Looking to understand the role of instant noodles in middle-class Chinese life, the IDEO team conducted in-home research with consumers across a range of life stages and levels of attachment to noodle culture and convenience foods. The first finding was reassuring: Everyone kept instant noodles at home. The category still had a place in middle-class kitchens. But beneath that was a more complicated, emotional story—and an unmet need for convenience and quality to coexist in a single product.

The team discovered that instant noodles are more than just a quick, on-the-go meal; they are a nostalgic comfort food that evokes fond memories. But since their heyday, their role in daily life has evolved. Once a complete meal in itself, instant noodles now often function as a versatile flavor base or culinary accent in other dishes. Because they don’t align with the healthier, higher-quality, and more novel food choices that middle-class consumers aspire to, noodle shops, delivery noodles, or fresh-cooked instant options often win out. Yet, even these alternatives come with trade-offs. Delivered noodles lose texture during transport. Sit-down noodle shops preserve quality but offer limited flavors.  Cooking from scratch meets the bar for both texture and flavor, but requires a significant time investment. As one young mother said, “If I could get the texture of fresh-cooked noodles without turning on the stove, I’d buy that instant noodle for sure.”

The research inspired the creation of a new category, which the team termed “fresh-brewed noodles.” More than just a noodle or broth upgrade, Master Kong’s fresh-brewed noodles would offer the speed of instant noodles with the quality of freshly cooked options, plus flavors not found in traditional noodle shops. The strategic positioning was clear. Executing it by making fresh-brewed noodles mass-producible, affordable, and eventually profitable presented a category-innovation challenge. To get there, IDEO designed a series of dual-track co-creation workshops with the Master Kong team and consumers.

One track focused on prototyping the core product experience: noodles, broth, and toppings. IDEO and Master Kong’s R&D team began by studying the traditional craft of Chinese noodle-making, starting in Shanxi, a region renowned for its noodles. Through successive rounds of prototyping and consumer tasting, the team identified a critical insight: for “fresh-brewed noodles” to be convincing, the innovation had to be centered on the noodles themselves.

Texture alone was not enough. Consumers needed to see a meaningful difference before they tasted the product. IDEO translated this insight into a distinctive noodle profile: irregular, dimensional shapes designed to remain springy, hold sauce and broth, and mimic the resilience of freshly cooked noodles using only hot water. Because this visible shape represented the product’s core value proposition, it became a hero feature on the packaging. The graphic design made a bold visual statement about the noodle form, turning a technical R&D breakthrough into an immediately legible consumer promise: these are not ordinary instant noodles.

A parallel track explored the broader commercial experience: trend-forward and reimagined classic flavor profiles, light yet deeply satisfying broths, carefully selected toppings, and packaging that signals a new level of quality on store shelves. One key insight was that utensils carry meaning. Conventional instant noodles are often associated with disposable plastic forks, while higher-quality noodles are eaten with chopsticks. IDEO translated this cultural cue into the design of the bowl’s lid.

Instead of treating utensils as an afterthought, the team designed a solid, rounded, heat-retaining lid that embeds a pair of small wooden chopsticks. The gesture creates a small ritual of anticipation and reframes the product—not just a convenient instant meal, but a more considered noodle experience. Once opened, the product fulfills that promise with satisfyingly bouncy noodles, a rich liquid broth pouch that replaces the traditional oil-and-powder packet, and a vegetable packet reformulated with more premium whole ingredients.

The first batch of “Te Bie Te” Fresh-Brewed Noodles—Chinese wordplay that emphasizes “special”—launched in August 2025 with three trendy and tried-and-true flavors. Within just three days, sales exceeded 100,000 bowls. Within a week, “Te Bie Te” topped the instant noodle category sales ranking on Douyin, China’s domestic counterpart to TikTok. The outcome was bigger than a product launch—it served as proof that a mature, declining category could be fundamentally reinvented to meet consumers’ real needs. For Master Kong, the project became a North Star and a model for internal category innovation in beverages, ready-to-eat foods, and beyond.

Once a popular, affordable staple, the instant noodle category in China has been declining rapidly due to shifting demographics, rising food delivery options, and increasing customer demand for healthier, more nutritious meals.

‍

According to the World Instant Noodles Association, between 2020 and 2023, China’s instant noodle consumption fell by 4 billion packs.

100,000+

“Te Bie Te” bowls sold in the first 3 days on the market

#1

on Douyin’s instant noodle category ranking within one week of launch

Taylor’s legacy began in 1969 with the founding of Taylor’s College and soon expanded to include Taylor’s University, one of Southeast Asia’s top private universities, as well as many other institutions that serve 35,000 students per year. The family-owned group also operates Taylor’s International Schools, Garden International School, and Nexus International School for students ages 4 to 18. In Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s capital city, annual tuition at premium private schools like these ranges from about $10,000 to $25,000 USD. Taylor’s wanted to do something different: provide the same level of academic rigor and immersive learning experiences at one-third the cost.

IDEO began by speaking with over three dozen students, parents, teachers, and experts across the capital to understand what was working, what wasn’t, and what was missing from such moderately priced international schools.

A few themes quickly emerged. Families, students, and teachers were worried about the stability of these new private schools, which tended to have higher-than-normal teacher turnover rates and were plagued by financial instability, negatively impacting talent attraction and retention, as well as student learning. Parents appreciated that the schools offered holistic learning experiences, such as field trips to rural areas, including jungles, but wished they were more consistently part of the curriculum. And now, the looming challenge of AI—how to use it, how to teach it, and how to teach with it—was in the background, a persistent cause for concern. The big unmet need? Reassurance that Taylor’s was thinking long-term and systematically about developing the skills, knowledge, and mindsets that would prepare students for an ever-changing world. Parents wanted a school that measured growth in academic, social, and character terms over generations, not just school semesters.

With these insights in hand, IDEO began developing a design Playbook for Taylor’s new brand—Lexel International Schools. A combination of “lexicon” and “excellence,” Lexel’s mission is “building what lasts, learning for life.”

The schools are centered around three key differentiators: 

• Always Ahead: Lexel schools commit to staying current with the topics and subject matter they teach, as well as the tools they provide to students, parents, and teachers.s.  
  ‍
• Learning That Builds for Life: The schools ensure programmatic, systemic, and consistent learning experiences from Pre-K to Year 11. Interested students can even continue their post-secondary journey in partnership with Taylor’s University and other higher education institutions within the Taylor’s ecosystem.
  
  
• Educators for the Long Run: These schools commit to ongoing investments in professional growth opportunities for teachers and stable learning environments for students.

Four Lexel Literacies—AI, Digital, Financial, and Nutrition—integrated into the Cambridge Curriculum bring the school’s vision and mission to life.

By systematically integrating AI literacy into its spiral education framework, in particular, an approach where major topics are revisited multiple times through a curriculum to build fluency over time, Lexel ensures parents that the school is thinking a decade ahead from Day One, setting the school apart. In addition to enhancing AI fluency, Lexel offers unique end-of-term experiences called Jungles & Junctions.

Combining three important strands of learning—community engagement, nature-based personal and interpersonal development, and career and university exploration—Jungles & Junctions leverages Taylor’s extended educational network and Lexel’s strategic founding campus within the Gamuda Gardens development in Selangor. Surrounded by tropical rainforests, the township’s residential neighborhoods, theme park, and various sports facilities, including an Olympic-length swimming pool, are transformed into an extended Lexel campus, with a GenAI-driven planner to help teachers streamline the organization of class outings. “The Township is Your Campus” became the tagline for this approach.

In September 2025, just months after IDEO’s collaboration ended, Taylor’s began classes at its first Lexel International School. By mid-year, the new school had achieved 115% of its year-one student enrollment target, with significant inbound demand for Year 2 already demonstrating the school’s market resonance.

