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Yep, according to GM. An interesting article by Fast Company by talks about how GM, frustrated with data coming in traditional form (reports, bar charts, etc.), wasn’t getting the message across–a 2D solution wasn’t highlighting a 3D problem. So they used Legos to denote very physical things like location (colors denote where a particular part was located in a vehicle) and size (how bad is the problem).

Interesting. I find myself wondering how we, as designers, would tackle visualizing information differently if we could build it and model it in physical, not virtual, space.

I do know that switching media–a sketch on a napkin, laying out post-its on my whiteboard, or positioning pencils on a table–can be a useful way to inject perspective into a design. With a toddler in the house, I realize that I may have more tools at my disposal…