Think with your Hands: – How to get started with Lego Serious Play Martin Sandberg 2013

Martin Sandberg, You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation -Plato 2

Martin Sandberg, What bricks to use? Use the most basic Lego bricks They enable thinking in metaphors 3

Martin Sandberg, When to use Lego Serious Play? Team building Unleashing creative thinking for accelerated innovation Work out a solution to a shared problem Create a shared mindset about something Constructive discussions where everybody is heard Build a shared vision Leadership development One-on-one coaching and Team coaching Use with your children, family, school,... 4

Martin Sandberg, Think with your hands Just start building. Trust your hands. Let them pick the bricks they want. Fiddle about... 5

Martin Sandberg, Lego Serious Play – Steps 1.The Challenge - Question 2.Build a model – Metaphor 3.Sharing – Give meaning – Tell your story 4.Questions and reflections 6

Martin Sandberg, Warm Up – Skills Building 1.Normal, non-metaphorical representation 2.Metaphorical representation 3.Combine models into a shared group model 4.Storytelling 7

Martin Sandberg, Warm Up Excercises Build a duck, 5-10 min Build a tower, 10 min Build something; assign a description – metaphor, 10 Build your dream colleague – metaphor, 10 min My Monday mornings – story line, 10 min 8

Martin Sandberg, Duck Build a duck using 7 bricks Explain how it is a duck – Are different people’s ducks similar? Now remove 3 bricks so that you have 4 left Explain how it is still a duck 9

Martin Sandberg, Highest Tower Either individually or as teams: Build the highest tower you can in 3 min – It should be able to stand without any support – You cannot reserve bricks Share something about your tower – explain what it means – Point out differences in the towers – no right or wrong way of building – Explain how you reasoned in the beginning. Who did what? Did you assign roles? Did you split the work? – Test for stability – show attachment to something we have built when it breaks or is disassembled 10

Martin Sandberg, Dream Colleague 1. Build a model that represents your Dream Colleague, 3 min Share, 1 min per person The facilitator asks questions to better understand the meanings of different parts of the models 2. Take one aspect from each model and make a shared model with the others in the team and place it on a paper napkin Everybody should agree on all the parts of the shared model. Everybody on the team explains the shared model 11

Martin Sandberg, My Monday Mornings 1.Build a story describing your Monday Mornings, 3-4 mins Share your metaphor and storyline 2. Take one part which you think is most important and put it in the middle and build a model together with everyone else in the group 12

Martin Sandberg, Build Something and Re-Interpret It 1.Build whatever you feel like building, 3 min 2.The facilitator assigns a meaning to the model 3.The participant explains how the model represents X, 1 min. E.g. ”My dream holiday is to scuba dive. My model describes the boat and...” Examples of meanings to assign: Your dream holiday The ideal home Your favorite activity An ingenious invention Your favorite song A relaxing day Your neighbor The car of the future Your favourite TV show or movie 13

Martin Sandberg, Listen with your eyes Look at the model that is being shared – use your visual sense to grasp and understand even more of what the other participants are describing 14

Examples of Challenges

Martin Sandberg, A) Future Success 1.Build a model which shows the road blocks to your immediate and future success 2.Build a model describing what your future will look like without the barriers 3.Build a model which shows what you need from others and yourself to knock down the barriers to your success 4.Combine your models which will show how you will get support from the team/group 16

Martin Sandberg, B) Team Member 1.Build a model showing who you are on the team – What do you bring to the team? – What could you bring to the team? – Build some of the functions that you carry out on the job, also include some hidden aspects of you 2.Build an addition to your model that shows how you think others in your team perceive you 3.Who are you at your best? – Build an addition to your model showing your thoughts about this – what characterizes you when you are at your best? 17

Martin Sandberg, C) Team 1.Build an individual model showing how you perceive your team: – Show what you believe your team is all about – What is the spirit of the team? – The feel of the team? – The values of the team? 2.Build a shared model that shows what your team is all about – What is the team’s shared perception of the team? – What is the spirit and the ‘feel’ of the team? 18

