I recently fulfilled a year-long ambition: to certify in the Lego® Serious Play® method. Ever since I read Michael Fearne’s book last year, I knew I wanted to train in it. Fairly new into freelancing, and with a fairly hefty price tag for the course, I sat on it for a year before taking the plunge. So what is it, what’s it for and why is it more vital than ever?
Origins: Where Does It Come From?
Developed over 20 years ago, within the Lego Group, it was originally used to support strategy development. A genius move of utilising the product a company was producing to develop its wider organisational strategy. About 10 years ago, the method went open-source, meaning a whole community of trainers and facilitators grew around it.
Who: Who Can Use It?
Anyone can train in the Lego® Serious Play® method, and there are a variety of ways you can those this. There are a number of training providers around the world who hold certification courses varying from 2 to 5 days long. The training provides a background of its origins, the science behind the method and a full immersive experience of designing and delivering in the Lego® Serious Play® structure.
It’s now recognised and used by organisations across the world – from BP and IKEA to Samsung and Virgin. Its a method that flexes to your sector and industry.
Why Does it Work?
Firstly, it’s fun! If you’re going to have a meeting looking at your vision for instance, it’s a lot better than post-its and flipcharts.
Secondly, it flattens organisational structures. No-one leads and no-one dominates. There’s equal value, power and insight into everyone’s thoughts and contributions. It’s a democratic method that encourages everyone to be involved equally.
Thirdly, by using metaphor and story-telling, it can help us externalise our ideas and thoughts – it’s a powerful way of generating new insights across teams and organisations.
How Can It Be Used?
The beauty of the method is its versatility. People build in answer to the questions you pose – each person has different experience to bring and different knowledge to represent. Together, when shared and explored in a group, new insights are generated. Lego® Serious Play® is about developing a new understanding on a topic or issue that individuals and teams can take forward, where they take responsibility for playing their part in the future they want to see.
Why Do We need It?
Opportunities to be creative, fun and playful are limited as an adult, and nowhere more so in than in the workplace. While there’s increasingly recognition that having fun at work and being good at your job aren’t mutually exclusive, we still have a tendency to err on logic, language and analysis. Lego® Serious Play® is different, novel, fun and tactical, and its a phenomenal way to tap into our feelings, intuition and imagination.
Using our hands unlocks a creativity that we don’t often get to utilise, and its also easier to have harder conversations through metaphor. Lego® Serious Play® is a democratic engaging way to explore complex topics, and who doesn’t want to play with LEGO?