The people behind SeriousWork
About Serious Work
LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® Facilitation Training and Certification
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Our storyand people

Born in 2015

Built in Denmark

SERIOUSWORK began in 2015 when Sean Blair and Marko Rillo shared a coffee at a gathering of LEGO® Serious Play® facilitators in LEGO's birthplace, Billund, Denmark. We discussed how few books there were about LEGO Serious Play and decided to write a how-book, to help readers understand the process, impact and outcomes of professionally facilitated meetings and workshops.

We launched our book in London in November 2016. It has since become the foundation text for LEGO® Serious Play®. Over the years we have become a small global business being joined first by Jens Dröge in Germany and now our team includes Johnny in Hong Kong, Gaylin in South Africa, Ellen in South Korea, Vicky & Sophie in China and Helen and Liam in the UK.

Our books are available in English, German, Spanish, Mandarin and Korean.
We run the gold standard of LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® trainings all over the world.

We fundamentally re-designed facilitator training

Practice based learning
Practice based learning

To accompany the ideas in the book, next Sean designed what has become the gold standard of LEGO Serious Play facilitation training courses.

Our approach to LEGO Serious Play training is practice based and facilitation-skill centred and helps people learn about the method and also develop their facilitation competency at the same time.

People give amazing feedback on our training. For instance our founder Sean has over 55 recommendations on LinkedIn profile. We now deliver our courses in many languages globally.
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Our next books

Three books in six languages and counting
We are the only trainers in the world to have written four books on the method.
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In 2016 we published our first book SERIOUSWORK. This is now available in English, German, Spanish, Mandarin and Korean.

In March 2020 we published MASTERING The LEGO Serious Play Method. MASTERING shares 44 facilitation techniques that professional facilitators uses to plan and delivers outcome oriented workshops. Also available in German.

In October 2020 we published How to Facilitate The LEGO Serious Play method ONLINE and shared the new techniques we created to deliver Online LEGO Serious Play. Also available in German and Italian.

In March 2023 we published Building Better Learning outlining how LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® can be unlocked in School settings.

LEGO Serious Play training goes online

Game changing development of the method
Even before COVID-19, environmental pressures were asking how remote teams could work together online without the carbon costs of travel.

We have pioneered the first techniques to enable remote teams to use LEGO Serious Play into shared model building (AT2).

We are happy to share these ideas with new LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® facilitators and any trained in the original face-to-face techniques.
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Meet the team
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Sean Blair
Founder and Master Trainer

Sean leads SERIOUSWORK. He was the principal author and designer of the books and developed the SERIOUSWORK LEGO® Serious Play® Facilitation Training course.

Sean is the founder of a ProMeet, an international professional facilitation business. He facilitates learning, growth and change in meetings, workshops, conferences all over the world.

Sean was a co-founder of the Service Design Network, an honorary Fellow at Durham University, a Trustee of the Royal Society of Arts, a council member of the Design Council and a commissioner on the Mayor for London’s Creative Industry Commission. Sean is an IAF Certified™ Professional Facilitator and a winner of a 'Facilitation Impact Award'.

Sean Blair LinkedIn
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Helen Batt
Business and Operations Manager

Helen supports the strategic and operational development of the business. She is responsible for the organisation of client workshops and facilitation training programmes and has financial management and control for the business.

She aims to provide a high quality service in the delivery of projects designed to improve the client experience and is a graduate of SeriousWork training and a certified LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® facilitator herself.

Helen brings over 13+ years experience delivering large scale commercial projects for clients including Hitachi, Siemens and London Underground, specialising in customer-relationship management and strategic resource management. 

Helen Batt LinkedIn
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Jens Droege
Master Trainer

Jens is Executive Coach, Change Manager and Certified LEGO Serious Play Facilitator. With his consulting company within the network of the German Steinbeis University Berlin (SHB) he facilitates workshops and meetings with and without the LEGO Serious Play method and offers leadership trainings.

Jens has over 15 years of experience in training and facilitation which he gained in various leading positions as Business Consultant in companies such as Porsche Consulting.

Jens has a strong belief in empowering people by sharing, listening and reflection, thus resulting in a higher approval and a feeling of responsibility. He has a strong focus on performance and personality, all of which he sees people gain through LEGO Serious Play. He has translated 3 of our books into German.

Jens LinkedIn
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Johnny Wong
Associate

Johnny has been working as a social worker for more than 16 years. He is experienced in counselling, personal coaching, group facilitation and team building.

Johnny was certified LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® facilitation in 2015 in London, and therefore is one of the first certified facilitators of LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® method and materials in Hong Kong. Johnny is also a co founder of Hong Kong based company, Sense Training works with corporates, schools and NGOs to conduct team building, creativity workshops and communication enhancement programs.

Johnny is an honorary lecturer at the University of Hong Kong, where he teaches students how to provide with effective training and counselling.

Johnny LinkedIn
Ellen
Ellen Choi
Associate

Ellen is a certified SERIOUSWORK LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® Facilitator. Primarily, she is a skilled User Experience (UX) designer and UX researcher, holding a Ph.D. in industrial and management engineering, Human Factors.

Ellen holds the designation of an ICF Professional Certified Coach and actively serves as a facilitator for design thinking and design sprint methodologies.

Upon her introduction to LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® by Sean, Ellen recognized its remarkable potential, particularly in enhancing communication across diverse departments. This realization motivated her to introduce the adoption of this potent communication tool within South Korea.

Ellen has successfully launched SERIOUSWORK's training sessions in South Korea and is diligently working to tailor its development to the unique dynamics of the Korean market.
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Camilla Nørgaard Jensen
Associate

Camilla is the Founder of the facilitation firm InterPlay that operates out of Denmark and the US.

