Drawing Toast

Choose this exercise

Purpose: Demonstrate visual differences in how individuals break down and sequence a familiar everyday task.

Use it when: Use when starting work on process modeling, workflow design, or systems mapping to show how individual assumptions diverge.

Skip it when: Skip when the session focus requires text-only documentation or when a team is already aligned on standard operating procedures and needs direct execution rather than conceptual divergence.

Group arrangement: Solo drawing, then small groups of 3 to 4 participants (pairs allowed if group size is 4 or 5), followed by a brief whole-room reflection.

Timing: Source suggests 5 to 15 minutes. 15 minutes provides time for prompt orientation, solo sketching, structured small-group comparison, and whole-room synthesis.

Materials and tools

• One sheet of blank paper (standard letter or 11x17 tabloid) per participant
• One felt-tip marker or pen per participant
• Wall-safe tape or pushpins to display drawings (optional)

Before participants arrive

1. Place one sheet of blank paper and one marker at each seat.
2. Ensure wall space or table surface is available for small groups to display sheets side by side.

Say this to open

Take the paper and marker in front of you. Without talking to your neighbors, draw your process for making toast. You have three minutes. Use simple shapes, stick figures, or arrows. Words are allowed, but try to communicate visually. Begin now.

How to run it

1. Introduce the challenge 2 minutes

   Distribute materials if not already at seats. Deliver the opening script. Clarify that no artistic skill is required and that rough shapes and arrows work well. Neutral example: one person might start by buying bread at a grocery store, while another starts with pushing down the toaster lever.

2. Draw solo 3 minutes

   Participants work individually and silently. Everyone sketches their personal sequence for making toast from start to finish. Call time at three minutes.

3. Compare in small groups 6 minutes

   Form groups of 3 or 4 (or pairs if total headcount is 4 or 5). Place drawings side by side on the table or wall. Each presenter takes up to 60 seconds to explain their sequence. If someone chooses to pass and observe, add their time to the open group discussion. Use remaining time to compare differences in starting points, detail, and perspective.

4. Debrief observations 4 minutes

   Bring the room back together. Hear observations from 2 or 3 volunteers on one major divergence they saw between sketches. Close by linking how these differing mental models show up when teams map work processes.

Debrief questions

• Where did your process begin, and where did it end?
• What invisible assumptions surfaced when you saw someone else's drawing?
• How do these differing mental models appear when our team maps work processes?

Finished output: Individual process sketches showing divergent mental models of a single familiar task.

Remote

Use a collaborative whiteboard with individual labeled frames. Participants sketch using digital shapes, pen tools, or upload a smartphone photo of a paper drawing. Use breakout rooms of 3 to 4 people for the comparison step, sharing screens or viewing the shared board simultaneously.

Hybrid

Remote participants sketch on paper and photograph their sheet to upload into a shared digital board. In-person participants take photos of their sheets and upload them to the same board. Subgroups form either fully online or via table laptops with speakerphones so everyone views the combined gallery.

Access and participation choices

• Participants may write a numbered step list or simple text flowchart instead of drawing pictures.
• Participants may choose to observe their small group's comparison without presenting their own drawing.

If the session gets stuck

Participants hesitate to draw, claiming they lack artistic talent.

Remind the room that stick figures, rough boxes, and basic arrows are fully sufficient. The exercise is about steps and sequence, not technical art.

One person dominates the small-group comparison phase.

Enforce a strict 60-second turn per presenter before allowing open group conversation.

A participant chooses not to show their drawing during group comparison.

Affirm their choice to observe without requiring explanation. Have the remaining group members share their sketches and roll the unused time into group comparison.

Terms used here

• Mental model: An internal mental representation of how a process or system operates in practice.