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https://soundcloud.com/adsummitph/come-out-and-playWords: Abi Aquino of MullenLowe PhilppinesMusic: Jasper PerezArtist: QuestRecorded, Mixed and Mastered at Soundesign Manila, with special thanks to Raul Blay.Today on the playground we are going to talk about playing to your strengths … and how finding your strength and the strength of your team can change your performance and profit.Many, many times people question how it is possible to even start this conversation with businesses and organizations whose core values are centered on production, shareholders and profit.Ask someone you know to describe the parts of their work that feels like play? As a reminder, this is when we feel capable, free to decide, change directions, most open to new ideas, authentic.The answer … work is not for PLAYPlay is that kind of risk and hard work for many people, as they have to climb over a whole mountain of guilt, judgement, shame and long held beliefs about productivity and the seriousness of work in order to even imagine it as a driver for change.But what if we considered the “soft skills” that drive innovation, productivity, and what if we said that play is the catalyst to not only igniting these skills but developing and growing them?Play moves us to change, and one of the ways we can use play is to ignite change in the way that we consider the perspective of others and how we see our own strengths, and abilities and opportunities.This is where I believe we need to go backwards to go forwards, we are often talking about the ways in which we progress, move forward and advance without considering that there are skills left uncovered every time we move forward without consideration of where people have been or where they are coming from.Research from Deloitte sayshttps://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/deloitte-review/issue-16/employee-engagement-strategies.html#endnote-42“that teams that operate in an inclusive culture outperform their peers by a staggering 80 percent.”inclusion and employee engagement does have a direct impact on the most concrete element of all. Business results. Why? Because inclusive cultures are what lay down the smooth and solid foundation for innovation.But how do we get from play to inclusion to performance?Through trust…The answer lies in creating psychological safety. In a Google-led study called Project Aristotle,https://rework.withgoogle.com/print/guides/5721312655835136/The internet giant found that psychological safety—the ability for “team members to feel safe and vulnerable in front of each other”—was the number one factor that drove the success of its most effective teams.Go back to the playground for a moment…Fort building… how many did it?My favorite was couch cushions and blankets… my grandparents had the best sectional orange ... and picky like it was made from wool – nonfunctional for sitting on but the BEST FOR FORTS! The key was that this awful material didn’t slip …so you could put the cushions just so and they would hold.The other great thing was that this couch was in the basement – so no adults could watch – so I would create these forts with everything in the basement I could find – my grandfather’s shoe horn that looked like a horse and blankets and sheets from the spare room and things would collapse and I would prop them up with stand up ashtrays and the broom from the laundry room…and then the best – once it was all done – just to lay on your back inside – freedom – mine – hidden – escape –The next step to great fort building was touring someone else through the fort – showing off what you had built and all the nuances of the space. Sharing your creation with someone who could see or connect with your vision…here is my bedroom, the kitchen, this is where the sun comes in and this is the secret exit in case of intruders …don’t gout that one unless its an emergency …it is not well tested!I could often be found at the end of the night asleep inside my “cave” …The next day the phone would ring, and it would be my grandfather wondering where his shoehorn was because he was late for work, or wondering where his plastic flamingos had gone to from the yard…I don’t think it was play for him…But these forts – they come in all shapes and sizes… and they provided this safety net …people still build them all the time…they just don’t realize it…And it is what good companies create for their workers – a place to feel safe, heard and included. To build spaces where everyone is allowed to build, create, and fail, to bring all of their different materials (life experiences, beliefs , values and skills) to space and to build in a way that is for them and others. People are driven to belong and be a part of something but building empathic connections to the different way that we build our forts comes first in seeing that every fort is great – because fort building is personal.When we can help and organizations to see that in play we have great strength, ideas and purpose then we can dig into the reasons why and how your organization deals with:Change ManagementPerformance EvaluationCommunicationProductivityEngagementMental and Physical HealthInclusionLoyaltyRetentionOnce we can recognize and reconstruct those foundational pieces then we can construct a business that grows and thrives sustainably.Play disrupts our standardized way of looking at the world – it invites us to change without shamingA business that can play in both challenging times and success will succeed because they have built and learned fundamentally that new solutions, ways of doing and engaging come from a fundamental trust and vulnerability to be wrong, do it in a way no one has considered, build with materials no one has brought to the table.You see without a diversity of people, perspectives and skills we stay relatively stagnant; we manage change instead of breaking out of set traditions and patterns…We start by building trust because without trust there is not safety and without safety there is not play and without play there is not creativity and innovationIf we don’t have that we will build all kinds of forts to protect ourselves – and keep others out, and hide vs being so excited to invite others in to play.We need to find out about the people we work with and for so that we know their “forts building” stories, because that is where we will find some of their greatest strengths and skills.Bréné Brown“You can’t ever do anything brave if you’re wearing the straitjacket of ‘What will people think?!”Daring greatly : how the courage to be vulnerable transforms the way we live, love, parent, and lead (New York: Gotham Books2012)“There’s no team without trust,” says Paul Santagata, Head of Industry at Google. He knows the results of the tech giant’s massive two-yearstudy on team performance, Which revealed that the highest-performing teams have one thing in common: psychological safety, the belief that you won’t be punished when you make a mistake.Studies show that psychological safety allows for moderate risk-taking, speaking your mind, creativity, and sticking your neck out without fear of having it cut off — just the types of behavior that lead to market breakthroughs.” https://rework.withgoogle.com/blog/five-keys-to-a-successful-google-team/But this does not come naturally, there is a process for learning how to use play as a path to performance.We move people from “why would you build a fort like that!???? To “why would you build a fort like that”?In play we can move from shame and blame to curiosity and discovery.So, let’s look at an example in business… company has 50 employees and has every employee complete a mandatory diversity and inclusion training module and in person training. Employees are paid for the time and return to work the following day… nothing changes… 2 weeks later…no measurable change in engagement, connection, no one talks about what they learned or can apply it to their job – but they have now “been trained” but trained for what?How many people have done this?Ever taken a training course and returned to work on Monday with no new skills, thoughts, ways of knowing, doing, or leading?If you want to lead an organization where employees feel engaged and included, motivated and driven to use their unique skills and talents to drive performance then you need to learn how they play. There is no Fast Food fix, 4 step process that will get you there, it is not just a check box on an application for funding or government approval. A diverse workforce that connects in play will include and perform.After play they will engage differently, look at their work from a different perspective and be curious about ways to make change from the inside of your organization to your customers and consumers.If you want to change direction – put down the walls and find the unique and often hidden strengths of your organization.Business is NOT predictable and consistent …PLAY is PRACTISE for risk and reality.Someone said to me today – Im always thinking I should be doing something else when I am in play …and I said…then you are not IN play…you are doing something that is captivating your time but not your heart – you see when we play …we are enraptured by it, even if it just for a second we are lost in what we are doing…If you are a fort builder…share it, if you are a collector, tell people how much you enjoy it, if you are a painter, show the world…Ken Robinson said you are in your element when you combine something you love to do with something you are good at.https://www.wbur.org/onpoint/2013/06/19/sir-ken-robinsonTake the time to find these…now play is powerful beyond measure.Play will reveal both your companies underlying challenges ( the unspoken and unwritten rules) and the talents of the people you work with and for…how you use it to improve performance and profit, that is a skill.Real creativity comes about through hard work and through application, but not the sort of application that kills the imagination but the kind of work that encourages it. It’s a mixture of those two things, of bringing it together — it’s a skilled process.Ken Robinson.https://www.wbur.org/onpoint/2013/06/19/sir-ken-robinsonThat’s me from the playground today, thanks for playing…. this playground is for everyone.