Building a Better Business Using the Lego Serious Play Method

Chapter 5Contemplating the LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® Territory

When you're watching a Boeing 747 airplane speeding down the runway on its way to takeoff, it's easy to wonder: how on earth it is possible for that giant thing even to get off the ground? Even though we know for sure it will get off the ground—and even though we may know the physics behind it—it still feels like a feat, even after years of watching. We're aware of the simple fact that the difference between the airflow speed above and under the wings is enough to lift 440,000 kilograms gracefully into the air; yet it seems amazing every time we see it. Despite this wondering, however, most of us continuously trust our lives to this law of physics and to the skill set of the pilots to manage the process and get us safely from A to B in the fastest way possible.

There are lots of similarities between this experience and the use of the LEGO SERIOUS PLAY method. It feels counterintuitive that a method where we spend time building and playing with LEGO bricks—where everyone's voice has been heard about all topics being discussed, and where the topics are complex and multifaceted—can get you faster and more reliably from A to B than the traditional meeting forms we have used for decades. And, the closer you look, the more fragile and deceptively simple it seems.

We do not continuously reflect upon the physics behind the fact that we're moving through the air when we take a flight somewhere. Similarly, participants who are immersed ...