The modern campus features spacious classrooms, science and technology labs, a library, a multipurpose hall, and a canteen. Annual tuition ranges from about $2,800 USD for pre-K students to about $6,100 USD for secondary students.

Most importantly, by combining Taylor’s deep academic expertise, Gamuda Land’s development prowess, and IDEO’s innovative design Playbook, Lexel brings quality, affordable international education closer to home for Malaysian families. According to one parent, “My daughter looks forward to going to school every day … and has a lot of opportunities to express herself. On a scale of 1 to 10, I give [Lexel] an 11.” Based on the IDEO Playbook, a second flagship campus in the Southern Klang Valley, which is scheduled to open in September 2026, has already exceeded its year-one target enrollment expectations, with plans to continue extending the Lexel network to other parts of Malaysia and the wider Southeast Asian region in the near future.

Malaysia’s private international school sector has grown significantly as parents seek quality English-language education. However, high tuition fees and limited access to reputable schools are continual challenges for those in the emerging middle class.

115%

of Lexel’s student enrollment target reached during the launch year of its first campus
‍

Year 1 enrollment target exceeded

at Lexel's second campus several months ahead of classes commencing

‍

The American news industry has long been a competitive and saturated market. This has only intensified with the emergence of social media outlets and AI-generated news. Even so, SAN’s rigorously unbiased, fact-based reporting style and rich video storytelling had enabled the ambitious startup to rise above the media fray in just three short years.

With a strong foundation to build on, IDEO sought to further differentiate SAN’s cutting-edge news product and build deeper engagement with a wider audience through a new user experience.

‍Collaborating closely, IDEO and SAN began by delving deeply into media consumption habits. They met with early SAN superfans, news consumers who spent hours a day absorbing content from traditional outlets like Fox and USA Today, and those who looked to their Ring doorbell app or Reddit for news. The takeaways? People were tired of clickbait and clunky interfaces. They sought clear, factual news that was easily accessible, with additional context to help them interpret events and understand their significance. They craved more than one perspective on important topics, so stories felt balanced rather than polarized. They also valued having control over how they consumed news, so making it easy to switch between text, video, and audio formats was crucial.

Together, IDEO and SAN created features across SAN’s website and app that put facts, trust, and transparency at the core of the product experience. Fact Cards distill key data points into clear, shareable units, while the Sources feature allows readers to trace information directly back to its original source. To make complex stories easier to grasp, Big Picture insights drill down into why events matter, surfacing underlying themes, historical parallels, differences in reporting, and common ground. The Why This Story Matters section provides readers with clear framing and sets the story within a broader context, while the Timeline illustrates how events unfold over days, months, or even years. An antidote to news polarization, See All Sides presents left, right, and center narratives for key topics side-by-side, and Media Landscape visualizations reveal how coverage varies across outlets. Finally, to ensure SAN fits seamlessly into readers’ daily lives, the redesigned Today Page is organized into three highly scannable sections: Latest News, Top Stories, and SAN Originals. The combined features create a balanced, clear, and non-polarizing news experience, making it easy for readers to delve deeper into the sources of their news.

SAN now delivers a news experience as modern, dynamic, and trustworthy as its journalism. A month after its debut, the SAN app’s page views increased 1,170 percent year over year compared to June 2024, while active users rose 700 percent. Readers also give the updated mobile experience a 4.8 rating on the Apple App Store. “Our team is delivering reporting that’s both deeply factual and accessible,” said Derek Mead, SAN’s Chief Content Officer. “This redesign is pivotal to the direction journalism needs to take and the leadership role Straight Arrow News is taking on as we help guide the news industry into a brighter future.”

SAN built a loyal readership and gained recognition for its unbiased reporting. To expand and stand out from legacy media, SAN  wanted a redesigned user experience that reflected its commitment to fact-based journalism.

1,170%

increase in app page views YoY 

700%

increase in active users

4.8 rating

on the Apple App Store

Sanofi was the first company to supply the polio vaccine worldwide. Because of the global fight against the disease, endemic wild poliovirus transmission is now limited to just two countries. However, attitudes toward vaccines and immunizations have shifted significantly. To ensure a smooth launch of Beyfortus in a time of increased vaccine hesitancy, Sanofi asked IDEO to conduct research across four important and very different healthcare markets: Germany, Spain, China, and the US.

IDEO worked with parents, caregivers, healthcare professionals, and healthcare administrators to identify potential barriers to vaccine adoption and understand the emotional needs of all stakeholders involved in the immunization process. Navigating cultural differences and diverse healthcare environments, the team uncovered a set of insights.

For healthcare professionals, the team discovered there was no one-size-fits-all approach to immunization training across Sanofi’s 20-plus global markets. While consistency of key information was important, trainings needed to be flexible and customizable. This way, regardless of whether the vaccine was administered by midwives, OB-GYNs, nurses, or doctors, they could  confidently discuss the pros and cons across cultural contexts and administer the drug correctly.
‍
For new parents, receiving information about a new immunization immediately after giving birth could be too stressful. But simply leaving pamphlets about Beyfortus in waiting rooms didn't address their real concerns, either. Caregivers needed to engage in conversations earlier in their pregnancies and continue them after leaving the hospital, when they might have additional questions.

IDEO translated these research insights into a highly accessible global communication toolkit that uses simple, straightforward language, metaphors, and illustrations to support informed conversations between healthcare providers and parents before, during, and after a child is born. IDEO then conducted a series of market-fit co-design workshops with representatives of Sanofi’s global immunization business to iterate on the print and digital tools, make them more resonant with regional customers, and ensure compliance with local regulations. IDEO handed the toolkits over for development to support the launch of Beyfortus in January 2024, just in time for RSV season.

Beyfortus saw enormous demand in its first year, demonstrating strong efficacy in real-world applications and achieving blockbuster status as a $1.8 billion therapy. Sanofi’s global launch team credits the patient-centric toolkit with increased requests for communication materials from its regional markets as well as from healthcare and government organizations that have typically been hard to reach, key goals of its global-local launch strategy.

Since its development, Beyfortus has received swift regulatory approval from the US, EU, China, and Japan, with patient demand causing Sanofi to triple its worldwide manufacturing capacity to meet the needs of the 2024-25 RSV season. Ahead of the larger global distribution of Beyfortus, IDEO and Sanofi partnered with equity expert consultants, Fearless Futures, to conduct a DEI review and worked with doctors and nurses who participated in the initial drug launch to make the materials even more accessible, relevant, and successful for 2025 and beyond. To date, six million babies—and counting—have been immunized with Beyfortus.

Worldwide, childhood vaccination hesitancy among parents fluctuates between 25-45%, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), a trend it considers one of the biggest global threats to public health.

85.9%

‍reduction in hospitalizations for infants who received Beyfortus compared to those who did not (2023–24 RSV season)

$1.8B

in first-year sales of Beyfortus

‍

From mammograms to messaging, parking lot payments to locked pharmacy shelves, we have plenty of ideas for human-centered upgrades. Here is what our community would love to reimagine, if only we had the chance. 

