The Play Factor: How Fun Transcends the Modern Workplace
📑 Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Background
02:37 Brandon’s Toy Invention career
08:30 The Role of Play in Work
21:30 Creating a Playful Workplace Culture
32:00 Leadership and Play
38:41 Tools for Making Environments More Playful
47:13 Brendan’s Magic
Disclaimer:
The content shared is to highlight the passion and wonder of our guests. It is not professional advice. Please read our evidence-based research to help you develop your unique understanding.
AI technologies have been utilized to assist in creating content derived from genuine conversations. All generated material undergoes thorough human review to ensure accuracy, relevance, and quality.
💕 Story Overview
In this episode of the MAGICademy Podcast, Brendan, founder of IDEO Play Lab and a fruitable toy inventor discusses how integrating play into learning and work can lead to greater engagement and creativity. IDEO Play Lab is a global design consultancy helping the world’s most audacious dreamers create braver tomorrows. Through his iconic toys like Fisher-Price Jumperoo, Barbie Products, Pictionary Air, and Twister Air Brendan illustrates how maintaining a playful mindset can significantly improve the design process and combat boredom in the workplace.
Magical Insights
Science of Play: Play is not just for children; it is a vital component of adult life that promotes engagement and creativity in the workplace. By recognizing that the opposite of play is boredom, organizations can create environments that encourage playful interactions among employees. This shift can lead to increased job satisfaction and innovative thinking.
Joyful Leadership: Effective leadership involves fostering joy within teams, which can lead to increased productivity and satisfaction among employees.
Creative Rituals: Creative rituals are structured activities that encourage imaginative thinking and innovation. Implementing these rituals can involve setting aside dedicated time for brainstorming, engaging in playful exercises, or using prompts that inspire creativity.
Reframing Mindset: To unlock creativity, reframing one’s mindset is essential. Techniques such as playful drawing exercises can help individuals break free from self-imposed limitations, encouraging a more open and innovative approach to problem-solving.
Movement and Brainpower: Movement plays a crucial role in enhancing brainpower and cognitive function. Incorporating movement into daily routines—whether through stretching, walking meetings, or playful activities—can significantly boost productivity and foster a more dynamic work environment.
⭐ What’s Brendan’s Magic?
Brendan's magic lies in his ability to blend playfulness with design thinking, transforming traditional learning and work environments into engaging, innovative spaces that inspire creativity and collaboration.
Conclusion
Incorporating play into organizational culture can transform not only employee engagement but also overall productivity and innovation. By fostering an environment where creativity and fun are prioritized, leaders can combat boredom and inspire their teams to think outside the box. It encourages individuals to take risks, share ideas freely, and approach challenges with renewed enthusiasm. Ultimately, organizations can cultivate a more dynamic, engaged, and innovative workforce by valuing play as an integral part of work life.
If you would like to stay tuned with our future guests and their magical stories. Welcome to join us.
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Tripathy, M. (2018). Role of Creative Thinking as an Imperative Tool in Communication at Workplace. Journal of Organizational Culture, Communications and Conflict, 22, 1.;
Lee, Y.S. (2016). Creative workplace characteristics and innovative start-up companies. Facilities, 34, 413-432.
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Brendan Boyle is a renowned toy inventor and educator, known for his innovative approach to design and play. With a background in engineering and a master's degree from Stanford, he has dedicated his career to creating engaging learning experiences and fostering creativity through play. As the founder of IDEO Play Lab and an instructor at Stanford's d.school, Brendan emphasizes the importance of hands-on learning and user-centered design in both educational settings and product development. His notable inventions include the Jumperoo and various Barbie products, showcasing his ability to blend fun with functionality. Passionate about lifelong learning, Brendan continues to inspire others by advocating for a playful mindset in both work and life, believing that play is essential for engagement and innovation.
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Jiani (00:04)
Welcome to MAGICademy podcast. Today with us is Brendan, and he is a very successful toy inventor and teaches at Stanford D school, and also is the inventor of IDEO PlayLab. Welcome, Brendan, to our podcast.
Brendan (00:22)
Thank you so much. So fun to be here. Good to see you again.
Jiani (00:26)
Good to see you as well. So people probably have read about you through all sorts of media outlets and they probably heard more of a formal introduction of you and your accomplishment and your ability to infuse fun into business, into toy inventions, into design. If you were to introduce yourself right as of now.
In an interesting way that nobody has heard about how would you introduce yourself? again
Brendan (00:57)
Well, I don't know about nobody, but probably it's not popular or not known. I'm six out of seven kids. So, um, uh, I'd say I always had a group of folks to play with because of the kids. And then I describe, um, my childhood more like a free range chicken. We just ran around all the time. We were outdoor kids. I think our mother wanted us to get outside and play. So it was deep, deep in, in that.
Jiani (01:09)
Ha ha ha!
Brendan (01:24)
and learning since I was younger, was learning from others quite quickly. So I would say a SAP, I really got into love of teaching when I was in grad school and I was a teaching assistant. And then quite quickly after I graduated my master's at Stanford, I started teaching different design classes. And that really got me interested in the whole idea of a better way to learn in a class that's more engaging, if it's more interesting. We've all had some of our best
teachers or professors, they were probably more interesting and they made you want to love the subject. So that's been a big part of my teaching style.
Jiani (01:59)
Yeah.
I wish I could be in your class and just get to play with the classmates.
Brendan (02:08)
If I look at the students and they look bored, I don't think all these students, they don't get it. I look at myself and go, maybe that lesson needs to be a little more engaging or something different. So we do a lot of hands-on learning. We're a lecture for a bit, but then we'll do something. That can be physical or digital, it's something tangible depending on what we're talking about.
Jiani (02:29)
That's beautiful. And we may be curious, like, you share with us, like, your childhood is about, like, outdoor play. Why toy inventions? Why out of everything else?
Brendan (02:43)
Well, I'm an engineer, I'm an engineer, and then engineers get to do all sorts of different things. One part of the process is actually doing a lot of the hardcore design on something. I found the beginning part of the, and I did enough of that, so I know that. I found the beginning part of the process, the ideation and the finding the idea in the first place, I found that way more interesting for me. So when I was doing a lot of design work at a company, I gravitated to that early on design.
