Since its founding over a century ago, Tokyo College of Music (TCM) has trained countless world-class musicians. Despite its well-established reputation, however, the school was feeling a pressing need to reconsider its role in order to remain relevant in a changing world.

The college had plans to build a second campus in Daikanyama, a prominent area of Tokyo known for being a hotbed for new global trends. Taking advantage of this opportunity, TCM leaders asked IDEO to help them develop a new concept for the school, and to redesign the learning experience while preserving a focus on classical music.

To kick off the research phases of the project, IDEO designers interviewed TCM students, and traveled to London, New York, and Boston visiting educational institutions, music schools, and arts facilities.

The team observed that students at music colleges outside of Japan were giving serious consideration to their career plans at an early stage in their studies, acquiring a variety of skills and mindsets through a well-rounded education. By contrast, TCM students were focused on learning and performing classical music, but tended not to have a clear image of future career opportunities.

IDEO proposed four specific directions for TCM’s new campus, based on an overarching theme of “culture, fields, and people collaborating across boundaries.” The first aim was to foster a business mindset and entrepreneurial spirit among the students that surpassed their classical music training. Next was to increase opportunities for actual performances, collaborations with professionals outside the school, and joint projects. The third aim was to position the college as a platform that would encourage the spontaneous creation of communities within and outside the school. The final aim was to develop students who were digitally savvy and fluent in new technologies, enabling them to continue evolving in response to developments in the real world. These goals are reflected in the various spaces of the school, as well as in the design of the experiences that occur in those spaces.

The most symbolic of these spaces is the Creative Lab. Originally intended as a library, the space now functions as a platform where people from within and outside the school community can collaborate and generate innovative ideas. The open layout, which encloses a cafeteria for students and faculty, can be altered depending on programming needs. The Creative Lab provides a venue not only for live performances in which the students can polish their improvisational skills, but for holding workshops and other events on topics such as cultural exchange, business, and new technologies.

New furniture and objects were carefully selected to inspire spontaneous encounters and conversation between students from different departments and staff, creating a flow of activity.

Even the landings on the staircases, which tend to be dead space, were designed with this concept in mind. One student commented that the space facilitates meeting new people and creates “opportunities for deeper interaction with students from other departments.” This intentional, open design has transformed the space into a hub within the school and the local community.

Through the new environment and educational opportunities at TCM's Daikanyama campus, students now have stronger opportunities to apply their creative talents in numerous fields worldwide, creating impact informed by the various perspectives, skills, and relationships they have developed at TCM.

Georgia is among the most populous states in the American South. It’s a place with a storied past and promising future—on the rise economically, and continuing its powerful cultural impact on music, TV, cuisine, and tourism. Over 10.4 million people call Georgia home, and nearly all of these people will at some point navigate the state’s websites for securing everyday services. Ideally, this online platform would provide unifying and accessible government resources for everyone, whether they’re renewing their vehicle registration, seeking a fishing license, or looking up tax law updates.

Georgia’s Office of Digital Services (DSGA), part of the Georgia Technology Authority, was challenged with designing a platform to modernize the collective and individual online presence of 80+ state agencies, many of which used visually disconnected formats and color palettes that could leave the public feeling confused. DSGA recognized that they could provide more efficient and higher quality service to the public if they simplified the language, designed the site from the user's point of view, and created a more cohesive look and feel across agencies.

IDEO worked with the DSGA to identify the priorities of Georgia residents who use the various agency websites. On a road trip from Savannah to Atlanta, with stops in Macon and Dublin, the IDEO team immersed themselves in the rich culture of Georgia, connecting with social workers, low-income residents, state agency leadership and civic organizations to learn how Georgia’s digital properties could better address their disparate needs.

The design research underscored that there isn’t just one Georgia—it’s a tapestry of people, geographies and political orientations. Yet several common themes emerged, including:

Georgians want their government to “give it to them straight.” On the redesigned Georgia.gov platform, the people of Georgia can easily search popular topics to get the information they need. This includes learning how to apply for food stamps, renewing a business license, or simply finding out the location of a local office in their area. If a user has remaining questions, they can connect directly with a real human for further assistance, balancing direct information with warmth and a personal touch. User feedback on the site provides the opportunity for continuous design improvement.

