Giving food assistance is about more than handing over a box of groceries. It’s about allowing people to make their own choices.

But the pandemic only narrowed people’s choices. Undeterred, Northern Illinois Food Bank (NIFB) put people’s needs above everything else, leading to innovations that could improve food banks everywhere. IDEO recruited neighbors to co-design a new digital tool intended to improve people’s access to food. Local residents provided more than insights—they steered design decisions and helped transform the relationship between NIFB and the community.

Northern Illinois Food Bank’s My Pantry Express app allows people to browse and order groceries online and to choose a pickup time and location that works for their schedule. We designed the app to provide useful information on dietary preferences and to be inclusive of cultural differences. The result allows choice and flexibility, helps prevent food waste, and preserves the dignity of shoppers throughout the process by making My Pantry Express feel like any other grocery site.

Ultimately, Northern Illinois Food Bank and IDEO’s strategy for success relied on new metrics. In addition to measuring effectiveness in pounds of food distributed, we found new ways to measure shoppers’ satisfaction—a solution that works better for all parties involved because it was designed by all parties involved.

An estimated 1 in 8 Americans experience food insecurity.

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The food insecurity rate is 2-3x higher for persons of color than for white households.

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60% of food insecure households do not use food pantries.

1.9M

meals distributed through My Pantry Express in 2021

50%

increase in distribution from prior year

To create Bendable, IDEO worked alongside the people closest to the problem, so every important decision grew out of their experience.

IDEO and the Drucker Institute aligned with the library system and city leaders in South Bend, Indiana, on a single objective: build a learning platform that offered education opportunities to people affected by the decline of manufacturing in the region. But even the earliest phases of research revealed that there’s no common profile that matched the diversity of learners. There are innumerable reasons why people seek to learn and as many barriers holding them back.

Knowing this, South Bend residents were the acknowledged authority for this work, and a design consultancy all their own. This radically simplified crucial decisions. Negative associations around traditional education led people to seek knowledge from those they already trusted. And they often lacked awareness about or the ability to access the many free resources already available.

The residents of South Bend helped the entire consortium see that the city wasn’t under-resourced but under-connected. That insight, and the power the community and the library system held to rectify it, made Bendable into the people-driven, connection-based learning platform it is today.

By 2025, as many as 85 million jobs will be displaced by automation, yet 97 million new ones could emerge.

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More than a third of adults pursuing postsecondary education before the COVID-19 pandemic were forced to abandon those plans.

25

programs and other resources offerings are now available to residents of South bend

4

states have begun to integrate Bendable into library systems

Protecting the right to vote means ensuring that all citizens can cast their ballots privately, independently, and easily.

With that principle in mind, Los Angeles County sought out a design strategy firm to create a next-generation, customizable system that would meet the needs of its large and diverse voter population while satisfying myriad voting regulations. The result: an accessible, self-enclosed ballot-marking device with a touchscreen that allows any voter to easily navigate, mark, verify, and submit a paper ballot. We also worked to improve the entire voting experience, including vote-by-mail ballots, interactive sample ballots, and the tally process.

As with any inclusive design, details matter. Voters with vision impairment or reading disabilities can opt for audio and tactile experiences with the push of a few simple buttons. And for voters who prefer to read the ballot in their native language—Spanish, Chinese, Korean, or any one of the 11 others supported by the county—the device lets them select their preference.

After extensive research and testing with constituents, we designed a solution that makes voting easier for anyone. And knowing that the only constant is change, we made the system flexible enough to adapt to emerging needs and technologies, protecting voters’ rights now and in the future. Read the full case study here.

26% of American adults have some type of disability. In the 2020 election, 18% of disabled voters nationally reported difficulty voting, about twice as many as non-disabled voters.

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In 2020, national voter turnout among disabled people was 7% lower than among non-disabled people in the same age group.

"Intuitive & secure"

was the sentiment most Los Angeles County voters expressed about the new voting system after the 2020 primary election

Conservation International is made up of conservation experts. To bolster its work, we bring a focus on scale, speed, and the human element to every project.

