sequence, respectively.

Examples of both types of maps follow below. Notice how your tendency to read left to right and

top to bottom helps you to easily follow the sequence of the content of their subject books:

Source: http://www.biggerplate.com/mindmaps/hXkDTEGc/the-leadership-mindmap

Book Summary Mind Map Page 6

Source: http://www.biggerplate.com/mindmaps/KCF2bJpx/virtuoso-teams-lessons-from-teams-that-changed-their-worlds-andy-bounton-amp-bill-fischer

Principle #6: Have some fun with color and images

What do the mind maps I’ve featured in this report have in common? They all make creative and

effective use of images to add visual interest. One common practice is to place an image of the

book cover in the central topic. Many book covers are very colorful and feature distinctive

treatments of type and images. This makes them stand out, and immediately tells the reader

what the subject of the mind map is – especially if the name of the book or its author are well

known to the people who are viewing the map.

A perfect example of this approach can be found on page 1 of this report: Johan Dhaeseleer’s

excellent summary of Made to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath, which was featured on the

Litemind Blog.

Book Summary Mind Map Page 7

Note how each first-level topic utilizes a colorful image to draw your interest, and then employs

icons to consistently guide you to specific types of content the map contains – such as a

megaphone to depict examples. Nicely done!

Principle #7: Adopt the authors’ subheadings as subtopic names

When you read a business book,

you will often discover that each

chapter contains subheadings

that break its content into

“chunks.” Headings or

subheadings are used to tell the

reader that the topic the author is

discussing is about to change. It’s

also a very useful visual device

for readers who simply want to

skim the book’s content, and zero

in on the key knowledge they need.

In either case, a lot of thought has usually gone into these headings and subheadings to make

them useful, clear and engaging. Therefore, it’s often in your best interest to adopt them

Book Summary Mind Map Page 8

verbatim as your map topics and subtopics, as the author has done with Keith Ferrazzi’s Never

Eat Alone, in the screen shot on the previous page.

Using this strategy not only helps to ensure that your mind map follows a common-sense

structure and follows the book’s content closely, it also increases the odds that readers will find

some topics of interest as they visually skim your book mind map. In this example, “Balance is

B.S.” and “Never Give in to Hubris” are real attention-getters!

Principle #8: Ultimately, do what works for you

If the book mind maps you create are only for your personal use, then create them in such a

way that they are most effective for you. Your visual style dictates what’s most meaningful,

relevant and memorable for you. So plan your book mind map accordingly.

Most of all, have fun capturing your new-found knowledge in this powerful visual format!

Questions?

Please contact Chuck Frey at chuck@innovationtools.com.

Please visit the Mind Mapping Software Blog for all of the latest news, trends and resources

related to visual mapping.

You can also follow Chuck Frey on Twitter for even more insights and ideas.

Published 5/7/12