Monster Moves is an app that gives kids the ability to create their very own monster dance party. Kid-approved by a rambunctious team of tiny beta testers, the app encourages children 5 and younger to exercise their creativity as they choreograph dance moves for a troupe of monsters. Kids develop an awareness of their creative control by sequencing illustrated tiles that correspond to each monster’s unique set of dance moves.

Whether it’s a twirl, flap, swing, or sway, the app enables kids to cultivate decision-making skills by drawing connections between their choices and the monsters’ dance steps. Each monster has a full repertoire of dance moves and accompanying musical beats, so kids can compose an original soundtrack and dance along. To encourage kids around the world to create and design, the app is available in English, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Spanish, Italian, French, and German.

Monster Moves—available on the App Store—joins a collection of apps, including Balloonimals and Balloonimal Babies, created by IDEO’s Play Lab, made up of a team of educators, designers and toy experts who foster kids’ curiosity, play, imagination, and creative confidence.

Chronic pain changes everything. Symptoms associated with chronic conditions can make activities that were a normal part of life—getting regular exercise or even a good night’s sleep—difficult to bear.

NeuroMetrix, an innovative health-care company based in Waltham, Massachusetts, developed Quell® to help treat chronic pain in people suffering from nerve, arthritic, back, leg, and foot conditions. Using a revolutionary technology called wearable intensive nerve stimulation (WINS), this device triggers widespread relief and, in a clinical study, reduced chronic pain and use of medication in thousands of users.

NeuroMetrix came to IDEO to help create the industrial design, interaction design, and mechanical engineering to bring Quell to the consumer market. Quell is a device that is placed in a sports band with a lightweight, slim design that fits comfortably on the upper calf and delivers therapy for chronic pain in the body. Its patented OptiTherapy™ technology is customized and automatically adjusts the therapy dose for optimal relief. An accompanying app, developed by Atomic Object, allows users to track treatment sessions, measure and understand the quality of their sleep as it relates to their pain, and personalize device settings.

IDEO’s work with Quell went beyond creating the product to something bigger—reframing chronic pain. For people who are in a constant state of suffering, the ability to take some measure of control allows them to feel more like active participants in their treatment plan, and to regain confidence.

Operating a CT scanner is a delicate balancing act: The tech has to get a clear image for accurate diagnosis while reducing the patient’s overall radiation exposure. There are a lot of variables, and every second counts.

GE Healthcare, one of the country’s largest manufacturers of CT scanners, hired IDEO to redesign the console user interface to optimize the tech’s workflow, the patient experience, and the image quality. The key challenge was accommodating both junior and senior tech experience when designing a single interface, balancing support, flexibility and control. The final design allows techs to see their entire workflow up front, is optimized for “glanceability,” and draws technicians’ attention to important information. Threshold limits ensure the radiation dose never exceeds the determined amount. Ultimately, the streamlined design enables the tech to feel confident and focus on the patient’s physical and emotional well-being.

With several new hospitals using the new GE CT scanner, the impact has been evident. Within 24 hours, techs are up and running on the machines. The vision for the future looks bright and clear.

How does a 130-year-old telecom company in Bogotá appeal to a tech-savvy generation without alienating its most loyal customers? Faced with growing competition, ETB, Colombia’s oldest telecom business, wanted to modernize its entire retail shopping experience and update its branding.

The company enlisted IDEO’s help in leveraging its already highly regarded brand. IDEO created a complete blueprint for the next generation of retail centers, including in-store spaces, digital services, and new personnel role descriptions. ETB’s new retail stores are warm and bright, and self-service kiosks eliminate the need for waiting in line. The company’s brand also got a face-lift with a new color palette and brand manual.

"Working closely with IDEO, we accomplished all of our goals,” said Vice President Carlos Alberto Gómez García, “from creating organizational change to reimagining interactions with our customers to evolving the brand identity of ETB."

Name: Loren Flaherty
Location: New York
Role at IDEO: Senior Communication Designer, which means I work collaboratively with project teams, helping them visually tell the story of the project. Through compelling visual narratives, I move from complex business challenges to strategic solutions.
Joined IDEO: 2014
Instagram: @lorenipsum
Titillating Fact: I have an obsession with finding numbers and keep a blog called A Number Of to record them. I started the blog in 2009. I find most of the numbers myself, although friends that know about it give me numbers that they find. A couple rules: Numbers must be dominant on the piece that's found, and the piece has to be smaller than 8.5 by 11. I especially like finding pieces when I travel.

1. Tortus Copenhagen

As a result of doing pottery for a couple years, I try to keep my eye out for inspiring ceramicists. I recently found the work of Eric Landon and Karin Blach Nielsen of Tortus Copenhagen on Instagram. I love the depth and gradient of the glazes on the large curved forms.

2. Numero Group

I spend a lot of time listening to music while working. I found this label when I lived in Chicago. The label finds otherwise unreleased, dusty, forgotten-about tracks and re-releases them. If you like soul music, check out their Eccentric Soul Series. They have a couple sample playlists on Spotify.