And then I left and started my own company and I left with 10 ideas. I think three or four were in the toy area and I thought I was gonna start a toy company. I didn't know there were groups around toy invention companies where you have a team. There are lots of individual toy inventors, but I was more always interested in working with a team. Maybe that goes back to all the kids. But so building a team and then coming up with all sorts of different toy ideas in different areas and then...
Jiani (03:35)
Okay, so...
Brendan (03:41)
then the way the business works is you go down, you go to a toy company and you show them your ideas and hopefully they like one and wanna license it from you. It's definitely not an easy process. It's challenging, because your invention has to be better than anything they're working on or at least more interesting. And got successful a little bit, lucky a little bit early and built that up into a bigger team than a bigger team. And then I was bought by a company called IDO, which is a big design firm.
Jiani (04:00)
Yeah.
Brendan (04:11)
Eventually became partner at ideal, which is exciting. And that was most of my career was inventing at the ideal play lab. And again, toy is a noun, play is a verb, and then fun is a feeling. So the toys are important, but it was the play that I was recognizing, which was where my passion was around how do you get more people to play my Stanford class isn't around kids, it's around adults and how, you know,
And you'll hear, you've heard me, you and I have chatted before, the opposite of play isn't work, it's boredom. So if your employees aren't, are bored, then they're not going to do a very good job. So how do you, how do you give them work that's more interesting? And then eventually we sold IDEO over the last three or four years and I stepped out to do a sabbatical. Then I joined another toy invention firm. I know, I know all of them because I created one of them.
This one's in London called Fuse London. Great, super smart, um, friends, colleagues over the years. So I'm helping them out, but I'm staying in California. Most of the time I go to London, but once a quarter and it's a really great team. It's, it's super, um, creative and it's just different. It's like being, Gianni, it's like being in the same league. It's just, I joined a different team so I can see different aspects of what's working and then fuse some things on my process and then learn.
Jiani (05:10)
I'm going to go to bed.
different.
Brendan (05:39)
You know, we should always strive to be lifelong learners. You certainly are, from the conversations that you inspire and the folks that you talk to. So how do you stay a lifelong learner? And sometimes, you know, a different story for a chapter of yourself is an interesting way to learn. So I'm learning a lot and hopefully continue to teach.
Jiani (06:00)
That's beautiful. That's beautiful. And when you were out of all this invention, like toys that you invented, what are some of your favorites?
Brendan (06:10)
It's usually, honestly, it's usually one of the things we're working on now that we can't talk about, but the ones we can talk about, a long time earlier in my career, I did a really, it's still doing quite well, it's a juvenile products, like for toddlers, babies, just six months old, called the Jumparoo with Fisher Price. So it allows, you put the baby in there, or the six month old, and they can jump up and down, because they can't really stand yet, but they love this feeling of jumping, like we all would.
Jiani (06:39)
Hahaha
Brendan (06:39)
And that's done really well. I was involved and helped invent the last four Barbie Dream Campers, which has been great. The things we're working on in Fuse are super exciting. Some of these are too recent, but Fuse has had a huge success over the years. They did the Hot Wheels T-Rex Hauler, which is this awesome looking T-Rex. Imagine a T-Rex meets a semi truck that's hauling Hot Wheels cars. So it's really cool. So there's...
Jiani (07:01)
transformer.
Brendan (07:09)
All sorts of stuff there. And then some games I've really enjoyed working on was Pictionary Air, where you draw on the air. And then more recently was Twister Air, where I was in a, in a, like, um, athletic store and they had one of those athletic mirrors that you were supposed to buy, then there'd be a trainer in the, it's a big LCD screen, there's a train, but it's a mirror too. And then you see the, you see the person working out and you're supposed to match them.
And that was really inspirational for, um, Twister here. It's like Twister's these dots that you have to put your hands on. What if those dots now are in the air and it's augmented reality? So always something new, always something new. The combination of physical and digital is interesting. A child doesn't care about the tech. They just care if it's fun. Like when, when toys first started putting motors and batteries, you know, that was a big deal.
Jiani (07:48)
Oh, that's fancy.
Brendan (08:05)
Child doesn't care. If it's more fun to push it, why have a button that makes it go?
Jiani (08:10)
Yeah, it's all about the experience and the feeling of that the experience is able to activate.
Brendan (08:17)
Exactly. I love using the word experience. That's what I talk to my students at Stanford. Play is kind of think about experience design. What is everything's designed unless it's nature. So what is your experience by waiting in line somewhere? Is it like waiting in line at Universal's Harry Potter line? That's a fun line because they have so many things for you to do. Or are you like at the post office? That's not very fun. Like that's a terrible experience. Or the Department of Motor Vehicles. You couldn't get a worse. Sorry if anyone's listening from the
department of vehicles, but a big opportunity to improve your experience. Um, one is when I talk to companies, I talk about what's your experience or what's your engagement level and how do you bring more joy and delight? I'm doing a lot of one day workshops for companies where I'll give an overall talk about play and then I'll do a lot of my work from Stanford, trying to bring more joy and delight into, into work.
And then also we can pick an issue that's more relevant to them and do some fun brainstorms at the end.
Jiani (09:24)
Yeah. And then, um, I'm curious, like, how do you define engagement? Cause I see we use this word like a lot. And what is engagement? People, people say that all the time.
Brendan (09:34)
Well, I define it, it can be all sorts of different things, but I define it with companies just because it's already a word in their vocabulary. They have a key performance indicator, so they usually have 10 top ones and one is around engagement and they know what that score is and how they do it. They do it with surveys or they do other things, but it basically comes down to do you like your job? Do you like what you're doing? Do you think it's important? Do you think you have purpose? So it's all those you can unpack.
But the one most companies are not really unpacking is this thing of play. And then when I, they think play is a little bit frivolous or they'll go, Hey, Brendan, we got play. Look at the foosball tables or look at the, we got a slide in our office. And I go slides, foosball tables. That's great. But that's not the way I would measure play. I would measure it through how much do your people like their jobs or are they interested in what they're doing? So the set KPI.
Jiani (10:07)
Mm.
Brendan (10:28)
And then I'll say play is a secret ingredient that you're not really helping unpack your engagement. It's around joy and light. Is it, do you want to come into work? Is it joyful? Is it interesting? Um, and is it feel like the company in the leadership's trying to do meaningful things, you know, and then you can define meaningful whatever industry you're in.
Jiani (10:53)
And let's kind of, I'm still curious about the toy invention part of it. So let's, let's kind of read, like rewind a little bit. Um, like, can you share with us a story of one particular toy that you've designed? And what does the, what does the zero to one process look like?