Georgians want to take pride in the legacy and the future of their state. IDEO developed an entirely new design system with new navigational elements, fonts, and a color palette inspired by Georgia’s landscapes, all of which can be modified for individual agencies while remaining consistent with the state brand.

A distillation of the original Georgia seal adds authority, and new icons anchor the site’s menus and bring more clarity to the search function. The platform was designed to be Section 508 and WCAG 2.0 AA compliant, providing clear and accessible page content that adheres to federal laws and international web standards. To instill trust in Georgia’s online presence, each page also has a header that indicates it’s an official Georgia State website and outlines the uniform features constituents can use to identify this.

With improved navigation and easy-to-access prioritized content, Georgia.gov is a much more efficient platform for addressing requests from citizens. The site projects a happy-to-help, citizen-centered approach that aims to empower all Georgians so that they feel confident, informed, and prepared.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 30 million Americans have diabetes, almost 10% of the population. The vast majority of these diagnoses are type 2, which is commonly treated through a combination of medicine, diet, and exercise. Today, one of the major barriers to better outcomes is access to trusted information. As little as 15 percent of people with diabetes receive adequate education from their healthcare providers on managing their disease and making recommended lifestyle changes.

Ascensia Diabetes Care, a global healthcare company, has been a leader in diabetes treatment for over 70 years, known primarily for producing blood glucose meters. IDEO has worked with Ascensia for more than a decade, helping develop and design their CONTOUR NEXT ONE meter in 2016. In 2017, Ascensia engaged IDEO with a new goal of moving the company beyond physical devices. Ascensia envisioned a first-of-its-kind approach to educating and monitoring diabetes patients. In partnership with IDEO, they wanted to build a comprehensive solution—one that would not simply take glucose readings and document food intake, but would consider all factors that impact a person's health.

Through deep collaboration, Ascensia and IDEO built a powerful app-based service. The project began with a strategic vision for the experience and ended with the delivery of an all-encompassing health offering, including training of providers, packaging, app design, content creation, and visual design.

The patient experience married data and tracking, real-life mentorship, and personalized content. When a patient signed up, they were paired with a Certified Diabetes Educator (CDE) who created a tailored program based on their needs and linked them to relevant articles on topics like cooking, mental wellbeing, and sexual health. The IDEO team led the charge in hiring and training guides, crafting the educational content, and even designing the content management hub.

The data engine behind the app is another one of the program's stand-out qualities. The app pulled data from multiple data sources—exercise bands and glucose meters—to provide constant feedback, track progress, and continually refine the experience. To generate empathy, as well as build the app's initial data set, IDEO's data scientists tested the product on themselves. One designer wore a wrist full of exercise monitors around the office and tracked her blood sugar after every meal.

The app-based service was tested with 60 people and demonstrated remarkable early results. Only two participants failed to complete the study—a stunning success rate when adherence to therapy for chronic illnesses in developed countries averages around 50%. Additionally, participants reported drastic improvements in both physical and mental health. One recently widowed 70-year-old woman emerged from depression, returned to swimming, and started having regular blood sugar readings.

The project required Ascensia to embrace new ways of working internally, adopt a broader view of their offering, and ultimately expand the way they serve people with diabetes.

When Mr. Gordon told his fifth grade students they were taking a field trip on a bus, many of them envisioned the city bus that they ride each day to school. But when they saw the Verizon Explorer Lab pull into the school parking lot, they realized a unique experience awaited them. Painted in bright colors, this bus promised something very different from their daily commute.

“Climb aboard, explorers!” says the Lead Explorer. The students walk through the bus’ sliding doors and inside, where instead of rows of seats, they find a sleek research lab. Suddenly, the lights dim. The bus makes a rumbling noise as though it’s about to lift off. And on a large screen, a vision of Earth from space appears. The students listen and point as the video narrator briefs them on NASA’s ongoing search for life in space.

Science education isn’t always this fun. Some kids have a chance to learn through interactive games, immersive experiences, or engaging field trips; but many lack access to rich educational experiences in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). As a result, they can be less likely to pursue careers in STEM, though many future jobs will demand mastery of these subjects. This not only impacts a student’s potential and future, but reduces the diversity and number of qualified STEM job applicants.

