Leadership Lessons from… LEGO

April 7th, 2009

Today is the birthday of LEGO inventor, Ole Kirk Kristiansen (1891-1958). In his memory, here is a excerpt from Chapter 1 of my book Toy Box Leadership entitled Legos: Relationships • Building begins with connecting.

What would make a corporate lawyer give up his six-figure salary to make $13 an hour? One word: LEGO. It all started on Christmas 1978 in Colville, Washington, when five-year-old Nathan Sawaya unwrapped his first set of LEGO bricks. As his collection grew, his family’s living room transformed into a giant “LEGO city.” At age 9, Nathan witnessed a life-changing event. His family happened upon a traveling LEGO tour at the Alameda Square Shopping Center in Denver. Inspired by seeing the grand scale of the White House and the Washington Monument built out of those little bricks he loved, he went back home and built a replica of the Oregon State Capitol.

As an adult, Nathan’s LEGO interest was merely a hobby until 2004 when he entered a contest, sponsored by the Legoland theme park, in San Diego to find the country’s best adult LEGO builders. After winning the contest he became a LEGO Master Builder assembling elaborate replicas. Making only one-fifth his lawyer’s salary didn’t matter because he was living his dream.

The history of the LEGO brick dates back to 1932, in Billund, Denmark, where Ole Kirk Kristiansen opened a new carpentry business making stepladders, ironing boards and little wooden toys. Kristiansen called his toys “Lego,” a name derived from the Danish words “leg godt” meaning “play well.” In 1942, the Lego factory burned to the ground. This unfortunate event provided Kirstiansen with the good fortune to rebuild, this time using a plastic injection-molding machine instead of wood to build his toys. In 1949, Kristiansen introduced the Automatic Binding Brick to moderate European success. Everything changed in 1961, when the Lego bricks were introduced to North America and became an immediate hit. The LEGO Group refers to their toys in the plural as LEGO bricks not LEGOS. We will respect their wishes within the chapter.

It is estimated that more than 235 Billion Lego parts have been manufactured since the first “automatic binding brick” was molded in 1949. Today, LEGO is more than just simple building blocks. LEGO is toys, theme parks, games, movies, computers and robots; all sold in more than 115 different countries. Now, the fourth largest toy manufacturer in the world, LEGO Group employs more than 5,000 people and produces more than 33,000 bricks every minute totaling 16 billion bricks annually. That translates into annual sales exceeding $1.1 billion. In 2000, Fortune magazine named LEGO the “Toy of the Century.”

The popularity of LEGO bricks results from the endless possibilities of what you can build. Their versatility is magnified when you realize how many ways you can connect them. You can arrange six eight-stud LEGO bricks in an astounding 915,103,765 different ways.

If you can dream it, the LEGO Group believes that you can build it. Think about the world records involving LEGO construction: A 92.5-foot tower using 500,000 bricks; a 4,626 foot long structure utilizing more than 3,000,000 components; or a life-size car built out of 650,000 bricks and weighing more than a ton. Each record began by merely connecting two little bricks.

Lego bricks provide the essence of this leadership lesson: Building begins with connecting.

The rest of the chapter gives the principles that Lego Leaders will possess. Check out more from the book here: Toy Box Leadership.

Also, this month John Maxwell is teaching about Toy Box Leadership (including LEGO) in his monthly Maximum Impact Club. Ge his outline here: MIC Toy Box Leadership.pdf

Entry Filed under: Classic Toys, Relationships, toy box leadership