Products: 

I love vending machines. Truly. (Ask me about the Sagamihara Vending Machine Park and how obsessed I am.) Still, I would love to redesign them, not because they’re broken, but because we’re not using them enough. What if vending machines weren’t just for objects, but operated at the scale of buildings—part autonomous convenience store, part capsule hotel, part service hub/micro-amenities, and part museum? The infrastructure already exists; the possibilities just need permission to expand. —Tiange Wang, Cambridge

As a woman, I avoid certain streets for safety. But I can’t tell you how many times map apps have routed me down dark blocks, empty stretches, and places where I’m doing constant safety calculations at hours I’d rather not be. It would be much easier if apps had a safer streets option you could toggle on—like “daytime-only” routes or blocks that are flagged as more dangerous at night. I’m not looking for paranoid design; just an acknowledgment that navigation isn’t neutral. —Jenina Yutuc, San Francisco

Call me old-school, but oven timers do not need 70,000 different features. Why must the generic timer, timed start, timed stop, and clock updating features all be different combinations and permutations of the same buttons?!  And—did you know—if your oven happens to catch on fire (or has been on fire in the immediate past), it triggers an alarm that cannot be turned off by the controls on said oven, even after the fire is out? Sometimes a gal just wants an oven that tells you when it’s preheated—or maybe when it is on fire—but both situations necessitate an easy way to make the beeping stop. —Shannon Vossler, Chicago 

As someone who’s Chronically Online™, I often get confused about where I last had a conversation with someone. A simple text exchange might turn into an Instagram DM sharing a post I thought they might like, then I remember they’re applying for new jobs, so I send a link via LinkedIn, then follow up on Messenger to share an On-This-Day memory… whew! I might use as many as six or seven ways to have ongoing conversations with the same person. Is there a way to consolidate them all into a Super-App? —Ashley Demma, Chicago

Even in humane catch-and-release situations, animal traps are often loud, cold, and terrifying. The second the metal door snaps shut, the animal goes into full panic mode. What if we treated that in-between moment with more care? Traps could be temporary spaces that are quieter, softer, and a little more familiar. And while we’re at it, why not add smart notifications? There could be a small sensor that pings your phone when an animal is inside and identifies the species, so accidental catches can be released quickly and safely. —Meron “Meri” Fasica, San Francisco

Coffee is one of my everyday joys. Yet most coffee cups are wasteful and lined with plastic. Are there better, more sustainable options? Can I enjoy a cup of coffee without worrying about toxins entering my body? Let’s make a zero-waste, zero-plastic hot beverage container! —Francis Beavers, San Francisco 

Soft plastics appear so frequently in my life, and I never know what to do with them. When I research online, recycling/disposal rules vary by state, county, or even municipality. At some point, I gave up and started handing over my growing piles of plastic bags to a friend who scoops up dog poop with them. We can address this problem from the supply side (packaging and shipping have evolved with ups/downs) and the demand side (programs like Beyond the Bag) and with solutions in between (soft-plastic drop-off bins at retailers). —John Won, San Francisco 

My mum has had severe rheumatoid arthritis for over 40 years and has now started a biologic medication, which she has to self-inject, but she can’t use the auto-injector because of her condition. She lives on her own, so it’s become another task to find someone to assist her with and another invasion of privacy she has to navigate. How can we make self-injectable medications more accessible to everyone? —Tash Wass, London 

As we layer more wearables into our daily lives—smartwatches, rings, day-to-day earbuds, sport earbuds, smart glasses, even lightweight robotic companions—the burden of charging our wearables grows. First, each required its own charger; then came proprietary contact chargers; then multi-device pucks that promised simplicity but still demanded attention and choreography. Every device drains at a different rate, creating a constant, low-level cognitive friction: Is this charged? Should this be charging? What if charging stopped being a chore and instead became something that quietly happened in the flow of life? Whether through light, motion, ambient energy, or beautifully integrated surfaces, power could become pass-through rather than performative, an infrastructure rather than an interaction. The goal isn’t just convenience; it’s preserving the purity and purpose of the objects themselves. —Tiange Wang, Cambridge

I’ve never given birth, but as a Black woman, I’m already nervous about it because of our high maternal mortality rate. And learning that the standard birthing bed was designed primarily for doctors’ workflow rather than for the full range of positions our bodies can use while giving birth is not comforting. Our bodies can give birth upright, on our sides, squatting, on hands and knees, (and yes, lying flat, too, if that’s our choice). So imagine a highly adjustable, gravity-assisted birthing bed that makes all those options feel natural and easy to switch between. It still works for monitoring and exams, but actually lets your body lead—easing pressure, opening the pelvis, managing pain, helping the baby rotate, or just resting. In a moment as powerful as birth, the person bringing life into the world deserves to be the most supported, central, and active one in the room. (At least until the baby arrives, but that’s a topic for another list.) —Meron “Meri” Fasica, San Francisco

I take a lot of photos and videos, and eventually my phone runs out of storage, and I can’t capture anything new. Deleting files is slow, overwhelming, and stressful, forcing me to make rushed decisions that barely free up space. It would be so much easier if I could instantly delete blurry photos, accidental videos, screenshots, and unused downloads while clearly seeing how much space each action frees up. It would be great if duplicate and near-duplicate photos were grouped together with the best version automatically selected so I can keep what matters and remove the rest in one tap. —Brooke Ung, San Francisco 

We rely on our phones for everything—including identity verification for government services. This is particularly inconvenient for the elderly. Smartphones have advanced too rapidly; while there are “senior modes” that enlarge font sizes, the elderly still face difficulties with both basic user logic and visual clarity. Redesigning a phone’s hardware and software could enable seniors to benefit from technological progress rather than hinder their lives. —Catherine Yang, Shanghai

Hospice equipment is cumbersome, ugly, and uninviting to patients. It lacks warmth, comfort, or a home aesthetic and is designed solely to get the job done as efficiently as possible. Hospice care, on the other hand, is gentle, kind, and warm. It would be wonderful if the equipment they used better reflected their approach and promise to patients and their caretakers of a peaceful, comfortable death at home. —Vivian Barad, San Francisco 

Systems: 

Why does every arts funder require slightly different applications, language, and formats? Independent artists and cultural workers spend countless unpaid hours navigating fragmented grant systems—all while balancing gig work, caregiving, or housing insecurity—only to receive cold rejection emails more often than not. What if philanthropy and other grantmaking institutions agreed to a common application model, like the Common App for colleges? Artists could submit one core profile annually,  with funders opting in to review, dramatically reducing redundant labor and shifting the administrative burden away from those least resourced to bear it. —Ariana Allensworth, New York City

The current car- and plane-heavy American transportation model is unhealthy, inequitable, and incredibly expensive to maintain, not to mention that it’s a terrible experience! Prioritizing trains, transit, and walkable towns and cities would dramatically reduce emissions, lower traffic fatalities, and save households thousands of dollars a year in car ownership costs. High-speed, upgraded regional rail could replace many short-haul flights, easing airport congestion and slashing pollution, while compact, walkable communities would support local businesses and improve public health by integrating physical activity into daily life. It could be a long-term investment in climate resilience, economic opportunity, and a higher quality of everyday life.—Jennifer Lo, San Francisco 

Could health insurance help people stay healthier longer instead of just reimbursing them for drugs? How could the return on investing in human bodies and lives be about our happiness and not about making money? —Stuart Getty, Duluth

The cost of owning a home has been increasing disproportionately compared to average salaries. Home construction has not evolved or benefited as much from new manufacturing techniques as other industries. While there are many great innovations, from materials to new manufacturing processes, these systems haven’t scaled fast enough to drive meaningful change. How might we redesign home-building systems to result in better (nicer, more efficient, healthier) homes that are also more affordable and accessible?  —Juho Parviainen, San Francisco 

My current health system keeps nagging me about an overdue flu shot. I got one at Walgreens in October, but my health system wasn’t alerted. When my doctor asks me when I last had a tetanus shot, I have NO IDEA because my health records are scattered across every institution where I’ve ever been a patient. It’s on me to remember and manage multiple portals just to find different pieces of my own health history. Test results are often presented as cryptic numbers or in medical language that sends me to Dr. Google. When I’m asked about family medical history, I can’t ask key family members because they are deceased. What if our health records followed us, not the doctors or institutions that provide our care?  What if they could learn from pharmacies, communicate and share information more effectively, translate medical jargon, and remember what matters most, so we don’t have to? —Kelly Bjork, Santa Fe