How does that look in the field? To restore the forest of Fiji, Conservation International paid a cash incentive to the community to buy, plant, and care for new trees and foliage. But once those cash incentives stopped flowing, the work ground to a halt. Taking a human-centered-design approach, one employee uncovered an insight: Fijians are more motivated to help in exchange for longer-term, noncash incentives like building infrastructure in villages. Small projects such as footpaths, repairs to communal trucks, beehives, or sports programs for youth continually reminded the community that the environment is a provider for their families, imparting a feeling of shared ownership in its conservation.

Stories like this, repeated around the globe, are how we hope to help Conservation International find sustainable outcomes. Our work together, including a six-month fellowship to help emerging leaders develop new capabilities, and a series of strategic, future-focused events for executives, has brought more tangibility and deeper collaboration to the organization.

Together we hope to create businesses, food solutions, and energy alternatives that conserve nature, and improve human health—because humans are a part of nature, too.

The scientific community overwhelmingly agrees that we have ten years to drastically cut greenhouse gas emissions or humanity will suffer devastating consequences.

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We need to conserve one third of the global ocean using area-based measures and ensure at least 75% of seafood is harvested using socially responsible, environmentally sustainable methods by 2030.

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75% of the world’s poor rely on agriculture for their livelihoods, which in turn depends on nature for pollination, irrigation, and soil replenishment.

20

leaders integrated human-centered design into annual goals, project pipelines, and fundraising efforts

20%

of the organization is now involved in design-thinking projects

To monitor how use cases have shifted over time, we developed a social listening tool to scrape AI hashtags on TikTok, creating a visualization of conversations and communities.

In the spring of 2023, much of the positive sentiment around AI was associated with productivity-related hashtags—activities like homework and writing. By October, AI music became its own distinct community, and hashtags for AI fanfiction, AI anime, and memes grew. Our most recent scrape in early 2024 showed us that AI is shifting from a predominantly solo activity to one centered on community. Hashtags like #aiart and #aiartcommunity are growing in size and in connections, suggesting that AI-generated art isn’t created in a silo—people are sharing their experiences.

In just a matter of months, Gen Zs have evolved their use cases to align with their priorities—sharing their passions and connecting with communities in playful and imaginative ways.

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AI companies are also moving fast. The race to create the most impressive and jaw-dropping AI products is adding frenetic urgency, and companies are spending millions of dollars on development resources, then quick-launching new products with the hopes that they will be well received. Often, launch is the first time companies are able to test out their products in the real world. 

We are seeing rapid technological progress, but also backlash against irresponsible designs and technologies that have real potential to clash with human values and cause harm. We believe AI has potential for revolutionary experiences and capabilities that improve the ways we live, connect, and play. But we also believe this future requires a foundation of trust and responsible design. 

To that end, we are experimenting with a different way of developing AI products—one that doesn’t compromise speed but also aligns with human values. By designing experiential prototypes that mimic real-world scenarios, we can create tight feedback loops that get us better user feedback, sooner. These prototypes are run in contained settings where we can look for unintended consequences. (Picture two people with paper scripts, role-playing what it feels like to interact with AI in a particular scenario.) We don't need to build the technology needed for the experience to work—our first step is to test for emotional value. That way, we focus our development resources on building the most impactful and responsible products and experiences possible.

In an earlier phase of our research, we used the results of our social listening experiments to work directly with members of Gen Z between the age of 13-24,  talking through potential product concepts and gathering their reactions. This time, we’re going deeper, prototyping products that have AI taking on different personalities and roles with a group of Gen Zs who are coming of age, gaining life skills, and forming their sense of identity as AI is also taking shape in our society. With their help, we’re learning how to build future AI experiences that center their values and needs. 

Growing up with social media, members of this generation have already felt the potential impact irresponsible technologies can have on their mental health and relationships, and they have a critical eye for both opportunity and responsibility. While they are strong proponents of the products and brands that they believe in, they're also not shy about making their voices heard when products clash with their values systems.  

In this series, we will put eight AI prototypes to the test. By leaning into immersive research tools like experiential testing and imaginative playtesting, we are focusing our learning objective on measuring how these young people feel when they are using AI products, and how the products would impact their perception of themselves and their relationships. For us, understanding the value of the product in the context of the user’s life, their value systems, and relationships is a crucial step that helps us identify the features and technical capabilities that are worth investing in. Join us as we dive into new prototyping methods for designing and testing the edges of what future users really want from AI.

