Serious Play Forum

[irene]

Hello everyone.
I have a question that I would like to know if you could clarify me.
I am a certified facilitator of the LEGO® Serious Play methodology.
For a while now, I am seeing people from my environment and social networks, who are not certified and who offer support services with LEGO, to which they put another name, without using “Serious Play”, but which are based on the methodology .
I was wondering to what extent that is lawful.
Thank you very much.

[Michael K. Wyrsch]

Good question, I am waiting for an official answer…

[Alan McShane]

Hi Irene,

As I understand it, anyone can use Lego bricks in their offerings as long as they do not infringe copyright or trademark rules or make it seem that they represent Lego in any shape or form and that applies to LSP offerings and non-LSP offerings. See here for guidelines on Trademark https://www.lego.com/en-us/seriousplay/trademark-guidelines

With regard to LSP itself, it is open-source and therefore available to be adapted and modified in its use by anyone. See the following post http://seriousplaypro.com/about/open-source/

Both accredited and non-accredited facilitators can offer LSP freely but once again the title they use for that offering needs to respect copyright / trademark rules and make it clear they do not represent Lego.

In other words the accreditation gives us the experience, the training and the support of the Master Trainer we trained with and all that comes with the training. However the title / accreditation is not issued by nor endorsed by Lego and as such it does not gives us exclusivity to the use of the method or it’s variants (regardless of how we label them).

That’s my tuppence worth …. but since it is an important point for many of us here, the community can feel free to correct me… That’s what we are all here for ; )

Alan.

[irene]

Thanks for your contributions Michael and Alan.
For what you say I understand that it is legal to do so, now my concern goes a little further: if they are people who have trained well on their own and use the methodology correctly, in the end it is to expand knowledge of LSP and that it suits us all.
My concern comes from a possible bad “representation” that makes the methodology and that affects us all.
I am aware that in front of that we can not do anything, simply sharing it with you helps me.
Thank you all and happy day.

[Rodrigo Borgia]

Hello Irene,

From my standpoint, as happens with this methodology happens with any other.

It depends on the ability of the facilitator to deliver a great workshop or a bad experience.
And of course, a good community support to enhance practices, knowledge and examples.

So, that said, there are other activities from Lego Education (such as Six Bricks) in which the same happens: non accredited can use the method while them are not incurring in trademarks penalties.

In my case, i make the point with every client that asks me: you can contract my services or any other. I have the experience AND the certification. :)

Hope it helps.

Have fun,

Rodrigo

[Alan McShane]

Hi Irene,

A worry shared is a worry halved ; )

Yes you are right. Bad execution has an impact on us all. That said, the accreditation does not guarantee good execution. As Rodrigo says, it comes from learning, sharing, failing, improving, experience etc.

Alan.

[Scott Simmerman, Ph.D. CPF, CPT]

Alan and Rodrigo offer great comments. Let me add one more set of ideas:

I am one of those non-certified folks, but I also have 25 years focused exclusively on facilitation and went through the Certified Professional Facilitator (CPF) offering of the International Association of Facilitators and am also a Certified Professional Trainer (CPT) from the International Association for People and Performance Improvement in addition to a doctorate (Ph.D.) in behavioral neurophysiology from UNC-CH.

My Square Wheels® metaphor has moved from using line art representations of how things really work in to LEGO-framed scenes and tools. We have online facilitation-skills teaching on Udemy for The Square Wheels Project and I have two board games that use LEGO as part of the teaching metaphor about implementing improvement.

We also have a new Roadblocks Management toolkit that uses LEGO scenes to engage people.

Instead of using LSP-created delivery frameworks, which are great, we simply go in another direction. At age 70 (with a birthday this week), I do not think that certification in LSP has much benefit for me or my customers.

There is a LOT more out there about interactive engagement that is not included in LSP certification. There are a LOT of facilitation skills that use METAPHOR more than construction to build the future. The issues are around active involvement, dissociation, reframing, future-pacing and lots of other constructs about how to generate communications and innovation. All the answers are NOT in LSP certification and many new and better ideas about improving skills and perspectives are out there!

And I just started a new Facebook Group called “Serious Playing with LEGO” to focus on sharing a very broad framework on interactivity.

[irene]

It is true, in the end the certification is not indicative of quality either. The important thing is the experience: the amount of workshops given, the shared skills, the successes and the failures obtained. Everything adds up and together we make it more powerful.

Honestly my concern came from a workshop that I have seen announced by a person without certification.
He uses the knowledge he received from the tool in 3hrs (through a friend who in turn was trained with a short 6hrs workshop).
Well, that has given him a different name, and he announces himself as the creator of that method.

When I saw it, it made me very angry, but now thanks to Scott’s comment, I understand that certification is not the important thing, but the desire to provide value to the client, with new ideas that are not written and can grow.

Perhaps the case that I have known closely is not a better example, but in the end the important thing is that the workshop provides value to the client, regardless of whether the facilitator has certification or not.

(By the way, Scott, happy birthday!! and I join the Facebook group if that’s okay).

Everything clarified.

Thanks to each one for giving me your rich and full of experience point of view.

[Rick Lindeman]

I agree with scott and alan.. the focus on certification is in that sense weird, since lego decided to make it open source… I am a certified facilitator (cps) from the IAF and written quite a bit on this method.. so i regard myself as a lego facilitator (as well as a facilitator with many other tools), without being certified by one of the training institutions which are mentioned here… (although i am sure they do good work, in both developing the method, and as stimulating the quality..

[Marko Rillo]

I am also offering certified training courses, but admit that the word “certification” on this market is misleading. Criteria for certification is just survival for 2-4 days at the training. The reason I offer certificates is that many people coming from corporate setting suggest that they need this as the evidence of attendance.

There is no impartial certification nor accreditation body for LSP. A much better measurement is the equivalent of IAF’s certification – like Rick wrote about. Also ICF has a three-tier system for Associate, Professional and Master Certified coaches. In both cases you first need to present the actual references of your clients as an evidence of your value.

So all in all – yes, LEGO SERIOUS PLAY methodology is open source and facilitating with LSP toolset does not require certification. Everybody can do it without being trained. I know many people who haven’t been formally attended training and facilitate really well. The true “certificate” is having paying clients to whom you are providing value.

When it comes to training – I would suggest that it is like riding a bike or climbing rocks. Learning it with somebody who does it well is a safer and faster alternative than doing it alone. You will know how to avoid hitting your head. :)

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