Friday Feminine Gamification Viewpoint: Lego science girls

Friday Feminine Gamification Viewpoint: Lego science girls

Toy block maker Lego will be creating a female mini-figure set with female scientists as the base design, it will be called Research Institute and will come out in August 2014. The process of coming to this choice is in fact a gamified idea generation. On the Lego Idea site, individuals can post ideas for new Lego sets, which are then voted on by Lego enthusiasts. When a minimum of 10,000 votes is reached the idea is selected for internal review to identify whether it fits with Lego values, branding, functionality and safety. Then out of the shortlisted ideas one is selected and goes into production and release. It is simple crowd idea sourcing with crowd voting as a core mechanic to make innovation selection work.

The “research institute” Lego set will include 3 female scientist a palaeontologist, an astronomer and a chemist. The original idea was submitted by Dr Ellen Kooijman, a geochemist and Lego enthusiast who felt it was time Lego produced some positive female role models for women in science.

In January this year Lego was also told off by a 7 year girl, that they were promoting gender bias and that it was time to get with modern days. Charlotte Benjamin wrote a strongly worded handwritten letter to Lego and with help from her mum, the picture of the letter was posted on Twitter and sent to Lego. Her request was simple Lego would need to make more Lego girl people, because right now they had too many boy people. She wants Lego girl people to go on adventures, save people, swim with sharks, have jobs and have fun, ok?!!! Her call for Lego to get with the modern girls program was her visit to a Lego store where they had a pink and a blue section, in the pink section the girl people only sat, shopped, cooked and went to bed, they had no jobs and didn’t go on adventures…

Effectively what both ladies are saying is that in order to buck the trend of gender bias, we need to actively create the path with feminine role models, starting with toys, games but continuing in to enterprise and business.

So here is my question for you, how can you create a female gamification champion or superhero and what will the adventure be that she is leading?

GamificationNat my cartoon alter ego is loosely based on a cartoon comics book character called Yoko Tsuno, who is a female engineer who saves lives and resolves seriously complex problems.

So who is your female superhero and how can she be your gamification champion for your organisation?