The day we buy a product is also the day its technology and value begin to decline. I’m experiencing this now with my robot vacuum cleaner. In just its second year, newer models already offer more intelligent, thorough cleaning. The obvious solution is to buy a new one. If I want to be more sustainable, I can resell the old device through second-hand platforms. But what if we leaned into the circular economy? Could we design systems that anticipate this inevitable replacement cycle? In China, “Replace old with new” programs are a promising start. But what if we went further upstream—into product planning and development—and designed hardware and software together to deliver incremental value over time, while also taking responsibility for producing less, but better? —Xueqing Xu, Shanghai

Experiences: 

I used to leave my phone in the other room while I work; but now, thanks to two-factor authentication, I have to keep it next to me, and I pick it up on the regular. I often find myself scrolling through various apps without even realizing it. Could we make screenless two-factor authentication, so I’m not interrupting my focus every time my software signs me out? —Elise Craig, San Francisco

Why are all online recipes built the same way? First, a way-too-long intro that reads like a new Dan Brown novel, then the inevitable “jump to recipe” button. It’s all starting to feel a little bland. Cooking is joyful, experimental, and deeply sensory—recipes should reflect that. Give me recipes that adapt to my taste and whatever’s left in my fridge. Give me measuring units that don’t require a scale, and let the home chefs who’ve cooked it add their own notes and wisdom. Bon appétit! —Max Lackner, Chicago 

Every child deserves nourishing, healthy meals that support clear thinking and confident movement, as well as an understanding of what their body needs throughout the day. I learned how to truly discern what a food label means and where protein, fiber, and macronutrients fit into my life way too late. School lunch should be the first place kids learn what it means to be nourished—where nutrition is really clear and understood. The dream! —Jenina Yutuc, San Francisco

Imagine this. To complete your breast cancer screening, you have to hand over your breasts to a technician who stretches them in a way that seems like it shouldn’t be possible, then puts them into a squishing machine where you cannot move—or sometimes breathe. For a good 15 minutes. (They would never do this to male anatomy.) When you get your results, they’re clear—but there is an asterisk. Your breasts are too dense for it to really be effective, but your insurance will not pay for the alternative means of testing. There has to be a better way. (But still, get your mammograms!) —Elise Craig, San Francisco 

Can sperm testing be more human? Some hospitals just put you in an empty room with porn from the ‘90s. It’s just difficult when you can hear people chatting and joking outside… —Wai Tong, Shanghai

We have all had to do the awkward dance at the parking lot ticket machine. You stretch your arm out the window to realize you can’t touch the screen. You unbuckle, but still can’t reach. So you finally put the car in park, crack the door open to place one foot out, and balance on your tiptoes to grab that ticket. Then you get the pleasure of doing it again when you leave the lot. It shouldn’t be that awkward! What if the system scans your license plate when you pull in and sends you a message to pay on your phone when you leave instead? —Marielis Rosario, Cambridge 

The produce section could be more than a colorful cornucopia of fruits and vegetables—it could also be a place that educates and informs. There could be a gut health section, or a brain health section, or even callouts on what’s great for glowing skin, strong hair and nails, or sustained energy. Designed well, it could inspire people to shop, cook, and eat differently. —Vivian Barad, San Francisco 

When you have surgery, they cut you open, rearrange your innards (maybe they take something out or put something in!), sew you back up, and then send you home the next day. Your family totally knows how to do major wound care, right? We’re gonna show you how this new catheter works once. Hope you’re paying attention! And here are a bunch of meds, make sure you take CAREFUL NOTE of the times you take them, even though your brain is swimming in painkillers. You’ll be fine! Am I the only one who feels completely unqualified to care for a loved one after they get out of the hospital?

What if there were a middle step between hospital and home where families and their care team could establish temporary care for those in recovery? Or at least have some way to help family members build confidence in their abilities to dole out the right medicines at the right times? —Shannon Vossler, Chicago 

More and more stores are locking up everyday products to deter theft, but they end up punishing the shopper instead. I can’t browse or compare products until I flag down an employee—and then they have to stand there while I anxiously rush to make a choice, and feel guilty for taking up their time. It solves one problem by creating three new ones. What if we flipped the model entirely and turned locked shelves into smart, vending-machine-like displays that preview every product—front, back, sides—without restricting access? Customers could take the time they need, employees could focus on service, and stores could maintain security without compromising dignity or discovery. —Tiange Wang, Cambridge 

I’ve yet to use an automatic car wash that actually leaves the car clean all over. Plus, they seem so inefficient with water usage. Can’t we have lasers and LIDAR that can scan your car and efficiently jet every nook and cranny? —Dan Read, Austin

As someone who deals with frequent migraines, I am regularly reminded how many spaces are awful to be in during an attack. Most recently, I was reminded of this in a hotel. Bright overhead lights, strong room scents, and tricky HVAC temperature controls are tolerable or annoying when you’re well, but when you’re sick, they are terrible triggers. And don’t get me started on grocery stores... —Jamie McCoy, Chicago

Most in-home kitchens in London feel designed for one person. If two people are cooking together, you have to say “excuse me,” because you need to wash your hands while the other person is rinsing vegetables, or you need to get a pot from a drawer that the other person is standing in front of. Kitchen islands might be a solution, but they won’t work for compact homes. How might we redesign the kitchen to encourage cooking together rather than hindering it? —Annie Liu, London 

Even those who don’t have to queue for the ladies’ room have surely had to wait for a friend or partner stuck in lines that snake on and on and on. It simply doesn’t make sense to continue allocating toilet space 50/50 (which isn’t even as equal as it sounds, as urinals take up much less space and are quicker to use, so the men’s room already has a leg up). How might we rethink the toilet experience to be more efficient and more inclusive for all? (Because just having a he/she on the toilet is dated as well.) —Jen Ives, London 

“Third spaces” like coffee shops and gyms, once solid places to casually connect, are becoming less accessible due to cost, time, and privatization. Many neighborhoods aren’t designed for bumping into people, especially if you don't live in a walkable city. What if the physical and digital environments we live in pushed us toward more organic connection? What if buildings and systems were designed to make spontaneous gatherings not only possible but inevitable? How might we design systems and spaces that make community-building joyful, low-effort, and sustainable? —Sindhura Sonnathi, San Francisco

We have all this sleep-monitoring hardware and software, but it only tells me to sleep better, rather than helping me sleep. Thank you. I know my sleep is not great, I can feel it! Continuing to tell me that is only going to increase my anxiety... —Wai Tong, Shanghai

In many urban areas, there’s more parking than housing. “Seattle had 30 parking spaces per acre, roughly five times the number of residential units. In Des Moines, the parking-to-housing ratio per acre was around 20 to 1.” This may just sound normal to Americans. But in places like Europe or East Asia, people’s daily lives are enabled by a built environment that’s people-centered, not car-centered. What might it look like to break free of a one-car-per-person rule? What would our public spaces look like if we weren’t required to reserve multiple parking spaces wherever we live, work, shop, and hang out? Denser neighborhoods where we can walk around safely? More green spaces and parks? More places that can be used for living, including affordable housing?  —John Won, San Francisco 

I love supporting my local coffee shops. Many of them have rewards programs built into their POS systems that track each order you place and award a set number of points, giving you a few dollars off or even free items. But you can’t see your total points until AFTER you place an order, and there is no option to use them along the way. Most baristas don’t acknowledge the rewards system, and by the time they bring your coffee, you’ve completed checkout and have hundreds of unusable points just mocking you. It feels like a digital version of the punch card that always gets lost in your wallet. There has to be a better way! —Rebecca Bass, Los Angeles

