The link below is from Aug and appeared in many US state papers on Aug 26th. I
Posted on Sun, Aug. 26, 2007
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Lego builds ties for adults
Program utilizes toy to hone skills used in business
By Shelley Emling - Cox News Service
BILLUND, Denmark --
Children have long used Lego's colorful snap-together blocks to unleash their creativity by building dinosaurs, airplanes, even complete fantasylands.
Now at huge corporations across the United States and around the world, adults are using Legos as a tool to enhance organizational creativity and performance.
The Danish firm, the world's fourth largest toy company, has transformed its beloved plastic toys into a business resource called Serious Play.
In two-day training sessions costing about $7,000, skilled Lego facilitators help clients build models that act as metaphors for their organization's strengths, weaknesses, and overall challenges. For example, employees might use the blocks to model a perceived threat of a corporate takeover.
Already Home Depot, Georgia Power, and R&L Foods Inc., the San Antonio-based owner and operator of Taco Bell and KFC franchises, are among the more than 400 companies that have participated in the program.
Employees at the Florida Department of Children and Families will participate in a Serious Play workshop in September.
"When it comes to protecting vulnerable children, the wrong decision could mean the difference between life and death," said Al Zimmerman, a department spokesman. "The Serious Play workshop will introduce child welfare workers to a new way of thinking, communicating and problem-solving in order to sharpen their skills and performance.
"It sounds strange to say this, but based on the proven success of the program, Lego blocks could ultimately improve our ability to protect and provide for the children in our care," he said.
Robert Rasmussen, one of the architects of Serious Play who is now a facilitator based in Massachusetts, said the program is effective because it results in 100 percent participation from 100 percent of the group 100 percent of the time.
He facilitated a workshop in January with about 95 Home Depot store managers from throughout the New England region.
"The idea was to teach employees how to think outside the box," he said.
In general, Rasmussen said, Lego is rare in that it functions as a universal language understood by people regardless of their age, race, gender or culture.
"This means that you don't leave any insights, opinions, thoughts or ideas undiscovered or untouched," he said.
Rasmussen said that the use of metaphors is a huge part of Serious Play.
For example, he said he might ask a group to build a model that describes the identity of their organization. The result might be a race car to express the idea that their company is a fast-moving one.
"Metaphors make it easier to express complex matters in a way that helps your own understanding and also the listener's understanding," he said.
Lewis Pinault, an American facilitator based in London, said he might ask a group of employees to model threats of a takeover, or to represent the person at work who irks them the most.
"We use Lego as a tool that enhances psychological flow," Pinault said. "Lego takes people out of their usual comfort zones."
The Serious Play program has proved so successful - some 110 facilitators have been trained around the world - that Lego has started to explore the idea of marketing the tool to families and perhaps even schools that are struggling with uncommunicative children.
"We might try to broaden our reach by introducing the idea to families and also to classrooms in order to help build social connections," said Jesper Jensen, the Denmark-based director of Serious Play.
Before going away on holiday recently, Jensen said, he asked his own two children to build their idea of the perfect vacation out of Lego.
"This got the whole family talking about what we hoped to get out of our time away together," he said.
The 6,500-piece Lego set designed for Serious Play mixes elements of various Lego theme packs marketed to children.
Jacqueline Lloyd Smith, a Canada-based facilitator, said Serious Play is based on the concept of "hand knowledge."
She pointed to research showing that the hands are connected to 70 to 80 percent of people's brain cells.
"Our brains can only handle so much information at once, and so through using our hands to explore ideas, we can surface a lot more information than we ever thought possible," she said.
Smith said she's receiving a growing number of inquiries for information from North American companies.
"The Carlson Hotel Group and AOL are recent examples," she said. "I believe that as news of Serious Play spreads, we will see more of the large multinational organizations using this unique problem-solving tool."
David Gauntlett, a professor of media and communications at the University of Westminster in England who has studied Serious Play, said that he believes the scheme works well simply because it's such an unusual form of expression.
"By thinking and building with their hands, participants can explore connections and relationships," he said. "I have to admit I was extremely impressed."
These corporate training techniques are a far cry from the world of wooden toys created by carpenter Ole Kirk Christiansen, who founded Lego here in 1932.
First made of wood that stacked together, Lego unveiled its first plastic bricks in 1949.
The innovative products caught on in Europe first before spreading in the mid-1970s to the United States, where Lego was later named toy of the century by Fortune magazine.
The name of the company, which celebrated its 75th anniversary this month, comes from combining the first letters of the Danish words "leg godt," meaning "play well."
Although sold in more than 130 countries, Lego's road to success hasn't always been an easy one. The company found itself struggling at the end of the 1990s as more children turned to computers for entertainment.
After an unsuccessful foray into Lego software, watches and clothes, the company decided to put the focus squarely back on building blocks. The strategy worked, and in 2006 the company racked up profits of $256 million.
These days the company employs more than 5,000 people and manufactures more than 16 billion bricks a year.