Sealy and IDEO first collaborated in 2008, to rethink the design of its Stearns & Foster line. For years, Sealy, the largest mattress manufacturer in the world, had taken the standard industry approach to selling mattresses and watched market share and sales flatten; it knew something had to change. Stearns & Foster evolved from a single product design into a keystone for transforming the organization.

IDEO helped Sealy use actionable consumer insights to develop a scalable design methodology and new brand principles, which it applied to product design, operational and manufacturing decision-making processes, and sales and marketing strategy. This “brand-to-product” framework was subsequently used for three separate and consecutive product launches—Stearns & Foster, Embody, and Posturepedic—resulting in an overhaul of 85 percent of Sealy’s mattress portfolio.

Tempur-Pedic was already working with IDEO on a new mattress design when it acquired Sealy in 2013. It was also interested in how design thinking and human-centered design could improve its business. Once solely focused on the technological elements of designing a mattress, together with IDEO, Tempur-Pedic redesigned the outer shells of its mattresses to reflect the quality on the inside. This design change led to the company to look at new ways to infuse design into their products.

“The initial project was to design the mattress,” said Thomas Overthun, associate partner and design director at IDEO. “But the second project was to create a whole design language from the mattress out to what it meant for any other product, from pillows to blankets and other accessories. It eventually became bigger than just the mattress.”

Working on the Tempur-Pedic/Sealy relationship has been gratifying, said IDEO partner and design director Michael Hendrix, because although home goods can be thought of as simply products, nothing could be further from the truth. IDEO and Tempur-Pedic/Sealy changed the course of the mattress company's business through the transformative power of designing where, and ultimately how, people sleep. And in the process, the organization itself changed as well, moving siloed departments to cross-functional teams, with the brand division central to their cooperation, which led to consistent and aligned decisions across the board.

Some of the projects include:

Stearns & Foster Luxury Mattress
Sealy teamed up with IDEO to develop a design language for Stearns & Foster mattresses that would reestablish what the brand stood for. Through redefining brand principles and rounds of prototypes that focused on evocative details, the new Stearns and Foster mattress was the highest rated in Sealy’s portfolio since it started keeping records, and initial retailer orders were three times what management projected.

Next-Generation Posturepedic
An icon in the mattress industry was brought into the 21st century by developing a new product that delivered on the long-running promise of the brand. Together, IDEO and Sealy designed a product that focused on holistic back health. In its earnings report, the company said US bedding sales for the quarter were up 10.6 percent, to $253.4 million, a figure driven by the new product line’s introduction. According to Sealy’s Q3 earnings report, the Posturepedic launch represented the largest and fastest rollout in the company’s history.

Embody by Sealy
The project began by defining the market opportunities for all-foam beds, and ended with the modern, streamlined Embody mattress as well as a simplified design language, free of industry jargon, to help retailers talk about the mattress to customers. “Sealy collaborated with IDEO to create an approachable and attractive mattress that delivers the simple, healthy rest consumers want with a selling story they can easily understand,” said Jodi Allen, Sealy’s Chief Marketing Officer.

Tempur-Pedic Sleep System
Best known for the revolutionary, NASA-proven Tempur material inside its mattresses, Tempur wanted to transform the exterior of its mattresses to match the caliber of innovation inside. Together with IDEO, Tempur created a new sleep system, including an easily removable and washable fabric mattress cover. “Tempur-Pedic was born of innovation, but we were never a design-driven company until we worked with IDEO,” said Patrice Varni, senior vice president of brand marketing, Tempur Sealy North America, LLC. “Seeing consumer need in a new way through IDEO’s eyes has transformed us. Our product design, our creative psyche, our brand are all fundamentally changed by this sharper focus. This collaboration has given us all a renewed sense of pride.”

The challenge of how we’ll feed the exploding world population in the future—in a sustainable, cost-effective, and environmentally friendly way—is seeding an agricultural revolution in Europe.

In 2012, INFARM founders Erez, Guy Galonska, and Osnat Michaeli found that vertical farms could be a solution to urban self-sufficiency. These farms could allow people to grow vegetables and herbs in small spaces, with no soil and far less water.