Brendan (11:00)
Oh, sure.
Jiani (11:21)
How was this idea was like born out of the team? And I'm just so fascinated about this, like zero to one process of building something out of...
Brendan (11:34)
Our toy design, it's a lot like, well, it overlaps quite a bit with user-centered design. I teach design thinking, user-centered design. So I always like to uncover a need. What's the real need? And it's hard when it's just fun because that can be new and novel, but fun could be something that's, it is based on it. Like the Koosh ball was invented 30 years ago and the actual need was that inventor
was trying to make a ball easier to catch for a two-year-old. That's that ball with, looks like a whole bunch of little rubber band strings coming out of it. And so I had a real need. The people, when they bought it, they also filled this novelty need or even a fidgety need because it was fun to throw and catch and things like that. The first Nerf ball was a foam ball. And the need was, you wanted your kids to be able to play ball indoors without breaking a whole bunch of stuff. So, it's around that. The need on the jumparoo that I invented
Jiani (12:09)
Mm-hmm.
I'm sorry.
Brendan (12:32)
was based on some of my master's work around a colicky infant, which is, you know, an infant that just cries all the time. Some motion helps stimulate the nervous system, so it helps soothe. So that's more of a scientific reason around that. But invention for me is always around, is there a need and then how fast can you take that insight and ideate, come up with lots of ideas, then how fast can you prototype? Because for...
Inventor you have to have a whole set of tools and one is making things and that can be physical or digital But you have to have more than just a sketch. So this is This is a Barbie Stroller and it pops open from one puppy so you can hold two puppies and It's a little button it telescopes. So it's really fun. It transforms. This was the original sketch that I did
on the back. This is just the back of the napkin sketch. This guy, it went from one to three puppies. Now it didn't go right from this drawing to this. It went several models in between from a foam core model. I remember my first model was foam core like cardboard rubber bands, then probably went to a 3D printed model, and then probably another 3D printed model. So then you have to like see if you can get the toy company interested. Fortunately, Barbie liked that one. So, but it usually for me, and the
Jiani (13:54)
I'm sorry.
Brendan (13:57)
The young designers I coach start with a sketch, like get comfortable with a quick drawing. And some folks on the team are, a few are amazing on drawers. Some are just good at back of the napkin, doesn't matter. You just have to get your drawing out. And I coach students this, I say, I've been around creative people my entire career. One thing they have in common is they're comfortable doing a quick drawing. Doesn't have to be amazing, but something that's more than just writing words.
And then I ask students like, raise your hand if you think you're a good drawer. No one raises their hand. And then I say, raise your hand if you think you're good at writing emails or texts and everyone that I can do that. Right. We do it all the time. So if you did like five or 10 drawings every day and you learned a little bit more and techniques is all about technique and practice, you get better at it. So.
Jiani (14:32)
Hahaha
Hahaha
I think it's overcoming that initial state of like judgment or fear or anxiety or just a pre preset of restrictive thoughts about you, what you can do, what you cannot do, what the teen can do, what the teen cannot do.
Brendan (15:05)
Yeah, I did.
I did a little drawing exercise in class. I've done this for a long time, but I did a twist on it where I give everyone this fancy piece of paper. It has a gold frame around it, so it looks like it's gonna be a famous drawing. And I say, find a partner, and in the 30 seconds, you draw their portrait, and they have to draw you. And I can see the whole class tighten up like, oh, I ain't gonna... Then I say, well, let's reframe this. Now, pretend you're in kindergarten, and I'm gonna give you guys crayons.
Jiani (15:31)
Hehehe
Brendan (15:40)
Now draw your portrait like you would as a kindergartner. Then everyone's having fun. Like there's no pressure. I just get to draw. The drawings are probably gonna look the same, unless you've had more drawing practice, but the pressure's down and the class is laughing. And when I don't put the kindergarten twist on it, I see when people show their drawings, I say, all right, share your drawings. I hear a lot of I'm sorrys. Like, I'm sorry I screwed up your face. With the kindergartners.
Jiani (15:45)
Hahaha
Hahaha
Brendan (16:06)
They're all just having a great time when you're acting like a kindergartener and everyone's just having fun drawing, right? So a lot of it's mindset.
Jiani (16:14)
Yeah, I think the mindset is very important. And, and a lot of our audiences are like entrepreneurs, leaders in, uh, in a company of all sorts. And potentially one of, one of the challenges that they usually encounter is how do we.
engaged teams, how do people become better leaders or followers or team members? And so they can get together around the idea or give birth to new ideas and help them to overcome potential challenges and solve problems in innovative ways. And you wrote an article about how great leaders are all puppy-like. So can you share with us like exactly what you mean and how do we empower leaders?
Brendan (16:55)
Yeah, it was a...
You know, I sit on this National Institute for Play Nonprofit Board where their main goal is to fund science of play. Think about knowing questions of science of sleep, how important it is, and we all wish we got more sleep, and we understand their sleep hygiene. People don't really understand there's a lot of great research over the last five, six years on papers and research around the science of sleep and how important it is and how it's intrinsic in us. So if you don't get enough
play, again the opposite of plays and work is boredom or depression with kids. So I was talking to one of the scientists and he mentioned about play posture and I go what's that? He goes well the easiest way to explain play posture is look at a puppy. When you come home you know and you have a puppy there, they're yeah that's it's a classic play
So I tell leaders like, what's your fly posture? Are you sitting like this? Are you on your screen? Someone comes up to you that's not your boss. If it's your boss, you're putting this thing down. But what if it's someone who works for you? Are you treating them just as important as everyone else? So everyone thinks your dog can read your mind. Your dog is probably just so good at user centered design. They observe you, their owner, they just constantly watch you. So if you look upset, they look guilty. If you look happy, they look happy. So they're trying to mirror what you're doing.
So if you're the leader and your play posture isn't engaging, just be aware of it. Cause especially for CEOs, I coach them, you're being watched. People just wanna know, is that CEO in a good mood or not? So you can help the culture of your company by just making sure you're aware. Some of it's just having to be aware. Some of it, you may not be intentional, but if your head's down in a laptop and you're not listening, people will notice.
Same for parents, by the way. You can tell your kids what to do all day long. They're going to see what you're doing and act accordingly. So it's the actions, it's not the words.