The attention economy has done a number on everyone’s… attention… and the kids are onto it. It’s so interesting how some youth are, in their own words, “rawdogging boredom” (AKA sitting still and doing nothing for an extended period of time without their phones, unplugging). The term’s vulgar, cavalier vibe suggests a generation treating boredom like a prohibited substance. Which does seem to be the message many digital experiences are suggesting. —Danny DeRuntz, Cambridge

Unfortunately, so many great restaurants and bars are closing in the Bay Area. This month, it’s an organic restaurant run by a renowned female chef. Last month, it was a Black-owned pizzeria with a killer happy hour. Why’s this happening? Owners report lower foot traffic, higher costs (from food to rent), and difficulty retaining workers. There are strong efforts out there: La Cocina is an incubator for BIPOC and immigrant women chefs that builds hard and soft skills; businesses are shifting to fast-casual formats to streamline operations and headcount; and I’ve seen a rise in restaurants run by worker cooperatives. But we can do more. How can cities help them stay open, via grants, financing, and advising? How can we shift our thinking to see restaurants as delicate nodes in the rich ecosystem of our communities, adding vibrancy and fighting loneliness? —John Won, San Francisco

Looking to partner with us on your own redesign?  Get in touch. We'd love to chat.

When your work life revolves around rethinking all kinds of products, experiences, and systems, you can’t help but see opportunities to redesign everywhere.

But it also brought great inspiration, as leaders we admire moved forward with confidence, embracing change as an opportunity to innovate and succeed throughout the year. As Michelle Lee, Co-Managing Director of our San Francisco studio, says, “There will always be things outside of our control, but that also means there's always something new to learn or something unexpected that's waiting to surprise us.” 

Here is advice for leading with confidence in 2026 from many of the partners and leaders we admire. Want even more leadership advice? Head over to IDEO U's Creative Confidence Podcast or blog to hear from more partners of IDEO U.

Get out of the scarcity mindset

One of the biggest obstacles I had to overcome in the last year was keeping myself away from a scarcity mindset. There's a lot of fear in the environment, and it's really easy to think that there's not enough: there aren't enough jobs, there aren't enough corporate contracts, etc. And the truth is, there are. I like to tell myself, “I just need one.” I just need one good corporate contract. I just need one good job. I find that mindset to be really, really powerful because it puts me in an energy of openness, creativity, curiosity, and abundance.

—Amy Bonsall, Founder, Collective

Embrace strategic flexibility

It’s time to stop treating uncertainty as a temporary disruption and start treating it like the complex operating environment that it is. Leaders don't need perfect predictions. They need the ability to hold multiple plausible futures in their minds at once, and make smart but very flexible bets on those futures. The organizations that will thrive will be those that can stay focused above the noise of ever-changing emerging technologies and stay close to real human needs. They’ll need to fail smart, learn fast, pivot quickly, and build strong capabilities and nimble adaptations to a shifting world. And to do this, they’ll need to hire leaders and frontline employees with the right skills to make that level of strategic flexibility happen. It’s my guess that most organizations don't have those people yet. If not, it’s time to invest in building that capability.

—Jennifer Lo, Futurist-in-Residence and Senior Director of Organizational Design, IDEO

Psychological safety should be a KPI

AI can't break the rules like creative people can. Not yet anyway. But AI is great at collecting inputs, which makes it an amazing brainstorming partner. I would use this to motivate my team and to embrace AI, not as a threat, but as a value add. But to do that, leaders need to reskill their team members. Which brings us to the next point.

Instead of instilling fear, talent re-skilling can be a confidence builder. Leaders must actively train their team to be expert prompters, whether on LLMs or diffusion models. The more they know how to use and play with the tools, the better it is for their confidence and sense of safety. I experimented with this at LEGO. One of my reports, an editor, felt lost. Partly due to a reorg, partly due to the fact that he had been there for almost two decades without moving up. Around the same time, there was a project that required us to create bespoke music. I saw it as an opportunity to experiment. I asked him to use his editing background and legacy knowledge of the brand as a kind of training data and generate a bunch of different songs using Suno. I could see how that whole exercise gave him a new sense of purpose. He's not just the “editor guy” who's tasked with making sizzle reels all day. He's now a member of the creative team, contributing ideas and prototypes using AI.

—Rudi Anggono, Global Head of Creative, Snap

Revisit your roots

I’d encourage leaders to resist the temptation of chasing every shiny new object. AI and innovation are powerful, but they should amplify what has always been true about your brand, not reinvent it. It’s important to stay grounded in what’s real to you, your brand, your leadership style, even in times of uncertainty. It’s a good time for organizations to revisit their company roots, history, and purpose. Remember what made your brand trusted in the first place. Then ask, “How can AI help us supercharge that?” 

—Joelle Park, SVP, Chief Marketing Officer, BWH® Hotels

Slow down to take action

One of the most crucial things for leaders to keep in mind as they head into 2026 is this: slow down to speed up. Slowing down means: observe more. Listen better. Seek evidence-based reasoning. Ask good questions. Suspend judgment. All of this is in the service of more quickly eliciting rich, multivalent perspectives and making new discoveries to drive your work forward. Another way to put this: reframe your bias toward action. Include thinking deeply together with your teams, clients, and colleagues before you solve, decide, and execute. Thinking together is action. Being curious in this way is a gift to yourself and to everyone you have the privilege of working with. 

—Dabney Hailey, Founder and Principal, Hailey Group, and lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management

There’s always something new to learn

Maintaining creativity in uncertain times really comes down to how we choose to meet the unknown. And I say “choose,” because it really is a choice. We can either shrink away from uncertainty or embrace it with a sense of awe, excitement, and wonder at being part of something that's bigger than ourselves. There will always be things outside of our control, but that also means there's always something new to learn or something unexpected that's waiting to surprise us. And that, frankly, is really fun. When we meet uncertainty with curiosity instead of fear, it flips the script. The unknown stops being something to avoid and becomes something we're eager to explore. That openness is what fuels creativity. On my team, I try to nurture a culture where questions, experimentation, and healthy risk-taking are all welcome.

—Michelle Lee, Co-Managing Director, IDEO San Francisco

Make space for human creativity

It's more important than ever to cultivate a culture of creative taste. A lot of creative technology tools are becoming more impressive and seemingly more magical, and getting really close to mimicking the human hand—especially when it comes to generating video and art. There’s that temptation to use it across the entire board for every single task. But it’s really important to look at AI tools critically, and understand what they are best used for, while keeping space and time for human creativity to do what it does best. 

—Takashi Wickes, Founding Designer,  OpenStudio

Champion daring concepts

Playing it safe is anathema to my understanding of creative leadership. When your primary responsibility is to do things differently, you have to be stubbornly committed to the cause. Stripping the ease and comfort of familiarity creates uncertainty, and there’s a very human impulse to avoid the unknown by clinging to the way it’s always been done. 

As a creative leader, it’s my responsibility to lean all the way into the audacity of delightfully unprecedented ideas. To champion concepts so daring, it feels like a fever dream to pitch them. To encourage willful weirdness and silly side quests as vehicles for creative disruption. More than anything, my job is to set a working example that refusing to play it safe isn't for the faint of heart—but the reward makes the risk well worth it. 

—Ellen Foord, Chief Creative Officer, City of Boston

Imagine starting over

In 2025, the LA fires completely derailed my life right at the beginning of the year, when I had all the best-laid plans. We were really fortunate not to lose our home, but we were displaced for a really, really long time, and we had to live in extreme uncertainty. Would we lose everything? How would we rebuild? What would we do in a landscape where everything had changed? 

