Work Hard, (Lego Serious) Play Hard

A few years ago, my friend Bob started showing me the real meaning of the “Work hard, play hard” motto while we were traveling all over the world for work, and since then I couldn’t agree more on how this reflects on my current work-life balance.

In the absence of a truly positive, productive and supportive company culture, many organizations opt for the perception of fun. On the other hand, sometimes playing hard is hard work, and working hard is a lot of fun.

Innovation needs room to “play”

The LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® method (LSP) is a facilitated thinking, communication and problem-solving technique for use with organizations, teams and individuals. It draws on extensive research from the fields of business, organizational development, psychology and learning, and is based on the concept of “hand knowledge.”

The use of physical bricks combined with the safe transition space created by the LSP method is a powerful enabler of honest and authentic conversations which can have an ongoing impact on team dynamics. Thinking with the hands permits people to build three-dimensional models of their ideas and tell stories about their models. Hence, the name “serious play”.

Love it or not, a tactile experience is the most truly missed experience when you have to explain or, even worse, sell, digital solutions or software in a world of heavy equipment like the FES one.

I can’t tell you how many times, organizing booths at trade shows from the US to Singapore, I ran into the design concepts and the only goal was always to avoid being mistaken for Info Point, Internet Point, Apple reseller, POS payment solution, and so on. Only because there were just laptops and monitors, and no equipment to touch, open, and try.

But yet, innovation always happens by using the practice of traditional, human-centric processes like sketching, deep focus, and tactile brainstorming.

Digital vs Analog Thinking

As we have adopted and internalized a digital way of living, we have also internalized a digital thinking paradigm.

Digital thinking implies automatically thinking in terms of discrete categories. It is being comfortable only with yes/no or go/no-go options. We may add one or more intermediate categories (such as “maybe”) but that’s just increasing the number of categories. We seem to have developed an ease with fuzzy options that lie between two neatly defined categories. Fuzzy options are inherently subjective and disputable. The smart thing to do appears to be making things objective (even if they are inherently subjective).

Contrary to the digital thinking paradigm, the analog mode of thinking allows you to have an infinite number of states. The analog thinking paradigm lets you precisely compare and contrast, which can help in building a well-thought-through and nuanced understanding of a given topic or situation. Unlike digital thinking, the focus of analog thinking is to deal with a subjective situation as it is without trying to be necessarily objective.

I guess you know which one I love the most… Analog, of course! And by far!

“Everything is awesome, everything is cool when you’re part of a team”

The Lego Movie is a 2014 animated adventure comedy film written and directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller.

You have to take 5 minutes to watch the opening scene on YouTube because there is more here than any sociology treaty with a focus on the labor market: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGXTmcpTDok

A working team is like a kindergarten.

Just like a group of 5-year-old building blocks, the best adult teams are highly collaborative, iterate constantly, and aren’t afraid of trial and error.

The famous “Marshmallow Challenge“, where groups of kindergarteners repeatedly beat MBA students and CEOs at building the tallest spaghetti tower, proves that a virtuous “kid mindset” is often the secret to high performance.

Several fundamental kindergarten rules perfectly describe a thriving workplace:

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Stay data-hungry. Stay data-foolish.
Your Friendly Neighborhood Digital Consultant