Jiani (19:05)
And I think also in terms of like the mindset, it's like always receptive, open to listen and pay attention to the ability for human beings and especially adults to play. In this society, we have this ability to really kind of train the playful mindset out of our mind and body and especially for adults and
How do we bring that back? Or people would say, well, being too playful will hurt the business. It means that you're not serious. And play seems like it's the opposite of being serious. Like how?
Brendan (19:48)
Now, so when I do these work, I just did a workshop for a big fortune, top 10 company. And it's a lot of the same things. Like we don't want to, we don't want to lose our, you know, work productivity. And then I'll really dive into the science of play, how science of play actually increases productivity because people are enjoying what they're doing more. They're more relaxed. They feel more confident. They feel more confident to take a risk because if you fail, it's, it's okay. Now, if you, if you
take the same risk and fail again, that's a mistake. But if you have a culture that sort of almost rewards, I tell one or two funny fail stories from inventing or my career and tell leaders, like make sure you share a story where you failed, but include the part where you learned, because failure is good providing you learned from it. If not, it's just a mistake. And we're so coached through K through 12 in college, whatever.
We're just not supposed to make mistakes. I mean, 92% again, A-minus crazy. Like that's not in, if for the entrepreneurs out there, if you're hitting 92%, you're, you're crushing it because you usually have so many little failures. What you want to do is have failures quickly and learn from them and then keep going. That's in toy invention world, that's a prototype or lots of folks, that's a prototype. If you nuance that prototype forever before you actually get feedback, you're not going to, you're going to learn too late. So you want those little.
learnings.
Jiani (21:15)
iterative feedback or micro adaptive feedback as soon as possible.
Brendan (21:20)
Exactly.
Jiani (21:27)
How can we say if we are having like a team meeting and how are there any strategies, techniques that we can do that's coming from the science, coming from your experience?
Brendan (21:40)
I usually like to think about mindset again and ritual. So the first day of class at my design for play class, I lay down a hopscotch match through the doorway. And I see about half the classes see it and they smile, half the class students see it and they smile. And then they skip in the class and they have a big smile. So I changed their mindset a little bit. The other half don't even see it cause they're so type A, they gotta get to class or they, so then it becomes a prototype lesson. Like half you saw, half you didn't.
Then I assign the students to do a class doorway ritual for each of the next classes. And then lots of creativity and lots of experimentation. But the whole point is to allow people mechanisms to change their mindset. And rituals are a good one. They can be simple rituals. So what is a ritual for your organization, your team, your company? What would be a fun ritual to start off a meeting? It's not like to yell at people about the rules. It might be something different.
So you could design those or that might be a little project for team one design. Most class team projects, your professor assigned to your team and then hands you the challenge or the work, and then you go sit in the corner and first thing you do is you exchange your names and your phone numbers and it's so like non-engaging. It just feels like, ah, so what I'll do, yeah, before I hand out the challenge, the project.
Jiani (23:01)
Check the box.
Brendan (23:07)
I'll put the team together and tell them to come up with a team name and go off into the campus and interview some people with rough questions about what the project is going to be. They don't even know yet. So they've had this experience of becoming a team before feeling like I was assigned to this team. I think there's a lot. There's just a lot of creativity there. You can use some examples, but it's almost more interesting and meaningful if some of these rituals come born from.
Jiani (23:23)
Mm.
Brendan (23:35)
the company culture or how you want to transform the culture.
Jiani (23:41)
Can you give us a little bit more examples of some rituals that we can...
Brendan (23:46)
I was in our Francisco office and this is pre-pandemic so there's a lot of people there. And I hear a little bell ring, kind of like it's a wonderful life. And I go, what's that? And everyone started clapping. And someone leaned over and said, oh, someone accepted an offer from us. So it's just kind of a nice, it was a nice thing. I think a lot of...
First days are very like memorable for people at work or at school or any organization you join. So what could you do? It's not high price point, but it is fun. I remember we had a team that would interview the person, what their favorite music artist was. And they'd go into the tech area where it was out in the open, but where you got your laptop and your other stuff on the first day. And their favorite artists would be playing on a turntable.
and we'd found an actual album and signed it by everyone in the group saying welcome. So it's little things like that. I think it's a lot of opportunities that are just a touch point of joy and delight. But with that mindset of that's playful, that's interesting, that would make that person's day. When you talked about, Jiani about experience, that makes their experience more memorable.
Jiani (25:02)
Yeah, and I could definitely foresee that person like decades later and say, oh you remember that first day? Oh I still have that album, you want to play? You want to listen to it? It's just such like in-depth like human connection.
Brendan (25:12)
Yeah.
I still remember the other first way. I had an internship in college. I'm not gonna tell you who, but I come there, I get there on time. The guy puts me in this office with fluorescent lights and he gives me this giant manual and goes, well, read this today. He's like, that's terrible.
Yeah.
Jiani (25:40)
Oh my goodness. And let's kind of follow on this trend of thought here. The first day is to create this in-depth human connection that's memorable. And then moving forward, how do we actually bring back the play, back to the workplace, or back to the team?
Brendan (26:05)
Yeah, well, one, you've got to have an enlightened leadership that actually wants this. I find people who have just joined want it no matter what. They're like, Hey, I was having a lot more fun in school or something. So they want it, but they can't just do it and start doing things without having some kind of air cover. So if someone, it doesn't have to be everyone, but it has to be someone. Like this company, I was doing a workshop for last.
We had an enlightened leader that said, we need more of this. Others, we're in a hybrid workforce. At school, we're back a hundred percent, which is just sort of nice. You don't have to have this trouble trying to hook up the tech. And then some people are in person. Some people aren't. So I'm definitely recommending to my students going out into the workforce or returning to the workforce, try to take a job where you can go in person as much as possible. You're just going to.
Jiani (26:50)
That's challenging.
Brendan (27:02)
have so many more meetings that are not like a Zoom meeting or a video call where it disappears. It's all those meetings that are afterward, beforehand, and you get to meet people on a different level, especially in person. It's just the way humans are built. So the more you can do that. So trying to figure that part of the world out because it's social play, social connection.
Jiani (27:31)
Yeah. And then, um, so yeah, ideally if it's in person, that's the best because a lot of nonverbal cues or maybe we just built biologically to, to social and to, to be in each other's space a little bit.
Brendan (27:46)
Yeah. Let's do our next podcast together. Let's, let's figure out how we do it in person. Let's, let's make our own little meeting.
