Synchronizing Top Management
Getting your leadership team to nod in a meeting is easy.
Getting them to genuinely believe in the same strategic direction is something else entirely. That’s what we do.
The real obstacle to your strategy isn’t the strategy.
Most executive teams don’t fail because the direction is wrong. They fail because the people at the top aren’t truly synchronized on it.
They’ve read the reports. Sat through the presentations. Agreed on the slide deck. And yet, when they leave the room, they each pull in a slightly different direction — with different interpretations of the priorities, different levels of conviction, and different ideas about what “commitment” actually looks like in practice.
The rest of the organization feels this immediately. There’s no consistent signal. No shared urgency. Decisions slow down, accountability blurs, and initiatives lose momentum before they gain it.
What’s missing isn’t information. It’s shared conviction.
Most executives have access to all the data they need. What they haven’t done is work through their own assumptions, doubts, and instincts — together, in the same room — until those things become genuinely shared.
That’s a different kind of conversation. And it requires a different kind of process.
LEGO® Serious Play® — a methodology built for exactly this.
At Living Institute, our certified executive trainers use the LEGO® Serious Play® methodology to do just that.
LEGO® Serious Play® is a structured facilitation approach with roots in organizational development and cognitive research. It uses physical model-building as a tool for thinking — allowing leaders to express complex, hard-to-articulate positions in concrete form, then explore them together in a way that a whiteboard or slide deck simply can’t replicate.
It bypasses the usual patterns of executive meetings — where the most senior voice shapes the room and real doubt stays unspoken — and creates conditions where every perspective surfaces and every truth is heard.
The result isn’t just intellectual agreement. It’s the kind of alignment that actually holds — because everyone built it together.
“LEGO® Serious Play® is a way of bringing everyone’s truths together and helping everyone understand another…Our truths all coexist and if top management does not understand that, they tend to forget the truth that is closest to them.”
– Heidi R. Andersen, Founder of LIVING INSTITUTE
Our workshops save nearly a year in time.
We’ve seen that even with just a one-day workshop, executives are quick converts – it shaves as much as six months to a year off the time needed to get on board with how to get ready for the future. Partly this is because we really focus on the “ah-ha” moment that snaps everything into focus. This perfectly complements all the data you’ve no doubt seen about how critical the culture is for the survival of your business. By the end of the workshop, you’ll know the importance of getting everyone on board at pretty much every level – intellectually and in your gut.
“…What we need to do in order to synchronise top management is to take them beneath this conscious level to their unconscious knowledge. We also have to help them tap into their feelings, because this is what makes them trustworthy to others when they speak about this agenda.”
– Heidi R. Andersen, Founder of LIVING INSTITUTE
Other Solutions
When you know your unconscious biases, you’ll have way better control of all your business decisions
Unconscious Bias
Unconscious bias throws a wrench into any plans to make diversity work. That means it’s the greatest enemy of belonging and psychological safety. Which means it’s the greatest enemy of innovation. Our workshops can help you see your unconscious bias and take control of it. That means better decision-making and a better workplace.
Events & Free Webinars
Upcoming
[Belonging at work] Building a workplace people don’t want to leave30 min.
Book
Diversity Intelligence: How to Create a Culture of Inclusion for your Business
Heidi R. Andersen, founder of Living Institute, has stuffed over 18 years worth of experience into a practical handbook on making inclusion an essential aspect of your company culture.
The book is on the recommended read list of 238 accredited business schools and universities – including Insead, Oxford University, London Business School, Said Business School etc.