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Parts of the images in this article were created/altered using generative AI.

The ways Gen Z is using AI are evolving almost as fast as the technology itself.

 It’s a way to optimise and improve inefficient and wasteful processes and accelerate emissions compliance—and it’s a great one. But when we leverage AI to shape demand for sustainable solutions, it's also an incredible collaborator.

After all, design is about integrating perspectives, and doing it in a systemic, inclusive way. AI can give us the ability to make our eyes and ears go further while managing exponential complexity. Paradoxically, it can even make us more human centred by making it feasible to access and include more user, employee, and community perspectives. 

At Economist Impact’s recent Sustainability Week in London, we discussed how this approach can succeed, but only when CEOs see sustainability and innovation as one interrelated competitive advantage—and bring them together with a shared remit, adequate bandwidth, and complementary skills. AI can then act as a powerful accelerator, helping to create solutions that meet climate commitments and business objectives. 

Unlocking nature’s perspective with data

This was the case in our work with H&M, which allowed us to delve into its data warehouse as part of its aggressive pursuit to be climate positive by 2030. The fashion giant was dealing with a problem that so many clothing manufacturers face: Traditional supply chain models make it very hard to predict the demand for a specific item of clothing several months in the future. Siloed teams along a supply chain made solving that problem even more complex.

By leveraging machine learning, we were able to incorporate the perspectives and needs of those teams and create an algorithm that could better predict demand and shorten the interval between sales and production. H&M didn’t just reduce excess inventory (and therefore waste), but also better anticipated which products might sell out. The result: In a pilot programme, which has since been scaled more widely, the company improved sales of specific lines by a third while reducing stock by a fifth, a change that was better for its bottom line, and the environment. 

Nature doesn’t appear on balance sheets, and yet most businesses depend on it.

With advances in AI, gains like these can come faster and be more complete—particularly if we take that kind of approach a step further and use nature metrics to train AI models. One of the best ways to approach this is to think of nature as a critical part of your infrastructure and start measuring it as you would any other element. Nature doesn’t appear on balance sheets, and yet most businesses depend on it. In most cases, that data—metrics around land use, water regeneration, forestation, net biodiversity gain, etc.—is available, but simply isn’t being collected and put to use. That means one of the chief perspectives we should consider, that of nature, isn’t being voiced. AI can provide the vocal cords.

Tequila companies, for instance, don't include information about the health of bat populations in their investor reports. But as bat conservationists will tell you, without bats to pollinate agave, there's no tequila. Imagine how bat conservation and food security would improve if tequila manufacturers started tracking bats’ habitat loss and used AI to spot trends, monitor for diseases, or determine effective and cost-efficient conservation strategies.

Solve for desirability down the chain

The data that powers AI is crucial, but it’s just part of the equation. The quality of the output depends just as much on the quality of the prompt. AI can act as a growth engine if we ask it to do so: to behave as a collaborator and surface the needs of more stakeholders in order to help designers create innovative, desirable products with better user experiences. And amid the race to net zero, desirability is key. 

Mature technologies like electric vehicles (EVs) and photovoltaics (PVs) can help us curb emissions, but their “hockey sticks” are already showing signs of fatigue very early on in the race. The European EV market was almost flat in 2023, and PVs’ growth is forecasted to slow in 2024. What is going on?

We have been pushing the supply side—tech and regulation—without paying enough attention to the desirability side. PVs are still more expensive at the moment of purchase and cumbersome to install and use. It remains much easier to just pay your monthly electric bill and let the energy company worry about powering your home.

Ease was a major consideration in our work with Sage, a multinational accounting and business software company. Its visionary Chief Sustainability Officer and innovation team knew that the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) it serves often don’t know how they’re going to reach net zero, and lack the resources to do so. Yet, in the UK alone, they account for about 50 percent of business emissions. Together, we developed Sage Earth, an AI-powered platform that uses Sage’s deep accounting insights to calculate its customers’ emissions, both direct and indirect, easing their transition to net zero.

To achieve scale, we need people to adopt green products because they are better, easier, and more exciting, not because they are green.

To achieve scale, we need people to buy green products because they are better, easier, and more exciting, not because they are green. We need to be more demanding about the quality of the sustainable products and submit them to the same standards as any other product. AI can help us on that journey.