What got me through was leaning into that uncertainty—asking myself what might open up if I had a radically new landscape to explore and build upon. That might sound like deluded optimism, but it was actually a genuinely powerful tool that helped me enter that imaginative landscape where everything had to be built anew. It became both a creative challenge and an opportunity.

—Catherine Connors, Co-Founder, StoryQuo

Build your own confidence

Confidence doesn't show up before you act. It shows up because you act. So every morning, before I checked my email or picked up my phone, I started asking myself a very simple question. “If I choose fear today, what possibility will I miss?” It didn't make the fear disappear, but it gave me back my agency. 

The second thing that helped me came from a conversation with Robert Waldinger from Harvard University. He leads the longest study on human happiness and how to live a good life. And he told me something simple and profound. The quality of your relationships is one of the strongest predictors of well-being.

—Dr. Frederik G. Pferdt, Google's first Chief Innovation Evangelist, formerStanford d.School lecturer and author of What’s Next Is Now

Get hands-on

One of my biggest challenges this year was staying focused amid a relentless stream of new technologies—especially AI—and separating what’s transformative from what’s simply trending. I relied heavily on a trusted network of peers to bounce ideas off of and sharpen my perspective, which was crucial. I also made it a point to get hands-on again—something many senior leaders of large organizations tend to drift away from over time. Continuing to stay in touch with the technical details by playing around with the technology myself or inviting my team to walk me through demos and new ways of building things proved invaluable. It has kept me grounded in reality and equipped to make confident decisions in an unpredictable environment.

—Artem Fishman, CTO, Dow Jones

Build your knots

I had an interesting start to 2025—a number of my senior people left for competitors. I thought it was going to be an extremely challenging year, despite all the wins we had in our business. I couldn't quite understand their reasons for leaving. But I decided to shift my attention, focus on supporting my clients and my team, and deliver really good work.

I couldn't have done it without a good network of relationships. I view them as knots in a net. You don't know when you're gonna need them, but they need to be reinforced. I've been able to build and grow a team that I wouldn't have thought possible. So I'll take this moment to thank everybody who has been there for me. And I think as leaders, we need to take the time to build our knots and to thank them for everything they have done for us. I couldn't have done it alone.

—Wardah Malik, Chief Executive Officer, BEworks

(Additional contributors: Heather Boesch, Jenna Fizel, Leah Marcus, and Lindsey Turner)

For many of the world’s companies, big and small, 2025 brought significant uncertainty—from tariffs and supply chain challenges to shutdowns and unexpected market changes.

The updates were promising—proof-of-concept work was progressing, releases were on schedule, and the mood was upbeat. Then came the question that changed the conversation: “Are our people really ready?”

The discussion quickly unraveled. Despite strong technical progress, the team had given little thought to how employees would adopt, use, and adapt to the new tools. The assumption was that technology was the solution, rather than designing for the people and outcomes the company needed to be future-fit.

We’re hearing some version of this story from the majority of the organizations we speak with. They’re sprinting to implement new technologies, but few are fundamentally rethinking how their teams learn, collaborate, and adapt. The result is a growing gap between technological capability and human capacity, driven by tech-first initiatives. And in that gap lies the real risk: technology will keep advancing, but without adaptable people, processes, and systems, organizations will struggle to turn potential into progress.

We know, because we’ve seen it before. Over the last four decades, we’ve watched many companies jump on new technology without considering what it will mean for their workforce. The organizations that thrive in this new era won't be those that automate fastest, but those that adapt fastest. Category leadership and growth will come from distinctly human strengths—creativity, curiosity, empathy, agility, and a growth mindset—unlocked by leaders who create the conditions and structures for them to flourish.

Here are those five strengths, and ways smart leaders can set employees up to thrive through moments of change.

1. Creativity 

Gen AI is only too happy to give us the answers. But by embracing human creativity, we can ask the right questions, make the right connections, and find innovative new solutions for our most pressing challenges.

Creativity gained quite a bit of traction as a business priority in the digital era, when an IBM study of more than 1,500 CEOs named it the single most important skill for leaders. Now consistently included in the World Economic Forum Future of Jobs Report as a “skill workers need to thrive,” creativity is something the whole workplace should embrace. Achieving long-term sustainable competitive advantage will require shifts in corporate behavior, like encouraging teams to borrow and remix concepts from entirely different parts of the business to stimulate new ideas; asking more questions to push beyond business-as-usual; and brokering conversations outside of self-made silos should become the norm. 

What does that look like? A few years ago, H&M Group came to us for help reducing overstock. The company was constantly running out of small t-shirts in-store and had a surplus of large ones. The first answer could have been to simply stock more small t-shirts. Instead, we got curious about the root cause, asking questions across the business—everyone from the designers themselves to garment suppliers, logistics managers, and in-store employees—to understand why the problem existed in the first place. It turned out, there were many different systems across the supply chain that simply weren’t talking to each other. By bringing curiosity, we identified and solved the real problem, and by applying a creative approach, we created and piloted an algorithm that not only reduced overstock by 22 percent but also increased sales by 34 percent.

To achieve defensible growth in this new era, we’ll need to combine irreplaceable human curiosity with emerging tech tools and foster the conditions for leaders to be more imaginative in how they solve challenges. The companies that do so will move beyond short-term efficiency gains toward more innovative thinking, ultimately leading to better solutions and, in turn, better toplines.

2. Human insight 

Human insight is what turns data into differentiation. AI can rapidly reveal what is happening in a system—the spikes, dips, bottlenecks, and patterns that form the surface-level story. But it will flatten the nuance of why those patterns exist in the first place. It won’t show you how they appear in the lives of the people behind them. And it won’t uncover the ingenious workarounds people invent to navigate systems that don’t fit their needs. This is where human insights are most valuable. And every one of those insights represents an outsized opportunity for design. As AI makes sophisticated analytics more accessible, human insight is fast becoming one of the most valuable differentiators a business can invest in.

Our work with an EdTech disruptor demonstrates this power. A few years ago, before the introduction of gen AI, a startup came to us looking for help creating an AI writing tool. Though at the time EdTech companies were in a tight race to get to market first, the client team wanted to make sure they were creating a tool that educators and students would really want to use. So, we went into classrooms, researching and co-designing with teachers and students who were very clear about what they wanted. Students weren’t looking for a tool that could write for them; they wanted a boost to get past the blank page. And teachers really wanted to provide personalized feedback for each assignment, despite heavy course loads. Together, we built Ethiqly, a writing tool that makes suggestions to help students organize their thoughts without replacing the critical thinking crucial to their learning, and drafts teacher feedback based on criteria they set for their classes (which students never see without teacher signoff). 

This is the value of human insight: it helps teams design the right things in creative, transformative ways that meet real needs. It ensures that organizations solve the right problem. And it grounds decisions in deep human understanding.

For leaders, this means treating human insight as a core organizational capability—not a research phase, not a niche discipline, and not a “nice-to-have.” It requires anchoring insight rituals in leadership meetings, reshaping organizations to codify human insight into your operating system, and creating structures that support ongoing contact with the real people your organization serves. It means rewarding curiosity at the moments that matter. And above all, it means recognizing that the organizations that thrive will be those that pair the speed of AI with deep human understanding. Leaders who make space for that understanding won’t just build better products and services—they’ll build companies that remain relevant, resilient, and genuinely connected to the world they are shaping.

3. Growth mindset

When technology rewrites the rules every week, the need for certainty becomes a liability. What teams need instead is a growth mindset: an instinct for curiosity and the belief that, with the right strategy in place, running experiments will not only help them learn, but also help them develop and grow. Even in the face of setbacks. That mindset isn’t just critical for navigating AI shifts; it’s the foundation for adapting to any moment of rapid change. Whether you’re activating a new strategy or going through a complete restructuring, you’ve got to be able to unlock maximum performance from your teams—and make them believe they can achieve it.