Jiani (27:51)
Yeah, it's like in person podcast. That would be nice. And so I'm just kind of this distilling, um, some, some key ideas. So the first impression in depth in human connection, humanized connection, um, ideally associated with somebody's interest or passion and, and a team kind of demonstration of care, team's care for that particular person, then, um, ideally it's in person. If we have.
physical space that people can get around and what would be the next element that you think would be very helpful to bring back that sense of leadership? You mentioned about the enlightened leaders.
Brendan (28:35)
I think leaders or even adults, once they start to unpack play more, and that's sort of my mission in life, there's been research on play personalities. So one might be the explorer, one is the competitor, one is the collector, one is the director. So these are different types of play personalities. You can kind of go back and just think about your childhood. Which one or two of those were you? Did you love to collect stuff? And then why aren't you doing that anymore? Did you end up, are you kinesthetic?
play personality where you love to move. When you're dancing or moving, that's what made you most. We did a project, it was all around learning in the elementary school. It's an obvious insight, but kids love recess. They love recess. And you would automatically conclude, oh, that's because they don't have to be sitting in, you know, the teacher yell now or lecturing. But one of the big insights about recess is they could move around.
And that just felt good for their brain. So how do you incorporate more movement in the classroom was the big insight. We had a bunch of cool ideas on that. So thinking about what is the insight behind the reason versus just coming to your own conclusion.
Jiani (29:49)
Yeah, and even workplace, like sometimes you have to sit on your desk 24, like throughout the day, how do we incorporate more movement or intentional movement?
Brendan (29:58)
Yeah, I coach leaders that lead by walking around. You sort of lead by walking. This was easier to do pre-pandemic, but a lot of folks are coming back at least three days a week, don't sit in your office and wait for folks to come to you. Walk around and just, don't be scary walking around. If you do it enough, people will want to see you and just, you know, say hi or avoid you working on that kind of thing. Um, yeah, I think that's interesting. I, I do think this hybrid working has to be take advantage of it. I gave a talk.
Six months ago and they wanted it to be 300 people virtual. This is a big company big entertainment company and I said well That doesn't really appeal to me because I like seeing my students and I can feed off the energy of them I said could you get at least 30 into a room and we'll call that our studio audience and the VP liked that idea and it worked out great because then I was Talking to 300 but it didn't feel like it to me. It felt like the 30 people in the room and
And certainly during the pandemic, the late night hosts found that out to be, they're telling jokes, but they needed that energy to feed off of. So I think there'll be some different hybrid uses of our space, uh, versus this, either this or that or a combo. Um, so
Jiani (31:16)
And then for like a playful workplace, what do you think are some necessary preparations that enlightened or playful leaders needs to be aware of or at least that thing?
Brendan (31:34)
I don't think you'd find any setback again, the same analogy from a leader saying, I don't want my people to sleep so much so they will work harder. You know, like they're sleeping too much. So it should be similar around once they understand the science of play and play personalities, and it's about engagement. How do I, how do I match the work with the meaning? Cause a lot of companies have a lot of big purpose statements and things like that. But that's.
the employees don't really understand it and it doesn't really match with the work. So if you can get those two down and you're actually working in an area that you really feel passionate about, this is where a lot of folks who get this right away with a hobby, they just love their hobby so much. And it's a ton of effort. And sometimes those hobbies turn into entrepreneurship or a career. And then they feel like I've never worked in a day again because they're doing it. You're probably not gonna get there.
all the time with a bigger company, but you can get closer. You can keep trying to move to where does it feel like people don't feel like they're working, but they're enjoying what they're doing and they're making a living, of course. So I think it's keep striving for that and it's a process. It's not all of a sudden you're going to get there.
Jiani (32:46)
Hmm. And in terms of like leadership, like you also mentioned about when people think about play, they fear that being able to play will hurt the productivity and you usually use the research about how play can actually increase the productivity. Can you share a little bit more on that? Like how does, how exactly?
Brendan (33:10)
It depends on the process and it depends where in the process. Like if it's the night before the big presentation to the board of directors, you probably don't need everyone trying to exploratory play a new idea. But if it's, you know, three months till you need to come up in the marketplace with other ideas earlier on in the process, when a leader says, just go play around with that, your team will go play around with that and learn.
I think we're all, people have asked me a lot about AI and things like that. Well, my answer sort of is just go play around with it and see what's interesting to you. See if it feels like there's something there. Don't be so afraid you don't even want to touch it because it feels like, you know. But yeah, I think a leader that's earlier on in the process, say go around and play with that or understanding it can be throughout the entire process, but it doesn't have to be the big idea. It can be the little idea too.
I always look at companies when I check into their lobby and a lot of their lobbies feel like TSA checkpoints. So you have a security guy there and I'm like a professional, I'm interested, I'm supposed to be here, but I always feel like, like I've done something wrong versus why not change that experience so it feels more on brand. And then it's good for, you know, new recruitment or it's good for customers, clients, or the people who work there themselves. If they
Jiani (34:10)
Mm.
Brendan (34:38)
had a little more of a joyful experience just coming into the building.
Jiani (34:43)
Yeah, it feels like, oh, I'm coming home. Ah, this is some place that I wanted to play and I wanted to like play with my companions or coworkers. Or nice. And you also mentioned about in our previous talk, you were talking about the charm of true playful leaders or works kind of like a movie director. Yeah, can you share us? Yeah.
Brendan (34:46)
Yeah.
A little bit. People also think play is you're kind of goofy or out open. I don't think it's different play personalities because you might be more of the storyteller. And if you're a really good storyteller as a leader and you're going to go back and tell stories of your own career or your own stories in the industry, people find that incredibly engaging or charismatic. So you don't have to be the jokester. That is a different style of play.
The jokester might be just more witty and fun. And, and always when I talk about play or these play personalities, it's good spirited, not mean spirited, because you know, you could be a jokester and mean spirited and you're punching down versus punching up when you punch up, you might pick fun at yourself and that's okay. You never want to punch down. So, um, on a joke, you can be self-deprecating on yourself sometimes. Um, but yeah, I think it's just a lot of.
Jiani (35:44)
Mmm.
Brendan (36:03)
of the leaders understanding what their own play personality is and how can they embrace that and bring it into part of their leadership. You might be the competitor as a play personality and that's fine providing again it's good spirited competition. You watch junior golfers who they're young, they're learning all the rules of golf and they call their own penalties. There's no referee who they're trying to like sneak around. They're learning good sportsmanship.
