Category: What

Bauer, J. J., McAdams, D. P., & Pals, J. L. (2008). Narrative identity and eudaimonic well-being. Journal of Happiness Studies, 9(1), 81-104.
Buckingham, M., & Clifton, D. (2001). Now, discover your strengths: Simon & Schuster.
Burr, V. (1995). An introduction to social constructionism: Routledge.
Clifton, D., Anderson, E., & Schreiner, L. (2002). StrengthsQuest: Discover and develop your strengths in academics, career, and beyond. Washington, DC: The Gallup Organization.
Drucker, P. F. (2004). What makes an effective executive. Harvard Business Review, 82(6), 58-+.
Dweck, C. (2007). Mindset: The new psychology of success: Random House, Inc.
Forster, J. (1991). Facilitating positive changes in self-constructions. Journal of Constructivist Psychology, 4(3), 281-292.
Gardner, H. (1993a). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences: Basic books.
Gardner, H. (1993b). Multiple intelligences: The theory in practice: Basic Books.
Gauntlett, D. (2002). Media, gender and identity: An introduction: Routledge London, UK.
Gauntlett, D. (2007). Creative Explorations: New approaches to identities and audiences.
Govindji, R., & Linley, P. A. (2007). Strengths use, self-concordance and well-being: Implications for strengths coaching and coaching psychologists. International Coaching Psychology Review, 2(2), 143-153.
Haidt, J. (2006). The happiness hypothesis: Basic Books.
Harter, J. K., Schmidt, F. L., & Hayes, T. L. (2002). Business-unit-level relationship between employee satisfaction, employee engagement, and business outcomes: A meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87(2), 268-279.
Ishii, H., & Raffle, H. (2008). Sculpting behavior: a tangible language for hands-on play and learning.
Kaiser, R. (2009). The perils of accentuating the positive: Tulsa, OK: Hogan Press.
King, L. (2001). The Health Benefits of Writing About Life Goals. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 798.
Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors we live by: Chicago London.
Linley, A. (2008). Avarage to A+. United Kingdom: CAPP Press.
Linley, A. (2008). Average to A+: Realising strengths in yourself and others: Coventry, UK: CAPP Press.
Linley, P., & Harrington, S. (2006). Strengths coaching: A potential-guided approach to coaching psychology. International Coaching Psychology Review, 1(1), 37–46.
Linley, P., & Joseph, S. (2004). Positive psychology in practice: Wiley.
Linley, P., Nielsen, K., Wood, A., Gillett, R., & Biswas-Diener, R. Using Signature Strengths in Pursuit of Goals: Effects on Goal Progress, Need Satisfaction, and Well-being, and Implications for Coaching Psychologists.
Linley, P. A., & Harrington, S. (2006). Playing to your strengths. [Article]. Psychologist, 19(2), 86-89.
Linley, P. A., Woolston, L., & Biswas-Diener, R. (2009). Strengths coaching with leaders. International Coaching Psychology Review, 4(1), 37-48.
Lopez, S., & Snyder, C. (2003). Positive psychological assessment: A handbook of models and measures: American Psychological Association Washington, DC.
Mahoney, M. (2002). Constructivism and positive psychology. Handbook of positive psychology, 745-750.
McAdams, D. (1996). The stories we live by: Guilford Press New York.
McGregor, I., McAdams, D. P., & Little, B. R. (2006). Personal projects, life stories, and happiness: On being true to traits. Journal of Research in Personality, 40(5), 551-572.
Mruk, C. (2006). Self-esteem research, theory, and practice: Toward a positive psychology of self-esteem: Springer Publishing Company.
Neimeyer, R. (1998). Social constructionism in the counselling context. Counselling Psychology Quarterly, 11(2), 135-149.
Oliver, D., & Roos, J. (2007). Beyond text: Constructing organizational identity multimodally. British Journal of Management, 18(4), 342-358.
Oliver, D., & Roos, J. (2007). Beyond text: Constructing organizational identity multimodally. British Journal of Management, 18, 342-358.
Papert, S. (1994). The children’s machine: Rethinking school in the age of the computer: Basic Books.
Papert, S., & Harel, I. (1991). Situating constructionism. Constructionism, 1-11.
Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. (2004). Character strengths and virtues: A handbook and classification: Oxford University Press, USA.
Proctor, C., Maltby, J., & Linley, P. Strengths Use as a Predictor of Well-Being and Health-Related Quality of Life. Journal of Happiness Studies, 1-17.
Roberts, L. M., Dutton, J. E., Spreitzer, G. M., Heaphy, E. D., & Quinn, R. E. (2005). Composing the Reflected Best-Self Portrait: Building Pathways for Becoming Extraordinary in Work Organizations. The Academy of Management Review, 30(4), 712-736.
Roos, J., & Victor, B. (1999). Towards a new model of strategy-making as serious play. European Management Journal, 17(4), 348-355.
Roos, J., Victor, B., & Statler, M. (2004). Playing Seriously with Strategy. [Article]. Long Range Planning, 37(6), 549-568.
Schwartz, B., & Sharpe, K. (2006). Practical wisdom: Aristotle meets positive psychology. Journal of Happiness Studies, 7(3), 377-395.
Seligman, M. (2002). Authentic happiness: Free press New York.
Seligman, M. E. P., Steen, T. A., Park, N., & Peterson, C. (2005). Positive psychology progress – Empirical validation of interventions. American Psychologist, 60(5), 410-421.
Sheldon, K. M., Kasser, T., Smith, K., & Share, T. (2002). Personal goals and psychological growth: Testing an intervention to enhance goal attainment and personality integration. Journal of Personality, 70(1), 5-31.
Singer, J. A. (2004). Narrative Identity and Meaning Making Across the Adult Lifespan: An Introduction. Journal of Personality, 72(3), 437-459.
Tracey, M. W., & Richey, R. C. (2007). ID model construction and validation: A multiple intelligences case. Educational Technology Research and Development, 55(4), 369-390.
Winn, W., & Snyder, D. (1996). Cognitive perspectives in psychology. Handbook of research for educational communications and technology, 112-142.
Wong, Y. J. (2006). Strength-centered therapy: A social constructionist, virtues-based psychotherapy. [Article]. Psychotherapy, 43(2), 133-146.