An approach that’s captured the imagination of futurists for decades, vertical farming involves growing vegetables and herbs in stacked units or inclined surfaces, within which moisture, light, temperature, and nutrients are monitored, and controlled.

After creating their first vertical farming experiment in their apartment in Berlin, the founders brought together plant scientists and industrial designers to explore and develop vertical farming’s potential.

Since then, the startup has created custom growing systems for clients including Airbnb, Mercedes-Benz, and Weber. Most recently, INFARM installed a vertical farm growing herbs and vegetables at the Berlin branch of German supermarket chain Metro, the fourth-largest retail chain in the world, to sell to the public. It’s been profiled in Wired Germany, Süddeutsche Zeitung, The Guardian, and Zeit.

INFARM collaborated with IDEO to further explore their B2B offer, including concepts for the industrial design of the stackable, modular, climate-controlled units; the interaction design of an accompanying app to monitor and control the units, and its business model.

Urban farmers will sign up for “farming as a service,” comprising the units themselves, as well as a monthly subscription for seeds, cartridges filled with nutrients, and a pH regulator. Because they’re stackable, the modules can be scaled to suit anyone from a home grower to a restaurant chef or supermarket owner. And Erez claims a 1 square meter growing tray can yield four to six mature plants every day, 365 days a year, doubling that of state-of-the-art hydroponic greenhouses.

As well as remotely regulating each unit’s climate, the app will educate growers about new vegetables and herbs, selling packs of complementary seeds, with suggested recipes for them, and cooking instructions. Aiming to promote biodiversity, the firm will sell rare-breed and heirloom seeds too.

The startup has funding from the EU’s European Pioneers fund, and is now looking to secure investment to accelerate software development and ramp up their hardware production capabilities. Quite literally, it's growing its business.

Sesame Workshop is the nonprofit educational group that revolutionized children’s television with the launch of the landmark Sesame Street program in 1969. The show, which has since become a household name, is now watched in more than 150 countries worldwide. The Workshop also creates educational content for new media platforms, and partnered with IDEO to design a line of Sesame Street–themed apps for Apple’s iPhone. The Elmo Calls app, which functions as a utility app for parents and as an entertaining behavioral-development app for kids, is now one of the Top 100 paid iPhone apps in the iTunes store.

The collaboration began with a mutual desire to bring the show’s beloved characters to the iPhone platform—and to do so using a human-centered design approach. Child-development experts, educators, toy and interaction designers, and even the Sesame Street puppeteers weighed in on the design decisions. The team also worked closely with families throughout the project—from initial concepts to early prototyping to the final development—in order to stay focused on how children actually use the iPhone for play. The games were designed accordingly. For example, the team omitted menus from the Sesame Street apps to keep the experiences simple, playful, and fun for a young child. And each game features exclusive new Sesame Street videos, allowing players to enjoy “lean back” moments along with interactive ones.

The resulting iPhone applications let children engage with the favorite Sesame Street characters in a whole new way. Kids touch, shake, swipe, and tilt their way through original games featuring Elmo, Grover, Bert, Rosita, and the Count.

The titles, all of which are available from iTunes, include:

• Elmo Calls: Engages 2- to 5-year-olds in listening-skills practice and active participation during everyday situations.
• Elmo’s Monster Maker: Allows kids to create unique monster friends that dance and play with Elmo.
• Sesame Street Video Maker: Lets kids star in their own music videos, mashing recordings of themselves with popular Sesame music videos and adding their own stamps and special effects.
• Sesame Street Makes Music: Helps kids explore an array of instruments as they contribute to new renditions of classic preschool tunes with their Sesame friends.

How do you know when you’re successful in your work? You can check off a list of technical skills and expertise you bring to the table. You can use a career development rubric to make sure you’re hitting the right goals. But often, it’s your behaviors—the intangibles that are the most difficult to articulate—that make the most impact. Things like your ability to stay optimistic or your willingness to adapt when there’s no roadmap.

Because of the nature of our work at IDEO, these intangibles are a big part of what defines the experience of working at the company. So in 2012, a global team of designers from our U.S., Europe, and Asia offices came together to codify these values and behaviors as part of a larger effort to evolve IDEO’s career development platform. More often than not, when IDEOers hit road bumps in their career, it was not about what they were doing, but how they were doing it.

