Building Better Teams: What Lego Blocks can Teach Us about Strengths
I’ve used LEGO blocks in more than one workshop over the years, and every single time, it sparks the same reaction.
Some people jump right in and start building.
Some sit back and study the picture first.
Some start organizing pieces.
And a few just look around wondering what everyone else is doing.
And honestly… that’s your team.
Not wrong. Not right. Just different.
And that’s exactly where so many leaders miss it.
Here’s What LEGO Gets Right (That Leaders Sometimes Don’t)
No one expects every LEGO pieces to be the same.
That would be ridiculous, right?
You don’t open a box and hope for 500 identical blocks. You expect variety—different shapes, sizes, colors—because that’s what actually lets you build something meaningful.
But then we walk into our workplaces and expect people to:
Think the same
Work the same
Communicate the same
Solve problems the same
That’s where things start to break down.
The CliftonStrengths Reality Check
Here’s a stat I always come back to from Gallup:
The chance of someone having the exact same Top 5 strengths as you—in the same order—is about 1 in 33 million.
Let that sink in for a second.
You are more likely to find a needle in a haystack… than someone wired exactly like you.
So when a leader says,
“Why don’t they just do it like I would?”
Well… because they literally can’t.
Back to the LEGO Table
When I run a LEGO activity, something interesting always happens.
The Achiever types start building immediately
The Strategic thinkers pause and plan
The Relational folks start talking it out with others
The Creative thinkers go completely off-script
And every single one of those approaches is valuable.
But only if we recognize it.
Where Leaders Get Stuck
Most leaders aren’t trying to do this wrong.
They’re just used to seeing the world through their own lens.
So they:
Overuse their own strengths
Expect others to operate the same way
Get frustrated when they don’t
It’s like trying to build something incredible… but only using one type of LEGO piece.
You might get something built.
But it won’t be nearly as strong—or as interesting—as it could be.
What Strong Teams Actually Do Differently
The best teams I’ve worked with don’t try to “fix” people.
They get curious about them.
They start asking:
What does this person naturally do well?
When are they at their best?
How can we use that more on this team?
And here’s the shift…
Instead of asking,
“What’s wrong with them?”
They start asking,
“What’s right with them—and how do we use it?”
That one shift alone can change a team culture.
A Simple Leadership Challenge
Next time you’re in a meeting, try this:
Instead of focusing on what someone didn’t do the way you wanted…
Pause and ask:
What strength might they have been using?
What perspective are they bringing that I don’t naturally have?
You don’t have to agree with it.
But you do need to understand it.
Final Thought
You don’t build something meaningful with identical pieces.
You build it with the right pieces… used in the right way.
That’s true with LEGO.
And it’s absolutely true with your team.
So maybe the goal isn’t to get everyone on your team to be the same.
Maybe the goal is to finally see the value in how different they already are.