My regular readers know that I use images and metaphors to express a lot of my thinking. My basic metaphor for how things work looks like this:
Square Wheels are the way things really work, and the Round Wheels are already in the wagon. Don’t just DO something, Stand there!
For 20+ years, I have been playing with issues of empowerment and engagement and team building, using cartoons and games to drive out desired behavior and produce better communications and alignment to goals and missions. I take the low road on all this, working hard to keep things really simple because I find that things ARE really simple.
If we are going to motivate and engage people in the workplace, it seems critical that we need to focus on removing the things that people perceive as getting in the way. So many people are un-empowered and un-engaged and it is necessary for their managers to actively involve them and to change or remove the perceived issues and roadblocks.
While one cannot empower or engage anyone directly, they can certainly coach and assist them in changing their beliefs and shifting their thoughts toward going #morebetterfaster, right?
In moving from my line-art representations to serious playing with LEGO block images and themes, we have upgraded some of our simple toolkits and support frameworks. Right now, we have the Stupidly Simple Square Wheels Toolkit (a very simple communications tool) packaged and on the website with the online training program found at The Square Wheels Project.
We have reworked all the materials in the Managing Workplace Roadblocks Toolkit, which is a neat expansion of a package of tools that has worked so well to dis-un-empower people and workplace improvement ideas. It shares a workable model and various support materials about how to frame workplace issues so that individuals and teams can deal with them effectively.
The model uses LEGO pieces to represent the roadblocks, with images in powerpoint to generate discussions along with worksheets for use in processing the ideas. It is easily linked to the various tools in the LEGO Serious Play® frameworks.
There is more to come, and a slideshare program and maybe a short video describing how things can change and how managers can more effectively involve their people in workplace improvement ideas, along with team building and coaching frameworks,
For the FUN of It!
Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools. Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant.
A detailed profile can be found at my LinkedIn page
You can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com
Scott’s quips and quotes on Poems on The Workplace is here.
Square Wheels are a trademark of Performance Management Company
LEGO® and LEGO Serious Play are trademarks of The LEGO Group
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