The team agreed that, in addition to identifying the technical requirements needed to progress through one’s career, it was just as crucial to give IDEOers the tools they need to navigate the complex culture. So they captured the values they believed were foundational to the culture and most strongly shared across the IDEO community, and put them to paper in The Little Book of IDEO. The title is meant to reflect its purpose for readers—a handbook that’s compact, useful, and free of any corporate jargon.

For IDEO-ers, this red cloth-bound guide provides a shared lexicon around both the hard and soft skills we need to succeed. It describes things like why IDEO is so loosely structured, where it comes from, and where it’s headed.

Most importantly, the book identifies the organization’s seven core values. These are by design specific, actionable, and integral to the kind of work we do and the environment in which we do it, going beyond common sense and general ethical practice. The intention: to foster meaningful conversations within the community about life at IDEO, and how to achieve success along the way. With each succinct expression comes a deeper explanation of why it matters, and how it shapes our experience at IDEO.

Over the years, the book has been roundly embraced by the IDEO community as an honest articulation of who we are, as opposed to what we aspire to be, and what we appreciate most about working together. When IDEOers first got their hands on it, a movement took shape to create videos that bring each of the core values to life. To depict the value of "Embracing Ambiguity," for example, New York-based designers built a makeshift cardboard rowboat, and while simulating a storm, navigated their way through uncharted territory with teamwork and optimism. San Francisco produced a Jacques Cousteau inspired look at the lifestyle and behaviors of designers in their natural collaborative habitat.

Through the process of making the videos, IDEOers came together to reflect on each of the values, talking through what resonated and what didn’t. It gave them a sense of ownership, and a platform through which to share their interpretations.

A Global Conversation

IDEO has a global presence—offices in two countries in Europe, two countries in Asia, and multiple locations across the U.S. As an organization that embraces a human-centered culture, it felt important to learn if the values resonated with the IDEO community in all of these locations, especially in a country like China, whose working culture is so different from the west. We saw the authenticity and resonance of the values as essential for attracting, motivating, and retaining local talent.

So how did The Little Book of IDEO land in Shanghai? Exploring this question would illuminate insights into how our own clients are often challenged to keep their company culture resonant within the global landscape.

A team of IDEOers in our Shanghai office took on the challenge of exploring the meaning behind each of the values. They were surprised with what they discovered—that despite the firm’s Western origins, locals felt largely connected to the values. It even helped to further solidify their identity as a community, even if it may have been in tension with local working culture, because it was rooted in a set of shared beliefs.

In some instances, the Shanghai team built on the existing values in order to refine the meaning for the local context. For example, the core value "Be Optimistic" rings true, but could sound naive when translated directly to Chinese, implying "rose-tinted glasses.” So in the Mandarin edition, an extra phrase was added to convey the measuredness we mean when we talk about optimism at IDEO. The lesson here: The treatment of something as fundamental and nuanced as our values requires authenticity and emotional connection, and therefore more of a transcreation process than straight translation.

Lasting Power

As an organization, we are designed to be flexible. This means we’re always changing—even when it comes to how we are structured—so that we can respond to the kinds of challenges that clients come to us for. In the midst of our constant evolution, The Little Book of IDEO is as resonant today as it was when it was published.

Not wanting to disappoint her, I started searching for some craft that would satisfy that messy complexity. I tried what I knew. Illustration might bring my imaginary characters and stories to life. But my skills were limited. Collage answered the urge for messy assembly, but lacked precision.

Then I tried making a GIF, that looping relic of the old web that’s come back as an art form. The beauty of GIFs is that they preserve a single moment, with all of its feeling, and play it back forever. It was imperfect. It was messy. I was mesmerized. It struck the balance me and my inner teenager needed.

I’ve found that custom GIFs can be made for all sorts of scenarios—to show thanks, explain an idea, even tell someone you’re thinking of them. Flowers pale in comparison to a custom-made GIF for your loved one this Valentine’s Day.

