Thinking Like a Kid: Marshmallows and Spaghetti

I just washed a fascinating talk on TED.com about the "Marshmallow Challenge." Teams of four were given 20 sticks of spaghetti, one yard of masking tape, one yard of string and one marshmallow. The goal is to build, in 18 minutes, the tallest free-standing structure, upon which the marshmallow rests atop.

What's fascinating about the results is how successful kindergarteners were (highly) versus M.B.A. graduates (poorly). The reason is two-fold. First, the M.B.A. graduates have been trained to plan for the perfect solution and then execute, which in this case, as in the real world, leaves them little time to react if that one solution fails. The children simply dove in to the process without jockeying for leadership and were able to execute many iterations and revisions. Second, the marshmallow, when supported by spaghetti sticks is heavier than people realize. So when a single plan uses the assumption of a light marshmallow, and that marshmallow is not placed onto the structure until the end, there is little time to react when the structure collapses. On the whole, 40% of the teams finished the challenge with no successful structure.

I think we all like structure and process. It's a safe feeling place, where deadlines are fixed and people's time is protected. But perhaps the more traditional ad process is a waste of time. Perhaps, what would be more effective is to plan for playtime up front. Playtime by the people building the project, not the executives, not the managers, but the builders, the creative minds. Tell them, here are your spaghetti sticks, your marshmallows, now go try some stuff. Lots of stuff. Go nuts.

Oh, by the way, the most successful group? Engineers and architects. You know, the builders.

Here's the talk.