Building belief through experimentation is an early expression of a new way of working and gets people thinking not only, “we can do this,” but “this is going to help us grow in ways we can’t even imagine yet.”

Take Ford, for example. We supported former CEO Jim Hackett through Ford’s transformation from a 115-year-old carmaker into a future-fit mobility provider by helping teams build belief through a series of explicit “beacons”—experiments that created permission for teams to pilot, learn, and adjust. Commercial Vehicles was one of our areas of focus; Ford identified its market-leading transit vans as a key opportunity space. Through a series of prototypes and two-week sprints, we built a pilot for a new, connected security service, which ultimately became a $100 million joint venture with the IT security company ADT. The team’s growth mindset was part of what enabled the Commercial Vehicles division’s shift from selling vehicles to delivering integrated, data-driven solutions. And more broadly, they were empowered by a CEO who explicitly granted permission from the top to challenge existing ways of working and learning from what did and didn’t work. It’s that permission that will be crucial to help employees discover and adopt new ways of working in the face of rapidly changing technology and systems.

4. Psychological safety 

Of course, none of the above will deliver what you need if teams don’t have the space to experiment, which brings us to our next strength: psychological safety. If a growth mindset is the fuel for adaptability, psychological safety is the ignition. Whether you’re running the company or working at mid-level, your teams will only take smart risks when they trust they won’t be punished for speaking up or trying something new. 

Creating these conditions requires real talk and acknowledgment of team dynamics, designing new rituals to shift those behaviors, and—as is often the case in our work—making tangible interventions or prompts to help the behaviors stick. Recently, we worked with a global professional services firm on another beacon project for culture change. The task was to help them up the ante on how they deliver a world-class visitor experience. The challenge was that the visitor experience wasn’t delivered by our client’s firm itself, but by four groups of service providers from four external partners. 

By interviewing and observing the four groups, we discovered that no one felt comfortable sharing openly, especially when it came to being honest about problems. There was also no forum where they could all come together for even basic conversations about how to collaborate. So, we piloted an incredibly simple ritual with them: a daily standup meeting that gave us a platform to encourage conversation. But perhaps the biggest unlock in that pilot (and something you can start doing today) was having members of the leadership team there to model the desired behaviors. Showing up and openly narrating uncertainty (“Here’s what I don’t know yet”) and inviting dissent (“What are we missing?”) set the tone for others to follow suit.

Throughout the pilot, we captured conversation patterns via a digital dashboard prototype to ensure a consistent meeting agenda and to make it easy to follow up on action items. Post-pilot analysis showed a clear shift from an “us-and-them” mindset to more proactive visitor-centric actions, consistent feedback loops, and a sense that the four partners were part of one team working together.

In a world where change and uncertainty are constant, whether driven by advancing technology or other factors, psychological safety is the condition that gives your team the space to think creatively, the belief they can do it, and the confidence to reject the status quo in service of growth.

5. Culture of change  

Change is no longer a project—it is the daily rhythm of modern organizations. Treating it as an episodic event with a beginning, a middle, and an end will leave companies perpetually behind. Leaders need to build cultures where adaptability is practiced every day, where every person knows how to respond, influence, and move forward amid uncertainty.

That begins with a focus on change literacy: the mindsets, tools, and systems that enable an organization to collectively understand, interpret, and actively shape change. It enables your teams to read situations, articulate why change matters, experiment with new ways of working, and scale what works. When this capability is concentrated, change is slow, fragile, and dependent. But when it’s distributed—when teams understand and embrace that culture of change—it becomes a shared mission rather than a top-down mandate.

A powerful and enduring example comes from our decade-long partnership with Intercorp in Peru. What began as a strategic engagement to explore ways to empower an emerging middle class in a growing economy evolved into a deep cultural transformation across more than two dozen enterprises. We built an innovation lab with teams that created entirely new businesses through research, co-creation, and a relentless focus on design-led experimentation. Intercorp shifted from a traditional corporate structure to a culture where people at all levels were empowered to test ideas, model new behaviors, and shape the organization’s evolution. The result wasn't a single transformation, but a sustained effort to reimagine everything from pharmacies and banks to health clinics and schools.

When organizations invest in a culture of change, transformation stops being disruptive and starts becoming a habit. People move faster, teams stay aligned, and companies develop the collective capacity to evolve at speed—essential components for fluency in continuous change required to match the pace of AI today. Leaders can invest in the most cutting-edge technology and tools, but if their employees don’t exist within a culture that embraces change and empowers the humans within the system, these investments will fall flat.

Under the pressures of constant, unrelenting, and accelerating change and hype, it is tempting for leaders to focus solely on technology investments. After all, the gains that AI promises will be extraordinary, and everyone wants to get out in front. But implementing technology alone will not deliver the outcomes everyone is looking for. True transformation designs for the humans in your organization and ensures they are set up for success.

We know because this isn't the first time we've been here. The cycle of new, emerging technology repeats. And we know from our long history of working with successful clients—like Ford, Intercorp, and many others—that the organizations that embrace technology while doubling down on these human strengths are the ones that succeed. Because it is the people, not just the technology, that will ensure your organization thrives in the age of AI.

Picture this: A leadership team at a major life sciences organization was reviewing progress on an important initiative to better integrate generative AI across the business.

Or won’t fall apart the second they’re out of the box?

Luckily, our intrepid toy inventors and play experts at IDEO Play Lab are ready to weigh in on the best of the best!

Here are our most highly recommended toys, games, and more for everyone from the littlest on your list to your most raucous game night buds. Some we had a hand in making, others are from toy and game makers we admire.

1. Harmonies by Asmodee
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Who will love it: Families with kids ages 10+.

What’s great about it: In this calm, creative, strategy game, every move makes your world a little more harmonious. You’ll take on the role of a gentle nature spirit, shaping the land and guiding animals to their new habitats. Place colorful terrain tokens to build mountains, forests, and fields, and create a living landscape. Choose animals to live in your habitats, earn points through clever placement, and watch your ecosystem come to life in peaceful balance. I love the game for the light amount of strategy required, its adorable graphics, and the chance that it gives kids (and adults!) to feel smart. 
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—Jeremy Chen

2. A Gentle Rain: Bloom Edition by Incredible Dream
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Who will love it: Kidults looking for a quick, screen-free way to unwind—because sometimes playing is better than meditating.
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What’s great about it: Keep this cozy tile-placement game close by on your coffee table or desk for a quick, relaxing play session whenever you need a break. It’s especially great for jigsaw puzzle fans who want something that’s easier to dive into and put away when done. Match the flower shapes on the edges of each tile to create the board. When you complete a square, add a flower bloom piece in the center. The goal is to bloom all eight flowers before you run out of tiles. It’s therapeutic to play this game solo, but also easy for someone to join or step away at any time. My nine-year-old son and I love playing a round while we’re waiting for dinner.
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—Diana Tobey

3. NANO-MALS by Hasbro (IDEO invention)
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Who will love it: Children who love cute, interactive collectibles and adults who also appreciate an aesthetic collectible with a soothing fidget element.
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What’s great about it: These adorable, interactive fidget toys are for children and adults alike! There are tons of different characters to choose from, like Meadowmist the Unicorn, Cowbert the Highland Cow, and Pamanda the Red Panda. Press their noses and watch as they light up and talk. Their arms and ears click back and forth, which provides a satisfying fidget element. These pocket-sized cuties can even interact with each other. Place two or more NANO-MALS close to each other and watch as they react with lights, sounds, and even speak in their made-up language.
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–Shaylyn Berntson

