15 Awesome Uses for Whiteboards

15 Awesome Uses for Whiteboards

The humble whiteboard. A staple of every office and school across the globe.

Whiteboards became widely commercially available in the 1960s but didn’t reach most spaces such as classrooms until the 1990s. Since then they have massively grown in popularity due to the flexibility and versatility they offer users, helping create dynamic working, learning and living spaces.

But most of us take whiteboards at face value - we reminisce over their use in classrooms as a child or just consider them part of the ‘office furniture’. Yet whiteboards really do have countless applications ranging from the entertaining to the life-altering.

In this guide, we walk you through 15 awesome uses for whiteboards.

#1 Organise Your Time

Whether at home or in the office, a whiteboard can be a powerful tool for organising your time.

This can be achieved in any number of ways, some of these includes:

To-Do Lists

We all know that writing a to-do list is a good way to stay on track throughout the day. But did you know that writing up your to-do list on a whiteboard can be even more powerful?

It is a great feeling when we cross out a task on our to-do list. This is amplified when you get to stand up and put a big cross or wipe out a task on your whiteboard. Having your to-do list up on the wall can also serve as a constant reminder to help keep you motivated throughout the day.

NOTE: if you work in a busy office, putting your to-do list on a wall can help people understand how busy you are at any one time, but it can also mean people can make their own judgement on your workload - so use this with caution.

Project Plan

Writing up project plans can be a great way to help yourself and your team organise their time. Although most projects are likely too complex to plan exclusively on a whiteboard, you may use it to map out key dates and milestones to keep everyone aware of what is happening, what has been achieved and what is expected of them.

Calendar

Using a whiteboard as a calendar can be a great way to organise your time. It is easy to edit and can be a quick reminder of what you have on, this can be especially helpful when you spend a lot of time on the phone booking in meetings - saving you constantly having to pull up your digital calendar.

You may also use a whiteboard to create a team calendar. This will help all team members (not just managers) see what everyone else is up to at any given time, adding transparency to the workplace.

#2 Plan a Wedding (or any big event)

Rings, a cake, some champagne and some food. Planning a wedding is easy right?

….well if you have ever planned one, or you have helped plan one you know this is far from the truth.

Using a whiteboard can help you keep on top of planning a big event such as a wedding by offering you a large, single view of everything that is going on. It is also simple to edit and change as your plans develop over time.

Use a whiteboard as an overarching view rather than adding too much detail, as it can become confusing.

#3 Help People with Dementia

Did you know whiteboards play a big role in supporting many people who suffer from dementia?

This is because whiteboards can be used to offer a permanent reminder of key dates, times and even locations of important objects in someone’s life. As people with dementia have to deal with memory loss, this can be a simple but lifechanging addition to their lives.

A whiteboard is especially helpful for carers as they can leave those they care for reminders in a permanent location, which can otherwise.

Read more: How Can Notice Boards Help People with Dementia?

#4 Motivate Your Sales Team

Although it isn’t a crucial part of being a salesperson, they do tend to be competitive in nature. That is why whiteboards offer a great way to drive motivation and increase profit in many organisations.

Using a whiteboard to highlight targets, bonus goals or to simply track the progress of individual teams or salespeople can be a good way to keep your sellers focused on what matters most. You may even use a whiteboard to gamify sales with special prizes and bonuses for those who perform well.

#5 Structure Work Flow

Managing workflow can be a tricky business. This is especially true as your team grows and what you work on becomes more complex.

You could use a whiteboard to highlight events that trigger specific workflows and details on the workflows they trigger. You could also use them to layout common business systems and details surrounding who is responsible for each element - creating a high level of transparency throughout the organisation.

Using a whiteboard in this way will help you define how the most important aspects of the business work and keep them at top of mind by making them easy to recall.

#6 Play Games

Whiteboards don’t have to be all about efficiency and structure, they can also be great tools to help you chill out and have a little fun. Most of us will remember rainy break times at school gathered around the whiteboard playing tic tac toe or hangman.

But the possibilities really are endless when it comes to playing games on whiteboards. Why not give a game of Pictionary or spot the missing object a go?

Using whiteboards for fun and games can be a great way to engage children in learning or introduce a little joy into a potentially long and boring meeting. In fact, using your office whiteboard to play games isn’t just a great way to break up a meeting, it can also help spark creativity and help your team come up with better ideas.

