Learn a New Way to Play Monopoly

... by learning to change the rules.

We learn most, and we learn best from people. People know stuff.

The first time I met Skip and Caroline Andrews of our Ho'ohana Community (that is, the first time in person) we were able to fill six hours with an amazing amount of non-stop conversation. Family. Jobs. Yellow ginger. Books. Places. Learning. Yoga. Mexican Food. Giving up coffee. Hawaiian designs. Managing people. Being a techie. Swimming with dolphins.

Among other things, we talked about playing Monopoly with your children.

Skip told me about how he taught their kids to play Monopoly faster and funner (yes, funner is a word, especially appropriate when talking about your children) by changing the rules in ways that allowed everyone to team up with everyone and anyone else during the game. We all know how loooooong a game Monopoly can be, yet playing Monopoly collaboratively made the game way faster every single time they played.

Another rule change: Everyone had to win.

We know that collaboration is good, and that it can lead to synergy, but we often think we have to pay a price for it, and normally that price tag is thought to be time - it takes time to work in harmony with other people, right?

Well, if the Andrews version of Monopoly is a case study answer, then, No! Not right. Collaboration makes things faster. Every time.

Think about it; what rules can you learn to change to collaborate faster?

Just think about Monopoly for starters - How would you change the rules? Here's some Tips & Fun Stuff from Hasbro.com to give you some ideas.

---

Post author Rosa Say has written about dumping rules before: What are the Rules? Hopefully, none. An excerpt ...   

No Rules = The Freedom of Creative License
Creative Freedom = Inspired Energy
Inspired Energy = An Abundance of new Ideas and Innovation
Bountiful Ideas and Innovation = Learning Excitement    
Learning Excitement = Joy, Hope, Optimism and Enthusiasm

Then, blogger Lee Iwan did her one better on the business side of things: Successful managers should be breaking the rules. (There are some great quotes in Lee's posting.)

Comments

[Steve Sherlock]

Rosa, rules are simply guidelines to get us started. Once we have reached mastery of the game or skill required, the rules are meant to be twisted or changed. Some will work better than others, some will be more fun thant others. We need to be comfortable with failing, recognizing that the change is not working, and be comfortable with changing it again. We can fail faster to succeed.

[Rosa Say]

What I loved about the Andrews story Steve, was that they didn't bother with mastery of the original rules at all - they went straight for the fast fun of collaboration!

I understand what you mean though; thank you for your comment. Can you think of an example where you've changed a game's rules with your family?

[Rosa Say]

An update: Found an older post at Raganwald which is titled "My favourite interview question" which is a fascinating companion read to this (and by someone who has thought about Monopoly far, far more insightfully than I did when writing my posting here!)

The interview question Reg was given, was "How might you design a program that lets people play Monopoly with each other over the internet?"

Read his answer here:
http://weblog.raganwald.com/2006/06/my-favourite-interview-question.html