With my internship at IDEO ending soon, I decided to create a parting GIF to share my gratitude. Here’s how to make your own:

1. Find a concept. Don’t dwell here. Get to making quickly and don’t overthink it! I landed on the metaphor of a rising sun, symbolizing illumination and a new beginning thanks to my experience here.

2. Gather supplies. Don’t spend any money on materials—they’re all around you. I rounded up old San Francisco brochures from my landlord’s supply closet.

3. Form a composition. Clear a workspace or spread out on the floor (as I did here), collect your supplies, and start cutting. Cue Bob’s Burgers.

4. Photograph. Find a space by a bright window and a makeshift hand stabilizer—in this case it was an empty coffee machine. I shoot about 30 frames with my iPhone, moving each piece of paper by hand, frame after frame.

5. Assemble in Photoshop. With your batch of photos loaded into a Photoshop file, click “Create Frame Animation” from your Photoshop Timeline (pictured on the bottom of the screenshot below). This allows you to create a frame-by-frame animation, revealing one photo in your sequence per frame. Make any adjustments in light balance and cropping, and manually tweak the alignment of any shaky photos here, too.

6. Save and export. To export your finished GIF from Photoshop, choose “Save for Web (Legacy).” Adjust the export settings to pare your GIF down to a manageable file size. Add a watermark or signature if you want to ensure you'll get credit for your work.

7. Let it fly! GIFs can be embedded in email, posted on social media, even texted.

I’m an intern at IDEO who’s training to be an interaction designer. But one morning at 4 a.m., after an all-nighter studying a maze of sterile, methodically made wireframes, I felt the 15-year-old me frowning at my career choice. Who was this person obsessing over digital simplicity and efficiency? What happened to the girl who loved drama? Who loved a mess?

There I sat, staring at this person whom I deeply admired, witnessing a fleeting moment of vulnerability, and I realized that I’m not the only one that feels this way.

I’m someone who will walk by the espresso machine multiple times, trying catch a glimpse of how to make a latte, just so when I decide to do it myself, I’ll look like I know what I’m doing. I avoid confrontations, so as not to tarnish what others think of me. I convince myself I am where I am because of luck. I’ve spent the first few years of my professional life trying to be a good pretender, trying to ignore this voice in my head that takes over and says I don’t belong.

But, there are ways to shake off those feelings, to help you remember the value you have, that you should trust yourself, and that you belong in your job. It took me a while to figure it out, but I’ve developed ways to cope. If I could take a time machine back to when I first started out, here are the three things I would remind myself:

1. NEVER STOP ASKING FOR FEEDBACK

I’m an introvert who, for years, kept my vulnerabilities wrapped up. Fake it til you make it was a subconscious motto. What I didn’t realize was how empowering it is to openly admit the things you are afraid of, and the empathy and advice you get from others when you do. The sooner you are able to identify these fears and voice them, the sooner others will be able to help you through these challenges. Don’t try to pretend your insecurities don’t exist—voicing them is the first step to overcoming them.

2. GET OUT OF YOUR WORLD OF EXPERTISE

Throughout school, I was laser-focused on learning everything I could about design. When I came to IDEO, this passion for design was no longer something that made me unique. It’s what you know beyond design that allows you to come up with a solution that your peers haven’t considered. Good design skills are most powerful when they are applied with another discipline or two, or three. I found the designers I most admired were experts in some other area—neuroscience, climbing, magic, baking.

3. MEASURE YOURSELF BY YOUR OWN YARDSTICK

It’s so easy to be consumed by other people’s talents, but comparing yourself to others is an impossible game to win. Instead, try competing with yourself. Where were you a year ago? Six months? Can you measure your improvement over time? It’s a commitment to continuously learning that will make you grow as a designer. You went from getting coffee at an internship to distributing the first magazine article you designed? Growth!

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I first heard the term impostor syndrome from a fellow designer. We were chatting about the projects we were on, and comparing each other’s work to our peers: designers we knew, designers we didn’t know, even super-influential icons we swooned over, like Stefan Sagmeister and Jessica Hische.

“How did we even get hired?” he asked me. “It’s like I have perpetual impostor syndrome—it’s bad.”

