Episode 2

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Published on:

20th Jun 2022

Wear your most playful hat to work

Play is a form of exploration, and it begins with the environment we have at our fingertips. This is Lee Kim’s approach to play, and it permeates the work she does in what we might consider one of the most serious of environments.

Lee is a design strategist and community builder, based in New York She studied mechanical engineering and fashion design. She serves as Global Congress Lead at Pfizer and is the founder of a social impact nonprofit called Design Dream Lab.

Things to consider

  • You can signal to people to find out who’s up for playing. It can be uncomfortable to begin with, but that’s how we find playmates.
  • It’s possible to make joy a core value of your organisation, even at a large scale.
  • Things are more memorable when we play with them, physically.
  • The things we make embed themselves in our memory.
  • We’re built for togetherness.

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About the Podcast

Why Play Works.
Let's radically reshape work.
Do you have a niggling feeling, a secret hope, that work could be more joyful, more fun and (maybe) a little bit wilder? Do you sense deep down that doing great work doesn't need to be a slog?

In Why Play Works, Lucy Taylor and Tzuki Stewart hear the stories of people who are radically reshaping the idea of work as play - from play practitioners to academics to organisations who take play seriously.

How can working on serious problems be fun and delightful? Is play the opposite of work, or is it actually how we unlock success? How can reconnecting to our playfulness create more fulfilling and enlivening experiences of work?

We investigate how we can harness the power of play to boost resilience, improve well-being and foster collaboration, connection and creativity in the way we work.

About your hosts

Lucy Taylor

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Lucy is the founder of Make Work Play, an organisation on a mission to use the power of play to help organisations unfurl their potential. She is a passionate believer in the power of playful working as a way of bringing the best out in people, creating flow and unleashing creativity.

Lucy designs and leads playful processes which help teams unleash their individual and collective magic. Her approach to facilitation is immersive, playful and creative. Make Work ‘ Playshops’ are a space for you to get the hard work done together in a way that feels enlivening and fun.

Lucy has held positions as Visiting Faculty on MSc Programmes at Ashridge Business School and the Metanoia Institute. She studied PPE at Oxford and has trained in Systemic Coaching and Constellation Mapping, improvisational theatre and puppetry.

Tzuki Stewart

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Tzuki is co-founder of Playfilled, which she brought to life in 2020 with Pauline McNulty to help forward-thinking businesses transform for high performance by filling their culture with purposeful play - the missing piece of the puzzle to increase creativity, collaboration, and continuous learning.

A culture consultancy at the intersection of new ways of working, organisational development and employee experience strategy, Playfilled supports leaders looking to rise to the challenge of changing expectations of work. They offer leadership talks, workshops and change programmes.

Tzuki previously worked in consulting and investment management, and completed an MBA from Warwick Business School in 2019 (timed to coincide with a newborn and toddler "because babies sleep a lot"... that turned out to be a bit of a fallacy!)