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

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

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

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

An estimated 1 in 8 Americans experience food insecurity.

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

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

1.9M

meals distributed through My Pantry Express in 2021

50%

increase in distribution from prior year

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

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

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

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

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

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

25

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

4

states have begun to integrate Bendable into library systems

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

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

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

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

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

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

"Intuitive & secure"

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

20

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

20%

of the organization is now involved in design-thinking projects

Before that happened, I spent a lot of time doodling my favorite characters—almost exclusively The Looney Tunes. My classmates and teachers liked my sketches. Some kids even paid me for them. I was good at it. But when the tremors started suddenly, after a series of unexplained episodes where I lost consciousness, I couldn’t make my simple lines simple anymore. Coloring was so hard and messy that pencil gray became my favorite color.

I dropped the pencil for more than a decade, did some clay work, played sports, and even started teaching Spanish. But when I got into the design school, I had to face up to challenge again. I ended up learning how to work with other media like 3-D modeling and animation to express my ideas. It was effective, but I still missed using the pen.

For me, nothing can really replace sketching. I learned during these years that drawing is not just a media; it is a way of thinking. So I embraced the shaking in my hands by thinking of every sketch I was doing as an idea, not a product. Just as every idea can be refined, so can every drawing. That was freeing. It meant that no matter how bad it was, over time, it could become something decent that expressed something. I start with my shaky sketch, and if I like it, I start adding shadows and details that are still shaky, but once it’s finished, it’s a single sketch; it is an idea.

One of the things I like to do when I’m traveling is to take the time to sketch the city I’m in. It’s an exercise for getting my tremor down; it helps me breathe slowly and focus on contemplating the moment, the people, the water, the sky, the birds, the glass. My shaky hands help me to draw silly lines in a fast enough way that I can capture the general picture. Then, it’s just a matter of letting my tremors go free until they become part of the landscape.

My hands shake. They literally shake. I’ve had a slight tremor since I was 12 years old, and it hasn’t been easy to adjust. For a while it was just too hard, and I stopped drawing altogether.

Between the allure of the WFH lifestyle, more flexible working hours, and be-your-own-boss independence, it’s no wonder more people are staying home. But the other side of that coin is that everyone and their mother is freelancing, so it's harder than ever to stand out. We asked our freelance IDEOers and those who hire them to tell us the best ways to make it work.

Here are the top three ways to rethink and refuel your freelancing:

1. Turn ‘networking’ into ‘helpworking.’

Before you audibly groan at the word “networking,” hear us out. Let’s try an exercise: Write down a favor you might ask of someone in your field. Pause. How do you feel? A little anxious? Maybe kinda bummed?

Now, imagine how you might offer to help one of your clients. Jot down three provocative ideas you have for them. Pause. How do you feel? Energized?

We thought so. And that’s the thing. It turns out that while asking for help is hard and can make us feel bad, giving help is actually invigorating and makes us happy. Huh.

So what does this mean for your freelancing? It means looking for opportunities to come together with other collaborators or companies in a way that generates good vibes all around. You can make this happen by bringing together other freelancers for your own hackathon-style event. (Maybe even get a company to sponsor it in exchange for your combined thinking). Or you can join a community-based network. There are tons of places to find like-minded creative people, like co-working spaces or meet-ups.

Whether one-on-one or one-on-many, flip networking from the downer of asking for help, to the booster of giving help—and upgrade the kinds of projects and people you work with as a result.

2. Show all your angles. #nofilter

Help companies hire you by showing them all the kinds of work that you do. Are you a medical illustrator with expertise drawing physiological diagrams? That's exactly what we need for one of our health-related projects. When you say “interaction designer,” explain the very specific range of interactions you design. And if you worked on a group project, add a sentence to call out the parts of the project you did.

There’s a fear that by being very specific in what you do and don’t do, you’ll pigeonhole yourself. But the truth is that when a company needs to hire a freelancer, it’s almost certainly because of a very specific task that requires a skill or resource that the company doesn’t already have. If you happen to do that very niche craft… you’re hired!

So don’t leave the range or specificity of what you can do to the imaginations of your prospective clients. Lay it all out (preferably on your website, in emails, on LinkedIn—the Skills section is great for this), and you’ll be increasing the likelihood of a “swipe right” when it comes to new collaborations and projects.

3. Repetition does not spoil the prayer.

So you met a prospective client or collaborator at an event (perhaps the recent Break the News brainstorm we hosted in our Cambridge office), you clicked, you exchanged information, and then… crickets.