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How so? A classic rookie mistakes in design work is “me-search”—doing research on yourself and creating something tailor-made for your needs, rather than seeking broader inspiration from the outside world. So, in service of greater creativity—and maybe a more clear-eyed body politic—here are four ways to escape your bubble.

1. Talk to Strangers

Now that the time and directions are available on every smartphone, it's amazing how little we need to talk to strangers. But think about what is lost when you never have a serendipitous encounter. To reignite this habit, seek out contexts that are naturally social: bars, book clubs, craft circles. Go alone, so you're required to interact with someone new. Going solo not your bag? Here's another approach: Follow Bill Murray’s advice and strike up a conversation with every taxi driver you ride with. Ask them plenty of questions beginning with the word “why.” Maybe you’ll figure out, as Murray did, what’s preventing them from doing what they love.

2. Unfollow People Like You

If you're choosing to hear from people who think exactly like you, you're going to get sucker punched every time public opinion swings the other way. Are you a bleeding-heart liberal? Try following conservative pundits, think tanks, and some of the average Joes who tune into them. Lean to the right? Look to the left! Hat tip to Harper Reed, CTO of the 2008 Obama campaign, for this one. Reed recently unfollowed most of the white men in his Twitter feed, instead directing his attention to women, people of color, and people with disabilities. Just to be clear, this was not an act of political correctness—his motivation was to expose himself to different points of view, in service of inspiring his personal creativity.

3. Join a Different Demographic

When it comes to picking a night out, most of us choose something that we know we're going to enjoy. And chances are, we’ll be surrounded by people just like us. As an alternative, go for an evening activity in which you're immersed in a completely different demographic. If you're a millennial, hit up bingo night with seniors. If you're a Boomer, grit your teeth and shake it off at a concert full of teenagers. If you're visiting a new city, seek out a comedy open mic and see what people are talking about. Yes, there's every chance that this evening’s experiment won't be as comfy as your usual fare... but we bet that it will help you understand people’s needs in a different way, making you better suited to creating new things for them.

4. Volunteer

Giving back is always the right thing to do, and it has the seldom-mentioned added benefit of easing you out of your filter bubble. Whether you're helping the homeless, people with disabilities, or any other group, you will be eye-to-eye with people you rarely encounter on your Facebook feed. The fact that you're serving others is a bonus. The person you may be helping most is yourself.

Illustrations by Ashley Holtgraver.

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In the aftermath of the 2016 election, there has been a new focus on the “filter bubble”: the phenomenon of being fed news and social media that is tuned to your existing point of view, rather than challenging it.

Filter bubbles are a problem for democracy. We believe they’re a problem for creativity, too.

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10 graphic novels to read right now:

1. Fred Korematsu Speaks Up (Fighting for Justice) by Laura Atkins (Author), Stan Yogi (Author), Yutaka Houlette (Illustrator) profiles a Japanese-American man who went into hiding to avoid being relocated into an internment camp, and was later arrested and put in a camp until 1945. (For 10 - 13-year-olds)

2. The United States Constitution: A Graphic Adaptation by Jonathan Hennessey (Author), Aaron McConnell (Illustrator) breathes life into our nation's central document of values and principles.

3. March by John Lewis (Author), Andrew Aydin (Author), Nate Powell (Illustrator) chronicles the life of the Congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis as he fought to end segregation.

4. The Complete Maus, 25th Anniversary Edition by Art Spiegelman tells the tale of a Holocaust survivor and his son and how they grapple with the past.

5. Palestine by Joe Sacco is an eyewitness account of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the early 1990s.

6. Economix: How Our Economy Works (and Doesn't Work) by Michael Goodwin (Author), David Bach (Author), Joel Bakan (Author), Dan Burr (Illustrator) is an accessible, eye-popping guide to understanding the economy.

7. Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi is a memoir of growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution.

8. The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression by Amity Shlaes (Author), Chuck Dixon (Adapter), Paul Rivoche (Illustrator) is the graphic version of Amity Shlaes's nonfiction book. It highlights the struggles of the men and women of the Great Depression, and argues that the New Deal actually prolonged it.