#7 Cut Food Waste

Did you know whiteboards can help you cut food waste? It’s simple really.

We are all occasionally guilty of forgetting some food at the back of the fridge, only to find it at a later date covered in a grim layer of mold.

Using a whiteboard to create a meal plan not only helps you limit the common ‘what should we eat tonight?’ question, but can also ensure that you are using up food before it becomes unusable. In fact, you may even just use a whiteboard to highlight the use-by dates of your recent shop, so you can spot what is close to being past its best and cook up a storm with it before it is too late.

#8 Generate Inspiration

Given the clear and obvious nature of a large whiteboard in a room, they can be a fantastic tool to help generate inspiration. This can be done in countless ways such as using a magnetic whiteboard to put up pictures that inspire a creative project or writing up inspirational quotes which will motivate you and your team when times get tough.

Whiteboards are designed to draw the eye, so utilise the attention they gain by injecting them with inspiration.

#9 Keep on Top of Communications

Whiteboards are a fantastic tool for centralising communications, whether at home or in the office.

For example, at home, you may use a whiteboard to note down important phone numbers and write up missed messages for others in your household. You can use it in a similar way in an office to communicate anything from team goals to missed calls and even to drop notes on for missed colleagues.

#10 Advertise Time-Sensitive Offers

Using whiteboards in a store, restaurant or cafe can be a smart way to communicate time-sensitive offers to your customers. This is because they are easy to change at a moments notice with no need for design and printing like other methods of advertising such as posters.

For example, a restaurant that is trying to use up a particular ingredient may use a whiteboard to advertise chefs specials or discounts on dishes to help them make more sales of dishes with that ingredient.

As whiteboards are a great tool for capturing peoples’ attention, they can be the perfect place to include your latest and best promotions.

#11 Communicate Time-Sensitive Information

Similar to using whiteboards for advertising time-sensitive offers, they can also be used to communicate information that is of the moment.

For example, Transport for London (TfL) is known for using whiteboards to communicate updates such as train delays and maintenance by using well-positioned whiteboards. In fact, these boards have achieved much media coverage recently for also including inspirational messages to London underground travellers.

#12 Map Out Presentations

Tools like Microsoft PowerPoint are great for delivering presentations to everyone from management to customers. But they don’t help you get to grips with the flow of the presentation and how it all comes together to deliver a powerful message.

This is especially true when your presentations are long with multiple slides, as it can be easy to lose track of what has been covered and where.

Using a whiteboard can be a powerful single source to help you keep focused on the bigger picture of your presentation. You may also use a whiteboard at the start of your presentation process to map out the journey you will take those who attend the presentation on, making it easy to methodically work through the creation of the slides.

#13 Collaborate with Others

Whiteboards have always been used as a collaborative tool, although typically they are used to communicate from one person to a larger audience. You can also use a whiteboard as a central location that all participants can use to explain new ideas and develop current ones.

To achieve this, rather than positioning your whiteboard at one side of a room facing everyone, place it in the middle of the room and give everyone a pen. This can really get peoples creativity going and is especially useful when you are trying to come up with a new concept, system or approach.

#14 Get Creative

Whiteboards can be a great place to get creative. Of course, they might not offer the depth of creative techniques as painting or drawing, but they can be used as a great space to explore creative concepts.

One great thing about whiteboards is that they are easy to edit, so they are incredibly forgiving to those who use them as an alternative canvas. When planning a large creative project such as a large painting, you may use a whiteboard to test out different compositions and find what works before going all in.

#15 Create, Capture, Repeat

It is undeniable that whiteboards are a great way to communicate and record information. This is especially true during active sessions where a team is communicating together. But what happens when the energy is high and you run out of space?

Simple, take a photo.

This is where traditional technologies such as whiteboards can really work into more modern-day solutions such as cloud computing. By using whiteboards to facilitate a level of flow that is often unachievable using digital means, you can then capture the information with a simple photo and upload it to a central location for all stakeholders to view.

Once captured and uploaded, you are then ready to wipe the board clean and keep the momentum going.

Awesome Whiteboards

This article has shown us that there really are countless uses for whiteboards. From injecting a little fun into any situation with games, to drastically improving the lives of people with dementia, whiteboards are a life-changing and helpful tool in almost any situation.

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