4. Flip 7 by USAopoly
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Who will love it: Families with kids ages 8+.
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What’s great about it: Flip 7 came out last year and has been growing in popularity ever since. It’s a fast, easy-to-learn game where players score points by flipping over cards from a deck. You can keep drawing cards as long as you like, but if you flip a card that matches the number on one you’ve already flipped, you “bust” and get no points that round. This push-your-luck kind of game is fast and fun—even when it’s not your turn—and leads to a lot of good-natured table talk.
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 —Matt Hovde

‍5. Rubik’s Pulse Cube by Spin Master (IDEO invention)

Who will love it: Classic Rubik’s Cube fans—and anyone who likes a new kind of puzzle. ‍

What’s great about it: Rubik’s Pulse Cube reimagines the classic Cube through the lens of sensory play and digital interaction. At first, the Cube is entirely silver with no colors—but when you press the button, the Cube lights up to reveal the colors beneath one-way mirrors. When the lights pulse on—go! You have to solve it before it’s lights out! Pulse Cube blends the familiar challenge with new layers of feedback, encouraging players not just to solve the puzzle, but to experience it.
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—Inna Yankelovich

6. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem Pizza Fire Delivery Van by Playmates Toys

Who will love it: Recommended for 4 to 14-year-olds, but this toymaker can confirm it provides hours of entertainment to 30-plus-year-olds, too.
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What’s great about it: This van looks amazing, holds all your TMNT characters, and most importantly, has a super fun motorized pizza disk shooter. Just push down on the slice atop the van, and the door automatically swings open, revealing the shooter. The graphics on the box are so cool, I saved it.
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—Sam Hobish

7. Ollyball Planet Earth 22” MEGA by VICTURY Sports

Who will love it: Playful children and adults.‍

What’s great about it: Two things: One, you can inflate this lightweight 22-inch ball with regular air using the enclosed straw, or you can fill it with helium and watch it float “gravity neutral” indoors or out. Kids and adults can have fun playing “keep-it-up” or just be mesmerized by the way the ball floats when you hit it. (Its patented KrunchCOR construction, which absorbs impact while maintaining its shape, also makes it safe for indoor play without fear of breaking anything.) And two, it’s a tool for learning about science and geography. Use the included pens to color in different countries, and the accompanying curriculum and lesson booklet for at-home STEM learning. 
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—Weishan Liao

8. Playful: How Play Shifts Our Thinking, Inspires Connection, and Sparks Creativity by Cas Holman

Who will love it: Adults who want to rekindle their spirit of play and wonder.‍

What’s great about it: Adults need play just as much as kids do. Cas Holman’s book, Playful,  is the perfect reminder of why it’s so important, especially today, when play can prepare us for uncertainty and help us see beauty in complexity. It’s a great read to help you identify your adult play style and bring more play into your life, both for the adult you and the kid that still lives within.
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—Michelle Lee

9. Bluey Chikit Chikit Camera Toy by Moose Toys (IDEO invention)
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Who will love it: Kids who love the adorable animated Australian Blue Heeler, Bluey.
What’s great about it: This camera is the perfect roleplay gift for Bluey fans and anyone who likes to take photos. Easily load pre-printed Bluey images into the photo frames, then put them into the camera. Press the button and watch as the photos come out of the sides. Kids can even customize the toy with their own photos and drawings!
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—Weishan Liao

10. Monopoly Deal by Hasbro
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Who will love it: Anyone 10+.‍

What’s great about it: If you’re wondering how vicious your friends can be, this game is an excellent way to find out. The gameplay itself moves quickly, leads to plenty of surprises and unlikely winners, and lends itself to making up your own house rules. And because it’s a pocket-sized Monopoly, it’s easy to chuck in your purse or backpack whenever you leave the house. I’ve played this in a parking lot, on a picnic bench, and at a restaurant table before dinner. So much fun and frustration in just 15 minutes!
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—Elise Granata

11. Booger Buddy Light-Up Nasal Bulb by Playhouse MD (IDEO design)
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Who will love it: New parents, especially.
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What’s great about it: This one’s a sniffle-season helper. Part toy, part tool, it’ll make both parents and sick little kiddos happy. The adorable light-up narwhal nasal bulb adds calm and even a little delight to clearing stuffy noses. With its kid-friendly, ENT-informed design, it turns a sick-day routine everyone dreads into a moment of playful connection. It even lights up with a gentle glow.
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—Keren Ruth Wong

12. Project Shindig by Sony Interactive Entertainment
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Who will love it: Pretty much everyone, especially if you want to play with both long-distance and IRL friends and family.
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What’s great about it: For those who can’t be together in person this holiday season, we highly recommend Project Shindig, a new website that combines video chat with fun, casual party games. Think of it like a virtual game night you can play right in your web browser with your family and friends—no apps or installs required; invitees don’t even have to sign up for an account! This product is currently in Closed Public Beta, so give it a try, invite your friends, and let us know what you think!
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—Diana Tobey

13. Skytrails by PLAYMOBIL (IDEO invention)
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Who will love it: Future engineers from 7 to 99.
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What’s great about it: Tired of gifting LEGO to the builders in your life? Check out Skytrails! This modular construction set is both fun to build and to play with afterward, thanks to loads of kinetic action. Enjoy sending figures zipping around the tracks you just assembled. 
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—Rikki Devlin

14. Hot Wheels Toy Vehicle Track Creator Triple Loop Kit by Mattel
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Who will love it: Recommended for kids ages 4+.
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What’s great about it: Hot Wheels recently updated their track design with this snap-together system. This is a big improvement from the old sliding platform, which is prone to coming apart and is difficult for younger kids to use. The new tracks stay together, feel stronger, and are far easier for smaller hands to play with. 
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—Sam Hobish

‍15. The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship by Z-Man Games
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Who will love it: Experienced gamers who like Pandemic, Lord of the Rings, or games that balance strategy and luck.

What’s great about it: Fate of the Fellowship is the latest iteration of a cooperative game based on the revolutionary Pandemic. The board is a map of Middle-earth, and the players work together as the familiar heroes of the story—from Samwise and Frodo to Éowyn and Gandalf—to defeat the rising dark forces of Sauron. This game perfects the formula: the gameplay is tense and full of interesting decisions, and the odds feel just the right amount of stacked against you to make winning feel legitimately satisfying. Plus, it’s richly layered with the LotR theme—it really feels like you are experiencing your own version of the story.
 
—Matt Hovde

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If you’re like most of us, you’ve had toy ads coming at you since before Halloween. But how do you know which ones are actually as fun as they seem?

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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.

Google DeepMind’s Matthieu Lorrain and IDEO’s Savannah Kunovsky on how AI is reshaping creative work.

As technology accelerates, the challenge and opportunity is to stay anchored in what really matters: people. Host Mina Seetharaman talks with Grace Hwang, former GM of Design and UX Research for Mixed Reality at Microsoft, about how leaders can use human-centered design to navigate this shifting terrain with clarity and creativity. Grace, a former IDEO associate partner and longtime advocate of ethically responsible design, offers powerful insights drawn from her work at Microsoft, health-tech startups, and IDEO.

The Creative Confidence Podcast has been going strong for eight years, with more than 120 leaders sharing their advice, tips, and stories with the IDEO U community. Longtime podcast listeners might recognize the voices of IDEO U Founder Suzanne Gibbs Howard and Design Director Coe Leta Stafford, our original hosts who masterfully surfaced insights and lessons from our expert guests. Now, we’re excited to introduce you to the new voice of the Creative Confidence Podcast – IDEO’s Head of New Ventures, Mina Seetharaman.

Learn how to lead through change and uncertainty with a human-centered approach. Discover three key leadership levers to help your team navigate uncertainty with clarity and confidence.