9. Climate Changed: A Personal Journey through the Science Paperback, by Philippe Squarzoni is a stark, black and white depiction of our dependence on fossil fuels and how that's affecting our planet. French author Squarzoni sweeps through the science, economics, international policies, and politics that influence our climate.

10. Trinity: A Graphic History of the First Atomic Bomb by Jonathan Fetter-Vorm is a historical glance back at the race to build and decision to drop the first atomic bomb during WWII. (For young adults)

A spread from Fred Korematsu Stands Up about the daily grind of discrimination.

We spoke to Laura Atkins, coauthor of the new graphic novel for 4th-6th graders, Fred Korematsu Stands Up (#1 in our list, above). Google put Korematsu, the Japanese-American civil rights figure who went into hiding to avoid being relocated into an internment camp, and was later arrested, on its U.S. homepage yesterday to commemorate what would have been his 98th birthday (he died in 2005).

IDEO: Why were you drawn to the topic?

Laura Atkins: It’s such an important theme for us to pass along to kids today. I was an activist growing up, arrested twice in high school protesting against apartheid and nuclear weapons. We are entering a renewed period of activism and protest. I feel honored to have been part of a creating a book that introduces young people to a remarkable man who stood up when it was so hard to do so.

I’ve worked in the children’s book world for over twenty years on the editorial side, and with a focus on multicultural children’s books. So a book, and series, focused on people who fought for their rights, was a perfect project for me. Fred Korematsu stood up against Japanese American incarceration when very few people did. He was ostracized within his own community and rejected by his family at the time. He shows the courage needed to stand up for your beliefs. But people did rally around him over time, and he was not the only person to fight.

Why are graphic novels good ways to deal with complicated historical, cultural, and political subjects?

This isn’t quite a graphic novel, though we were definitely influenced by the graphic novel look. We did want to create a book that used visuals in a predominant way, in an effort to make the book attractive and inviting for young readers. My nine-year-old daughter will always choose a graphic novel first. And I’ve found some graphic novels that introduced me to socio-historical contexts better than just fiction (Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi and Palestine by Joe Sacco come to mind). John Lewis just received multiple awards from librarians for his March graphic novel.

I actually wrote my MA thesis on graphic novels that depicted personal memory and collective history, focusing on WWII (coincidentally). Drawing from Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud, I looked at how the interaction between text and visual elements can create a deep and complex reading experience. This is true for readers of all ages. I think graphic novels offer some of the most innovative and exciting reading opportunities today.

What did you look at for inspiration? Are there other great examples of graphic novels or other graphic treatments of historic figures/movements that you could point us to?

I read a lot of children’s book depicting history, especially in terms of our diverse country. Voice of Freedom, a picture book biography about Fanny Lou Hamer, a civil rights activist, was a big influence. I love how the author, Carole Boston Weatherford, wrote in a first person present tense voice to bring us deeply into Hamer’s experience. Marilyn Nelson writes powerful poetry to introduce us to historical figures and events. Her biography, Carver, is one of my favorite books of all time. She uses photos and a variety of voices to introduce readers to George Washington Carver, going way beyond just inventing peanut butter. Her picture book, A Wreath for Emmett Till, shows how deep and complex picture books can be. Ashley Bryan just won awards for his gorgeous and moving book, Freedom Over Me. He deals with the lack of primary source records from slave times to create and give voice to several enslaves characters, along with transcendent artwork. Freedom in Congo Square by Carole Boston Weatherford and illustrated by Gregory Christie, Javaka Steptoe’s recent biography of Basquiat, Radiant Child—so many great books out there. Kids can learn about Josephine Baker and the Shackleton expedition. I could go on and on…

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When trying to gain empathy for people unlike you, panels can be more powerful than headlines. Some of the best books published in recent years have used comics to crack open sensitive political, cultural, and historical topics. You'll note that this list isn't without bias. Graphic nonfiction is a tool more frequently used by the left, and it's hard to find many examples with a more conservative outlook—trust us, we tried. But we believe that all of the books on this list have a different perspective to offer, and can help us look at the world in a new way. Did we miss any others? Tweet us. We'd love to hear what you think.

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.