At the 2014 International Association of Facilitators conference, Camilla introduced Sean Blair to the LEGO Serious Play method. He immediately recognised its power and later invited her to contribute a chapter to his first book about the method.

Originally an Industrial Design Engineer, Camilla earned her doctorate at Arizona State University by specialising in how to accelerate knowledge-driven value creation in the arenas of creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Her PhD showed how LSP can help solve complex problems that require cross-functional collaboration. She has since pioneered the method with heavy industry professionals, the pharmaceutical industry, US military veterans, and in higher education.

Camilla LinkedIn
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Gaylin Jee
Associate

Gaylin is laying the path for a better world of work through developing leaders and building social capital in teams. Her work is underpinned by conscious business principles and draws on novel methods for alignment, optimisation, and flourishing at work. She works across many industry sectors and sizes of organisation, with a leaning to tech, financial services & FMCG.

With an absolute confidence in the potential for creative, hands-on approaches to create a better tomorrow, Gaylin is Certified in LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® and Online LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®. In 2019 she authored the chapter “From compete to create: exploring new tools” in the Springer Nature Switzerland text “Thriving in Digital Workspaces”.

She writes regularly for Talent Talks Africa and is a frequently on the speaker line-up at the Women in Tech Network South Africa events.

Gaylin LinkedIn
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Sophie, Ma XiaoTsing 麻晓晴
Associate

MA XiaoTsing is an IAF Certified™ Professional Facilitator using the technology of participation to support cultural transformation in commercial cases which require teams to think and make change together. She also works as an external expert delivering talent development programs for many enterprises in China. XiaoTsing is good at diagnosing clients needs paying more attention on creating appropriate designs to achieve intended outcomes that benefit from her nearly 10 years coaching background, an ICF PCC. 

XiaoTsing loves LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® as an excellent participatory tool. With the learning journey of SERIOUSWORK facilitation skills from Sean, she co-translated the book “HOW TO FACILITATE MEETINGS &WORKSHOPS USING THE LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®” into Mandarin so that more Chinese facilitators are able to use the powerful method to enhance communication.

Sophie LinkedIn
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Vicky Qu
Associate

Ms Qu Yun is a highly recognized trainer of leadership, and a profound coach of organization and relationship systems with credentials of International Train-for-Trainer, ICF PCC, Master Facilitator of LEGO Serious Play & Points of  You & Design Thinking. 

She has more than 15 years of management experience in top ranked multi-national companies across FMCG, retail and manufacturing industries, and rich work experience both global and local in areas of market strategy, operating model, operations and company university.

Ms Qu Yun holds a post-graduate degree of Developmental & Educational Psychology at Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and a bachelor degree of Business Administration at FuDan University. She is bilingual, fluent English with overseas working experience in,Australia.

Vicky LinkedIn

Our friends

We are lucky to have good friends of our business
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Camilla Nørgaard Jensen
Friend of SeriousWork

Camilla is the Founder of the facilitation firm InterPlay that operates out of Denmark and the US.

At the 2014 International Association of Facilitators conference, Camilla introduced Sean Blair to the LEGO Serious Play method. He immediately recognised its power and later invited her to contribute a chapter to his first book about the method.

Originally an Industrial Design Engineer, Camilla earned her doctorate at Arizona State University by specialising in how to accelerate knowledge-driven value creation in the arenas of creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Her PhD showed how LSP can help solve complex problems that require cross-functional collaboration. She has since pioneered the method with heavy industry professionals, the pharmaceutical industry, US military veterans, and in higher education.

Camilla LinkedIn
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Mirjami Sipponen-Damonte
Friend of SeriousWork

Mirjami is the founder and CEO of the leading faciliation business in Finland: Xpedio and has 13 years experience in facilitation and organisation development.
Mirjami is a global board member of the International Association of Facilitators, and the European & Middle East Regional Director.

In 2016, she was awarded the "Gold Facilitation Impact Award" award for outstanding facilitation. Mirjami is a certified LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® facilitator.
Mirjami inspires the opportunities of working with the groups and the experiences of success in creating functional processes for the individual needs of the group. Paying attention to the learning environment, adapting to the situation and the needs of the group, and creating a confident and secure environment are all important in building relevant group experiences.

Mirjami LinkedIn
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Héctor Villarreal Lozoya
Friend of SeriousWork

Héctor has 18 years experience facilitating and business consulting throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.

Héctor has a Master Degree in IT Management and a post graduate diploma in Conflict Resolution from Madrid Complutense University. He's been a member of the International Association of Facilitators since 2004 and a Board Member from 2014-2019.

He is a Certified Online Facilitator in LEGO Serious Play which he uses to engage meaningful conversations with groups that aim to produce significant change. His passion for aiding teams to develop true collaboration skills has cemented his belief that LSP can cut across the surface to create profound and beneficial interactions. He is currently translating the Online book of LEGO Serious Play into Spanish.

Héctor LinkedIn
LEGO, SERIOUS PLAY, the Minifigure and the Brick and Knob configurations are trademarks of the LEGO Group, which does not sponsor, authorize or endorse this website. SeriousWork respects and aligns with the the LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® trademark guidelines

LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® © 2023 The LEGO Group
SERIOUSWORK uses the LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® method described in the LEGO Group Open Source Guide made available by LEGO under a Creative Commons licence ‘Attribution Share Alike’

©SERIOUSWORK 2023. SeriousWork and ProMeet are a part of Serious Outcomes Ltd a UK based company number 11115058.