Recently, a fashion retailer described to us the challenges of using recycled cotton, which has a rougher texture. Trying to make T-shirts that maintain the same level of softness as those made from first-use cotton is impossible. Gen AI can use data about existing materials to formulate new ones, consider how to make them more regenerative, determine their best applications, and explore which users those products will most resonate with. 

And there are many more users to design for in a regenerative world. To make our world more circular, we must consider all the humans that follow the first user: the second user, the person who will repair the item, the person who will redistribute it, the third user. Everyone has to desire the resulting product; otherwise, it ends up in a landfill. Thankfully, AI can help us empathise more systemically, not just with the first customer of a product and the subsequent ones, but also with the communities that will be at the receiving end of those products. 

AI can help us empathise more systemically, not just with the first customer of a product and the subsequent ones, but also with the communities that will be at the receiving end of those products.

Think about the design for a new circular appliance, for instance. You aren’t always able to factor in the representation of local repair shops, local recyclers, and the whole ecosystem that will have to deal with the consequences of a new product landing in their community.

Now we can train GPTs that amplify previously-overlooked viewpoints, ask questions, and offer critique to the designers in ways that wouldn't be available otherwise. It provides us with more valuable real-world views and constraints and reduces the number of assumptions we have to make. 

AI shouldn’t substitute for human intelligence but it can do some of the heavy lifting: giving us artificial patience, artificial thoroughness, artificial persistence, and artificial long perspective.

AI can help us capture more of what it is to be human by feeding all the nuances, needs, desires, and concerns that different communities have back to us. It can help us find insights in more of the data nature holds. It can bust through our limitations and complement our shortcomings. AI shouldn’t substitute for human intelligence, but it can do some of the heavy lifting: giving us artificial patience, artificial thoroughness, artificial persistence, and artificial long perspective. It can help us ensure the best choice is the easiest one to make, helping us navigate to a crucial, often overlooked lever in the climate fight: desirability.

‍We discussed “How Organisations Can Use Artificial Intelligence to Boost Sustainability” as part of a panel at Economist Impact’s 9th annual Sustainability Week in London. This piece captures some of what was discussed and our broader thoughts on the subject.

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Parts of the images in this article were created/altered using generative AI.

Often, when we think about how AI can help us solve problems, we think of it as an efficiency driver.

Think back: Starting from the camaraderie of chat rooms in the '90s which created space for gay men to safely build community, to the social media boom of the mid-’00s that redefined global interactions, we've witnessed seismic shifts in how we connect with others and explore our identities. The proliferation of smartphones further catalyzed this transformation, embedding digital interactions into the fabric of our daily lives and birthing the attention economy that dominates today's tech landscape. Influencer culture cemented larger narratives that shape trends, fashion, and societal norms.The 2020s have centered Web3, XR, and AI in the global techno-sphere, creating new mediums for us to convene with others, rethink the design patterns of the past, and creatively express ourselves. 

As designers, we are often tasked with navigating the complex interplay between individuality and collectivity. The question becomes: How can we leverage technology to enhance personal expression while fostering a rich, diverse cultural landscape premised on care, understanding, and communal values? This challenge is not just about creating functional designs, but about understanding the broader implications of our work on the cultural ecosystem.

The good news? Technology is entirely made up, by humans, and all of it can be evolved.

When it’s done well

The positive aspects of this convergence are manifold. The spread of digital tools and platforms has led to an unprecedented explosion of creativity. Now, more than ever, global voices can find and scale messages, meshing our shared cultural fabric. 

Projects like Carne y Arena, a virtual reality installation that immerses participants in the harrowing journey of refugees crossing the US-Mexico border, exemplify the power of technologies like XR to foster understanding, transcending physical and cultural boundaries to tap into the human condition. In the installation, you take off your shoes, feel wind blowing against your skin, and then find yourself in the 360 sight, sound, and touch of the experience, thanks to VR and a body pack. 

As the director, Alejandro Iñárritu, explains, "My intention was to experiment with VR technology to explore the human condition in an attempt to break the dictatorship of the frame—within which things are just observed—and claim the space to allow the visitor to go through a direct experience walking in the immigrants' feet, under their skin, and into their hearts.”