So if you're a competitor and you want your team to do well, it's great. Oh, this is a funny story. Years ago, I was working with Cranium Toys. They were up in Seattle, great company. They were bought by Hasbro. But they were competitors, but they had such a good slogan, everyone shines. But they had the revenue, they had a big square floor and they had every million, they had a big...
It looked like a big monopoly board, but it was a million. And they had to get to their revenue for the year. So each time they got to another million, they didn't just move the game piece one up. You know, it's a big five foot game piece. They grabbed the game piece, grabbed a couple of big gongs and ran around the whole square and then moved it to the next square. So what a delightful way to have the good spirited competition on revenue versus just the reports says, hey everyone, we made our targets good for us. Right?
Jiani (37:31)
Yeah. So it's like an embodied place. Like you're moving and you're celebrating. You're getting feeling the emotions.
Brendan (37:35)
That was just a clever way, it's just a clever way to share revenue for the month or whatever.
Jiani (37:43)
So when you're talking about like the movie there's definitely a lot of like play personalities and When you're talking about like it's like a movie director Is there a layer that's beyond the play personality and more?
Brendan (37:58)
Some people like to direct and I find good leaders, you know, you think about being an individual contributor and that younger in your career, that's pretty important. You're trying to make, you know, prove that you're, should be there and working hard. As you go further through your career, you might be leading a team or leading a group. And for me, as I got further in my career, I just really wanted to set the stage. And a director...
doesn't get all the fame sometimes, but he's setting the stage for the actors and making sure they're set up for success and the movie's well produced and it's got a good film editor. So you're trying to put all the components together for success versus like taking all the credit. I mean, the director does get credit, but it's not like your main actor who's headlining.
Jiani (38:52)
that setting the stage can we kind of unravel that like setting the stage if we were to transfer this concept into like setting the playful stage for the talents in the workspace how is that getting done
Brendan (39:05)
I think it's...
Setting the stage and making sure, making sure as a director, you give everyone credit possible. So you'll remember if you're at a big team meeting, there's a whole bunch of people and someone's up there like thanking all the team members. And if you were on that project and you know, you didn't do a lot, but you did something. And if your name doesn't get mentioned, you go, ah, forgot about me, right? Versus if your name does get mentioned, you go, oh, that was nice. That was good. And if you look at a movie.
at the end, how many credits are in there? They nuanced to make sure everyone got credit who was working on that movie. So seldom, even in the toy invention world, the press likes to talk about it like it's the lone inventor. It's always a team. It's always a shared invention. And the best inventions that have come out of my teams have been like everyone felt like they touched it at some point. It was rarely the person who was off in the corner that came up with it and then walked over. So thinking about that, just making sure that's celebrated.
Um,
Jiani (40:10)
That's beautiful. So creating a space that everybody will have the opportunities to contribute peacefully and be able to mention, credit their contributions. Yeah.
Brendan (40:25)
And that's learned by example because that junior person out there hears their name. And then when they go up to the ranks, they're going to want to do the same thing. You just want it. It's, it's no cost to share, share more credit, uh, or just to make sure you're, you're sharing whoever was touching it.
Jiani (40:43)
And does it take an inventor like you to set the stage for playfulness?
Brendan (40:51)
I don't think so. I think this is a lot of my work at Stanford. I get 35 students a quarter and I'm hoping they go out and try to change, the organizations that they're working in. And then these workshops I'm running through, they don't need to hire me. They can have me run a workshop so that it's easier. And then they can take some of those tools and start using them.
Jiani (41:17)
And when you say tools, what tools do you actually use when you're helping people to transform into a more playful space or helping them to set the stage?
Brendan (41:24)
It's like how to run more playful meetings, how to run more playful brainstorms, how to think about engagement when you're trying to frame up work and challenges. It is a lot of things that you can start to do next week. If it's a Friday, you can start on Monday on some of those things.
Jiani (41:43)
How we, throughout our conversation, have we touched upon like how to do a playful meeting that you share some of it, or there's some pieces that it's not there yet.
Brendan (41:53)
I took, this is interesting. That seems a little tactical for where we're going, but I did a, I've done a lecture at a couple of different universities on how to be a more engaging professor. And it's a lot of the learnings I've had from all my teachings. I sort of put them down and here's, here's what I'm doing. And see this translates to you and the professors love it. In fact, I got one professor who came up to me and said, are we allowed to do these things? I'm like, it's your glass. You can do.
You can try to make your class more interesting. There's no law about that. I don't take attendance, but what I do is build a name badge for everyone and write it out myself and put it on the table. One, it's a lot faster. Two, I'm learning their names. And three, I can instantly see who didn't make class because that name badge is left. So that's a clever way to like make your class go more efficient, learn people's names.
And then, um, then having show up like, cause I'll ping them right away and say, I didn't see you in class. Are you okay? I'm teach like you're a professional. You just don't not show up to work. You just don't not show up to classes without letting somebody know.
Jiani (42:58)
Hahaha
Yeah, and playful meetings. So are we, is there like a process to run a playful meeting? Is there a framework you need to think about? How, if there's like brand new manager or entrepreneurial leader, they wanted to.
Brendan (43:22)
I think a lot of stuff has to be efficient and you have to get stuff done. You got to go over what we're accomplishing this week. Who's doing what. So I like the word game mechanics, as it implies, like you're doing something to improve the process. Gamification feels like, oh, that's just putting some candy in the meeting or something like that. So what I would say is do those meetings. There might be a different way to like host them, like maybe someone else hosts them each time.
But the meetings I get more excited about are a different type of meeting where everyone's looking for inspiration and they share that once a week. So they come in or we have a private Instagram channel and so people can populate it and then once a week, we'll just pull up the channel and say, tell us what you saw here, what's going on. Those are way more interesting kind of meetings and things like that. So figuring out like, you got to do some of the meetings that are just like, you know, it's workflow and other things. That's.
You know, hopefully everyone's in a good mood. My goal on those would be making it as fast as possible. So you're not spending so much time. Or make sure you don't have too many people. A lot of people like to go to meetings in big companies because they feel like they're going to miss out. So it's making sure you're, again, if you're the director, giving them air cover, like, hey, we're going to update you on this meeting with a quick brief so you can get, you know, do other stuff that you would find more exciting.