Build & Share™ is particularly useful to investigate those characteristics that create feelings of hope, self-efficacy, optimism and resilience and together those four components create Positive Psychological Capital.

Positive Psychological Capital (PsyCap) is defined as “an individual’s positive psychological state of development”. In other words PsyCap can be used as a way to define well-beeing, and Build & Share seek to strength and develop both the individual and group based PsyCap.

The four components

Research has shown that PsyCap has a positive influence on performance and satisfaction in groups and organisations. The four components in PsyCap are defined as:

• Hope: persevering toward goals and, when necessary, redirecting paths to goals (hope) in order to succeed.
• Self-efficacy: having confidence (self-efficacy) to take on and put in the necessary effort to succeed at challenging tasks.
• Optimism: making a positive attribution (optimism) about succeeding now
• Resilience: sustaining and bouncing back and even beyond (resilience) to attain success

As PsyCap is concerned about an individual’s internal resources for dealing with challenges at work, PsyCap is an emerging framework for applying positive psychology to business settings. By developing employee’s psychological capital organisations can create a competitive advantage

LEGO® Serious Play® for Positive Psychology is a group facilitation method that builds on theory, research and application within positive psychology and narrative practices. When applied in groups and organizations you are bound to get a deeper, more meaningful understanding of topics especially related to motivation, resilience and engagement.

Positive psychology, the science of well-being and flourishing helps teams, groups and whole organizations ensure more sustainable change, transition and engagement. Add to that LEGO® Serious Play® which is a facilitated meeting, communication and problem-solving process in which participants are led through a series of questions, probing deeper and deeper into the subject. Each participant builds his or her own LEGO® model in response to the facilitator’s questions using specially selected LEGO® elements. These models serve as a basis for group discussion, knowledge sharing, problem solving and decision making. The use of LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY helps the facilitator, leader, teacher and many others accelerate insights and learning related to areas like positive psychology and well-being, business performance, strategizing and goal setting, team building, and last but not least agile methodologies.

LEGO® Serious Play® for Positive Psychology is a method that provides an engaging and more memorable approach to shared group understanding and self-exploration in areas related to well-being and optimal human functioning. Based on research that shows that literal hands-on, minds-on learning produces a deeper, more meaningful understanding of the world and its possibilities, LEGO® Serious Play® for Positive Psychology deepens the reflection process and supports an effective dialogue – for everyone in the group. This is done by posing reflective questions, but in stead on answering these questions in the traditional way, participants build their answer in for example LEGO® and respond by using metaphors and narratives they have created themselves.

Sharing is fundamental

It is crucial that each person’s voice is heard during this process. Everybody shares what is on their minds, and everybody is listened to. This is very important in order to achieve the purposes of the LEGO® Serious Play® for Positive Psychology process: to let everyone share their thoughts in a constructive way and to give everybody a chance to hear each others’ points of view. Sharing is fundamental to the method; on one hand sharing is done to create a common understanding of the group’s way of dealing with a situation, and on the other hand to create the best starting point for people to feel ownership for the reflections and ideas expressed. Eventually this will help them to arrive at the solutions and actions that need to be taken in order for them to enhance their well-being and group performance.

The Hands on Thinking method

The effective use of the LEGO® Serious Play® for Positive Psychology methodology rests on a thoroughly tested and researched six-step process, which builds on a learning theory which ensures that participants take ownership of their own learning.

Read more about this process here: