From the outside looking in The Lego Group had a hugely successful business a decade ago. It was a beloved brand that seemed to be surviving the digital age. The balance sheet told a different story though and Lego had more years in the red than in the black between 1998 and 2004.

Part of their problem was doing too much. Lego had over diversified by moving into theme parks and clothing. And the once primary coloured bricks now came in a palette of 100 colors.

In 2005 Lego sold the Legoland theme parks and halved the number of colours of bricks they were making. They began asking their designers to innovate with constraints, but to leverage those to become even more creative. Lego returned to profitability that same year.

One of the first questions the new CEO Jorgen Vig Knudstorp asked was,

“What should we stop doing?”

The thing you take away leaves room for the things that really matter.

So, what should you stop doing?

Image by psychopyko.