Jiani (44:51)
That's beautiful. We've been just like, it's kind of like a crash course of how to turn your workplace culture into a more playful and productive place. Beautiful.
Brendan (45:02)
Yeah, I don't know why meetings are always scheduled for like 45 minutes or an hour. I always had this concept, especially in bigger companies, you'd have like recess where everyone has to go into the courtyard and then wander around. Then you could have that five minute meeting that you couldn't even schedule. Cause he's, I bumped into Jimmy, I got one minute to talk to you. So everyone goes on recess once a week for an hour and they bump into each other. So if you couldn't get a meeting with that person, you might.
Jiani (45:33)
Love it.
Brendan (45:33)
We were down at, um, I was running a project at Headspace and meditation, and they did a group meditation like once or twice a day. It was really kind of cool because he'd sit in a big room and someone would, would sort of run the five, 10 minute course and you feel kind of chill. It was right on brand for them.
Jiani (45:51)
That's beautiful. What role does mindfulness play in the playful space?
Brendan (45:57)
I think mindfulness is just good as a human, just like trying to be mindful. And we're so distracted with our devices and trying to make sure we're listening. And try some tricks at home. Try not to have two screens open when you're on a virtual call. Try to like pay attention, especially to your partner or kids. And cause it's all...
it's all behavior someone's watching and learning from. So just make sure, I was doing this improv interviews or questions of folks, just random folks I was running into, how many screens you have open? And there's one guy was like, he was an Uber driver. Oh, I normally have like six, seven open. And it's like, oh my God, he's playing a video game, he's reading the papers, doing all this stuff. And it's just like, yeah.
Jiani (46:53)
Just by thinking about that, I'm getting over the place. As an inventor yourself, what practice do you do to enhance your ability to focus and not getting distracted?
Brendan (47:06)
Well, it's the state of flow. So a lot of people who make stuff find that state of flow, you know, or people, video gamers understand this, if it's too hard, you give up, if it's too easy, you're bored. So you want, you want to learn a little bit. So whatever your state of flow is for me, it's like tinkering, coming up with an idea, sketching it, tinkering, playing with it a little bit, sharing it with the team, getting feedback or a brainstorm is a state of flow for me, just because it's enjoyable. Teaching is.
You know, a good class is just a state of flow. I want the class to be engaged. I want them to be engaged. I set the students all in a circle, uh, initially, so they can't check out. No one can be on their device in the back. Yeah. A student who was in the education department taught me that because she used to be a kindergarten teacher. So, um, so yeah.
Jiani (47:53)
It's like a fish ball.
Brendan (47:54)
Well, it's just everyone's on equal terms. It's not like the CEO is sitting up front and everyone else is in the back. So it's hard to work with a group bigger than 30 to 35, unless you got a bigger space.
Jiani (48:08)
Hmm and I think for 30, it's maybe like a big circle or smaller circles. I would
Brendan (48:14)
It's a big circle. It works out great. And then we'll break up into smaller teams or into workshop areas and things like that.
Jiani (48:22)
That's nice. And I, so as, as we kind of look into the future with all the emerging technology and you mentioned part of like a virtual reality and, um, AI and what's already been kind of research is like brand machine, brand computer interaction where potentially we can just put a chip in our brand and we'll be able to like, you know, install a download and install a new skill set. Um,
With all this emerging technologies and also biometrics, how do you see play evolving?
Brendan (48:58)
Well, the play behaviors that are intrinsic, especially with kids, aren't going to change because it's like role playing or things like that or exploratory play. Those aren't going to change. For adults, well, one, there's always been emerging technology. It's just like we used to have so much technology in the classroom, like different types of screens and video rooms and things like that. Now every student comes in with this device or similar and they've got all the technology on them.
So it would be, again, I said it earlier in the podcast. Initially, if you don't know anything about it, just start exploring so you can sort of feel relevant. I love this concept. It's from Tom Kelly, author of creative confidence. Have a reverse mentor. So I have lots of reverse mentors. At my age, I'm a mentor to several startups and former students.
I have two or three reverse mentors and they shouldn't be your kids. They should be someone else. Uh, so I have former students who all say, Hey, tell me about, tell me about this or that, or coach me up on this or that. And it's a nice, they, they love the experience and I love the experience, but. You have to try to stay relevant. Otherwise for innovation, if you're not relevant, you're, you don't have to know everything, but you just have to be relevant.
Jiani (50:18)
Do you think playfulness, the ability to play the childlike sense of wonder, to play some sort of role in the state of innovation, like true innovation, growth?
Brendan (50:30)
Yeah, 100%. I think it's a great question. I think curiosity is very close to play. They're like cousins. I've been again around creative people and they're usually curious. Not just about their own industry. I see a lot of execs that are very understanding and relevant on their own industry. They know all that other execs, they know all the competition, but they're not curious about emerging stuff or other companies or things like that. So trying to stay curious.
And that's certainly the beginner's mindset. If you've ever walked around a block with a four year old who's in a good mood, they stop all the time. They're curious. I got to stop. Now that's really great, but you got to be able to turn your curiosity on and off. Otherwise you're never going to get around the block. So a lot of adults have just turned it off. They're just not as curious. Or if they see something, they forget how to be curious. They just judge it like that's stupid. That person's wearing two colors, two different socks. Yeah.
Jiani (51:08)
Hehehe
We hear that a lot.
Brendan (51:30)
So first is there is a sock company that sells individual socks
Jiani (51:35)
Yes, I've seen that. Why not? Who says the socks need to be exactly the same?
Brendan (51:41)
So yeah, try not to judge, try not to judge initially.
Jiani (51:47)
Hmm. I love that. Any potential caution, something that we need to be aware of? Um, is there going to be too much play? Is there...
Brendan (51:59)
No, it's not going to be too much place. It's going to be similar to sleep. People will start to understand the importance of it and start to understand what it really means. And if they can't get it in the workplace and they'll change work, or they'll get it somewhere else.
Jiani (52:14)
So it's kind of a human nature to intrinsic. I love it.
Brendan (52:16)
intrinsic, it's built into us.
