The two faces of Estonians

Last week I was invited to Estonia (by Parnu Konverentsid) to speak at a Leadership Conference about Playfulness in Business. Estonia is a very nice country, one of the three Baltic States in the North East of Europe. As big (or as small) as The Netherlands, but with 12x less inhabitants. They have a beautiful medieval capital Tallinn and a lot of nature. In Europe they do relatively well.

In the few days that I spend there, I encountered the two faces of Estonians. Their serious, polite and introvert behaviour when they are in a business setting. And their playful, sparkling, more open behaviour when they are having a party, especially the younger generation. Maybe not surprising when you understand that the younger generation was born in a free Estonia and their parents lived many years under an illegal occupation from the Soviet Union (1940-1991). So, when I told some people my plans of doing an interactive speech for the 300 businessleaders, where I would invite them to PLAY, they looked at me in disbelief and wished me “Good Luck”.

So there I was, my heart pounding in my chest when I was announced onto the stage. Standing on the stage, with the plan of starting with blowing bubbles, I realized that I had accidentally dropped part of my blowing bubble on my way. I had to quickly improvise and get a new one of one of the tables of the audience. In a way this saved me, because when you’re improvising you’re in the moment, and that’s exactly where you should be during a speech. From there it went really well. Explaining why I believe Playfulness in Business could help them perform better, creating more openness, connectedness, collaboration and creativity. Attributes that are needed to cope with today’s VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex & Ambiguous) World. Then came the moment of truth, inviting the audience to different kinds of PLAY, like movement play, social play and creative play with a few short ‘Play Missions’.

What happened was, was what happens everywhere. Once people feel that they get the permission or the Licence to Play, they enjoy themselves immensely. Their eyes begin to sparkle. It’s because Play is in our nature. Play connects us and Play is pure Joy.

So for me this was a Mission Accomplished!

Now back home in The Netherlands. I feel that I will return many times to this charming country and it’s very nice people. Special Thanks to Toomas Tamsar, the man who had faith in me, without ever seeing me speak before 🙂

Playful greetings,

Annemarie Steen

(*) photos taken by Urmas Kamdron

Creating a Culture of Innovation using the Power of Play

Most companies and organizations know that in this fast changing and complex world, they have to create a culture of innovation to be able to sustain a healthy business.  A lot of time and effort is spent on creating new strategies, business models, structure, processes, technologies, tools, and reward systems, hoping that these will lead to success. Unfortunately, ‘invisible forces’ are responsible for the fact that 70% of all organizational change efforts fail.

The trick? According to Soren Kaplan, expert on innovation; “Design the interplay between the company’s explicit strategies with the ways people actually relate to one another and to the organization.”

Licence to Play is an innovative concept that identifies and engages your (5-10%)cultural change talents to make the needed  difference from within, using the power of play. Why Play?

Playfulness is something that we all are born with, it’s in our nature to play. Play is the fastest way to create the ‘soft stuff’ that drives innovation; openness, connectedness, collaboration, creativity & learning by doing.

Unfortunately Play is also something that people fear to express in their serious workingenvironment. Therefore I developed the concept ‘Licence to Play’ that allows people in organizations to open up, be playful and facilitate their co-workers to do the same. They literally get a ‘Licence to Play’, signed by the company director. With this licence they will be assigned to perform (secret) play missions and facilitate powerful playful learning games on relevant topics.

Are you ready to PLAY?

Here’s your secret Play Mission: http://youtu.be/Y0uWLHy-yo0

With Playful greetings,

Annemarie Steen

Does your company have a Licence to Play?

When you look at outperforming companies like Google, Zappos, Virgin, South West Airlines and Mindvalley (Malaysia), there’s one thing they have in common. They invite and promote playful behaviour of their staff. Why? Because they know that playfulness is the fastest way to create openness, connectedness, collaboration and creativity; attributes that are needed now more than ever to create innovative products and memorable customer experiences. And their numbers show that it pays off in profits.

Still, work and play are seen as opposites in most companies. In my work as a facilitator of Playfulness and Playful Learning in business, I see that most adults have a huge fear of playing. Play is seen as something childish, not done, crazy, non serious and only permitted among good friends or on the sportsfield. What would happen if companies would invite play to the workfloor, allowing it, or even better; promote it!

More and more research is showing that bringing positive energy in organizations leads to more flexibility and better results in a complex environment.

So how do you get the people in your organization to play more? I developed a brand new learning concept: Licence to Play. A three month program for a selected group of people; the most suitable ones for becoming a positive leader and secret change agent.

Interested to learn more about this Play inducing program?

Contact me for a secret meeting…J

With playful greetings,

Annemarie Steen

annemarie@steentrain.nl