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Draw a cow talking to a rabbit!

I am a Leadership Development Consultant. And my job is to facilitate, and I have been facilitating during the past 20 years. When I facilitate, I use all the amazing tools that the Visual Practice gave me. But, at times (very few times) I have done Graphic Recording.

This was 2017, and this was a meeting between the CEO and the first line of directors of a global company with a branch in Argentina (actually you buy their products on a daily basis). I do not know what the meeting was about. That information was privileged and not shared with me. I could not talk to the facilitator before the meeting. He was “overbooked” and did not have time for me. The meeting had started at 9am and I was supposed to join them at 3pm to record the conclusions from their meeting. They specifically requested me to arrive at 3pm (not before) to start at 3pm! So I did, cursing myself why had I accepted this job.

The wall they proposed me to use was far from the group and right in the back of the room.
I put the paper, started doing my job, and after 10 minutes someone approached me and said, in loud voice: “The facilitator wants you to draw cartoons, not that!”

I looked at her with a funny, yet professional, face and I said: I am a graphic recorder and this is what I am supposed to be doing. This is how my job is done. I do not draw cartoons. She left and during the next 30 minutes, she came back 5 times asking me: “Draw a cow talking to a rabbit”, “draw a bottle of milk speaking with a dog”, “do not write words, the facilitator doesn´t want you to write words”, blah blah blah.

I did what I could and when they finished I tried to remove the paper from the wall. But I could not, because I had put the big paper in a surface which had a sticky product, therefore the paper would not come out! I have the funny feeling that the paper is still there!

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