3. Photofit: Self-Portraits

This is an older project but I just re-found it. Fourteen people were asked to create self-portraits using a police Photofit kit from the 1970s, without referring to a photograph or mirror.

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In this series, we ask IDEO designers to share the stuff they're digging right now—tools, books, music, sites, people, places—so you, too, can drink from the fount of inspiration bubbling up here. This week's guest star: This week's guest star: Loren Flaherty.

In our first episode, Berlin-based digital design director Anne Pascual sat down with London's senior editor Ed White to talk about how technology is changing intimacy, and what that means for designers.

We set out to speak to some people designing at the edges of intimacy, to better understand both sides.

We spoke to Pia, the founder of a "paid dating" app called OhLaLa, to talk about mobile, expanding choices, and the ever more complicated boundaries of the modern mating game.

We chatted to the founder of OffTime, an app designed to help you get offline and focus on meaningful, real-world moments with your family and friends.

Technology needs to support us in our efforts to reconnect with others, to find intimacy instead of what most of the technology is doing, which is just exploiting our weaknesses.

OFFTIME, MICHAEL DETTBARN.

Lastly, we caught up with Internet activist Zara about how technology both empowers vulnerable people and minority groups. But while people can find comfort online, they’re also increasingly exposed to the dangers of sharing their data.

What will the next episode bring? The future of work, the circular economy, ageing? Let us know what you think: IDEOEurope@ideo.com.

We're always connected, but are we actually connecting? Billions of mobile phones and Tinder hookups later, many feel increasingly lonely, overloaded, and disenfranchised. IDEO Europe’s first podcast, How Might We, digs into how technology is changing intimacy.

The Teachers Guild is a professional community that activates teachers’ creativity to solve the biggest challenges in education today. While learning and doing design thinking, teachers build their creative muscles and connect to diverse partner organizations that are committed to bringing their solutions to life. It’s an initiative run by a team of educators and designers from IDEO’s Design for Learning Studio and PLUSSED at Riverdale Country School.

Learn more about the Teachers Guild here.

WATCH: Welcome to the Teachers Guild!

Two years ago, I ordered wood, frets, a few parts, and a couple of guidebooks. After watching hours of instructional YouTube videos, I built a mold and got going.

I’m entirely self-taught. I learned mainly by doing, common sense, and from my experience building models as a product designer. There’s a violin maker next to our office who helped me understand old techniques like hot-bending wood, working with hot hide glue, and using and sharpening wood hand tools.

I’ve finished two guitars, and I’m working on a new one now. I do all of my work on them in our IDEO Munich workshop. The first took about 140 hours to make, over six months. The second one took less time. (A professional builder takes about 40 to 60 hours, for reference.) You can’t rush it and there’s not much room for iteration—it has to be right the first time. I sign the inside of each soundboard so people know where and when it was built, in case someone takes them apart after I’m gone.

I build off a 1930s plan by CF Martin, a German who emigrated to the US in the late 1800s and founded the famous Martin Guitar Company. He invented the American steel-string guitar. The model is called OM (Orchestra Model). It was the biggest guitar made at the time, and was for playing in orchestras and, of course, without amplification. I find its shape beautiful, and it has a fine voice. It’s still built today. It has passed the test of time, I guess.

My latest build is European: a gypsy jazz guitar like one played by famous jazz guitar inventor Django Reinhardt. Created by an Italian guitarist named Maccaferri, it was produced by Selmer, Paris, from the 1930s to the late 1940s. I love that genre, and this guitar has a unique sound.

With the shift to a management position, I’m turning my design skills more towards consulting and away from product design. I miss the focussed work that goes deep, spending time on one project, and having a tangible result after hours of work.

Guitar making gives me all of that. It is extremely rewarding. The result of your work becomes increasingly evident, and at the end you can make music on your own creation, while other guitarists can enjoy what you’ve built. It is an exercise in learning, prototyping, craft, and design.

Guitars have been a love affair of mine since childhood. I was surrounded by music at home: My father plays guitar and taught me to play my first chords. Since I am an avid tinkerer, craftsman, and maker, it was a logical step to build them myself.

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.

Ed White has a rule he's tested on his own writing: hold yourself as the writer, and let AI be your editor. Ed is a Senior Design Director at IDEO's London studio, where he co-leads the firm's AI portfolio across Europe. Before IDEO, he spent 12 years as a writer and editor at the Financial Times, Wired, and Contagious. So when he talks about when to use AI for storytelling and when not to, it comes from two decades of crafting his storytelling skills.

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In this episode, Mina Seetharaman talks with Ed about two specific tools he uses to keep AI in an editor's seat: a "roasting agent" prompted to critique his drafts without any sugarcoating, and a simulated audience he rehearses pitches on before the real thing. They also get into what Ed is hearing from design leaders at Anthropic, Lovable, Shopify, and Google Creative Lab about how creative work is changing, and why he thinks the friction of writing something yourself is worth protecting rather than automating away.

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.