Effortless: Make It Easier to Do What Matters Most

by Greg McKeown

It’s not just that work and play can co-exist, it’s that they can complement each other. Together they make it easier to tap into our creativity and come up with novel ideas and solutions. Take Ole Kirk Christiansen, who had the idea to turn his struggling carpentry business into a toy company while tinkering in his empty warehouse. He called his company LEGO, from the danish term leg godt, which means “play well.” When the Second World War disrupted the toy business, instead of giving up and shuttering his factories, he stayed curious as plastics entered mass production, eventually creating LEGO’s first “Automatic Binding Brick,” a breakthrough that led to a whole new suite of products. Later, Christiansen and his team invited children to their offices and in watching them play were inspired to develop entire “play systems”—towns complete with people, buildings, roads, and cars—which exponentially increased their business. Even to this day, LEGO’s offices bustle with activity and joy. And this culture of productive play continues to fuel their creativity, spawning everything from LEGOLAND theme parks around the world, to video games, to TV shows and blockbuster LEGO movies. In 2015 LEGO was named the “world’s most powerful brand.” It’s also a powerful example of how “playing hard” can make hard work feel effortless.