In under-resourced schools, students are often limited to the scarce tools available for STEM learning in their classrooms. Many kids rarely have a chance to leave their neighborhoods. For these kids, mobile learning experiences that come to their school offer unparalleled exposure to cutting-edge, technologically advanced, and—most importantly—inspiring gateways into these critical academic subjects.

As part of its focus on digital inclusion, Verizon partnered with IDEO to share the excitement of STEM learning with middle schoolers. To facilitate access and discovery of STEM, the team designed a learning experience that takes place on a coach bus and can be scaled to reach kids across the nation.

The team set out to transform the bus into the Verizon Explorer Lab: a futuristic research lab that transports kids to new environments, from outer space to under the sea. As part of the larger Verizon Innovative Learning program, the Verizon Explorer Lab offers delightful and rigorous content that meets national science standards.

A multidisciplinary team comprised of designers across interaction, communication, environments, games, and software partnered with Verizon to bring the Verizon Explorer Lab to life.

To keep the student at the center of the experience, the team designed alongside kids. Their gravitation toward play, interaction, and technology inspired the digital game that students play onboard the bus. When developing the game’s narrative, the designers turned to popular kids’ books and movies. What began as a card game prototype eventually became a 360-degree video and virtual reality expedition to Mars—complete with a custom musical score—that introduces middle schoolers to engineering basics.

After stepping through the bus doors and taking a tour of the solar system, Mr. Gordon’s students receive an emergency call from NASA: They must rescue the missing Curiosity rover, which is dedicated to collecting evidence of life on Mars. Eager to save Curiosity, the students become immersed in the adventure at hand. And through the adventure, they become immersed in science.

Students use tablets to design their own Mars rover. Each rover appears on a large screen and traverses the planet’s extreme terrain. The goal is to collect data that suggests life on Mars, including ice deposits, photos, and more. Students iterate on their rover’s design—wheels, power sources, and sensors—to test if it can stand up against dust storms and craters. The team consulted a NASA planetary scientist to ensure accuracy, as well as educators to establish cohesion with classroom curricula.

During the game, students are encouraged to compare designs and learn from each other: One rover may be able to travel long distances and take various photos, while another can carry large quantities of ice and sediment samples but can’t go far because of its size. At the end of the mission, the group finds Curiosity and sends all of the evidence they’ve collectively gathered back to NASA to aid the search for life beyond Earth. Before departing the bus, students watch an animated video that explains various jobs in STEM and encourages kids to pursue one of these careers.

The Verizon Explorer Lab teaches students the engineering design loop, the value of collaboration and teamwork, and what a career in STEM might look like. The mission to Mars game is just one of many potential STEM learning opportunities for students and integrated, customizable learning modules for teachers.

Since launch, the Verizon Explorer Lab has traveled to various parts of the United States and reached thousands of kids. It continues to be managed by Learning Undefeated, Verizon’s nonprofit partner. By designing for and with students, it’s possible to create educational experiences that facilitate meaningful learning and genuine fun. The Verizon Explorer Lab represents progress towards a more inclusive future for employers and the STEM field.

At their core, rituals are intentional actions that follow a particular repeatable pattern. Certain words or phrases, symbolic props, and patterned movements are used to elevate everyday moments into meaningful and memorable experiences. Rituals have a unique ability to make intangible values and beliefs concrete because they bridge the mind and the body, the two ways humans process and make sense of the world. We use them all the time in religion, politics, and sports to help groups navigate change, form a shared sense of identity and purpose, and enhance performance—but we forget they can also be incredibly powerful at work.

In the past year, we’ve had a lot of time to learn about rituals for the virtual world. Some of IDEO Chicago’s favorites are featured in a new book by Stanford’s Ritual Design Lab called “Rituals for Virtual Meetings: Creative Ways to Engage People and Strengthen Relationships.” The book highlights remote rituals from companies around the world that help with focus, connection, flow, and more. Here are some of our favorites.