4D experiences like Carne y Arena offer new, visceral ways of activating senses and emotional tones that we are far less able to access in 2D. VR is an incredible storytelling mechanism, and it can be an incredible tool anywhere we are designing for human experiences—like policy implications in government, or caregving in hospitals. Projects like this underscore the potential for design to bridge individual and collective experiences in meaningful ways.

Similarly, during Goliath: Playing With Reality, I immediately felt like every school curriculum should be filled with VR experiences. Through this VR-enabled, animated storyline, we delve into the life of Goliath, a person experiencing schizophrenia. Goliath's narrative highlights years of seclusion in psychiatric facilities and his journey toward finding community in online multiplayer games. The experience invites viewers into his mental world, showcasing the significant role digital communities play in fostering friendships and support, often beyond their initial design intent.

Project Common Voice by Mozilla stands as a beacon of how AI can be harnessed for cultural preservation. At its core, this project is a crowd-sourced database that gathers voice recordings from people around the world, aiming to share voice recognition technologies widely. By encouraging contributions in a multitude of languages, dialects, and accents, Common Voice plays a crucial role in safeguarding linguistic diversity. This effort not only supports the development of more inclusive voice recognition systems that can understand and respond to a broad spectrum of human voices, but also illustrates the capability of technology to support preservation of languages and dialects. In the broader context of design and technology's impact on culture, Project Common Voice exemplifies a commitment to using AI to respect cultural and linguistic diversity, thereby enriching the collective cultural landscape.

As a design tool, Common Voice pushed me to reconsider how AI can be used to design for inclusion at scale. The ability to plug in a service like this means that products can rapidly support more users in more contexts, removing some of the barriers and gatekeeping in many of our existing design paradigms for technology.

And as a final example: Someone close to me has long-term depression and anxiety. She found major collaborative iPhone games, like Clash of Clans, are a way to playfully connect with new people. For her, those friendships moved from online to real life, for life. She and her friends started to travel together—she even dated one for a while. Previously isolated, she ended up moving across the world, from the US to Europe, to live near her new friends. Her life has shifted for the better. She’s healthier, happier, and more connected in real life, as well as online.

As designers, we need to remember that the platforms that we design will be used in many ways outside of our intentions–for better and for worse. In my work at IDEO, I pay attention to how people make what we design their own; often, I fold those use cases in as the real value propositions, even if they are outside of the vision we start with as designers.

The flip side

The rapid integration of individual contributions into the collective domain has also caused irreparable damage. The accelerated pace at which personal expressions become part of the cultural lexicon compromises the depth and authenticity of cultural evolution. The risk of a homogenized, polarized, and defaulted monoculture, shaped by trends, algorithms, and the endless dopamine loops they feed, rather than organic self-understanding and cultural diversity, means that design needs to take on new values. The potential of powerful technologies to be used as surveillance arms means we need to put extra care and intention in how and what we build. The spectrum of ethical issues and social needs invite us to consider how we might use the mediums that come next–AI, XR, robotics, etc.–to preserve the richness of our personal, cultural, and social perspectives in a fast-paced digital world. That’s an opportunity for design.

As designers, we have a broader responsibility to the cultural zeitgeist. We need to advocate for designs that not only resonate on a personal level, but also contribute positively to the collective narrative. We are shaping the levers that culture will build and flow upon, and that’s a major responsibility. This dual focus on the individual and the collective calls for a nuanced approach to design, one that balances innovation with care, and personal expression with cultural nuance.

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Parts of the images in this article were created/altered using generative AI.

Over the past 30 years, technology has converged individual creativity with our collective cultural experience, reshaping our personal realms and redefining the broader cultural tapestry in which we all participate.

The toymaker came to us to figure out how to make the device safe and fun. We started thinking not just in terms of physical usability (though designing for tiny hands and making sure products can survive a drop on the ground is our bread and butter), but also about how we encourage healthy engagement patterns.

A lot of VR headsets are designed to be super sticky—so engaging that users don’t want to take them off. But when we design for kids, we spend a lot of time thinking about how we can create healthy interactions. We wanted the design of the View-Master to help children intuit when it was time to put the toy down. So, we decided not to include a head strap—or any other means of attaching the headset to little bodies. When kids felt their arms get tired or their eyes start to cross, they would know it was time to take a break.