Jiani (52:22)
What is so let me give a kind of a recap for our audience up to this point and we'll move into the magic piece. So, so far we've talked about the, the story of Brendan and how he started out of all the other possibilities and focus on toy design and how he loves to be in the in the flow, the process of just sketching out the idea and do sorts of multiple rounds of iteration, get feedback and constantly improve. And we talked about the important.
of play in classroom and also in the workplace and how play is just this intrinsic human nature and we talked about different ways to build a playful culture within your team coming from the first day to the process and to how we celebrate. We also talked about different ways we can do micro celebrations or micro playful moment.
that helps people to just start to get into the play state. We also talked a little bit about the mindfulness and how mindfulness helps us to actually focus and help us to get in a zone of playful flow. So, and we also talked into the future of play, some potential caution that we need to pay attention to. And now let's move to the magic conversation. And so my next question is Brendan.
You probably shared some of those like at the beginning of the conversation But I would still like to kind of ask you again like when you're about like 11 around 11 years old What did you enjoy doing so much that time just disappeared for you?
Brendan (54:02)
Well, it wasn't hanging out in classrooms. I know that. I got, I got a report card that said all he wants to do is go outside and play basketball. So I think I like playing basketball a lot. I liked, um, I liked exploring. We kind of lived it. Well, it was parents in care if you just wandered around. So we would go out exploring and we'd find these gullies or creeks and just sort of wander down, hung out a lot of time exploring versus kids today. And I just, I think it's, um,
Jiani (54:11)
I'm going to go to bed.
Brendan (54:32)
too tricky for parents who are so worried. So I love that. I remember making model airplanes, I found that, or kites. I remember it because that was cheaper. I made a lot of kites. And that was fun. But yeah, it's definitely part making and part exploring.
Jiani (54:49)
I love that. And then you're living like, like a path of tinkering, making, and now teaching and sharing your wisdom with people. That's beautiful. Any particular challenges that you have to overcome that helped shape who you are now as an inventor and teacher and leader?
Brendan (55:15)
Yeah, it was challenging to go to undergrad engineering. It just wasn't a fit for me. And I wanted to be an architect, but my dad was an architect and he said that was too tough of a path because it's hard to make a living. And then my son is a composer. So I think we're all following our path now. So, but yeah, a lot of students are conflicted with this that I coached because they...
you know, they get pressure from parents and things like that. So they're, they're looking for a job that looks good versus feels good. So it's like, you gotta look what feels good versus looks good. And, and that's totally personal to what you're doing or what's, what's happening. So a lot of folks find themselves in a career. It looks good. It pays good, but it doesn't fit good for them. It fits good for others. So trying to figure out what is that fit for you? Um, there's a book from the Stanford D school called Designing Your Life.
which takes your sort of career as a design project. Everything in my world is a design project. So it helps frame up. I coach younger students to, you can talk to me all day long, but talk to someone who's doing what you wanna do, but they're five, six years older than you. So it's like seeing your future pretty easily versus, and say, tell me how you got there. So there's a lot around exploring.
Jiani (56:32)
Mm.
Hmm.
Brendan (56:41)
what you do versus most people. I think I read this article a long time ago. People spend way more time on looking what car to buy than what job to take. Because when I was younger, I was just opportunistic. I just wanted a job. If I'd known I really would have wanted a toy industry, it would have been a total different first job. But I wasn't even exploring it. I didn't even know there was an invention job.
Jiani (57:04)
Yeah, even nowadays, like invention jobs still is very like rare and yeah
Brendan (57:09)
Well, it is rare and it is getting harder and harder, but it could be a designer. I would have been happier as, you know, not mechanical engineer, more different types of design or other communications, but it's exploring and being more intentional about it versus just opportunistic.
Jiani (57:27)
Hmm. What, um, so, so the, how did you overcome that kind of the pressure coming from the family and really just the side?
Brendan (57:38)
I didn't have much pressure from the family because I was, again, six out of seven kids, you know, they were less worried about the younger. Maybe the oldest had more pressure, maybe that's, but there wasn't much pressure there. It was more like just, you know, get an education, get a job. So that's what I did. It wasn't until I got into grad school at Stanford that it just changed my path because at the time Stanford was one of the few schools that were making stuff. The shop was open.
Jiani (57:42)
I think I don't play.
Brendan (58:06)
You know, the electrical labs were open. You could design and build things. So.
Jiani (58:11)
I love that. And as we conclude our conversation, what do you think is your magic?
Brendan (58:20)
It's funny, I hired two magicians that became toy inventors and magic and design really overlap. Most people don't know how an airplane works, but it's levitation, it looks like it's magic, right? So I think we have to appreciate some things that are magic. But I think my magic, what was the question? What is my magic?
Jiani (58:33)
Yeah.
Yes, what is your magic? And people's magic grows, it's always evolving because we don't want to restrict people's view about their magic It's always evolving, so... With that perspective, what do you think is your magic?
Brendan (58:52)
Yeah, I think I'm, again, I've gone from toy, and I still love toys, to play, and then that causing fun. And I'm trying to do that in my invention work and in my teaching work and in my workshop work. It's just trying to move people in that way from...
Play is a verb and it's a good thing and it can make your life more joyful and delightful or your experiences or your company. Who can argue against that?
Jiani (59:23)
Yeah, who can? That's beautiful
Brendan (59:27)
You can, you can if you're a grunt, if you're a grumpy person maybe, but that's okay.
Jiani (59:34)
So I would say it's the ability to help people find their inner play.
Brendan (59:40)
Yes, yes. Play as lifelong. You should keep playing lifelong.
Jiani (59:42)
I love that.
Lifelong exactly and such a beautiful talk Brendan. I had so much fun
Brendan (59:53)
Thank you. And I love the work you're doing and I appreciate it. And yeah, our next one we're going to do together.
Jiani (1:00:01)
Yeah, right in person
Brendan (1:00:03)
Yeah, we can do it. We can do it at Stanford, we can do it here, we can do it there, but we'll figure it out in person. So.
Jiani (1:00:08)
We'll figure out in person. Beautiful. And we can maybe do a play session and invite people to play. That'll be fun. So beautiful. Thank you so much, Brendan, for coming to the podcast and
Brendan (1:00:12)
Oh, that'd be fun.
Thank you for reaching out and I love the work you're doing. And yeah, I hope we can keep it going.
Jiani (1:00:26)
Yes, let's do that. I will keep you posted about the conversation that we've been having and let's visit each other sometimes. And thank you, thank you very much. And in terms of the, let me stop it. So in terms of the
Brendan (1:00:36)
Love it. Thank you. Thank you very much.