Embrace the cacophony

For years, all-hands Monday Lunch Meetings (MLMs) have been an important weekly ritual for sharing inspiration, information, and project work over a meal at IDEO studios across the globe. When we first entered round-the-clock remote life, presenters were faced with an intimidating, feedback-free void. It felt cold and awkward, and nothing at all like the MLMs we knew and loved.

To fix that, we identified that the MLM routine itself wasn’t enough—we needed to design moments of consistent virtual connection to revive the feeling of the shared experience. So we sped up the pace of shares, encouraged side conversations in chat, added sound effects like air horns through a creative hack using DJ software, and fully leaned into the awkward audio latency tendencies of video calls with our monthly singing of “Happy Birthday.” By embracing the cacophony, we subverted the silence and saved each other from being isolated in the void, retaining some semblance of consistency and communal spirit during an otherwise unpredictable and lonely time.

Find serendipity through structure

When we were together in our studio, we could rely on the walls and furniture to create safe boundaries and immersive experiences. But in a video room, space can feel infinite and spontaneous conversation challenging. We realized we needed to design specifically for serendipitous encounters.

One of the first events we created was the ChIDEO Variety Hour. An event inspired by improvisational, slapstick variety shows (think The Muppet Show and old telethons), it’s meant to showcase the range of talent and work being done in the studio. It feels spontaneous and whimsical thanks to two constraining factors: First, presenters sign up in advance for “on-screen time”—from as little as one minute to as long as 30. Second, two hosts write a script for the show and get robust “back of house” support from a team that monitors live technical aspects like time keeping or moderating chat.

At the first Variety Hour we had a research share from recent project work, an intermission dance party, and one minute of screaming, to name a few examples. It was the most participatory virtual event we had ever had, and Variety Hour has since become a beloved monthly ritual in our digital studio.

Make the most of digital tools

When everyone works remotely, the physical distance becomes compounded with digital invisibility. The right ritual can manufacture proximity, rebuild trust and connection, and mimic the ebb and flow of a good house party. This is where digital tools can shine.

The Breakout Room function is meant for subdividing large webinar audiences, but we asked, what if it was used for something like speed dating? Breakout Rooms can be randomized, sized in different ways, and attendees can even move between them on their own. We harness these features for an icebreaker game called “Chance Encounters of the Zoom Kind.” By randomly placing participants in different breakout rooms together, keeping the duration a surprise, and providing thought-provoking conversation prompts to break the ice, we recreated casual collisions for the digital office. In some cases, it was the first time people had seen each other since the lockdown began, and it provided much needed reconnection, randomness, and joy.

Developing your own rituals

If you’re looking to decrease the stress that accompanies change, create conditions that kickstart innovation, inspire greater trust and collaboration among coworkers, or turn the mundane into the memorable, consider creating your own workplace rituals from scratch—or turn to the dozens outlined in Rituals from Virtual Meetings for inspiration.

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When COVID first sent office workers remote, many companies struggled with the decentralization and loneliness of virtual work. Thankfully, at the IDEO Chicago studio we had a secret weapon we knew would help us bring serendipity, joy, and creativity into the uncharted landscape of perpetual videoland: rituals.

Our personalities and outlooks, where we grew up, and all of the experiences we’ve ever gone through in life get filtered and expressed through the things we create. And—perhaps even more importantly—our identities impact why we create, helping us find meaning and purpose in our creative work.

In celebration of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month (APAHM), we're sharing reflections from some of the incredible creatives who continue to inspire us. Here, they share insight on what drives them and their goals for the future—bound to, centered in, and empowered by their unique identities.

Adamu Chan, Writer, Filmmaker, and Community Organizer

Adamu Chan is a formerly incarcerated writer and filmmaker whose work is shaped by his connections to community. He’s written for Slate about the impact of COVID-19 on prisons, and has published a short film from within San Quentin. He sees his role as a catalyst to drive change in society.

“Culture and history are our collective memory, and history is usually shaped by dominant groups. Art has historically been one of the only avenues for marginalized peoples to participate in dominant discourses, and so I believe it is the job of artists to produce cultural projects that propel political and social transformation. I would like to be remembered as someone who helped move our world towards being more equitable, just, and inclusive.

If we are committed to transforming ourselves and our society, it is important to hear the stories of those who have always lived at the margins, because they hold the answers to what is broken, and in their stories of survival are the solutions we are seeking.”