Over the past four decades, the IDEO Play Lab has designed and licensed more than 250 toys and games, from classics like the Barbie Camper to the first set of Sesame Workshop smartphone apps for kids.

With every product, we think about how to design fun and engaging experiences that delight parents, entertain kids, and lead to success for our partners. But we also put a lot of thought into making design decisions that support healthy habits, and help kids—and their families—thrive. 

Here are a few examples of how we’ve navigated those design choices.

Designing for movement: Dusty Wing Control

Most of us have learned to use a joystick or a set of arrows to drive a remote-controlled toy or move a character around a screen. But when we set out to help bring the character “Dusty” from the popular Disney movie Planes to life in an action-oriented vehicle toy, we took a step back to rethink how littler kids would engage with it.

As we tested designs, we saw that small children not only struggled with small buttons and the spatial skills necessary to operate the typical remote control joystick, but also that there was no fun in sitting still and tapping buttons. Instead, during our design research sessions, kids pretended to be the characters: They went full airplane mode, hands stretched out, zooming around the living room, dodging furniture. 

Taking a cue from their play patterns, we put Dusty’s remote control mechanism in toy wing tips that fit on little hands, enabling them to interact in a way that is not only more fun, but also instinctive, better mirroring how they naturally play. Players drive Dusty forward by pressing and holding a controller button, enabling his propellers to spin. When they bank left and right, Dusty matches their every move. Dusty even calls out flying commands that they can perform together.  The toy is not just easy for them to operate; it also gets them off the couch and moving, playing the main character in their own stories.

Designing for confidence: Pictionary Air

When we set out to re-invent the classic drawing game for the digital age, we had to figure out how to bring the core interaction to life in a new way. During ethnographic research, we noticed that when players were under pressure, they would often stare at their drawings looking embarrassed, and hesitate to keep drawing. To get people out of their heads and back in the game, we designed a new interaction that keeps participants looking up and laughing with each other. We combined a light pen and a smart device’s camera to allow picturists to create life-size illustrations in the air in front of them, an early foray into AR for classic games. For another layer of fun—and another option for those with less confidence in their drawing skills—players could interact with their sketches to provide more clues, much like in charades. We also decided to make drawings disappear quickly after each round was finished, to lower the stakes for self-conscious players.

Designing for all ages: Twister Air

In classic Twister, the fun hits when players are frozen in contortionist poses, hovering and balancing over each other. Our challenge from Hasbro: What does Twister look like in the TikTok era? And how do we make it fun for everyone? As we tested out potential interactions, we observed that for younger kids and older adults (basically everyone but the teenagers), the choreography on most popular dances was a bit much to learn or to even attempt. While kids found it hilarious when parents messed up (you’ll see lots of dance flops posted online!), we also wanted to find a way to create a sense of achievement for all ages. We started looking for the sweet spot between silly fun and accessibility, stretching players just enough to make them feel challenged, but not too overwhelmed to keep trying. In our prototypes, we preserved the classic Twister interaction while building in opportunities for rockstar moments where players can flop or shine. The footage made for viral family group chat nuggets, helping everyone feel part of the fun.

Designing for development: Little People Klip Klops

Preschoolers love the action of cars zipping down racetracks. But typical matchbox cars move too quickly for their little hands and slow reaction times.  When we set out to create a similar action-oriented—but also character-driven—toy for Little People, we needed to figure out how to slow down the experience, without sacrificing the action. Through several rounds of prototyping, we built out Klip Klops, leveraging a very simple mechanism that allowed princesses on ponies to teeter back and forth down a ridged downward track. By centering  the “clip clop” sounds of the hooves and building out a multi-story castle setting where the princesses and their steeds would live, we created opportunities for kids to enjoy the intentionality of the movement and built in the space for layered storytelling, allowing little kids to practice multiple development skills at once.

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Navigating your own toy design journey, or trying to get your team at work to stretch its imagination? Get in touch at helloplaylab@ideo.com. We’d love to collaborate.

Almost a decade ago, when we were all exploring VR of the early aughts, Mattel set out to redesign its classic View-Master as an affordable VR headset for a new generation of kids.

I help organizations cut through complexity by shaping how they show up, through brand strategy, identity, and storytelling.