It’s tempting to think that the prospective partner will keep you top-of-mind for future projects. The reality is that, while they probably felt the spark too, life happens. And in the chaos they might not remember important details—like how to contact you! So make it easy for them by reminding them regularly of your work, what you’re up to, when you’re available, and how to get in touch.

There’s a reason advertisers commonly reference the number seven as the sweet-spot in terms of “effective frequency”—the number of times a customer needs to see an ad’s message before they buy. Think creatively about how you stay in touch and top-of-mind for potential partners. Send them a monthly email showcasing your latest work. Mail them a beautiful poster you made. Send a note praising their most recent project. Continue to show up to more events. Aim for more. To you, it might seem repetitive, but to a prospective client, it’s a reminder that you’re there, ready to co-create.

In the end, more is more. That’s the key to navigating today’s ambiguous (and exciting) un-9-to-5.

With the rise of the gig economy, the workplace has changed dramatically—and for the better, we think. The definition of a “long and successful career” has been flipped on its head. (Hint: It’s no longer about walking into the same office building for 30 years). And who’s leading the charge? Freelancers.

I took this picture last summer while I was back home in Istanbul. Istanbul is a city that people mold to fit their needs. Market owners, residents, even kids always find ways to reimagine the streets. Sometimes it’s a group of kids turning a cul-de-sac into a football field. Sometimes it’s the residents of the neighborhood having tea on the stairs of a building, treating the street as a café.

Growing up in there made me look at sidewalks in a completely different way. Last summer, while I was wandering around my neighborhood, I noticed this amazing piece of furniture that our neighborhood market owner made. He put a pillow on top of the water containers and turned them into a bench. It’s a perfect temporary seating arrangement.

Human-centered design requires us to observe human behavior with beginner's eyes, so that we can spot the innate ways people interact with the world around them. We call these intuitive and unconscious reactions Thoughtless Acts, and IDEO designers collect photos of them to inspire their work.

But that’s the thing. Finding readers who have the time to slog through an unpublished manuscript is hard. Like, really hard. Many people said they would read it, but never got further than the first few chapters. Was it because they hated the book? Or just because they got busy watching season four of Orange is the New Black? And the wonderful friends who did read it—were they actually honest with me? Or pulling punches because, who wants to make a friend cry?

That’s when a friend who actually finished my book had an idea: What if we could take some of the best aspects of the design thinking process (such as collaboration, multidisciplinary perspectives, prototyping) and adapt them for the writing and publishing space by connecting authors with a diverse pool of readers who could provide thoughtful, honest feedback? Meet The Spun Yarn.

We hypothesized that there was a whole universe of potential readers out there—moms and dads and students and grandparents who might be interested in earning a bit of extra cash by providing thoughtful feedback on an unpublished novel. So we placed a Craigslist ad in four cities to see what would happen. Within 24 hours, we had to pull the posting because we were flooded with wonderful applicants. A traveling musician from Wisconsin. A cookbook author from Georgia. A retiree and jewelry maker from San Jose. We hired these folks and others and created the framework and the process to provide honest and actionable feedback on people’s novels—including mine.

Here's how it works:

Every novel that we receive is matched with three readers, each of whom reads the entire book and provides feedback using the same evaluation matrix (a mix of qualitative and quantitative input).

Once this stage is complete, our Spun Yarn team crunches the reader input and identifies the themes and patterns that have emerged about the manuscript. We deliver this synthesized feedback report to the writer. In a sense, what we’re doing is helping writers understand that a draft of their book is just like a design prototype. Most of the time, what we’re finding is pretty straightforward stuff. A main character needs to be fleshed out. An author’s ending ties things up way too neatly. Readers absolutely loved the glimpse into the world of surgery that a certain novel provides. Double down on that in a future prototype (I mean, draft) of the novel.

There’s a saying attributed to IDEO founder David Kelley that there’s no such thing as one magic idea. What I’ve learned from the Spun Yarn is that the same goes for novel writing. It turns out (based upon input from three very thoughtful and very honest Spun Yarn readers), that I haven’t written a masterpiece. There is a ton of work that still needs to be done. But thanks to help from my own multi-disciplinary design team (based in Minnesota, Rhode Island, and Berkeley, respectively), the next draft of my novel will be just a little bit closer.

Have you written a novel? Want some honest feedback? Visit thespunyarn.com.

About a year ago, I finished a novel. After much editing in the early morning hours, I arrived at that place where I could no longer see any flaws in the book. What I needed next was feedback (on what I hoped was a masterpiece, but couldn’t be quite sure).

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.