Kimberly Ang, CEO and founder of of KAYA

Kimberly Ang is the founder and CEO of KAYA, an app that connects climbers and helps them track and get insights from their workouts. Prior to that, she led IDEO’s Design for Health portfolio. Today, Kimberly is focused on forging a path so that others like her feel welcome within the climbing community.

“Looking ahead, there are three changes we’re focused on: 1) Democratize access to the insights and coaching people need to learn how to climb and climb well 2) Celebrate a much more diverse range of climbers to show everyone they can be included in this community and 3) Take care of our public lands and ensure we grow sustainably.

I hope to be remembered as leading with heart and being myself, and creating space for others to do the same.”

Anupama Rao, Communications Designer and Behavioral Science Practitioner

Anupama Rao is the creator behind BrainGoo, a library of visual storytelling sequences (often in the form of Instagram posts and stories) that explain complex words and make observations about the world. In her day job, she’s a Design Researcher at Qure.ai. Her work is fueled by a desire to make healthcare access more equitable and compassionate.

“I work in the intersection between the future of design and behavioral science so that I get the chance to tackle wicked problems, especially those focused on women’s rights and healthcare, via small incremental changes. I’m fueled by my experience as my mother’s primary caregiver from a young age. The idea is to work towards inclusive design by consciously accounting for representation, systemic inequalities, social biases, and lack of access.

Currently, as a designer at Qure.ai, I work with experts to create AI products that make healthcare affordable and accessible, which is equal parts challenging, overwhelming, and rewarding. I love seeing how design can play a role. For example, can designing this report differently save a healthcare professional 10 seconds? What factors influence a crowded ER when a patient is having a stroke? How can I make this relevant to a low-resource, sparsely populated village?

I want the legacy of my work to be its empathy for the context it lives in, and its ability to create sustainable and positive behavior change.”

Michelle Lee, Managing Director, Design For Play at IDEO

Michelle Lee leads the Design for Play studio at IDEO, where she designs actual toys—but also finds ways to bring games and play into other unexpected industries, like education and health.

“My initial career in toy design taught me that play has potential far beyond the world of kids and toys. Through play, we stretch our imaginations, conquer our fears, realize new possibilities and take on challenges with optimism and confidence. It enables us to find meaning and happiness in the world. At IDEO, I lead a team that harnesses this power of play to ensure that aging is joyful, education is engaging and environmental action is inspiring.

I see the future in bringing play to tackle some of society’s biggest challenges—helping people thrive mentally and physically, building inclusive communities and helping to elevate voices that are often unheard. Driving lasting change by aligning these important issues with what brings people joy.”

Want to learn more, and get inspired by other Asian and Pacific Islander creatives? Follow the #AsianCreativeNetwork tag on social media, and check out our Asian Pacific American Heritage Month series on Instagram.

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What you make is who you are. For many designers, creativity is rooted in identity.

From flexible working conditions to the coexistence of both physical and digital experiences, COVID-19 has accelerated the trends and behaviors that have been rearing their heads for some time, and pushed them to the forefront of our everyday lives.

Indeed, the future is already here. How might we fully step into it with creativity and resilience?

Recently, a group of IDEO designers in Tokyo convened a creative project to brainstorm and design for the implications of the pandemic on the future of Japan. Called “Emergent Futures,” the goal of the work—accessible below—was not to predict the future, but to prepare for the possibilities it may bring.

To envision these “emergent futures,” we started where we always do: with people, and by observing ourselves, our families, and communities. For each future, we describe what it looks like and what behaviors prevail, the evidence we see for this future already emerging, and what design opportunities exist for Japan-focused businesses.

For example, the first emergent future we explore is Leftover Spaces—the idea that physical spaces will become more dynamic due to public health concerns around occupancy. With this, business opportunities related to rent, consumer preferences, space design, and co-ownership emerge. We explore and ground this emergent future through Kei, an IDEO designer and blossoming curry chef, whose needs inspired us to prototype a pop-up system concept—the Kei Truck. Our research reveals how some businesses are already prototyping this future, including restaurants operating as corner stores and Hoshino Resorts, who is leveraging data tracking to keep guests safe. These examples provoke key takeaways for leaders, from the need to develop a more entrepreneurial, adaptable workforce to using data in a human-centered way.