Martin Sandberg, D) Team Aspirations 1.Build a individual model showing what you aspire to be like as a team in the future 2.Build a shared model Each person explains each part of the shared model 19

Martin Sandberg, E) Team Goals Build a model describing the goals for the team Build a model describing the objectives to meet the goals (first steps to meet the goals) Build a model with the objectives in the form of a storyline to show when in time they should be completed 20

Martin Sandberg, F) How do you see yourself? Build a model describing how you see yourself in your role (team member, Scrum Master, Product Owner, Manager,... ) 21

Martin Sandberg, G) Your role Build a model describing your role on the team What is easy in your role? What is difficult in your role? 22

Martin Sandberg, H) Strengths and Weaknesses A.Build a model showing the strengths of your Product, Team, Organization,... B.Build a model describing how you can utilize the strengths 1.Build a modell showing the weaknesses 2.Build a model describing how you can remove or compensate for the weaknesses 23

Martin Sandberg, J) Appreciation 1.Build a model describing what you appreciated in the workshop 2.Build a model describing what you would like to change in a future similar workshop 24

Martin Sandberg, K) Retrospectives 1.Build a model describing what went well 2.Build a model describing things that we should start or stop doing 25

Martin Sandberg, How does Lego Serious Play work? Much of our brain’s activity is dedicated to the manipulation of our hands When we model with our hands and tell stories there is more neuronal activity and better suffusion of blood to critical areas of the brain 70-80% of our brain’s nerve endings are connected to our hands 26

Martin Sandberg, How does Lego Serious Play work? Psychological Flow: Individuals gain most from a learning process when they are committed to and enjoy the process 27

Martin Sandberg, The Facilitator Creates Open-ended building challenges Gets the group’s dialogue to serve its purpose Makes the reflections and dialogue process easier Helps participants express themselves Asks clarifying questions 28

Martin Sandberg, Participants’ Etiquette The Lego model is your answer to the building challenge There are no wrong answers There is no ONE right answer – everyone has different views What the model looks like is not the most important thing The meaning attached to each model is what makes it valuable The Lego models are tools and means to an end 29

Martin Sandberg, Group Size Roughly 4-8 people per group One workshop group requires one facilitator It is generally not possible to facilitate two groups ‘side by side’ because each group would need focused attention from the facilitator, at the same time 30

Martin Sandberg, Play ! Put bowls of Lego bricks in your meeting rooms and see what happens Combine Lego Serious Play with other facilitation techniques Play around with the Lego bricks and invent new challenges Get your workshops to a flying start by starting with Lego Serious Play to get people talking and energized 31

Martin Sandberg, References seriousplay.com strategicplayroom.ning.com seriousplaypro.com Open source introduction document: LSP Introduction LSP Introduction User requirements with Lego: LSP and User RequirementsLSP and User Requirements 32

Martin Sandberg, Talks you might find interesting The future depends on play: The future depends on play_Seriouslythemovie The future depends on play_Seriouslythemovie Tim Brown: Tales of creativity and play ted.com/talks/lang/en/tim_brown_on_creativity _and_play.h ted.com/talks/lang/en/tim_brown_on_creativity _and_play.h Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity ted.com/talks/lang/en/ken_robinson_says_schoo ls_kill_creativity.html ted.com/talks/lang/en/ken_robinson_says_schoo ls_kill_creativity.html Sunni Brown: Doodlers, unite! ted.com/talks/sunni_brown.html ted.com/talks/sunni_brown.html 33

Martin Sandberg, Food for Thought How come executives love playing with Lego? Why do we associate work with ’serious’ and play with ’not serious’ ? How can you use Lego Serious Play when you have distributed teams? Is Lego Serious Play still ’serious’ when it is used in schools? What is a ’lean in’ vs. a ’lean back’ meeting? How long can you keep your fingers away from a pile of Lego bricks (e.g. in a meeting room)? You can download this presentation here: slidesha.re/ONgvsj slidesha.re/ONgvsj 34