Dollars & Sense

Legos & Business Strategy

Economist Bent Flyvbjerg encourages us to find our “Lego” in his new book “How Big Things Get Done.”  Mr. Flyvbjerg, whose new book is reviewed by Ben Cohen in this week’s The Wall Street Journal, says that most large projects that are completed successfully use a modular approach. Excerpt from The Wall Street Journal:

“That’s the question every project leader should ask: What is the small thing we can assemble in large numbers into a big thing?” says University of Oxford economist Bent Flyvbjerg. “What’s our Lego?”

Modularity is a clunky word for the elegant idea of big things made from small things,” he writes. “Look for it in the world, and you’ll see it everywhere.” Everywhere includes “software, subways, hardware, hotels, office buildings, schools, factories, hospitals, rockets, satellites, cars and app stores,” he writes. “They’re all profoundly modular, built with a basic building block. They can scale up like crazy, getting better, faster, bigger and cheaper as they do.” 

Tesla’s so-called gigafactories and Apple’s headquarters are good examples of modular design, Dr. Flyvbjerg says, but the more delicious one is a wedding cake. Bake one layer. Then another. Then another. Then stack them—just like Legos."

I think of our retailer and brand members as our Legos.  A Lego by itself may be small, but add many together and they become formidable. The same applies to indie stores. We have a network of nearly 1,200 indie stores (and 110 brands) that are taking shape into a powerful tool. This network is helping consumers and fending off Amazon and other large players.  It’s also fitting that the author should reference wedding cakes since our network handles so many wedding registries. We use today’s wedding registries as building blocks to attract and support more registries. 

When I work on Bridge, I sometimes feel like I’m a kid playing with Legos.  These days, I’m happy that we can get paid to have fun and build. (When I was a kid, it was the opposite: a costly hobby!)  We’re helping solve the retail industry's problems. Building Bridge allows us to use a wide variety of skills and traits, including design, entrepreneurship, marketing, and curiosity.  On the side of our Shop Local’s site, in the margin, we could put a toy disclaimer: "For Ages Curious & Up.”

Bridge is the largest and most complex Lego set I’ve ever tried to assemble. Team, thank you for helping us continue to put the pieces together.  

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Read Ben Cohen's The Wall Street Journal article about Mr. Flyvbjerg’s book here: 
https://www.wsj.com/articles/lego-megaprojects-bent-flyvbjerg-big-things-11675280517

Tags:
Lego wsj Ben cohen

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