Though Emergent Futures is a collection of provocations about the state of Japan post-pandemic, the value of this futuring exercise and framework is universal, especially now. For Japan and other parts of the world to meet the challenges and opportunities we face post-COVID—from how to safely utilize physical spaces to how to remain competitive in a changing job market—our response must be human-centered, innovative, and imaginative.

Please share the work far and wide. We hope to spark the global collaboration required to ensure the future is evenly distributed, so we can step into it with confidence and creativity, together.

Download and share Emergent Futures here.

“The future is already here—it’s just not very evenly distributed.” Though attributed to essayist William Gibson nearly 20 years ago, the quote could not be more relevant today.

It was a result of her own tenaciousness, her creativity, and the support of RepresentED, a small organization with a big mission to prepare students for careers in industries where they are underrepresented. The organization uses a human-centered approach to diversify the next generation of leaders through training, mentorship, and internships. RepresentED’s founder, Rashida Hanif, met Cisneros when she was a transfer student at UC Berkeley. Hanif notes that transfer students—particularly Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) young adults—are missing out on what she calls the “hidden curriculum of life.”

Cisneros immediately saw the opportunity to help other Black and Brown transfer students like herself attain university education and gain visibility into concealed opportunities for their futures. Cisneros first learned about RepresentED in 2017, when she applied to join the first cohort of fellows. As part of the fellowship, she participated in a design thinking workshop led by former IDEO designer Scott Shigeoka. Later, she and her team competed in OpenIDEO's Future of Higher Education Challenge and designed an app that connected transfer students with much-needed community and resources. The experience and process introduced Cisneros to an industry she had never considered before. “Learning about design was absolutely pivotal for me,” she says.

Making change from within

After the competition, Cisneros was encouraged to apply to IDEO, and was hired as a recruiting coordinator before being promoted to her current role. Today, she leads Color by Design (CxD), which she helped launch in the wake of the rise in activism for social justice last year. She also helps facilitate internal programs at IDEO like business and inclusive leadership trainings, which seek to support IDEO’s senior leaders (and eventually all employees) to better understand how to create a culture of belonging. “In these trainings, we’re going to provide tangible leadership skills which help build awareness of where people are in their own personal journey,” she explains.

Shifting the power dynamic

This month RepresentED and IDEO are opening application submissions for the fall session of CxD. The program is open to all BIPOC students from backgrounds that have been historically underrepresented in design.

“It was important to shift away from the typical ‘company-intern’ power dynamic,” said Hanif. “It’s about an equal exchange of value that shifts the long-held power dynamics between the company and the fellow.” Following a bootcamp in design thinking, the cohort will receive placement on a six-month full-time IDEO project and have the opportunity to pursue a career at IDEO. Whether they decide to continue a design career or not, fellows will leave the program with a deeper understanding of design that they can apply to nearly any line of work.

Fellows will also be trained holistically for entry into culturally white-dominated industries, preparing them for challenges that are likely to come up, like imposter syndrome. “Having the ability to name things like imposter syndrome enabled me to step into my own authenticity,” explains Cisneros, “while understanding that institutions need to do their own work in order truly create a culture of belonging.”

A signal to the industry

Looking forward, there’s a lot of potential for programs like CxD to drive lasting change within other companies and industries. “This isn’t just a pipeline program, it’s a signal to the industry,” Hanif notes. Companies that have more diversity in their staff will have a greater competitive edge, and the design skills fellows bring to the table can be applied to more than just traditional design work—they can be used anywhere.

“It's not about checking DE&I boxes,” she adds, “When you build products and services, you want the people who buy those products to be represented in the design process—there’s a real business case for that.”

The first cohort has been invited into IDEO in January 2022 for a 6-month period, and an iteration of the program will launch by the end of 2023. We will share more updates as we get closer to the recruitment season. If you have any questions, please contact cxdinfo@ideo.com.

For Jordan Cisneros, a Senior Specialist on IDEO’s Global Learning and Development Team, access to a career in design was not a given.

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.