Working at the intersection of brand and business, I bring an editorial eye and a bias toward making—turning ideas into tangible experiences that people can understand, trust, and believe in.

My work spans government, healthcare, financial services, media, and consumer goods, from launching Gen Z-focused ventures to building innovation labs and reimagining legacy brands. I relish moments of ambiguity and enjoy translating across teams, perspectives, and priorities to move ideas forward.

I started my career in editorial and digital design, shaping cross-platform experiences and identity systems in publishing and agency environments. That foundation still shapes how I work today: I’m detail-oriented, collaborative, and overreliant on the Oxford comma. I hold a BFA in Visual Communication from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

For 25 years, I've asked the same question: Who does this design exclude—and what are we going to do about it?

My work spans human-centered strategy, inclusive design, and qualitative research, with clients ranging from Microsoft, Google, and Verizon to the National Science Foundation, and San Francisco Unified School District.

Before IDEO, I taught elementary school in East Palo Alto and spent a decade doing design work with social service organizations—where I learned firsthand what it costs people when systems are built without them in mind.

I am currently writing User Error, a nonfiction book about digital access and the design decisions behind it. I live in Oakland, California.

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My expertise spans brand, communication, and product design across tech, education, the arts, and social impact.

I believe great work demands both high-level vision and obsessive attention to detail, and only happens through collaboration.

I bring an inclusive, hands-on approach and a deep understanding of business, which enables me to consistently deliver excellence while always asking why.

Before joining IDEO, I worked at the brand firms Pentagram and VSA Partners. I began my career as a designer, leading teams at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Milwaukee Art Museum. I hold an MFA in graphic design from Maryland Institute College of Art and a BFA in communication design from the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design, and have taught at some of the best design schools in the US.

I am responsible for IDEO’s long-term success in China and working with clients to use design as a tool to enable growth. Specifically, I have helped Chinese companies design holistic brand solutions through the development of their products, communication, services, and innovation teams, and I have helped multinationals expand their presence and influence in China.

I advise global leaders on developing China-led innovation and capabilities.

In over 15 years in IDEO Shanghai, I have worked on projects that use design to elevate the quality of the experience of healthcare products and services, streamline processes that increase productivity, create spaces and programs that promote and enable inclusive communities, and build next generation mobility solutions that are planet-positive.

Before joining IDEO, I worked at Philips Electronics and the Electrolux Group in Italy, the Netherlands, and Singapore on a number of breakthrough commercial products. I am a member of the Young President Organization in Shanghai.

Most AI products today are built for work—a space with clear problems and established systems. One founder noticed a gap: personal life is messier, harder to systematize, and mostly left behind by the AI boom. So she built Cue, a personal AI that lives inside iMessage and group chats, to go where the other tools haven't.

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In this episode, Becca Carroll, IDEO's Chief Strategy Officer, talks with Sida Li, co-founder and CEO of Shared Context Lab, about staying anchored to a human need while the technology around her keeps changing shape, why she treats her business model with the same rigor she'd bring to a product, and what it feels like to build a company at this particular, disorienting moment in AI.

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The conversation also gets into how Sida makes design decisions: the language Cue uses to describe itself, the tradeoffs behind building inside iMessage instead of a new app, and a real story about a business idea that didn’t pan out.

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This is the second in a two-part series profiling founders from IDEO's Startups-in-Residence program. The first conversation is with Johannes Seemann, founder of Sooner, on designing GenAI for the emotional side of money.

Most personal financial tools are built to run the numbers and optimize towards a budget. While that works for some, most people experience money as a lived relationship that does not neatly fit into a spreadsheet. Johannes Seemann and Becca Carroll discuss why money is emotional before it is mathematical, and what a human-centered approach to building a generative AI financial product looks like in practice.

Mina Seetharaman talks with Scott Shigeoka, author of Seek and Head of Curiosity Cultivation at the Eames Institute, about what distinguishes genuinely curious leadership from performative curiosity, how power dynamics shape curiosity, and why practicing curiosity can restore energy rather than drain it.

Mina Seetharaman talks with David Epstein, author of Inside the Box and Range, about why total freedom often produces average work, how leaders can design useful limits on purpose, and what organizations such as General Magic and Pixar reveal about the relationship between boundaries and creativity.